On eris ‘strife’: I.01.008–012, I.01.177, I.01.177, I.03.100, I.05.891, I.11.005–016.
The Master Narrator calls on the Muse to explain the cause of the eris ‘strife’. See also the pointed use of the word eris ‘strife’ at Pindar Paean 6.50–53. It is now revealed that the god Apollo has a basic role in the plot of the Iliad, and that he too was angry at Agamemnon, even before Achilles became angry at this over-king. It is now also revealed that Apollo himself has agency in the outcome of the epic that we know as the Iliad. On the term epic, mentioned already in the comment at I.01.001-012, see the inventory of Words and Ideas. In the version of the epic as we have it, however, such an agency of Apollo is subsumed under the ultimate divine agency represented by the Will of Zeus. In earlier versions of the Iliad, on the other hand, the events of the epic could actually be attributed to the agency of Apollo. More on this subject in HPC 111–115.