The Odd Case of Triptolemus the Blessed

During her time scouring the earth in search of her long-lost daughter, Demeter stumbled upon a helping hand in the form of a mortal, Coleus.

He and his wife invited Demeter in and gave her food and shelter. Now in the ancient Greek tradition, there is a very big theme of inviting or rejecting strangers into the home. Often times when a stranger is rejected, the fear is that this stranger is a god or goddess in disguise, and rejecting the deity this can spell disaster for those who rejected the deity.

However, this was not the case for Coleus who invited Demeter in and gave her food and shelter. Now Coleus and his wife had two children one of them was called Triptolemus.

As a sign of gratitude, Demeter wanted to bless the children.

One of the kids was held up to a fire in a nightly ritual. This was a method to burn away the child’s humanity and therefore turned this kid into a divine being.

However, in this process, she was interrupted by the mother. Because of this, the child could not reach divinity.

This is when Demeter decided to go about it in a different way. She took Triptolemus and showed him the art of agriculture. Now I work in a high school in Japan. Bear with me. People don’t often associate growing food, farming, or agriculture as an art style, but let me tell you, this school is specialized in agriculture, culinary sciences, and health. When you sit outside with the kids, eating rice grown locally, and curry whose vegetables include potatoes, carrots, and onions – all of which were grown there in the school – one learns to appreciate the effort those who study agriculture really put in.

Demeter showed Triptolemus how to listen to the earth, and how to grow, and before they knew it he was a grown man and semi-divine. He became the first teacher of agriculture in Ancient Greece. This sounds as if Demeter lived with them for years, but this process took a couple of days, and the blessed Triptolemus became an adult in a couple of days.

As she continued to search for Persephone, Triptolemus carried out the art of agriculture for humanity passed down by the very goddess of food, grain, and agriculture.