During the time period that The Odyssey was written and set in, the author(s) and the audience believed in the Greek gods. These weren’t just fictional characters being written about, this was part of their religion. Athena coming down disguised as a man to help Odysseus and his son Telemachus was part of the divine coming down endeared to help. Poseidon interfering was a fight between two actual beings who had power over these people.
Think about the most commonly worshiped god today, the Christian God. Why doesn’t God show himself, why doesn’t he intervene, make people worship Him, snuff out what He doesn’t like about the world? Well, in a way, He does intervene. Coming from a Christian perspective, we are all in God’s playpen, so now the question is, does God create fate, does He lead us to do everything we do as part of His plan, or does He help us out every now and then, but we aren’t all just puppets? These are all questions many ask themselves, and similarly, these questions were probably asked about the Greek gods, how much did they intervene, and why?
In The Odyssey, Athena does come and assist our main characters, Odysseus and Telemachus. Athena is the Goddess of wisdom in the Greek pantheon, which makes us believe that Athena does this because she sees the good in Odysseus being his wit, how smart he is. She is helping him out as a kind of honor for representing her within himself. However, Athena isn’t the only god interfering. Poseidon attempts to thwart Telemachus in his early attempts to save his father and later tries to stop Odysseus from returning home, obstructing him through this long journey. Perhaps this is simply because Poseidon already often fought with Athena over being the patron god of the Greek city-state of Athens, or perhaps this is because where Athena saw the good of Odysseus in herself, Poseidon recognizes Odysseus’ flaws more than anything.
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