Odyssey 9.271 · Book 9, line 271
Zeus, the strangers' god
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Odysseus — ξείνιος, ὃς ξείνοισιν ἅμʼ αἰδοίοισιν ὀπηδεῖ.
the god of guests, who goes beside reverend strangers.
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The setting
Odysseus finishes his appeal to the Cyclops: he has invoked Zeus, the avenger of suppliants and guests. This closing line names the god in his role as protector of the stranger at the door.
A note on this passage
The last line of Odysseus's plea. He has just named Zeus Xenios, the god who stands behind the guest-bond, and here fixes what that god does: he walks at the side of strangers who deserve respect. It is a threat dressed as piety — honor us, or answer to heaven.
The undercurrent is that Odysseus is quoting the whole moral order of his world to a creature outside it. Everywhere else in the poem the appeal to Zeus of guests is decisive; the cave is the one place it means nothing. He is speaking the rules to something that has never heard of them.
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