The Hero's Journey
Joseph Campbell describes the Hero's journey in his ground
breaking work, The Hero With a Thousand Faces. He argues that the
Hero's journey is a 'monomyth' that recurs again and again in the mythologies
of different cultures:
All these different mythologies give us the same essential
quest. You leave the world that you're in and go into a depth or into a
distance or up to a height. There you come to what was missing in your
consciousness in the world you formerly inhabited. Then comes the problem
either of staying with that, and letting the world drop off, or returning
with that boon and trying to hold on to it as you move back into your social
world again. That's not an easy thing to do. (1)
Campbell connects the hero's journey to the rites of passage
that are central for children taking the step into adulthood in which they
assume responsibility in their community: "The standard path of the mythological
adventure of the hero is a magnification of the formula represented in
the rites of passage: separation--initiation--return: which might
be named the nuclear unit of the monomyth." (2)
The hero's journey represents a process whereby the individual
develops from a fragmented sense of identity to an integrated identity
with a clear sense of life's purpose. Jean Bolen describes this individuation
process as repairing psychological damage represented in terms of a continuum
ranging from multiple personality disorder to psychological dismemberment:
With the help of the inner self helper in psychotherapy
[an archetypal encounter], the many fragmentary personalities become aware
of the others, after which they can voluntarily integrate into one personality.
To a lesser extent, because the damage done is less ... [t]he task is not
to knit together separate personalities, but to reconnect with cut-off
parts of ourselves. Psychological "dis-memberment" takes place in the first
half of life ... To heal and make whole takes "re-membering." To do this,
we must go downward or inward to find the pieces and bring them back to
light. (3)
The significance of the need to expand one's sense of
self in order to fully develop one's inherent potentials is also explained
by Marianne Williamson:
There is within every person a veiled, oceanic awareness
that we are all much bigger than the small-minded personas we normally
display. The expansion into this larger self, for the individual and the
species, is the meaning of human evolution and the dramatic challenge of
this historic time. (4)
The Swiss psychologist Carl Jung believed the ego was
merely a fragment of a larger self that included the unconscious:
[T]he personality as a total phenomenon does not coincide
with the ego, that is, with the conscious personality, but forms an entity
that has to be distinguished from the ego ... I have suggested calling
the total personality which though present cannot be fully known, the self.
The ego is, by definition, subordinate to the self and is related to it
like a part to the whole.... the ego not only can do nothing against the
self, but is sometimes actually assimilated by unconscious components of
the personality that are in the process of development and is greatly altered
by them. (5)
Jung suggests here that individuals need to integrate
their personal consciousness with the unconscious elements of their psyches
in order to gain a coherent sense of selfhood. These elements of the unconscious
correspond to what Jung called archetypes of the collective unconscious.
Archetypes of the collective unconscious therefore take on an important
role for the establishment of self-identity. Individuals need to engage
with these archetypes in a way that expands their sense of self. As the
archetypal psychologist Carol Pearson writes, the hero's journey is "a
journey about individuation" in which archetypal encounters "help us define
a strong ego, and then expand the boundaries of the ego to allow for the
full flowering of the self and its opening up to the experience of oneness
with other people and with the natural and spiritual worlds." (6)
The key to establishing an integrated sense of identity
and finding one's life mission is to encounter what Jung believed to be
the three most significant archetypes: the 'shadow', the 'Mother' and the
'Father'. To explain these archetypal encounters, it is worth spending
some time exploring Jung's theory of archetypes.
Jung's Theory of Archetypes
As did Sigmund Freud, Carl Jung argued that the human psyche could be divided into two parts - the conscious and the unconscious. Jung differed from Freud in a major way, however, by arguing that the unconscious had two layers. (7) The first was the personal unconscious in which lay the repressed desires and wishes that formed the basis for neurotic complexes that were the principle focus in the initial development of psychoanalysis. Jung's notion of 'personal unconscious' therefore corresponded to Freud's notion of the unconscious. Jung then argues the existence of a 'collective unconscious' fully present and functional at birth:
My thesis, then, is as follows: In addition to our immediate
consciousness, which is of a thoroughly personal nature and which we believe
to be the only empirical psyche (even if we tack on the personal unconscious
as an appendix), there exists a second psychic system of a collective,
universal, and impersonal nature which is identical in all individuals.
This collective unconscious does not develop individually but is inherited.
It consists of pre-existent forms, the archetypes, which can only becomes
conscious secondarily and which give definite form to contain psychic contents.
(8)
It was precisely here that Jung departs from Freud in
a major way that ultimately would lead to their estrangement. Jung argus
that the 'archetypes of the collective unconscious' are ideas similar to
Plato's theory of forms or pre-existent universal ideas. The archetypes
are powerful psychological drives that correspond closely with instinctual
drives: "archetypes are the unconscious images of the instincts themselves,
in other words, that they are patterns of instinctual behavior."
(9) Therefore, while Jung believed there were numerous archetypes,
Freud limited his theory of psychological (and civilizational) development
to only two instinctual drives, life and death instincts (eros and
thanatos).
Jung infers the existence of 'archetypes of the unconscious'
through his close study of numerous cultures, religious practices and mythologies
throughout the world. (10) He explains
the reason for his controversial inference in the manner of a social scientist
convinced that s/he has amassed sufficient empirical evidence to validate
an hypothesis:
[T]he concept of the collective unconscious is neither
a speculative nor a philosophical but an empirical matter. The question
is simply this: are there or are there not unconscious, universal forms
of this kind? ... It is true that the diagnosis of the collective unconscious
is not always an easy task. It is not sufficient to point out the often
obviously archetypal nature of unconscious products, for these can just
as well be derived from acquisitions through language and education....
In spite of all these difficulties, there remain enough individual instances,
showing the autochthonous revival of mythological motifs to put the matter
beyond any reasonable doubt. (11)
The myths handed down from generation to generation by
peoples throughout the world provided the raw data for filling out these
archetypes which Jung believes are 'ideas without content'. To explain
the notion of an 'idea without content' we can look to Jung's Mother archetype.
The idea or archetype of a universal protective Mother recurs in numerous
myths, yet the content of this idea varies greatly. We can begin with the
benign, humble and meek demeanor of the Virgin Mary rendered in El Greco's
famous painting of her floating in Heaven surrounded by adoring angels
while lovingly holding the Christ Child, with a lamb situated immediately
beneath her. Her demeanor is meek and benign, and her eyes are downcast
- as are all depictions of the Virgin Mary in Christian literature.
(12) She is depicted wearing royal blue signifying her role as
Queen of Heaven, Mother of the universe. Christian representations of the
Virgin Mary as the universal mother couldn't contrast more with representations
of the Goddess Kali in Hindu iconography. Kali is a fearsome figure wearing
a garland of human heads as her necklace and a girdle of human arms.
(13) She holds a bloody saber in her upper left hand and a severed
human head in her other left hand. Her upper right hand is held up in a
'fear not' gesture while her lower right hand is extended to signify a
bestowal of boons.The same archetype of the universal protective Mother
exists here and in other myths yet it is expressed in ways distinct to
the culture and traditions of a people. Similarly, other archetypes of
the collective unconscious can be discerned as representing an essential
form or primordial idea but being expressed in ways distinct to different
peoples and cultures.
Jung described three archetypes that "from the empirical
point of view" have the "most frequent and the most disturbing influence
on the ego. These are the shadow, the anima [Mother] and
the
animus [Father]." (14) [See
Figure 1 for a diagramtic representation of the Jungian psychoanalytical
model to be used.] (15)
The Shadow Archetype - 'Slaying the Dragon'
In his 1917 essay, "On the Psychology of the Unconscious," Jung describes the 'shadow' as a fundamental aspect of one's personality made up negative qualities that are usually hidden
or ignored in developing a sense of identity. He writes:
"By shadow I mean the 'negative' side of the personality, the sum of all
those unpleasant qualities we like to hid, together with the insufficiently
developed functions and the content of the personal unconscious."
(16)
Jung believed that the shadow was the "most accessible"
and the "easiest to experience" of all the archetypes since "its nature
can in large measure be inferred from the contents of the personal unconscious."
(17) This leads to a "moral problem" which results in individuals
having to confront their personal 'shadow' in establishing their personal
identity:
The shadow is a moral problem that challenges the whole
ego-personality, for no once can become conscious of the shadow without
considerable moral effort. To become conscious of it involves recognizing
the dark aspects of the personality as present and real. This act is the
essential condition for any kind of self-knowledge, and it therefore, as
a rule, meets with considerable resistance. (18)
For self-growth to occur, individuals must deal directly
with their own negative characteristics; and avoid projection of these
onto others. The implication is that undesirable characteristics projected
onto others by an individual merely reflect undesirable characteristics
that the individual in question personally needs to address directly. As
the social psychologist Sam Keen writes: "Depth psychology has presented
us with the undeniable wisdom that the enemy is constructed from denied
aspects of the self." (19) The psychoanalyst
Erik Erikson explains the role of the shadow in identity formation and
its projection of moral categories onto others as follows:
Identity formation normatively has its dark and negative
side, which throughout life can remain and unruly part of the total identity.
Every person and every group harbors a
negative identity as the
sum of all those identifications and identity fragments which the individual
had to submerge in himself as undesirable or irreconcilable or which his
group has taught to perceive as the mark of fatal "difference" in sex role
or race, in class or religion. (20)
A psychological study on Hindu and Muslim office clerks
in Southern India found that each would attribute the friendly behavior
of co-religionists to individual personalities and unfriendly behavior
to circumstances. (21) This pattern was
reversed when it came to the behavior of individuals from different religious
backgrounds, thus making possible the projection of negative stereotypes
onto whole communities.
Erikson argues that when an individual loses confidence
in being able to "contain the negative elements in a positive identity"
this leads to an identity crisis in which individuals can be exploited
by political elites "who become models of a sudden surrender to total doctrines
and dogmas in which the negative identity appears to be the desirable and
the dominant one." (22) The role of the
shadow in identity formation makes possible the kind of destructive violence
that the prominent psychoanalyst Erich Fromm believed was unique to humans
and separated them from other species in the animal kingdom who lack the
mental ability to project moral categories onto others:
We must distinguish in man two entirely different kinds
of aggression. The first, which he shares with all animals, is a phylogenetically
programmed impulse to attack (or to flee) when vital interests are threatened.
This defensive, "benign" aggression is in the service of the survival
of the individual and the species, is biologically adaptive, and ceases
when the threat has ceased to exist. The other type, "malignant" aggression,
i.e., destructiveness and cruelty, is specific to the human species and
virtually absent in most mammals; it is not phylogenetically programmed
and not biologically adaptive; it has no purpose, and its satisfaction
is lustful. Most previous discussion of the subject has been vitiated by
the failure to distinguish between these two kinds of aggression, each
of which has different sources and different qualities.
(23)
The role of the shadow in projecting moral categories
onto others is exemplified in the dehumanization that takes place in war.
The social psychologist Robert Rieber refers to this projection as a critical
part of the 'enmification process' or creation of enemy images.
(24) Once formed,
such images or stereotypes are difficult to change and ultimately reinforce
one another in conflicts as Janice Gross Stein observes:
Once stereotyped
images are in place, they are extraordinarily difficult to change. Because
enemy images contain an emotional dimension of strong dislike, there is
a strong desire to maintain the existing image and little incentive to
seek new information about a foe. Stereotyped images also generate behavior
that is hostile and confrontational, increasing the likelihood that an
adversary will respond with hostile action. A cycle of reciprocal behavior
then reinforces adversary images by providing allegedly confirming evidence
of hostile intentions. Enemy images tend to become self-fulfilling and
self-reinforcing. (25)
In Jungian
psychoanalytical terms, encountering the shadow archetype suggests that
individuals deal directly with their own negative characteristics rather
than projecting these onto others. Individuals would then not project dichotomous
moral categories of good and evil, right and wrong, normal and abnormal,
etc., onto themselves and to others. In his recent book, Nonviolent
Communication, Marshall Rosenberg argues that dichotomous moral thinking
is at the heart of all conflict. (26) The
key to resolving conflicts then, is to restructure the way we communicate
in order to identify and respond to what others feel and need, rather than
what is right or wrong. Dealing with one's own undesirable characteristics
can be represented in allegorical terms as 'slaying the dragon'. As Jung
writes: "We each must rediscover a deeper source of our own spiritual life
... To do this we are obliged to struggle with evil, to confront the shadow...
There is no other choice." (27) The archetypal
encounter of 'slaying the dragon' means that individuals are able to separate
the desirable and undesirable characteristics not only for themselves but
in others. Demonizing or dehumanizing others in a way that suggests one
has nothing to learn from another is unlikely to occur for those who successfully
deal with their shadow archetype. In sum, 'slaying the dragon' is to communicate
and relate with others in a way that avoids projecting one's own undesirable
moral categories upon another.
The Mother Archetype - The 'Sacred Marriage'
The second archetype Jung believes to be most important
for individual development is that of 'the Mother'. Jung uses the term
anima to signify the Mother archetype. He argues that it forms an
instinctual driving force in the male psyche:
Whenever she [the anima] appears, in dreams, visions,
and fantasies, she takes on personified form, thus demonstrating that the
factor she embodies possesses all the outstanding characteristics of a
feminine being. She is not an invention of the conscious, but a spontaneous
product of the unconscious. Nor is she a substitute figure for the [human]
mother. On the contrary, there is every likelihood that the numinous qualities
which make the mother-imago so dangerously powerful derive from the collective
archetype of the anima, which is incarnated anew in every male child.
(28)
In contrast to Freud's Oedipus complex in which a male's
competitive relationship with his father plays the central role in masculine
psychological development, authors such as Ben Gurian suggests a male's
relationship with his mother is more fundamental due to the archetypal
relationship with her:
As we grew up in her arms and in her castle, our mother
was, in archetypal terms, like a great nurturing Goddess--the Mother-Creator,
the Sacred Queen, the wise Crone and the beautiful Maiden all in one....
We were attached to our mothers (or other primary care-givers) in a unique
way. Our ancestral cultures and their mythologies have symbolized this
primal attachment in figures like the Greek goddess Sybil, with her multiple
gigantic breasts that feed and nurture the world, or the medieval Christian
vierge ouvrante in which, when the sculpted cabinet of the Virgin
Mary is opened, Jesus is seen within, a small figure wrapped in a much
larger chest. What we need in the very early stages of life is profound
attachment to Mom, for we live very much by her love and attention. Without
her deep attachment to us, especially in the first six months of life,
our ability to relate to others is profoundly damaged. Our ability to trust
depends on healthy attachment to our mothers during our infancy. If there
is abuse, neglect, abandonment during early attachment, we are deeply wounded.
(29)
Joseph Campbell suggests that the Mother archetype represents
creative universal forces that once were dominant in the fertility cultures
of ancient river valley civilizations. In response to a question about
the centrality of the Mother Goddess in the ancient world, Joseph Campbell
replied:
Well, that was associated primarily with agriculture and the agricultural societies. It has to do with earth. The human woman gives birth just as the earth gives birth to the plants. She gives nourishment, as the plants do. So woman magic and earth magic are the same. They are related . And the personification of the energy that gives birth to forms and nourishes forms is properly female. It is in the agricultural world of ancient Mesopotamia, the Egyptian Nile, and in the earlier planting-culture systems that the Goddess is the dominant mythic form. (30)
These ancient agricultural societies eventually were supplanted
by a warrior ethos carried by invading nomadic tribes.
(31) He explains how the Babylonian myth of Tiamat and Marduk
revealed this profound cultural change by the new male god of Marduk annihilating
the previous all powerful goddes, Tiamat.
So the story begins with a great council of the male gods
up in the sky, each god a star, and they have heard that the Grandma is
coming, old Tiamat, the Abyss, the inexhaustible Source. She arrives in
the form of a great fish or dragon - and what god will have the courage
to go against Grandma and do her in? ... So when Tiamat opens her mount,
the young god Marduk, of Babylon sends winds into her throat and belly
that blow her to pieces, and he then dismembers her and fashions the earth
and heavens out of the parts of her body .... There was no need for him
to cut her up and make the universe out of her, because she was already
the universe. But the male-oriented myth takes over, and he becomes
- apparently- the creator. (32)
The archetypal psychologist Jean Bolen argues a similar
process happened in Europe and is implicit in the myth of one of Zeus's
consorts, the goddess Metis, who shrank and was eaten by Zeus:
Metis, as divine feminine wisdom, was indeed swallowed by the patriarchy, and disappeared from the Western world. The myth reflects what happened historically (probably between 4500 B.C. and 2400 B.C.): successive waves of Indo-European invaders, with their warrior gods and father-based theologies, subjugated the people of old Europe, who for 25,000 years had followed mother-based religions and developed a peaceful, culturally advanced civilization that was unstratified, agricultural, and egalitarian. Because their cities were unfortified and exposed and because they lacked military skills, they were conquered by the horse-riding, sky god-worshiping invaders who imposed their patriarchal culture and religion on the defeated people.
The Goddess (known by many different names) became the
subservient consort of the invader gods, and her attributes and powers
were absorbed (swallowed) or came under the domination of a male deity.
(33)
References to the Mother Goddess also appear in Indian
Tantric philosophy where the energy of the Mother Goddess, Kundalini,
lies dormant at the base of each individual's spinal column awaiting release
in order to integrate all aspects of one's personality. Sri Aurobindo,
one of the foremost Indian philosophers in the twentieth century, explains
that the Kundalini is "the divine power asleep in the lowest physical center
which awakened in the yoga, ascends in light through the opening centers
[in the spine] to meet the Divine in the highest center and so connect
the manifest and the unmanifested, joining spirit and Matter."
(34) The rigorous purification and meditative processes in Tantric
philosophy can be likened to a hero's journey in numerous mythologies for
which the goal is to awaken the dormant transformative energy of the Mother
archetype for the good of the hero and the community:
When in mythology the Goddess is oppressed - by being
killed, imprisoned, buried alive, or exiled - the whole community suffers.
Often, a Hero's task is to rescue the Goddess, who holds the deed to the
community's happiness. Fairy tales, wisdom tales, and medicine tales about
men who develop into Warriors and Kings by doing great deeds, including
rescuing a princess, are tales about the necessity of men unchaining the
Goddess within themselves and in the world, in order to be whole. A primary
message men receive in fairy tales is that you cannot have a functioning
kingdom without a free feminine. (35)
The hero's journey to liberate the Mother Goddess is represented
in what Campbell calls the 'sacred marriage' with the Goddess-Mother.
(36) In Jungian psychoanalytic terms, the 'sacred marriage' suggests
a psychological encounter with the Mother archetype that brings about a
radical transformation of the individual. James Redfield elaborates on
the importance of such an encounter: "[I]f we are to open up to the full
potential of transpersonal awareness, we must become conscious of and integrate
both the female and male aspects of our higher selves.... [I]n order to
connect with the divine energy within, we must locate, court, and finally
engage the energy of the female nurturer within our own being."
(37) Similarly, Corinne McLaughlin and Gordon Davidson write
of the importance of finding the feminine dimension within ourselves:
The feminine principle within each person, man or woman,
is in tune with the heartbeat of earth - our deepest biological roots as
humans. The cause of much of our human pain is our alienation from these
deep roots. Many people today are orphaned from the Great Mother, out of
touch with nature and their own human nature destroying the earth and the
ecological balance. They are often afraid to lose rational control and
express their softer, intuitive, feminine side. This overemphasis on the
masculine principle has been at great cost to men as well as to women.
(38)
A Greek myth which wonderfully illustrates how the feminine
dimension has been excluded and marginalized is that of Homer's Iphigenia.
Iphigenia was the youngest daughter of King Agammenon, and when the Greek
army could not set sail for Troy due to poor weather caused by the displeasure
of the goddess Artemis, it was decided a sacrifice was needed. Nothing
less than the sacrifice of Agammenon's beloved Iphigenia would placate
Artemis, and Agammenon finally relented. The Greeks then set sail for their
long but successful campaign against the Trojans. What the myth illustrates
is that in any enterprise involving masculine virtues of courage, leadership
and sacrifice, the feminine dimension must be sacrificed. This can be seen
even today in the way business leaders make decisions that drastically
affect the lives of others - the feminine dimension of care and nurture
is sacrificed to the expedient of making a profit.
The key characteristic of the 'sacred marriage' is the
integration of all the archetypes of the unconscious, and the power and
wisdom to overcome the complexes of the personal unconscious and continue
the hero's journey. In terms of the Chinese philosophical categories of
Ying and Yang, the integrative function is one of the main characteristics
of the feminine Ying energy which must be balanced with the masculine Yang
energy. (39) To illustrate both the importance
of the 'sacred marriage' and the danger that goes with it we can turn to
some themes drawn from Homers 's Illiad.
In the Illiad, the goddess of discord, Eris, is
slighted by her companion gods and in revenge she arranges for a golden
apple to be rolled into the hall of Mt Olympus with a message that it was
meant for the most beautiful goddess. Eventually the choice comes down
to the goddesses Hera (personification of power); Athena (personification
of wisdom); and Aphrodite (personification of beauty) - thus representing
the three main characteristics of the Mother archetype. The story goes
that Paris, a Trojan prince at that time staying with a shepherd family,
is given the choice of deciding which of the three goddesses is the most
beautiful. Each goddess offers Paris a gift to gain a decision in her favor.
Hera offers him political power in the form of an earthly kingdom; Athena
offers him wisdom; and Aphrodite offers him the most beautiful woman in
the world as a wife. Paris' selection of Aphrodite leads to his death due
to the wrath of Hera and Athena. (40) Paris'
decision reflects the danger of a partial encounter with the Mother archetype.
By choosing only one aspect of the Mother archetype, beauty, Paris did
not integrate the other aspects of the Mother archetype. The Trojan War
and the conflict between the gods is therefore an allegory for the dangers
of a discordant self that has not entered into the 'sacred marriage'.
In Jungian psychoanalytical terms, the 'sacred marriage'
with the Mother archetype represents achieving an integrated personality
that synthesizes the different archetypes of the collective unconscious.
The opposite of such an integration is what the psychologist R.D. Laing
refers to as a state of "chaotic non-entity":
The best description of any such condition I have been
able to find in literature is in the Prophetic Books of William Blake.
In the Greek descriptions of Hell, and in Dante, the shades or ghosts,
although estranged from life, still retain their inner cohesiveness. In
Blake, this is no so. The figures of his Books undergo division in themselves.
These books require prolonged study, not to elucidate Blake's psychopathology,
but in order to learn from him what, somehow, he knew about in a most intimate
fashion, while remaining the same. (41)
Laing's 'chaotic entity' is clearly an extreme version
of individual discord. One, however, need only look at mundane examples
to realize that there is a degree of discord in otherwise 'healthy' individuals.
The person who does not keep New Year resolutions; individuals unable to
give up smoking; and those unable to change their eating habits; those
not able to control emotions like anger; etc., are all examples of individual
discord.
The 'sacred marriage' suggests that to become integrated
and whole one must live with the idea of the Mother's unconditional love.
This idea must be so strong that nothing can shake it in order for psychological
wholeness to come about. This need for wholeness through the mother's love
is made startlingly clear in a statement by a patient who suffered from
one of the most extreme forms of fragmented identity -- schizophrenia:
Everyone should be able to look back in their memory and be sure he had a mother who loved him, all of him; even his piss and shit. He should be sure his mother loved him just for being himself; not for what he could do. Otherwise he feels he has no right to exist. He feels he should never have been born.
No matter what happens to this person in life, no matter how much he gets hurt, he can always look back to this and feel that he is lovable. He can love himself and he cannot be broken. If he can't fall back on this, he can be broken.
You can only be broken if you're already in pieces. As
long as my baby-self has never been loved then I was in pieces. By loving
me as a baby, you made me whole. (42)
The psychological qualities unleashed by the 'sacred marriage'
- the most important of which are the three goddesses of wisdom, power
and beauty who figured in Homer's Trojan War - are necessary for integrating
the individual and achieving a coherent sense of identity.
The Father Archetype - Atonement
The third archetype Jung believed most important for individual
development is that of 'the Father'. For Freud, development of the superego
corresponded to the internalization of societal norms that could be directly
traced to the competitive relationship between father and son in the Oedipus
complex. As mentioned earlier, the Oedipus complex overlooks a more cooperative
relationship between father and son; as well. Though Freud's depiction
of the father for individual and civilizational development is inadequate,
he was correct in identifying its centrality in religious thought. It is
therefore to common elements in religious thought I now turn in order to
assess the importance of the father archetype.
Rudolph Otto argues that a common element in all religions
is that of a 'numinous element' that cannot be properly described:
Accordingly, it is worth while, as we have said to find
a word to stand for this element in isolation, this 'extra' in the meaning
of 'holy' above and beyond the meaning of goodness.... I shall speak, then,
of a unique 'numinous' category of value and of a definitely 'numinous'
state of mind ... This mental state is perfectly sui generis and irreducible
to any other; and therefore like every absolutely primary and elementary
datum, while it admits of being discussed, it cannot be strictly defined.
(43)
The idea of the numinous advocated by Otto represents
the archetypal experience related by mystics from earliest recorded history.
The numinous experience represents Plato's contemplation of the idea of
the Good; Buddha's experience of nirvana; Moses' encounter with Yahweh
on Mt Sinai; Plotinus' idea of the One; Arjuna's encounter with the universal
form of
Krishna; and countless other experiences described by mystics all
have in common the idea of an ineffable encounter with the numinous.
(44) Dante's description of the mystical encounter at the end
of the Divine Comedy comes close to capturing the essence of such
an experience and stands as one of the great pieces of Western literature:
My language now will be more inadequate, even for what I remember, than would that of a child still bathing his tongue at the breast.
Not that there was more than a simple appearance in the living light which I gazed upon and which is always as it always has been;
It was my sight which was growing stronger as I was looking; so what looked like one worked on me as I myself changed.
In the profundity of the clear substance of the deep light, appeared to me three circles of three colors and equal circumference;
And the first seemed to be reflected by the second, as a rainbow by a rainbow, and the third seemed like a flame breathed equally from both.
O how my speech falls short, how faint it is for my conception! And for what I saw it is not enough to say that I say little....
Like a geometer who sets himself to square the circle, and is unable to think of the formula he needs to solve the problem,
So was I faced with this new vision; I wanted to see how the image could fit the circle and how it could be that that was where it was;
But that was not a flight for my wings: except that my mind was struck by a flash in which what it desired came to it.
At this point high imagination failed; But already my desire and my will were being turned like a wheel, all at one speed,
by the love which moves the sun and the other stars.
(45)
Dante's use of metaphor to describe this numinous encounter
reveals the extroadinary difficulty in describing a state of consciousness
which lies outside the parameters of time and space. Jung divides Otto's
idea of the numinous into two elements - anima and animus - Feminine and
Masculine components respectively. For Jung, they are powerful psychological
driving forces for men and women respectively.
Woman is compensated by a masculine element and therefore
her unconscious has, so to speak, a masculine imprint. This results in
a considerable psychological difference between men and women, and accordingly
I have called the projection-making factor in women the animus, which means
mind or spirit. The animus corresponds to the paternal Logos just as the
anima corresponds to the maternal Eros. (46)
Jung's distinction between masculine and feminine archetypes
as psychological driving forces for women and men respectively needs to
be revised. Numerous examples of myths and mystical experiences reveal
that the Father archetype plays a powerful psychological role for men.
In contrast to Freud's Oedipus complex in which the relationship between
father and son is a troubled and competitive relationship, there is in
fact a far more cooperative and fulfilling relationship played between
father and son, and daughter for that matter. Fulfilling this relationship
in terms of encountering the Father archetype is to achieve what Campbell
described as at-one-ment, where an individual transcends his/her
own personal desires and strives to regain a lost kingdom - a self-actualized
life. (47) In Virgil's Illiad, Aeneas
descends into Hades and has his destiny revealed to him by his dead father,
Anchises, who prophesies that by establishing a Trojan colony on the river
Tiber, Aeneas will lay the foundation for the Roman Republic that will
eventually rule the world:
Come, I shall now explain to you your whole destiny. I
shall make clear by my words what glory shall in time to come fall to the
progeny of Dardanus, and what manner of men will be your descendants of
Italian birth, souls of renown now awaiting life who shall succeed to our
name.... But you, Roman must remember that you have to guide the nations
by your authority, for this is to be your skill, to graft tradition onto
peace, to shew mercy to the conquered, and to wage war until the haughty
are brought low. (48)
More recently, in the animated children's video, The
Lion King, Simba the lion cub returns from exile to combat his nefarious
uncle, Scar, to reclaim his dead father's kingdom. This occurrs as a result
of a vision in which Simba communicates with his dead father's spirit who
reveals that Simba's troubled life in exile stems from having forgotten
him, his father Mufasa, and therefore having forgotten who he, Simba, is.
Simba can recover his true identity by realizing the will of his dead father
and becoming part of the 'great circle of life'. Simba's decision to confront
his uncle and rejoin the great 'circle of life' represents atonement
with the Father archetype in the sense of finding one's place in a
cosmic plan. In Jungian psychoanalytical terms, encountering the Father
archetype means that one has discovered their 'mission' and 'calling' in
life, and is committed to achieving that 'mission'.
In sum, the hero is the individual who has successfully
been able to encounter the three archetypes of 'the shadow', 'the Mother'
and 'the Father.' 'Slaying the dragon', the 'sacred marriage' and 'atonement'
are all archetypal encounters signifying various signposts along the road
to an integrated sense of identity where one is confident of one's life
mission. I now turn to a closer examination of the three steps in Campbell's
hero monomyth - separation, initiation and return - to make clear the process
of self-discovery which is at the heart of the hero's journey.
Step 1 in the Hero's Journey - Call to Adventure
Campbell described the significance of the first step
as "a radical transfer of emphasis from the external to the internal world,
macro- to microcosms, a retreat from the desperation of the waste land
to the peace of the everlasting realm that is within."
(49) The hero's withdrawal into an inner world results in him
or her discovering their hidden potential with the capacity to become "a
personage of not only local but world historical moment.
(50) Campbell's hero of 'world historical' importance corresponds
closely with the great German philosopher George Hegel whose own view of
the historical hero follows:
The
great individuals of world history...are those who seize upon...[the] higher
universal and make it their own end....To this extent they may be called
heroes....They are the most far-sighted among their contemporaries; they
know best what issues are involved, and whatever they do is right. The
others feel that this is so, and therefore have to obey them. Their words
and deeds are the best that could be said and done in their time.
(51)
There are three phases in the first step of the hero's
journey: 'Hearing the Call'; 'Refusal of the Call'; and 'Crossing of the
First Threshold.
(52)
An illustration of these three phases is the character
Odysseus in Homer's Illiad and the
Odyssey. The call to adventure
begins when King Agamemnon and his brother King Menelaus arrive in Ithaca
to ask Odysseus to join them in the coming war against the Trojans. Odysseus
attempts to refuse the call by pretending to be mad and tieing a horse
and ox to a plough instead of two oxen. Suspecting Odysseus' trick, Agamemnon
arranges for Odyssesus' infant son, Telemachus, to be placed in the path
of the plough. In order not to kill his son, Odysseus stops pretending
madness. By abandoning his trick, Odysseus has now crossed the first threshold,
since to refuse from helping his fellow kings would bring him personal
dishonor.
Another example is the first episode of the Star Wars
trilogy. Luke Skywalker is a restless and troubled figure, uncertain of
who he is and what his future holds. The call to adventure comes in the
form of a robot droid carrying a plea for help for a mysterious figure
called Ben Kanobi. Skywalker sets off to find Kanobi and in the process
is ambushed by desert creatures. Kanobi arrives on the scene to rescue
Skywalker and explain a mysterious 'Force' which Skywalker needs to understand
in the following way: "The Force is an energy field created by all living
things. It surrounds us, it penetrates us, it binds the galaxy together."
(53) Skywalker at first refuses to heed the call to adventure
due to a strong sense of duty to his foster parents. He, however, crosses
the first threshold when he learns that his foster parents have been murdered,
thereby cutting down the tree nurturing his former existence.
In Jungian psychoanalytical terms, the 'call to adventure'
and 'refusal of the call' signify the human ego recognizing its fragmentation
and incompleteness but hesitating to act upon this insight since it would
mean abandoning the certainties of rational existence. Then the individual
has some life transforming event that leads to crossing the first threshold
into the collective unconscious to begin the journey of self-discovery.
Step 2 in the Hero's Journey - Great Remembering
The second of Campbell's three steps involves initiation
and testing in which the hero has to successfully encounter the archetypes
of the unconscious. Due to the theme of recovery of something lost or forgotten,
this step can be called the 'great remembering' rather than Campbell's
'initiation and testing'. There are three phases in this step, each of
which corresponds to one of the three archetypal encounters discussed earlier
as the most significant in the self-discovery process: 'slaying the dragon';
the 'sacred marriage'; and 'atonement'. (54)
An illustration of the second step in the Hero's journey
is Homer's Odyssey when Odysseus sets out on his return to Ithaca
from the Trojan war. 'Slaying the dragon' represents the many hurdles he
must overcome on his journey home: the Scylla and Charybdis; Circe; Cyclops;
etc. All the trials signify an encounter with his personal shadow. After
disaster at sea, Odysseus lands shipwrecked on the island of the goddess
Calypso. He experiences the 'sacred marriage' with her and is offered the
boon of immortality if he stays and forgets his wife Penelope and any idea
of resuming his journey. This is a boon which ordinarily bestows great
fame and honor on the recipient, and could represent the culmination of
his many trials and tribulations. Zeus, however, has other ideas and sends
Hermes to command Calypso to release Odysseus and allow him to continue
his journey. 'Atonement' comes with Odysseus continuing his journey and
achieving the destiny revealed to him by the prophet Tiresias when Odysseus
had earlier journeyed to Hades. (55) 'Atonement'
brings with it recovery of the kingdom of Ithaca and reunion with his loyal
wife Penelope.
In Jungian terms, the 'great remembering' means confronting
complexes of the personal unconscious that prevent individual growth and
self-actualization. Jung's concept of the 'shadow' is relevant here since
it represents in archetypal form the sum of all the obstacles posed by
the personal unconscious. Encountering the Goddess is an archetypal experience
important for elevating and empowering the self - hence the metaphor of
Calypso wishing to bestow immortality on Odysseus. The encounter with Calypso
suggests an archetypal experience of bliss in which the Hero could freely
choose to immerse himself/herself - an elevated state of blissful consciousness
that contrasts greatly with the struggles of ordinary waking consciousness.
This contrasts with the encounter with the nymph Circe who transforms Odysseus'
men into swine and would have done the same to Odysseus, thus representing
a weakening and sapping of the hero's vital energy.
(56)
Odysseus' choice between the boon of immortality offered
by Calypso and the resumption of a difficult and dangerous journey represents
in mythological terms the same dilemma confronting those who have attained
nirvana according to the Buddhist tradition. The dilemma here is whether
one should stay immersed in the nirvanic experience - and become boddhisattvas
- or to return to the realm of conscious life to relate the archetypal
experience - to become buddhas. Those who choose the latter path of eventual
return to the external world of consciousness experience atonement - the
opportunity to fulfill their revealed destiny. For Odysseus this meant
leaving Calypso to fulfill the destiny revealed to him by Tiresias.
'Slaying the dragon', the 'sacred marriage', and 'atonement'
are archetypal encounters with the shadow, Mother and Father archetypes
respectively. These experiences are essential for integrating the conscious
and unconscious parts of the self, for personal empowerment, and for gaining
direction and meaning in life. These three archetypal encounters are the
heart of the self-discovery process. If one is not prepared for these archetypal
experiences, then one exposes himself/herself to powerful disintegrative
forces. Those who have taken hallucinogenic drugs often report terrifying
archetypal experiences that can lead to schizophrenia and other personality
disorders. Campbell explained this as follows:
What is the difference between a psychotic or LSD experience
and a yogic, or a mystical? The plunges are all into the same deep inward
sea; of that there can be no doubt. The symbolic figures encountered are
in many instances identical ... But there is
an important difference.
The difference ... is equivalent simply to that between a diver who can
swim and one who cannot. The mystic [or hero], endowed with native talents
for this sort of thing and following, stage by stage, the instruction of
a master, enters the water and finds he can swim; whereas the schizophrenic,
unprepared, unguided, and ungifted, has fallen or has intentionally plunged,
and is drowning. (57)
Step 3 in the Hero's Journey - The Return to Society
The third step in the Hero's journey involves a return
where the hero shares the fruits of his/her journey in terms of wisdom,
compassion and leadership for one's society and for global humanity. There
are three phases in this step: 'Refusal of the Return'; 'Crossing of the
Return Threshold'; and 'Master of the Two Worlds'.
(58)
An illustration of the three phases in the final step
is what is reported to have occurred after Prince Siddhartha (Gautama Buddha)
gained enlightenment under the Bodhi Tree. He faced a difficult choice
between whether to teach the sublime truth to a critical and uncomprehending
public or to remain immersed in the nirvanic experience. Rendered in poetic
terms by Sir Edwin Arnold, we gain a sense of the difficultly of the choice
for the Buddha:
But many days the burden or release -
To be escaped beyond all storms of doubt,
Safe on Truth's shore--lay, spake he, on that heart
A golden load; for how shall men--Buddha mused--
Who love their sins and cleave to cheats of sense,
And drink of error from a thousand springs-
having no mind to see, nor strength to break
The fleshly snare which binds them--how should such
Receive the Twelve Nidanas and the Law
Redeeming all, yet strange to profit by,
As the caged bird oft shuns its open door?
(59)
Siddartha chose to 'cross the return threshold' and therefore
became the Buddha. This was the point of no return since it represented
his decision to follow his calling - teaching others the truth of
his revelation. (60) The Buddha became
'Master of the Two Worlds' by being able to re-experience nirvana to both
reinvigorate himself and to show the path to his students. He no longer
lived a life of attachment, and therefore was free from the cosmic drama
of birth and rebirth.
In Jungian terms, 'refusal of the return' implies the
reluctance to leave the elevated state of consciousness reached in the
journey of self-discovery, and to reenter the normal waking consciousness.
Crossing the return threshold signifies that one is willing to forego remaining
immersed in an elevated state of consciousness (the sacred marriage), and
to return to ordinary waking consciousness in order to realize one's calling
(atonement). 'Master of the Two Worlds' means one has integrated the
elevated state of consciousness and normal waking consciousness in a 'grand
synthesis' that empowers and gives purpose to the self. This is powerfully
described the famous Indian yogi Paramahamsa Yogananda in terms of both
living in an elevated state of ecstatic consciousness and fulfilling daily
duties:
In the initial states of God-communion (sabikalpa
samadhi) the devotee's consciousness merges in the Cosmic Spirit; his life
force is withdrawn from the body which appears 'dead,' or motionless and
rigid. The yogi is fully aware of his bodily condition of suspended animation.
As he progresses to higher spiritual states (nirbikalpa samadhi),
however, he communes with God without bodily fixation; and in his ordinary
waking consciousness, even in the midst of exacting world duties.
(61)
Becoming 'master of the two worlds' means one has achieved
the ultimate boon - the creation of a self-actualized identity where one
is in full control of their own destiny. Rather than being pulled in different
directions by unconscious forces that typically overwhelm the rational
self or ego, one has harmonized these powerful forces under the leadership
and direction of the self-actualized self. 'Master of the Two Worlds' signifies
achieving the mythical kingdom of God.
Step 4 in the Hero's Journey - The Deep Forgetting
The self-actualized identity at the end of Campbell's
three step hero's journey means that individuals go through a unilinear
process of self-discovery. One is simply at various stages on a straight
road and one, at worst, is prevented from progressing further at the various
hurdles that appear in the self-discovery process. This overlooks a more
cyclical process where self-discovery develops in a more circular fashion.
Carol Pearson advocates a cyclical process for the hero's journey as follows:
I would illustrate the typical hero's progression as a
cone or three-dimensional spiral, in which it is possible to move forward
while frequently circling back. Each stage has its own lesson to teach
us, and we reencounter situations that throw us back into prior stages
so that we may learn and relearn the lessons as new lessons at new levels
of intellectual and emotional complexity and subtlety.
(62)
In a cyclic process, then, there needs to be a further
step in which one temporally falls back or loses what was earlier achieved.
This backward step is absent in Campbell's three step hero's journey of
self-discovery. Yet this backward step, in fact, is a common motif in mythology
- the 'deep forgetting' or the 'fall from a state of grace'.
In Plato's Republic he explains how souls, before
coming to Earth, drink from Lethe - the river of forgetfulness:
[T]hey camped at eventide by the River of Forgetfullness,
whose waters no vessel can contain. They were all required to drink a measure
of the water, and those who were not saved by their good sense drank more
than the measure, and each one as he drank forgot all things.
(63)
Similarly, in Virgil's Aeneid, the river of forgetfulness
is again mentioned:
And now Aneas saw at the far end of the valley, apart,
a bushy wood loud with a forest's rustling sounds; and saw too Lethe's
river, where it flows before the Homes of Peace. About this river, like
bees in a meadow on a fine summer day settling on flowers of every kind
... the souls of countless tribes and nations were flitting. Aeneas was
startled by the sudden sight, and in his bewilderment wished to hear his
doubts explained, and find what might this river be which he saw before
him, and who they were who crowded its banks with this numerous array.
His father Anchises gave answer: 'They are souls who are destined to live
in the body a second time, and at Lethe's wave they are drinking the waters
which abolish care and give enduring release from memory.
(64)
In Hindu mythology, the theme of forgetting plays an important
part in the journey towards self-identity. The famous mythologist Mircia
Eliade argues that the theme of forgetfullness is a "pan-Indian motif"
that corresponds with "loss of consciousness of the Self."
(65)
An allegorical interpretation of the Fall in the book
of Genesis is that the expulsion from Eden was a form of forgetfulness.
This is well described in Christian Gnostic myths. For example, in the
Hymn of the Pearl in the Acts of Thomas:
A prince comes to Egypt from the East, seeking "the one
pearl, which is in the midst of the sea around the loud breathing serpent."
In Egypt he was made prisoner by the men of the country. He was given their
food to eat and forgot his identity. "I forgot that I was a son of kings,
and I served their king; and I forgot the pearl of which my parents had
sent me, and because of the burden of their oppressions I lay in a deep
sleep. But his parents learned what had befallen him and sent him a letter.
"From thy father, the king of kings, and thy mother, the mistress of the
East ... Call to mind that thou art a son of kings! See the slavery, -
whom thou servest! Remember the pearl, for which thou wast sent to Egypt!"
The letter flew in the likeness of an eagle, alighted beside him, and became
all speech. "At its voice and the sound of its rustling, I started and
rose from my sleep. I took it up and kissed it, and I began and read it;
and according to what was traced on my heart were the words of my letter
written. I remember that I was a son of royal parents, and my noble birth
asserted its nature. I remember the pearl, for which I had been sent to
Egypt, and I began to charm him, the terrible loud-breathing serpent. I
hushed him to sleep and lulled him into slumber, for my father's name I
named over him, and I snatched away the pearl, and turned to go back to
my father's house." (66)
In the Hymn of the Pearl, the father and mother
are allegorical representations of the archetypal experiences of 'atonement',
and the 'sacred marriage'; while the pearl represents the subsequent 'mastery
of the two worlds' that one had earlier achieved. The motif of remembering
one's previous identity corresponds to reclaiming a lost kingdom and memory
of one's divine ancestry - the integrated and empowered self confident
of his/her life mission.
Consequently, a fourth step in the hero's journey is a
'deep forgetting' or 'fall from grace' where one loses all memory of their
previous identity and of integration of self gained through the archetypal
encounters of 'slaying the dragon', the 'sacred marriage' and 'atonement'.
Such individuals must begin again the self-discovery process which now
can be more properly understood as a rediscovery of a lost identity
rather than a discovery a new identity. Just as there were three
phases in each of the three previous steps of the hero's journey, so too
three phases exist in the 'deep forgetting'. One can forget their self-identity
either through fear, lust for power, and/or materialism.
Fear is an important cause of forgetting one's life mission.
In his book, Fear Itself, Rush Dozier argues that fear is
the most basic of human drives:
Through understanding fear we understand ourselves. Fear is something humans have in abundance - more, I believe, than any other species. Science calls human beings Homo sapiens: wise man. A better name might be fearful man. Within the animal kingdom, we humans are the connoisseurs of fear. Our big brains harbor vastly more fears than any other animal. (67)
Fear can lead to the empowered and integrated sense of
identity achieved in the 'great remembering' falling about. Fear therefore
results in a fragmented sense of identity where one becomes disempowered.
This leads to a desire for power or control which is the second stage of
the deep forgetting.
The second phase of forgetting is the quest for personal
power. This results in an effort to control one's personal environment
in the face of external threats to achieving one's desire. According to
James Redfield, there are four strategies for controlling one's environment
and achieving personal power. (68) The
first is 'intimidation' where one controls their environment through threats
of erupting into rage and violence. The second is 'interrogation' where
one controls through judging and criticizing others. The third is 'victimization'
where one controls through uses of sympathy and guilt trips. And the fourth
is 'aloofness' where one controls through the use of silence and ambiguity.
In the political arena, the quest for power leads to political and military
leaders using the resources of their society to devastating effects for
both their community and neighboring societies.
The third phase of the 'deep forgetting' is materialism
and sensuality which is a powerful means of forgetting one's identity and
is a common theme in many myths. Mircea Eliade describes a famous example
from Indian folklore about the great yogi Matsyendranath:
[T]he master, traveling in Ceylon, fell in love with the
queen and went to live in her palace, completely forgetting his identity...
Gorakhnath realizes that his master is doomed to die.... He then goes to
Matsyendranath, in Kadali, presenting himself under the form of a dancing
girl, and falls to dancing, at the same time singing enigmatic songs. Little
by little, Matsyendranath remembers his true identity; he understands that
the 'way of the flesh' leads to death, that his 'oblivion' was, basically,
forgetfullness of his true and immortal nature, and that the 'charms of
Kadali represent the mirages of profane life. (69)
Similarly, in Homer's Odyssey, Odysseus and his men land
on the isle of Circe, and while having an affair with Circe, his men degenerate
into pigs through their unrestrained gratification of their sensual desires.
Odysseus was able to remember his mission and thus remained human, while
his men had forgotten theirs. Odysseus then left Circe and freed his men.
In conclusion, the hero's journey spans four steps each
of which has three phases. The hero's journey is a cyclic process in which
the hero goes through various stages of discovering and forgetting his/her
self-identity. The journey can be represented as a cycle as represented
in figure 2, but should be thought more as an upward spiral in which the
hero moves gradually towards a more profound understanding of his/her identity
and life mission. The hero's journey involves a conscious decision by the
hero to proceed in his/her journey of self-discovery, and face his/her
complexes of the personal unconscious and the archetypes of the collective
unconscious.
ENDNOTES
1. Campbell, The Power of Myth (New York: Doubleday, 1988) 129.
2. Campbell, The Hero with a Thousand Faces (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1968) 30
3. Gods in Everyman: A New Psychology of Men's Lives and Loves (San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1989) 291
4. The Healing of America (New York: Simon & Schuster, 1997) 41.
5. Jung, "Aion: Phenomenology of the Self," The Portable Jung (New York: Viking Press, 1971) 142-43.
6. The Hero With a Thousand Faces, xxvi.
7. For Jung's discussion of these classifications, see "Aion: Phenomenology of the Self," The Portable Jung, 139-44.
8. "The Concept of the Collective Unconscious," The Portable Jung, 60.
9. Jung, "The Concept of the Collective Unconscious," The Portable Jung, 61.
10. Jung traveled extensively, see his autobiographical, Memories, Dreams, Reflections, (Collins Fount Paperbacks, n.d.) 266-319
11. Jung, "The Concept of the Collective Unconscious," The Portable Jung, p. 62.
12. A recent book challenging this traditional portrayal and arguing a more assertive and radical view of the Virgin Mary led to the excommunication of the author, a Sri Lankan Catholic theologian. See Fr Tissa Balasuriya, Mary and Human Liberation: The Story and the Text (Trinity Press International, 1997).
13. Cf. Joseph Campbell, The Hero With a Thousand Faces, 115.
14. Phenomenology of the Self," The Portable Jung, 145.
15. This contrasts with the six archetypes - innocent, orphan, wanderer, martyr, warrior, magician - Carol Pearson uses in her book, The Hero Within (New York: Harper & Row, 1989)
16. The Collective Works of C.G. Jung (Princeton University Press) vol 7, 66, n.5
17. Aion: Phenomenology of the Self, The Portable Jung, 145
18. Aion: Phenomenology of the Self, The Portable Jung, 145
19. Faces of the Enemy (New York: harper and Row, 1987).
20. Erikson, Life History and the Historical Moment (New York: W.W. Norton & Co., 1975) 20
21. Psychologists for Social Responsibility, Dismantling the Mask of Enmity: Educational Resource Manual (Washington, D.C., 1991) 1-15; 62-68.
22. Erikson, Life History and the Historical Moment, 20.
23. The Anatomy of Human Destructiveness, 4.
24. Rieber, ed., The Psychology of War and Peace. The Image of the Enemy, (New York: Plenum, 1991).
25. "Image, Identity, and Conflict Resolution," Managing Global Chaos, ed. Chester Crocker & Fen Hampson (Washington, DC.: US Institute of Peace, 1996) 98.
26. Nonviolent Communication: A Language of Compassion (Del Mar, CA.: Puddle Dancer Press, 1999).
27. Quoted in Jeremiah Abrams, "Shadow and Culture," The Shadow in America: Reclaiming the Soul of a Nations, ed. Abrams (Los Angeles, CA., Nataraj, 1994) 24.
28. Jung, "Aion: Phenomenology of the Self," The Portable Jung, 151.
29. Gurian, Mothers, Sons & Lovers: How a Man's Relationship with his Mother Affects the Rest of his Life (London: Shambhala, 1994) 50-51.
30. Campbell, The Power of Myth, 167.
31. Campbell, The Power of Myth, 169.
33. Jean Bolen, Gods in Everyman, 298.
34. Sri Aurobindo, Letters on Yoga (Pondicherry, India: Sri Aurobindo Ashram, 1995) Part III, 977.
35. Gurian, Mothers, Sons, & Lovers, 85.
36. The Thousand Faces of the Hero, 246
37. The Celestine Vision: Living the New Spiritual Awareness (New York: Warner Books, 1997) 160.
39. For description of the respective attributes of the Ying and Yang principles, see Spiritual Politics, 61.
40. For description of these events, see Donna Rosenberg, World Mythology: An Anthology of the Great Myths and Epics, 2nd ed., (Chicago: NTC Publishing Group, 1996) 45-46.
42. Laing, The Divided Self, 172
43. Rudolph Otto, The Idea of the Holy, (Oxford University Press, [1923], 1958) 6-7
44. For a detached yet sympathetic description of the mystical experience, see William James, The Varieties of Religious Experience (New York: McMillan Pub. Co., 1961) Lectures 16 & 17.
45. The Divine Comedy (Oxford University Press, 1990) [Paradiso XXXIII: 106-145] 498-499.
46. Jung, "Aion: Phenomenology of the Self," The Portable Jung, p. 152
47. The Thousand Faces of the Hero, 246
48. Virgil, Aeneid, tr. W.F. Jackson Knight (London: Penguin, 1958)[Book VI, 752-879] 170, 173.
49. Campbell, The Hero with a Thousand Faces, 17.
50. Campbell, The Hero with a Thousand Faces, 17.
51. Lectures on the Philosophy of World History, tr. H.B. Nisbet (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1975) pp. 82-84.
52. Campbell includes two other phases "supernatural aid" and the "passage into the belly of the night" which I omit as they conflate with the archetypal encounters to be discussed later. The Hero with a Thousand Faces, 36. I also have renamed his first phase which he calls the Call to Adventure, 'Hearing the Call'.
53. Cited in Campbell, The Power of Myth, 145.
54. The Hero with a Thousand Faces, 36. Campbell has an additional three phases: 'woman as temptress', apotheosis and the ultimate boon which I delete since they are not as significant as the first three.
55. Homer, The Odyssey, Bk XI, 173-75
56. The encounter with Circe corresponds with Campbell's idea of overcoming 'woman as temptress'. The Hero With a Thousand Faces, 36.
58. The Hero with a Thousand Faces, 37. Campbell describes a further three: 'freedom to live', 'The Magic Flight'; and 'Rescue from Without'. I omit these three phases since they unnecessarily overlap with one another and with the archetypal encounters found in the testing and initiation stage of the hero's journey.
59. The Light of Asia (Wheaton, Ill.: The Theosophical Publishing House, 1969) Bk VII, 120.
60. If the Buddha and heroes in general had just one calling unique to themselves, this would signify no real choice. There consequently must be a number of callings revealed to the hero which he/she can choose between.
61. Paramahamsa Yogananda, Autobiography of a Yogi (Los Angeles: Self-Realization Fellowship, 1983) 278.
63. The Republic, bk 10, 621a-b.
64. The Aeneid, [bk VI, 688-720] 168.
65. Myth and Reality (New York: Harper and Row, 1963) 116.
67. Rush Dozier, Fear Itself: The Origin and Nature of the Powerful Emotion That Shapes Our Lives and Our World (New York: St Martin's Press, 1998) 6.
68. James Redfield, The Celestine Vision (New York: Warner Books, 1997)
69. Myth and Reality,114-15. This particular myth corresponds closely to Campbell's phase of 'woman as temptress' in second step of the hero's journey - the road of trials. I believe it more accurate to include this phase as an entirely distinct forth step of the great forgetting.