Divine visitors and the test of hospitality

Do other ancient stories tell of heavenly visitors who test hospitality, spare the hospitable, and destroy the rest?

What the relationship labels mean

Possible historical contact: The cultures were in contact, so one tradition could have known the other.
Shared literary world: The stories appear to share older roots or a common cultural setting.
Similar human experience: Different peoples responding to similar realities, such as river floods.
Resemblance only: A real similarity worth noticing; no historical connection has been established.
Modern speculative theory: A modern interpretation, not an ancient source. Not supported by authenticated evidence.

Rome (Greek myth) · Phrygia, retold in Rome

Philemon and Baucis (Ovid, Metamorphoses 8)

Resemblance only

Composed: c. AD 8
Earliest surviving copy: Medieval manuscripts, 9th century AD onward

Jupiter and Mercury, disguised as travelers, are turned away from a thousand homes. A poor old couple, Philemon and Baucis, welcome them. The gods lead the couple up a mountain, flood the whole region, and turn the couple's cottage into a temple.

Similar

Gods visit in human disguise
One household shows hospitality while the community refuses it
The hospitable are led to safety on high ground before the land is destroyed

Different

Written over a thousand years after Abraham's traditional date
Destruction by flood, not fire; the couple looks back and is not punished

Greece · Aegean

Homer, Odyssey 17

Resemblance only

Composed: c. 8th century BC
Earliest surviving copy: Papyrus fragments from the 3rd century BC; complete medieval manuscripts

A suitor warns another: "the gods, in the likeness of strangers from far countries, put on all manner of shapes and go through the cities, beholding the violence and the righteousness of men."

Similar

Gods disguised as strangers test how people treat guests

Different

A general warning, not a story of a city destroyed

Back to the story

Visitors, Judgment, and Sodom →Three visitors promise Sarah a son. Abraham pleads for Sodom. Lot's family escapes as the cities of the plain are destroyed.