Fate Never Changes: The Moirai
Are our fates written before we are even born? Who decides our fortune for us? Can we change the destiny?… All these questions were asked, even before it was decided that we would exist. Here are the Three Sisters of Fate, creating lives for us.
The Moirai, which is called Fates in English, are the incarnations of destiny. They are depicted as three sisters and their names are Clotho means spinner, Lachesis means allotter and Atropos means the unturnable, which is a metaphor for death. The origin of the name Moirai is the Ancient Greek word Μοῖραι, which means a portion or a lot of the whole and destinies.
Their roles are divided into three:
Clotho, the youngest, weaves the thread of life from her staff to her needle.
Lachesis measures the thread of life given to every human being with the measuring stick.
Atropos, the eldest, cuts the thread of life. She chooses the way how each person dies; and when the time comes, she cuts the threads of life with her “hideous scissors”.
Moirai’s powers and decisions cannot be surpassable even by the gods and goddesses. Because they are the enforces of fate and fate is above everything. They determine for mortals and immortals a life and a life span according to the laws of the universe. Only Zeus, if he chooses, can change an assigned fate.
The Moirai are the daughters of the primaeval goddess of night Nyx, and sisters of the female death spirits Keres means the black fates, the personification of death Thanatos means death and the goddess Nemesis who enacts retribution against those who fall into vanity.
The Moirai appear three nights after the birth of a child to determine the course of their life. Eileithyia, the goddess of childbirth, is their companion as the Three Sisters are weaving the thread of life and even foretelling the fate of newborns. Since they are the determiners of destiny, they must necessarily know the future. The Moirai do not reveal the future but, sometimes, they do so and then they act as the goddesses of prophecy.
In some depictions, the Moirai are shown with scepters and crowns, the symbols of sovereignty and dominion.
