Mythic Discourse:

Essays on Mythology, Culture & Soul

Compiled by
John Knight Lundwall

Cosmos & Logos Press

Salem, Utah 2006
Copyright © 2006, Cosmos & Logos Press
1026 South 550 West, Salem, Utah 84653

The individual authors of each essay contained within this book retain personal copyright
ownership of their respective work. Authors may be contacted through the web site
www.cosmosandlogos.com. Any reproduction or distribution of any essay or portion of any essay
without prior written permission from its author is strictly prohibited.

Cover, book design, and Introduction by John Knight Lundwall

 Table of Contents

Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1

The Salvation of Imagination . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4

By Chris Laliberte – Presents a brief look at an important contribution of religious scholar
Henry Corbin to the field of depth psychology by examining the way his translation and
presentation of the Persian mystical concept of the Mundus Imaginalis has informed the field.
Particular attention is given to the unique confluence of the Sufi theme of the "Voyage and the
Messenger" and Carl Jung's own personal encounter with the unconscious.

The Grateful Dead: Communitas Through Music and Dance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16

By Ann Vermeer – The author finds a sense of the sacred through the modern ritual of concert-
going. The music of the Grateful Dead and the experience of Grateful Dead concerts initiate and
transform participants into new states of awareness and being.

Epics: Of Ministers, Morticians and Architects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 29

By Terry Pearce – The author shows how the epic novel can recreate the past and project the
future; not merely to define a need for change, but to transform that need into a call for
progress. Unfortunately, Western civilization cannot respond.

Exploring the Libation Ritual in Greek and Roman Myth . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 41

By Sean Froyd – The ritual pouring out of liquid on the ground has been a puzzling part of
many mythological systems. While we as outsiders cannot know why libations have been poured,
a close examination of the myth may give some hints to an answer. Limiting an investigation to
the Greek/Roman myth systems, what can be learned about libation?

Shout and Speak: Possession in African Diasporan Religion in the United States . . . . . . . 52
By Jeff Levering – African diasporan religion in the United States, like diasporan religion in
the Caribbean and South America, continued the African spiritual heritage of possession.
However, due to the unique condition of slavery, the tradition of possession acquired a novel
expression in the diasporan religion of the United States.

Riding on Horses’ Wings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 64

By Janet Rich – A look at how horses inspire the human heart and mythic imagination in Native
American and other cultures.

The Huichol Trinity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 78

Pam Bjork – An exploration of the divinity of the Huichol Indians of Mexico as experienced in
their annual pilgrimage to the Sacred Mountain of Wirikuta where they seek peyote that is dear
to their life. In this arduous journey, plant, animal and man are united and become one with the
world and cosmos.
The Hopi Wedding Belt: Cosmic Text and Textile . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 91
Linda Vogelsong – Based on original fieldwork, this study gathers a rare collection of data on
one of the Hopi's most ancient and revered ceremonial artifacts, explores the worldview
assumptions that underlies the textile's cultural and ritual function, and hints at the ecological
implications for our world of separating the transformative powers of psyche and cosmos
encoded in its text.

The Wind Beneath Our Wings: Divine Inspiration and Shadow Exaltation in Rites of (Gas)
Passage . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 110
By Craig Titley – "Is there more to farting than meets the nose?” The author explores the role
of flatulence in world rituals and depth psychology. WARNING: may be too sensitive for some
nasal passages.

What is “African Art?” An Exploratory Debate in Two Parts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 122

By Sarah Holloway – Artistic expression from the African continent and Diaspora is so richly
diverse that it is difficult to categorize into the neat "art history" boxes most of us are familiar
with. However, exploring the creative spirit of Africa and the African Diaspora is deeply
revealing -- not only of the society, history and mythology of this ancient culture, but also of the
deep-seated prejudices lurking within even the most liberal-minded of Westerners.

Approaching the Beat of a New (Female) Drummer: West African Tradition in

Transition . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137
By Emily Afanador – This essay explores gender construction in the ritual drumming of West
African cultures where women have been traditionally excluded from the role. How does
blurring the gender boundary to allow women to drum potentially strengthen and weaken
women's power?

Plato, Poets, and the Virginia Standards of Learning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 149

By Lynda Burns – Written for the History of Depth Psychology in Winter 2005, this paper
focuses on the similarities between the current fight over No Child Left Behind and the fight
between Plato and the poets in ancient Athens. In both cases, the fight is about what the goal of
education should be, demonstrating that despite the passage of over two millennia, nothing has
really changed at all.

Strange Fruits of the Soul: Epic as Orphic guide to Nectar . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 158

By Cheryle Van Scoy-Mosher – In this analysis of Toni Morrison’s epic, Beloved, archetypal
forces are unveiled as bearers of cultural realities that resonate through the novel’s significant
characters. Depth psychological associations further elucidate the themes.

Astrology and Jung: Bridging Science and Synchronicity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 170

By Susan Paidhrin – Jung is often proffered by astrologers as a significant supporter of
astrology, mainly because of his theory of synchronicity. This paper explores Jung's explorations
of astrology both within a scientific and synchronistic framework.
Baptism: Social Order or Initiatory Rite? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 182
By Gary Wilson – With the passing of time, the Christian tradition has placed greater emphasis
upon baptism as a ceremonial cleansing away of “Original Sin,” rather than as a powerful rite
of initiation. Is baptism today merely a socially ordained prerequisite, or does it still hold an
efficacy as initiator into the mysteries?

“Love is a Force of Nature”: An Archetypal Analysis of Brokeback Mountain . . . . . . . . . 195

By John S. Gentile – Brokeback Mountain won multiple international awards and was the most
controversial film of 2005; its outstanding success suggests that it resonates powerfully on the
archetypal level. This essay presents an archetypal analysis of that landmark film.

Raven as Trickster, Messenger, and Artist . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 209

By Nancy Weems – Eden is found. A secret treasure is lost, but the world is gained. There is no
explicit or implicit moralizing. There are no laws that have been broken or punishments for
doing so. What might Western Civilization been like if various episodes of "The Raven Steals the
Light" had been painted on the Sistine ceiling?

Zombification: Fact, Fiction, or Function? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 218

By Brad VanWagenon – A degree of scientific evidence exists in support of zombification. This
evidence, however, is by no way conclusive. The zombie serves a mythological, psychological,
and sociological purpose. More than anything, the zombie can be viewed as a product of our
projections.

The Silence of the Sage: Jung’s Ambiguous Reactions to Charges of Anti-Semitism

and Nazi Collaboration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 231
By Benjamin Daniel Blatt – Because of some unfortunate remarks that Carl Jung made in the
1930s, a number of scholars and psychoanalysts, mostly followers of Sigmund Freud, have
accused the pioneering Swiss psychoanalyst of anti-Semitism. A closer inspection of the record
shows that Jung’s fault was not anti-Semitism, but insensitivity, articulating his racial theories at
a time when they could be seen to justify the Nazi regime in Germany. After World War II, aware
of how his remarks had been interpreted, Jung apologized to and sought reconciliation with a
number of Jewish colleagues and scholars, including Rabbi Leo Baeck.

Chaos and the Sacred Moment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 244

By Katherine Lansing Davis – This paper looks at the Chaos before Creation through Creation
myths, particularly the aspects of nothingness, darkness, emptiness, and the connection of these
images to the creative impulse within humankind. The unconscious aspect of our psyche may be
compared to these notions of Chaos. The thought is presented that entering the dark, through
story, myth, song, poetry, etc. may inspire images which texturize that dark and bring in the
Sacred Moment, the divine impulse to “[…make] the darkness conscious,” as Jung said—the
awakening of “Let there be light.”
Sorrow So Lovely . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 259
By Susan Weir-Anker – This paper highlights a story from the Acoma and Laguna Pueblos in
New Mexico. The legend compares to a similar beautiful sadness in Celtic traditions, Greek
myth, Hindu epic, Japanese fairytales, and Australian Aboriginal legends as informed by a depth
psychology perspective.

Lyric Poetry and Sappho . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 271

By Cynthia Smith – The author explores the connection between the expressions of lyric poetry
and music and their relationship to soul tending.

Taurus Oedipus and the Riddling Sphinx: A New Interpretation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 285

By John Knight Lundwall – A new and original interpretation of Sophocles’ “Oedipus the
King.” This thesis argues that the Oedipus myth put forward by Sophocles has embedded within
it astronomical allegory disclosing the secret cycle of time upon which the world ages were
based, i.e. the precession of the equinoxes.
 Introduction
Life is opposition. This truth lies at the very essence of all living things, for all living things live
in a matrix of opposition. Every seed that produces fruit must first find its way out of the dark
earth. Every fish that hatches must swim against the currents. Every bird, reptile, or animal that
lives on earth fights for survival in an atmosphere of resistance. Even the earth itself finds in its
yearly revolution a season of summer and a season of winter. So why should it be different for
humankind? Of course it is not different; just the reverse is true. Homo sapiens are ultimately
beings of polarity: the id vies with the super-ego, the conscious vies with the unconscious, there
is progression and regression. As Carl Jung states, “sooner or later everything runs into its
opposite” (Astor 25).

For human beings, however, there are oppositions which extend well beyond that which is found
in nature. Once food, clothing, and shelter are procured life does not suddenly become easy.
Oppositions still arise, and these in their nature are no less severe than the basic needs of physical
survival. Paul Tillich explains there are three natural and metaphysical oppositions which haunt
human consciousness and fill every thinking being with anxiety: the fear of death, the fear of
meaninglessness, and the fear of guilt and condemnation (Tillich 42-54).

Throughout history structures have been put in place to assuage these elemental fears within the
human psyche, balance them, and in many cases entirely conquer them. According to Mircea
Eliade, ancient cultures sought to reconcile these potent anxieties by the creation of sacred space
and sacred time. The temple and the altar were fixed points of orientation which brought
meaning and allowed the ritual participant to traverse the spheres of heaven and earth (Eliade
31). The symbols and structures of ancient religion provided tools for humankind to deal with
their psychic oppositions. Ancient mythology likewise crafted a matrix of story about creation
which provided for a renewal of both cultural and personal anxieties. “Life cannot be repaired,”
states Eliade, “it can only be recreated through symbolic repetition of the cosmogony [...]”
(Eliade 82). This was the purpose of myth: to recreate, to maintain, to preserve the sacred culture
(Bond 38), which in turn provided the tools which faced the fears of death and meaninglessness
and reduced the fear of guilt. Being apart of a mythic culture meant belonging to a homogeneous
sacral center that was the mythic axis-mundi or center of both the physical and spiritual worlds.

Modern civilization however, has been desacralized. There are no cosmic centers with religious
meaning that the whole of modern society chooses as a point of orientation. There are no
overriding mythologies that modern culture applies as a basis of cultural renewal; rather, modern
myths tend to be splintered and antagonistic towards one another. When a society loses its mythic
core it loses its psychic energy, and as Jung states, this is nothing short of a moral catastrophe
(Jung and Kerenyi 73). This modern reality is due to several factors. Both modern religion and
secular culture, as Jung noted, have failed to adapt its own symbolism and stories with current
experience (Izod 35). The images and myths that sustained ancient cultures are without meaning
in modern times. They have been repackaged and frozen in formulaic expression: kitsch has
replaced cosmogony.
Of course, cultural decay has occurred before. Many civilizations have risen and fallen during
great cycles of time, or it could be said, during great cycles of consciousness. When individuals
can no longer relate to their environment and their environment no longer provides “adequate
adaptations” nor can it form “functional relationships” in which personal or cultural
psychological needs are balanced, then a new, living myth must be created. Living myth is the
crystallization of adaptations and relationships between individuals and their culture that work
(Bond 39): “We cannot live without a myth, because we need a vital functional relationship to
the environments in which we live. As a culture and ultimately as individuals we cannot live
without a myth that connects us to our own evolution from environment to environment. [...]
when the cultural myth fails, the new myth must come from within the individual” (Bond 47).

Personal mythology is a modern term, but its utility and function has always been with the human
race. As Jung theorized, an individual’s psyche is divided into three interacting realms: personal
consciousness, personal unconsciousness, and the collective unconscious. Individuals live in
consciousness, but when the conscious self is out of alignment with unconscious anxieties and
when culture no longer satisfies the demands of these anxieties, then the personal unconscious
acts as a polarizing force driving the conscious self through a state of oppositions in an attempt to
find harmony. As Jung writes, “I began to understand that the goal of psychic development is the
self. There is no linear evolution; there is only a circumambulation of the self” (Jung 196).

Dreams, images, ideas, and even symbols emerge from the unconscious as the polarity and
counterpoint of the conscious self. Many of these fantasies (as Jung called them) have no root in
an individual’s personal experience or past. These, Jung asserts, come from a collective fantasy,
of which ancient mythology was made, and which provide balance to inner polarities. Ancient
mythology, therefore, was the crystallization of the collective fantasy, and like ancient religious
space and time, provided a point of orientation for individual and communal psychic integrity.

Ultimately, psychic integrity comes when a culture or individual is firmly grounded in their
spiritual centers. “Know Thyself” was the sacred invocation engraved upon the Delphic temple.
Indeed, the Self is the ultimate mystery, for it is concurrently omni-present and infinitely deep.
Inasmuch as mythology penetrates the superficial barriers of projected being, it is active and
living. It has been said that mythology is a subset of religion, but authentic religion is a subset of
soul–the soul that seeks infinite progress–a psychic state, as Jung noted, where there is no longer
any self-deception (Jung 196).

This book is a collection of essays written by those whose interests lie within the world of myth:
personal, cultural, and ancient, sacred story and rite. Herein the reader will find essays about
consciousness, civilization, ritual, psyche, mythology, and soul. These essays are not exercises
within the unconscious, but introductions to the door of change. From creative and poetic
exchanges to more academic exegesis, every approach is a knock at that door. So it is that every
author welcomes with open arms all guests who will seek, ask, and knock at the gateway within.
 WORKS CITED

Astor, James. Michael Fordham: Innovations in Analytical Psychology. Florence: Routledge

Press, 1995.

Bond, D. Stephenson. Living Myth. Boston: Shambhala Publications Inc., 1993.

Eliade, Mircea. The Sacred and the Profane: The Significance of Religious Myth, Symbolism,
and Ritual within Life and Culture. New York: Harcourt, Brace & World, Inc., 1959.

Izod, John. Myth, Mind and the Screen: Understanding the Heroes of Our Times. New York:
Cambridge UP, 2002.

Jung, C. G. Memories, Dreams, Reflections. New York: Vintage Books, 1963.

Jung, C. G. And C. Kerenyi. Essays on a Science of Mythology, The Myth of the Divine Child
and the Mysteries of Eleusis. Princeton: Princeton UP, 1993.

Tillich, Paul. The Courage To Be. New Haven: Yale UP, 1980.
 The Salvation of Imagination

By Chris Laliberte

Through his lifelong study of esotericism, particularly that of Iranian Sufism, Henry

Corbin established a thorough, powerful argument for the recovery and re-imagining of

Imagination itself. In doing so, through his writings, and lectures at the Eranos conference and

elsewhere, he brought back to modern consciousness, and to depth psychology in particular, an

invaluable awareness of the realm of the Imagination.

His re-definition of Imagination is based quite precisely on the diligent and thorough

definitions provided by the esoteric traditions of Iranian Islamic philosophers and mystics such as

Shihabuddin Yahra Suhrawardi, Muhyeddin Ibn ‘Arabi, and Mullah Sadra Shirazi, among others.

To understand Corbin’s recovery of the Imagination, it must be placed initially within the context

of his life’s work: the study of religious esotericism. While esoteric approaches might seem

entirely religious, and hence superficially opposed to psychological thinking, the diligence of this

kind of thinking forms a ‘science’ of its own, and can be translated into depth psychological

thinking quite readily.

As Corbin explains in his book The Voyage and the Messenger, Sufi esotericism’s

primary outlook is one of a movement in the awareness and knowledge of the pupil from the

exoteric, or external realm of ordinary appearance, to the esoteric, or inner, hidden realm of the

spirit behind the physical world. This is practically identical to the focus in depth psychology of

helping people move from being externally focused, or projecting, to understanding the inner

source of their projections, their own unconscious life. While this may at first seem diametrically

opposed—Corbin and the mystics seeing the hidden world as one ‘out there’ and depth

psychologists locating it ‘in here’ entirely within the patient’s psyche—we shall see that in the
work of Carl Jung and his exploration of the collective unconscious, these two conceptions are in

essence identical.

For Corbin, one of the most important aspects of this inner or esoteric work is initial

establishment of the ‘reality’ of the inner world, and the inner or visionary experience. He takes

for granted that, from the point of view of the visionaries experiencing mystical visions, the

‘reality’ of the experience is identical to the reality of ordinary experience through the physical

senses. In this way, it is a form of Gnosis, a way of knowing, that is just as valid as any

knowledge we gain through our physical senses. Specifically, the Sufi’s understand all

knowledge to exist for humans in one of three modes: knowledge gained from the perception of

the senses (the Malk or physical world), knowledge gained from the perceptions of the “Pure

Intellect” (the spiritual realm similar to Plato’s world of Perfect Forms), and an intermediate

knowledge gained from the perception of the imagination (Corbin, Alone with the Alone, 4).

The care with which the Sufi philosophers delineated the different realms of perception,

and the different realms of knowledge gained by the organs of perception of these realms, mirrors

the care with which Carl Jung, in his introduction to his Answer to Job, delineates the validity of

psychic facts as distinct from physical facts:

“Physical” is not the only criterion of truth: there are also psychic truths which can neither
be explained nor proved nor contested in any physical way. . .Beliefs of this kinds are
psychic facts which cannot be contested and need no proof. . .psychic experience is to a
certain extent independent of physical data. The psyche is an autonomous factor, and
religious statements are psychic confessions which. . .are based on unconscious, i.e., on
transcendental, processes. . .not accessible to physical perception but demonstrate their
existence through the confessions of the psyche (Job xi-xii).

Corbin’s explicit focus is on this middle, or imaginal realm, of these “psychic facts.” It is

a realm to which we have access through the organ of perception called the Imagination: “The

proper organ of access to this intermediate world is not to be found in any sensory faculty, nor in
the virtus intellectualis, but in the active Imagination” (Corbin, Voyage, 124). So we experience

this realm imaginally, through the images of our mind’s eye. Corbin is clear to point out: these

images appear to the imagination, they are not a product of it. In this regard Jung is in agreement:

“The archetypes of the collective unconscious. . .precipitate complexes of ideas in the form of

mythological motifs. Ideas of this kind are never invented, but enter the field of inner perception

as finished products. . .They are autonomous” (Job xiv).

This establishes the reality of the images of the imagination, which exist in a world that

the Sufis call “Not-where,” or Malakut. This intermediate realm “is no utopia, but a real country

and a real space, yet one which has neither location nor climate in the world perceived by the

outer senses. It is also known as the ‘confluence of the two seas’” (Voyage 125). This idea of the

realm of the Imagination being a middle realm is crucial. The “two seas” referred to are the ocean

of the physical world and the ocean of the spirit world. The Imaginal Realm, which Corbin refers

to as the mundus imaginalis, is actually the meeting ground of the physical, material world and

the spiritual world. It is an edge, and a synthesis—the transcendent function that resolves the

polarity of matter and spirit. “. . .it is the world of metaphysical images. . . wherein spirit takes

form and matter is immaterialized” (Voyage xx). It is the both/and that allows the union of these

apparent opposites, and is an edge that, much like a fractal, has enormous complexity, as well as

layered patterns of repetition.

The Sufi philosophers and mystics were interested precisely in the movement, which they

imagined as a Voyage, from the physical world (Mulk) to the spirit world (Jabarut)—a journey

back to God, to the Light. Thus the term for this kind of mysticism is “Ishraq,” which means

literally “East,” and the Voyage is from the “West” (symbolic of the Mulk or material world) to

the light of the rising star or sun in the “East” (symbolic of the Jabarut or spirit realm).
 The Sufi imagery of this Voyage is detailed and vivid. The first step of the Voyage is the

recognition by the seeker that he is in fact a prisoner in the “West” (the material world). It is a

bird, usually a Hoopoe bird (Solomon’s bird), that helps the seeker become aware of his bonds.

The seeker, once awakened, finds an opportunity to escape when his captors are inattentive, and

off he goes. Soon, the seeker meets a messenger, who is an Angel (Gabriel, specifically), who

guides him through the difficult and unfamiliar terrain. At long last, if he prevails through the

trials, dangers and distractions, he arrives at the source of Light, where “the King” or some image

of God reveals itself as a mirror of the seeker’s soul. From this imaginal apprehension of self as

God, of all things as one thing, there is then a mandate: return to the West! Go back from the

unity of oneness to the multitude of things, but now with an awareness that they are all God. On

this return, the seeker ‘walks with the messenger of the King,’ in other words, the Angel Gabriel

(always explained by Corbin as being both the Angel of knowledge and revelation) now dwells

with him, and so even in returning to the West or the material world, there is always a connection

to the realm of the soul.

This is the very basic layout of the imagery portrayed in The Voyage and the Messenger,

which is a journey to the imaginal world, wherein it is possible to personally experience the spirit

world (Jabarut), for it is there that the Jabarut finds form, or Image. What is most important to

the Iranian mystics and philosophers Corbin is presenting is that this journey be experienced

personally. There is a philosophy that frames it—the theory of the three worlds and the modes of

their perception—but the important thing is the direct knowledge gained by the personal

experience of the journey. Corbin is quite clear: “. . .a philosophy which does not lead to a

personal spiritual realization [visionary or mystical experience] is a vanity and a waste of time;

yet mystical experience which is not founded upon sound philosophical training is exposed to all
the dangers of going astray which we now call schizophrenia” (Voyage 121). This is because the

knowledge gained by direct personal experience, or gnosis, is of an entirely more authoritative

order than that gained by intellectual study and philosophical comprehension.

In presenting these Sufi ideas to the West, Corbin is providing powerful access to a very

old and very sophisticated tradition who’s entire aim of study is precisely the aim of study of

depth psychology: the journey of the ego “back” into relation with the Self. The depth of detail to

which the Sufi philosophers have attended to this process should provide enormous resource for

deepening depth psychology’s theoretical and imaginal understanding of how we might gain

understanding of the psyche: through the gnosis of directly experiencing the journey through the

mundus imaginalis, or imaginal realm.

Jung as Gnostic Mystic

For students of Carl Jung, the imagery of the Sufi Voyage to the Light should seem

somewhat familiar. His account of his own “confrontation with the unconscious” in his

Memories, Dreams, Reflections is remarkable in how similar his experience, both physically and

in fantasy, is to the mystical Voyage. He relates the beginning of his direct encounter with the

unconscious as a “state of disorientation,” which involved a personal quandary regarding his own

religious beliefs. Soon after confronting that the Christian myth was not the one he was

personally living, and that he felt he had no alternative story, he was visited by a dream, and in

the dream was confronted by a “white bird. . .a dove.” The interaction with the dove Jung

correlates to a growing sense that “there was something dead present, but it was also still alive.”

In this imagery we can clearly recognize the similarity with the initial state of the

Voyager: awakening to being in prison, or to the sense that one is dead while alive—imprisoned

by the physical world, cut off from the spirit or the unconscious, and so dead to our souls. Again
he relates to feeling “under constant inner pressure.” Jung knew he had to undertake some

movement. “Since I know nothing at all, I shall simply do whatever occurs to me” (MDR 173),

and he began playing the building games of his boyhood all over again.

Jung, in his Voyage, seems to have struck out through the terrain of the Imaginal realm on

his own for quite some time, encountering many disturbing images and fantasies, much of which

was quite unclear to him at the time. This again relates quite clearly to the imagery of the

Voyage, where the seeker is specifically described as a ‘stranger.’ Quite courageously, Jung kept

at it, continuing to engage the terrain of the Voyage. To the Sufis, the terrain out of the West is of

mountains: “They arrived at the summit of the first mountain, from where they could see eight

other peaks” (Voyage 149).

For Jung, without the philosophical framework to structure his Voyage, his ascent

inverted, a journey down into darkness (as opposed to up into Light). “In order to seize hold of

the fantasies, I frequently imagined a steep descent. . .It was like a voyage to the moon, or a

descent into empty space” (MDR 181). And it was at the depth of one of these journeys that Jung

finally met his Messenger Angels—first in the form of Elijah and Salome, and then later in the

image of Philemon, who “developed out of the Elijah figure.” Jung is quite clear that these are

beings not simply of his own mental fabrication: “Philemon and other figures of my fantasies

brought home to me the crucial insight that there are things in the psyche which I do not produce,

but which produce themselves and have their own life” (MDR 183). It is just this insight that

helps Jung to develop his idea of the collective unconscious—a realm of archetypal images not

located in a particular person’s psyche, but independent and autonomous. In essence, the mundus

imaginalis, the imaginal realm of the soul.

 Jung journeyed with his Messenger, who “conveyed to me many an illuminating idea”

(MDR 184). His encounter with the female essence he identifies as the anima again demonstrates

the essential role of the imagination in this entire journey: “It is she who communicates the

images of the unconscious to the conscious mind. . .For decades I always turned to the anima

when I felt that my emotional behavior was disturbed. . .I would then ask the anima: “Now what

are you up to? What do you see? I should like to know.” After some resistance she regularly

produced an image” (MDR 187).

Eventually, Jung was “compelled from within. . .to formulate and express what might

have been said by Philemon,” (MDR 190) and he wrote the Seven Sermons to the Dead. This was

a remarkable foray into an explication of the paradox of the unity of God with the multiplicity of

manifest form: essentially, the separation of the Mulk and the Jabarat. Here Jung was impelled to

do exactly what the Sufi mystics had all done: give voice to their journey, and to the Messenger,

that others might find guidance in bridging the paradox. The Sermons are addressed to the dead,

who as Stephan Hoeller points out in his commentary on the Seven Sermons, are actually the

living trapped in the West: “. . .the dead to him [Jung] undoubtedly meant the unregenerate

hyletic representatives of humanity, who by identifying with physicality to the exclusion of their

psychic and pneumatic natures, have allowed physical life to render them spiritually dead”

(Hoeller, The Gnostic Jung 65).

It is also remarkable that Jung himself invokes the identical imagery of the meeting of the

East and the West with his own preamble: “Seven exhortations to the dead, written by Basilides

in Alexandria, the city where East and West meet [emphasis added]” (Hoeller 44). Using the

exact same language as Corbin does in translating the Sufis, Jung has located the writing of the
Seven Sermons precisely in the realm of the mundus imaginalis—the place where East (Jabarut;

spirit world) and West (Mulk; physical world) meet—at the “meeting of the two seas.”

The main point for the Sufi philosophers was to obtain knowledge through personal

experience—gnosis. In this, Jung is in complete agreement. In his own memoirs, he freely

admits: “The years when I was pursuing my inner images were the most important in my life—in

them everything essential was decided. It all began then; the later details are only supplements

and clarifications of the material that burst forth from the unconscious, and at first swamped me.

It was the prima materia for a lifetime’s work” (MDR 199). All of Jung’s writing, all his rigorous

scientific analysis, all his creative, disciplined theorizing and conceptualizing, can be seen

essentially as commentary on his own mystical, guided voyage into the mundus imaginalis. In

this, his life seems a striking image of the visions and philosophical commentaries of Ibn ‘Arabi

and the other Sufi scholars whom Corbin represents.

While it is unclear whether Carl Jung had any exposure to the ideas of the Sufi mystics

and philosophers, especially during his early years, the close correspondence of their ideas and

approaches examined thus far begs for some kind of connection. Jung’s discovery of alchemy as

that essential framework that enabled him to integrate and understand his Voyage fully (MDR

185) provides such a link. Alchemy was “none other than the bridge over which the Gnosis of

old traversed the ages and entered the modern world as the Jungian psychology of the

unconscious” (Hoeller 26). Titus Burckhardt, in his book Alchemy: Science of the Cosmos,

Science of the Soul, cites among his early alchemical sources none other than Muhyi’d-Din Ibn

‘Arabi (Burckhardt 72), the same Ibn ‘Arabi Corbin represents as the deepest exponent of the

Creative Imagination.
 Putting the Imagination First

The story of Carl Jung’s Voyage into the Malakut to encounter God certainly establishes

an important link between depth psychology and Iranian mystical philosophy. Jung recognized

the importance of the Imagination as an access to something beyond: in his view, the

unconscious—the Sufis would call it God or the Jabarut. The Imagination, again, is the meeting

ground, where the physical can meet the spiritual—it is the mundus imaginalis, and it is also that

capacity of the individual to perceive the mundus imaginalis. Jung, however, seemed to always

have his sights set beyond the images of the fantasies, as he called them. He was interested more

in the unconscious itself, he was searching past the God-image for what it represented, and called

that unity of psyche the Self. He understood Self to be an archetype of wholeness, yet he imbued

it with much more importance and emphasis that the other archetypes within the psyche. This

was his God, the same God beyond the Mountain Qaf at the end of the Voyage the Sufi mystics

undertook.

While Jung was focused on that end goal of the Voyage (as indeed the Sufis seemed to

be), a branch of depth psychology calling itself Archetypal Psychology and championed by James

Hillman, among others, has discovered a vast wealth of knowledge and insight by exploring the

terrain of the Imagination itself. With little interest in getting ‘beyond’ what the images of the

mundus imaginalis might signify in the realm of the Spirit (Jabarut), they are interested in these

images themselves. This has been called, by David Miller, “The New Polytheism” (Miller 8).

While there is doubt about what influence Corbin (and through him the Sufi mystics) may

have had on Carl Jung, there is no doubt about his important contribution to Archetypal

Psychology. In his prefatory remarks to his essay “The Thought of the Heart,” James Hillman

directly cites Corbin as a major influence, a “master” of the accounting of the imagination of the
heart (Hillman 3). David Miller prefaces his book The New Polytheism with a letter written by

Corbin. As Hillman says: “Because the primary principle has already been given by him

[Corbin], we may explore tributaries of the main stream” (Hillman 4), and this the “polytheists”

do with a vengeance.

Hillman places this recovery of the power of imagination at the heart of the effort of

“soul-making,” which he sees as the point of depth psychology (Hillman, Re-Visioning

Psychology, ix). Quite simply, Imagination, the realm of images, the mundus imaginalis, is the

soul. Or at any rate it is the realm of the soul. And both Hillman and Corbin are quick to point

out the enormous danger of losing this ‘third’ concept between body and spirit. “Suhrawardi thus

set out to guarantee the ontological status appropriate to the mundus imaginalis” notes Corbin.

“If this world were to disappear—if we were to lose all trace of it—then prophetic and mystical

visionary experiences. . .would all lose their place. They would literally “no longer take place” . .

.In the absence of the imaginal world, we are reduced to mere allegory” (Corbin, Voyages, 126).

Hillman is concerned that the middle realm of the soul not disappear in a widening split

between ‘spirit’ and ‘body.’ He takes great pains to distinguish soul from spirit, precisely because

spirit is increasingly seen as the polar opposite of the physical, and the focus on spirit in this way

becomes transcendental—as the polar opposite of the material, it cannot exist with the material.

“. . .spirit chooses the better part and seeks to make all One. . .there is something beyond and

above, and what is above is always, and always superior” (Hillman 69). He calls this

“transcendental denial,” saying “If I have disparaged the transcendental approaches of humanistic

and Oriental psychology [not to mention the main monotheisms], it is because they disparage the

actual soul. . .In the name of the higher spirit, the soul is betrayed” (Hillman 67).
 “Soul,” Hillman says, “is imagination, a cavernous treasury. . .a confusion and richness

both” (Hillman 69). And here is where the Archetypal Psychologists find it most interesting to

stay. The figures encountered in the Imagination are the Gods of old. They are referred to by the

Islamic Sufis, as well as visionary Christian mystics such as Swedenborg (see Corbin’s

Swedenborg and Esoteric Islam) as Angels. Hillman and the Archetypal Psychologists prefer to

encounter them as the pantheon of the old Greek and Roman gods, for the good reason that these

figures are still such a vital part of the imagery and mythology of our cultural heritage. David

Miller calls the Gods and Goddesses “the empowering worlds of our existence; the deepest

structures of reality” (Miller 97). Corbin might modify to say that they are the images of the

deepest structures of reality, which themselves are of the Jabarut beyond the mundus imaginalis,

but which we can directly encounter through the images they create in the imaginal world.

The recovery of imagination was the explicit work of the early Islamic mystics, a task

Corbin vigorously adopted in his own life’s work upon encountering these sages through their

writings. Carl Jung similarly discovered the essential importance of the imaginal, in his own

personal encounter with the world/himself, and in his theoretical work as well as his

psychoanalytical work with patients. Currently, Hillman and others within depth and Archetypal

psychology are continuing to carve out and defend a place for the Imagination. The importance of

this should be clear: without a place where “the body is spiritualized, and the spiritual is

embodied,” the transcendent function bridging the either/or of body and spirit, human and god,

ego and Self, cannot occur, cannot take place. We are left with theories and ideas. It is the

imagination, the lived experience of the mundus imaginalis, that provides for a personal, soulful

felt sense of both/and.

 Works Cited

Burckhardt, Titus. Alchemy: Science of the Cosmos, Science of the Soul. Louisville: Fons Vitae,
1997.

Corbin, Henry. The Voyage and the Messenger. Berkeley: North Atlantic Books, 1998.

–. Swedenborg and Esoteric Islam. West Chester, PA: Swedenborg Foundation,1995

–. Alone with the Alone. Princeton: Princeton U P, 1997.

Hoeller, Stephan. The Gnostic Jung and the Seven Sermons to the Dead. Wheaton, Il:
Theosophical Publishing House, 1982.

Jung, Carl. Answer to Job. Princeton: Princeton U P, 1973.

–. Memories, Dreams, Reflections. New York: Random House, 1963.

Hillman, James. The Thought of the Heart and the Soul of the World. Putnam, CT: Spring
Publications, Inc., 1992.

Hillman, James. Re-Visioning Psychology. New York: Harper and Row, 1975.

Miller, David. The New Polytheism. Dallas: Spring Publications Inc, 1981.
 The Grateful Dead: Communitas Through Music and Dance

By Ann Vermeer

Drumming, bodies and feet in motion, electric notes singing from the cosmos, gauze

skirted women twirling in trance; the crowd, a sea of color, engaged in celebration, meditation

and ecstasy! The music of the Grateful Dead, combined with dance and often hallucinogenic

drugs, captivated the hearts and souls of concert goers for thirty years until the death of lead

guitarist, Jerry Garcia, in 1995. Grateful Dead concerts, an open and improvised engagement

between the band and their followers, the Deadheads, have been compared to the ancient

mysteries (Campbell), as well as a ritual community and a religious phenomenon (Sutton).

Preceded by two formations, called Mother Mc Cree’s Uptown Jug Champions and The

Warlocks, The Grateful Dead officially began making music together in 1965, and remained

essentially on the margins of the music industry for thirty years, preferring live performance to

making studio albums. The free form style of the music and “go with the flow” attitude of the

band allowed for an unusual creative space, encouraging the band members and the audience to

achieve an altered state of consciousness, intensified by the surrounding community or an

experience of the numinous, a connection to the divine.

Some of the bands first performances took place at what have become known as the

“Acid Tests.” These events began in 1965, as an offshoot of the medical testing of psychedelic

drugs at the VA Hospital in Menlo Park, California. Several participants in those tests, including

Ken Kesey, author of One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest, began experimenting with the LSD,

which was not yet illegal, pursuing altered states of consciousness outside of the clinical setting.

Kesey and the Merry Pranksters, a group of friends who were also known for traveling around

the country in a day-glo painted bus, blasting music and pulling public pranks, hosted the Acid
Tests (Troy 2). The Grateful Dead performed as the house band for these gatherings and Garcia

claims that the “Acid Test was the prototype for our whole basic trip” (Shenk 5). The use of

drugs remained central to the experience for many concert goers for thirty years. The concert

going ritual emerged during the 1960’s counter-culture movement, when young people broke out

in a very vocal and public way from established societal rules. Rock festivals and concerts

provided young people an escape from the prescribed rules of the patriarchy and allowed them

the freedom to explore areas of sexuality, drugs and spirituality. By the time the band began

playing public performances at the Avalon Ballroom in 1966, they were already surrounded by

the stories and myths of the Acid Tests. During the band’s thirty years together, they carried the

attitudes, actions and legacy of the ‘60’s into the present.

On June 16, 1974, I experienced my first Grateful Dead concert at the Iowa State

Fairgrounds. After the concert and at the end of a long summer day, I arrived home to an empty

house. Sitting on the front porch, watching the sun set, I grabbed my camera to capture the

memory of overwhelming beauty, awe and well-being. At the age of fifteen, I knew something

had changed for me. I was seeing the world through new eyes, feeling it through a body that was

lighter, more hopeful and more able to dance through life. All of my subsequent concert-going

experiences have been an attempt to recapture that euphoric feeling of one-ness with other

audience members, the band, the Earth and perhaps the cosmos.

Until taking this class, I would not have thought about the Grateful Dead concert

experience as a ritual, mostly because I have thought of ritual as being stifling, limiting and

serial; what Ronald Grimes calls “the usual scholarly view of ritual”:

(1) repeated (for instance, every Sabbath); (2) sacred (related to the holy, of utmost
significance); (3) formalized (consisting of prescribed, unchanging movements such as
bowing or kneeling); (4) traditional (not being done for the first time, claiming an ancient
 history or authorized by myth); and (5) intentional (nonrandom actions, done with
awareness of some reason or meaning) (Grimes 60-1).

Far from being formalized and intentional, my reasons for attending concerts always remained

vague and unconscious, yet I found the experiences moving and important. As an introverted

intuitive, I have spent a great deal of my life in my head, immersed in a world of ideas and

possibilities. For me, being embodied and present in the here and now is fleeting and ethereal,

generally occurring without any conscious intent. It is clear to me now that I sought out the

experience of Grateful Dead concerts because I felt alive in my body! Because the experiences

were intense, pleasurable and repeated often, I can easily reconnect to that sense of spirit in my

body and the freedom to move in rhythm with the music. Like the maenads, the followers of

Dionysus, I sensed an archetypal freedom at concerts; the freedom of movement and the freedom

to explore who I am outside the restrictions and expectations of the patriarchy. Within the ritual

space there was safety and support to explore a different consciousness, commune with the

divine and set free some of the repressed aspects of ourselves.

Deadheads tell stories of their experiences with the divine during concerts, using the

language of religion and the spirit world to describe them. A self proclaimed cool dude from

Orinda, California says this about a live Dead show: “Suddenly, it’s just us and the band, Jerry’s

white hair flying behind him like angel wings, all of us singing “the sun’s gonna shine in my

back door someday” like it’s the Hallelujah Chorus” (Kelly 11). A music anthropologist from

Texas evokes images of Freud’s longing for the mother’s womb in describing her first Dead

show. She said, “I felt safe, like it was a good place to be, I felt taken care of, and moist and

warm. Because of that I went back to see them many, many times” (Kelly 7). This connection to

the sacred through ritual is echoed by Otto and Eliade who agree that “…ritual arises from and
celebrates the encounter with the numinous or sacred, the mysterious reality that is always

manifested as of a wholly different order from ordinary or ‘natural realities’” (Eliade 12:405).

A major tenet of the “Myth and Ritual” school is that myth is born out of ritual. Grateful

Dead concerts as ritual follow that pattern. While I don’t intend to argue for the primacy of ritual,

it does seem to fit in this case; the band’s initial performances preceded the myths and symbols

that emerged from the culture. Robertson Smith, one of the founders of the school, provides a

template where it is possible to link the Grateful Dead community to religion by citing his notion

that religion arises out of “activities that cemented the bonds of community” (Bell 4). Within the

Deadhead community, the band has been seen as “god-like,” particularly Garcia, who has been

called a god, a shaman and a tribal chief. When asked about he felt about this “divine-like”

projection from his fans, he called them illusions. In writing this paper, I came to see the band

and Jerry more as tribal elders, who allow for magic to happen through not defining anything and

because of that, Jerry says, “it becomes everything” (Brown 17). Garcia believes that “[t]here is a

human drive to celebrate and [The Grateful Dead] provide[s] the ritual celebration in a society

that doesn’t have much of it.” He claims that the celebration should be part of religion, however

since it is not, it emerges at concerts because fans “trust the environment that it occurs in”

(Brown, Tales).

Van Gennep introduces us to the idea of rites of passage, the crossing of a threshold from

the profane into sacred territory. Because the threshold crossing can be treacherous, specific rites

are created to facilitate the crossing. He breaks these rites into three phases: separation, transition

and incorporation. Using the Greek root word, limen, meaning threshold, these phases have also

been termed preliminal, liminal and post-liminal (Van Gennep 11). Separation signifies the

detachment of an individual or group from the prevailing social structure or “set of cultural
conditions.” The group or individual then enters into the liminal phase, an ambiguous state that

does not resemble the world outside of the ritual space. Finally, the ritual subject, or group

returns to his or her previous position in society with perhaps new insights as a result of having

passed through the ritual process, but once again following the rules of the culture (Turner 94-5).

The ritual of attending Grateful Dead concerts is not strictly a rite of passage, but it does

follow Van Gennep’s stages at a macro level, and, like a Mandelbrot set, there are micro-level

rituals that follow similar patterns within the greater whole.

Separation/Preliminal

Separation removes the ritual participant from their daily routine or life. As an adult with

a real job and getting ready for a concert, I consciously experienced separation beginning shortly

after leaving work. Driving home, I would mentally let go of work as if I would never return. At

home, I performed the physical act of peeling off pantyhose, hanging up my business suit, pulling

on a pair of jeans and putting on a tie-dyed T-shirt, the true symbolic act of separation. The trip

to the concert, which was generally within 200 miles, was driven in the requisite Volkswagon

van, listening to Grateful Dead music and perhaps drinking a few beers with friends.

Transition/Liminality/Communitas

The beginning of the liminal stage is marked by entering the parking lot. Rather than an

ordinary concrete meadow with defined spaces for vehicles and rows of outdoor lights, one

enters the world of organized chaos. Here, a tent city out of time has been constructed, filling and

overwhelming the senses with color, sound, smells, tastes and texture. Weaving toward the ticket

gates, one converses with strangers while walking through rows of campers and vans playing the

music of the favorite band. Young and old alike are dressed in tie-dyed T-shirts or shirts

honoring the Grateful Dead or other musicians deemed friendly to the scene. Peaceful
excitement, patchouli and the smell of marijuana fills the air. Vendors occupy the rows closest to

the concert entrance selling tie-dyed and batik clothing, ankle bells and earrings, vegetarian

goodies, social consciousness and music industry favorite buttons, and always glass and onyx

pipes and other drug paraphernalia.

Everyone’s participation is voluntary. It is not prescribed by the dominant culture, and

although it is not crisply ordered or orchestrated, there is a set of unspoken rules that concert

goers follow. Turner says that, “[t]he attributes of liminal personae (“threshold people”) are

necessarily ambiguous, since this condition and the persons elude or slip through the network of

classification that normally locate states and positions in cultural space” (Turner 94). The

unspoken rules fulfill Turner’s conditions for the liminal persone and include equality,

responsibility and respect for each other. There is an equalization of the participants and

“outside” socioeconomic status does not apply or visibly distinguish concert goers (Sutton 13).

Each person is expected to take responsibility for themselves and their friends. That means that if

a companion gets too drunk or too loaded, friends have a responsibility to get them to a place

where they are safe and not disturbing other concert goers. There is a respect for fellow concert

goers demonstrated by cheerful greetings or conversations and in general, there is an expectation

of peaceful orderliness and each participant takes the unspoken oath.

Once inside the arena, the relaxed atmosphere becomes electrically charged with

anticipation of a great concert! There are two specific sections in the arena that are of interest.

The first is the tapers section, a set of 200-250 seats behind the soundboard specifically reserved

for those dedicated to taping the perfect concert. These tapes are traded within the Deadhead

community with the band’s permission and tapers are committed to not selling them for profit

(Shenk 278). There is also a section where the “twirlers” or “spinners” congregate to move
without obstruction, twirling and dancing their way to a high or bliss. The Spinners, in fact,

created an ascetic commune called “The Church or Family of Unlimited Devotion” in

Mendocino County, CA where they followed strict ascetic guidelines, including celibacy and

abstinence from alcohol and tobacco (Shenk 268). There is a great reverence for the band when

they take the stage, knowing that they hope for themselves and the audience a connection to

something beyond themselves. In Garcia’s 1991 Rolling Stone interview, he says:

When we get onstage, what we really want to happen is, we want to be transformed from
ordinary players to extraordinary ones, like forces of a larger consciousness. And the
audience wants to be transformed from whatever ordinary reality they may be in to
something a little wider, something that enlarges them…Maybe that’s what keeps the
audience coming back and what keeps it fascinating for us, too (Garcia as cited by Sutton
116).

The band, acting as ritual elders, provide the sacred space, a liminal container or

alchemical vessel in which concert goers may experience what Otto calls the “wholly other”

(Otto 36). They also provide the music which acts as the transformational fire. The music itself,

though improvisional in style, follows a predictable pattern, including a 45 minute to one hour

first set, a 20 minute experimental drums/space interlude and a one and a half to two hour second

set, plus one to two encores. Much can be said and has been said about the music - the style, the

lyrics and the rhythm, but perhaps the most important ritual aspect emerges during the music;

what one anthropologist calls “a sense of profound closeness and intimacy between the band and

the crowd” (Shank 53), and what Turner calls communitas. For Turner, communitas is an

“unstructured or rudimentarily structured and relatively undifferentiated comitatus, community or

even communion of equal individuals who submit together to the general authority of the ritual

elders:” (Turner 96). For Deadheads, “this achievement of communitas and the mystical

transformation from individual to group consciousness formed the heart of the…ritual process”
(Sutton 115). When this happens, there is an overwhelming sense of oneness with all present and

a profound gratitude for the experience. There are specific moments where communitas is felt

deeply. Before breaking into a song, the band often “noodles” around with guitar licks and

rhythms and audience members may experience a “mind-melding” connection to the band by

intuiting the song they are about to play. There are also moments during songs where the whole

audience sings their favorite lines together, creating a union among the crowd.

Turner, says Doty, sees a relationship between trickster figures and the liminal phase of

rituals. The fact that we are in a liminal or threshold space means we are in Hermes domain.

Hermes is the trickster god who on his first day on Earth stole his brother Apollo’s cattle, erased

their tracks in the sand by swishing a palm frond across them, and lied to Apollo and Zeus about

his deed. “In opposition to the authorities and power of controlled consensus in the social

structures, such [trickster] figures represent for Turner the ideal pattern of social interaction he

calls communitas, an experience of fellow feeling, social solidarity and cohesion” (Doty 360).

The counter-culture position of the Deadheads and the trickster roots of the band through their

relationship to the Merry Pranksters and the Acid Tests place this feeling of communitas at the

heart of the ritual.

Incorporation/Post-Liminal

There is no guarantee of an experience of the numinous at Grateful Dead concerts. The

band may not gel, the crowd may be cranky, it may be impossible to call out a single song before

it actually starts. But I contend that the concerts serve consciously or unconsciously to unite spirit

and matter through the embodiment of music and dance. The ritual serves to renew one’s being

through communitas or the experience of the numinous. There is also the idea that Grateful Dead
concerts serve to release pressure in the community by embracing those things that are repressed

within the dominant culture.

On November 1st, 1986, Joseph Campbell participated in an event at the Palace of Fine

Arts in San Francisco called From Ritual to Rapture, from Dionysus to the Grateful Dead.

Campbell was not a fan of rock and roll, but he was intrigued by the Grateful Dead’s capacity for

mythmaking. After attending a concert in 1985, he said, “I think that the Grateful Dead are the

best answer today to the atom bomb.” He felt that while the atom bomb separates us, the music

of the Grateful Dead draws out our “common humanity” (Campbell 222). He sees Dionysus

dancing through the audience members, and he sees the dance as innocent and “a wonderful

fervent loss of self in the larger self of a homogeneous community. He compares the experience

to (other) religious celebrations that he has witnessed including: Russian Easter at midnight and

the singing of Kristos anesti (Christ is Risen!), at the Cathedral of the Virgin of Guadalupe in

Mexico City and in India, “…at the temple of Jagannath, that means lord of the Moving World. It

doesn’t matter what the name of the God is, or whether it’s a rock group or a clergy. It’s

somehow hitting that chord of realization of the unity of God in you all, that’s a terrific thing and

it just blows the rest away”(Lawrence).

The Dionysian mysteries and Grateful Dead concerts do have similar patterns in action

and in philosophy. Through dancing, wandering into the mountains and the use of hallucinogens,

the followers of Dionysus, or maenads, freed themselves from the suffocating influence of

patriarchy. This separation from the daily culture allowed them to commune with nature, worship

the god and dance themselves into a trance. Dionysius as ‘“the God of Ecstasy” connotes the

sudden presence of a supernatural force that leads people into altered states of consciousness

through group ritual’ (Evans 57). He also supplied the wine that allowed for a change in
consciousness. Like the maenads, the Deadheads also created space for revelry outside of the

profane space of patriarchy and many Deadheads wandered the countryside, following the band

from venue to venue. The worship of Dionysus was performed by those in classical Greece that

existed outside of the mainstream, and represented a counter-culture longing for a closer

relationship to nature, recognizing the beauty of creation and our own animal natures (Evans).

The final evidence of the Grateful Dead concert as a meaningful, modern ritual is the

emergence of myths and symbols in the culture. The naming of the band itself, the symbolic

creation story has multiple versions. The most reliable of those relates that Jerry Garcia opened

the 1955 Funk and Wagnall’s New Practical Standard Dictionary of the English Language and

drew the name at random, defined as follows:

grateful dead – The motif of a cycle of folk tales which begin with the hero’s coming
upon a group of people ill-treating or refusing to bury the corpse of a man who had dies
without paying his debts. He gives his last penny, either to pay the man’s debts or to give
him a decent burial. Within a few hours he meets with a traveling companion who aids
him in some impossible task, gets him a fortune, saves his life, etc. The story ends with
the companion’s disclosing himself as the man whose corpse the other had befriended.

Rick suggests that this definition is closely linked to the band’s image of “karmic

retribution” or “what goes around comes around.” He sees this as evident in the band’s lyrics,

such as “if you plant ice, you’re gonna harvest wind” and in how Deadheads treat each other, for

example, the trust that some fans have arriving at the show with no ticket or money hoping that

another fan will give them a free ticket, called a miracle (Rick). I would suggest that the name

“The Grateful Dead” holds tension and evokes a sense of being and not being, of giving and

receiving, of life and death. The name of the band belongs to the mythical realm and connects it

to the ultimate mystery of death and perhaps life after death. Looking at Grime’s traditional part

of the definition of ritual, it is possible to connect the Grateful Dead to the Greek Eleusinian
mysteries or Tantric initiations in the Hindu tradition, whose underlying goal was to help people

deal with the reality of death and overcome the fear of death.

Finally, it is important to acknowledge that symbols have emerged from the Grateful

Dead culture, the most prominent being the skull with a wreath of roses, Skull and Roses. The

image was first used as an advertising poster for a concert at the Avalon Ballroom. The artists

spent a lot of time searching though old graphics books in the stacks at the San Francisco library.

There they found a book called The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam and in it an illustration using a

skeleton and roses. Intuitively they connected the image and The Dead; the skeleton symbolizing

death and the roses representing rebirth and love (Troy 179). A newer symbol, The Dancing

Bears, was created by Jonathan Marks’s Grateful Graphics in 1985. The icon depicts a row of

five colorful bears, “each in a different posture of jubilation” (Shenk 49). In this symbol, one

easily imagines the joy of concert going and being in communitas with the band and other

Deadheads!
 Works Cited:

Bell, Catherine. Ritual: Perspectives and Dimensions. New York: Oxford U P, 1997.

Brown, David Jay and Novick, Rebecca McClen. “Jerry Garcia: Spiritual Music”. A Magical
Universe: The Best of Magical Blend Magazine. Mill Spring, NC: Swan, Raven & Co.,
1996.

–. “Tales of the Living Dead with Jerry Garcia”. Magical Blend Magazine. Jan. 1994. 15 April
2005. <http://www.levity.com/mavericks/gar-int.htm>.

Campbell, Joseph. The Hero’s Journey: Joseph Campbell on his Life and Work. San Francisco:
Harper & Row, 1990.

Doty, William. Mythography: The Study of Myths and Rituals. Tuscaloosa, AL: U of Alabama P,
2000.

Eliade, Mircea. Ed. Encyclopedia of World Religions. New York: MacMillan, 1987.

Evans, Arthur. The God of Ecstasy: Sex-Roles and the Madness of Dionysos. New York: St.
Martin’s P, 1988.

Grimes, Ronald L. Beginnings in Ritual Studies. Columbia, SC: U of South Carolina, 1995.

Kelly, Linda. Deadheads. New York: Citadel Underground, 1995.

Lawrence, Gerald. Sir Francis Bacon New Advancement of Learning. April 15, 2005.
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Otto, Rudolf. The Idea of the Holy. London: Oxford UP, 1957.

Rick, Matthew. The Akashic Junction. “Deadisticism: The Magic and Mysticism of the Grateful
Dead” 15 April 2005. <http://www.ulster.net/~shady/deadisti.html>.

Shank, Gary and Simon, Eric J. “The Grammar of the Grateful Dead”. Deadhead Social Science.
Adams, Rebecca G. and Sardiello, Robert, Eds. Walnut Creek, CA: AltaMira P, 2000.

Shenk, David and Silberman, Steve. Skeleton Key: A Dictionary for Deadheads. New York:
Main Street Books, 1994.

Sutton, Shan C. “The Deadhead Community: Popular Religion in Contemporary America”.

Deadhead Social Science. Adams, Rebecca G. and Sardiello, Robert, Eds. Walnut Creek,
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 Works Cited Continued

Troy, Sandy. One More Saturday Night: Reflections with the Grateful Dead, Dead Family and
Dead Heads. New York: St. Martin’s P, 1991.

Turner, Victor. The Ritual Process: Structure and Anti-structure Chicago: Aldine Pub. Co.,
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Van Gennep, Arnold. The Rites of Passage. Chicago: U of Chicago P, 1960.

 Epics: Of Ministers, Morticians and Architects

By N. Terry Pearce

The dominating aspect of epic is scale. Not only does epic refer to individuals, but also to

civilizations, and indeed to the cosmos. Not only does it record the past, but it also gives us the

current implication of our history and then points to a future, sometimes with an allegorical

finger, sometimes more directly. Its span of time from the past to the present and into the future

gives us solid clues to find what has to be given up and what can be hoped for. In grappling with

this broad scale, epic authors become ministers, morticians, and architects. They remind us of

who we have been, put it to rest or integrate it, and lay out the footprint of the temple of the

future. Louise Cowan writes that “What is crucial to the epic is an intuition of motion within the

body of mankind that strives to overcome currently existing codes and conventions to move

toward the fulfillment of a destiny toward which a people are called” (Cowan, 23). In this way,

the motion of epic is not merely fated haphazard change. Rather, the movement is perceived as

progress, change that leads directly to a result that readers want, for which we are called, for

which we long.

Both Moby-Dick and Beloved, epic American novels with subject matter in the same

period of our history, answer clearly to Bainard Cowan’s question of whether “the bourgeois

novel form […] limits its vision to a civilization that is now passing away, or whether its

meaning shifts as the world shifts; or even beyond this, whether its meaning actually grows so

that it has something genuinely prophetic to say to our own time and our own future” (217-218).

He concludes that it is not the form of the work that determines its legitimacy as epic. Rather it is

what the novel does that is epic (220). Perhaps unlike Beowulf, The Odyssey or other epic poems,

the novel can help us identify, execute and celebrate real tasks, real accomplishments in our time.
This form finds its ground in our experience, and as such gives us the ability to participate

directly in the reality of the story.

What makes these works mimetic? For Toni Morrison it is not the accuracy of the details

of the story. Rather, the story should “be the map. It should make a way for a reader (audience) to

participate in the tale” (Memory 217). The novel can then suggest movement in a concrete way in

fields that are not far off and noble, but rather are accessible and practical. Just as the novel can

perform the epic function today, as the world accelerates and as technology brings us closer

together, participation will become more vital, and other media will surely take this role.

Moby-Dick and Beloved suggest progress rather than mere change in initiating a new

national myth that will take us beyond our current circumstances. Both novels address the plight

of a young nation with blight on its values and a limit to its vision. The 1850s society of the

United States fits Cowan’s template of an “era(s) of a people’s rising political consciousness” (B.

Cowan 220), yet the central concerns of these works are as vibrant in today’s American society

as they were at mid nineteenth century. As we explore the epic and its characteristics, we will see

how the themes of these books are consistent with today’s challenges in the United States, and

how we need to find the elements of epic in any way we can, as we continue to struggle to

complete and integrate the mythology of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries and continue to

create a story for our time and beyond.

Essential to the establishment of scale and movement is concert with the transcendent.

Such an alliance expands the message, and even the messenger, to a cosmic level. Transcending

the mere facts of the narrative, both Melville and Morrison implore a Voice that is metaphysical

and steeped in universal values to help them with their inspiration. Melville does this through the

voice of Ishmael in an early acknowledgement of an unseen force moving him toward his
venture. He cannot refuse the allure of the spirit. “But wherefore it was that…I should now take

it into my head to go on a whaling voyage; this the invisible police officer of the Fates,

who…secretly dogs me…he can better answer that than any one else” (21, 22). Then he employs

a prophet with a biblical name, Elijah, who warns the would-be whalers, portends their fate, and

then gives in to destiny. “Any how, it’s all fixed and arranged a’ready; and some sailors or other

must go with him, I suppose; as well these as any other men. God pity ‘em!” (88). More

universally, he shows his societal intent in an eloquent statement of reverence for the common

workman of America, and an appeal to the deity of their values. “[…] if I shall spread a rainbow

over (the workman’s) disastrous set of sun; then against all moral critics bear me out in it, thou

just Spirit of Equality; which hast spread one royal mantle of humanity over all of my kind! Bear

me out in it, thou great democratic God!” (103-104).

Morrison’s invocation is more subtle. She calls her universal muse forth in the foreword.

Pondering on her own front porch on the Hudson River, she considers the model of the historical

Margaret Garner, a slave who murdered her children, as a way of voicing the shame of slavery.

But it wasn’t Ms. Garner’s voice that added gravitas to the novel; in fact, Morrison names her

fictional slave owner after her real-life heroin. It was Margaret Garner’s youngest victim who

provided the metaphysical muse. Morrison recalls: “I sat on the porch, rocking in a swing,

looking at giant stones piled up to take the river’s occasional fist. […] She walked out of the

water, climbed the rocks, and leaned against the gazebo. Nice hat” Then these telling words, “So

she [Beloved] was there from the beginning, and except for me, everybody (the characters) knew

it—a sentence that later became ‘The women of the house knew it’” (Beloved, xviii).

She was there from the beginning, the spirit, the word made flesh, the one sacrificed; who

rose again from the water and finally was to leave pregnant with a new testament. Certainly not a
Christ figure in the content of a message, Beloved was a Christ figure in form, moving easily

between flesh and spirit, and giving each the opportunity, through her presence, for salvation.

Beloved was the instigator of the cleansing needed to move these characters, their society, and

the country to another place. She was the source of rememory, the clearing of the past, required

for new beginnings. As a haunting spirit, she is credible to the principals in the story. Morrison

comments that not only would a haunting spirit be considered usual in the household of the

African American of that era, but “it would be unusual if the haunt were not there” (Interview).

The slaves’ spiritual roots were in Africa, where ancestors frequently visit after death, sometime

embodied in the person of the shaman, to help or haunt, to cure or create sickness. In fact, in the

Ogun societies of Africa, a special ceremony was required for someone who had killed another.

One of the reasons for the ritual was that “without it, the spirit [...] may trouble the victorious

warrior [...], and he may cause trouble at home” (Armstrong, 31). Ancestors and haunting were

part of the spiritual roots of slaves long before they were introduced to Christianity. The haunting

spirit was expected, prophetic and powerful. While we might see Beloved as Sethe’s memory,

those in the novel who see her witness her as a red light, angry, beautiful, seductive, coy and

selfish. She created the epic condition of “reminding people of what has been lost or

dismembered” (Slattery, “Nar. Mem.,” 334). To all those with whom she engaged, she gave

salvation in her ability to goad them into memory and integration. To Sethe, she gave a chance

for redemption through incessantly reminding her of her own guilt; to Paul D., an opening of the

can of history formerly rusted shut; to Denver, a Self to identify with her own story; and to the

community of women, a way to banish and forgive the old and to gather together to start anew.

Having made the universality clear through a metaphysical voice, both Melville and

Morrison take us through the process of death and rebirth, pointing toward a new myth for the
society. Their process mirrors that of universal initiation into new forms of life. Rituals for

growth into the next stage of development are practiced world-wide and usually studied in their

application to individuals; but these processes seem at least metaphorically applicable to

civilizations, and therefore present in the epic. Writing of such rituals, Mircea Eliade suggests

that from childhood to responsible adult, from warrior to chief; “everywhere, even in the most

archaic societies, they include the symbolism of a death and a new birth” (197). Universally too,

however, there are other steps in the process common to such transformation; a separation from

the old community, a descent into the depths of despair and darkness; revisiting the past and

experiencing its death. Finally, “there is a mark on the body “[…] external marks of death and

resurrection such as tattooings and scarifications” (198). In many traditions, in the process of

rebirth, the initiate must also actually kill a man and eat some of the flesh. Whether done literally

or metaphorically, this image suggests an integration of the old as part of the new.

Of course, the heroes and heroines of Moby-Dick and Beloved leave their old

communities to enter the process of transformation, and they clearly descend into the depths of

despair and darkness. These authors make sure we understand that the old way has been washed

away, killed completely—that it is time for a new order of things. Beloved disappears into the

river from whence she came, leaving footprints that fit anyone who treads in them, making sure

that we understand she is a societal figure. Morrison lets us know that this disappearance will

slowly take its desired toll. “By and by all trace is gone, and what is forgotten is not only the

footprints but the water too and what it is down there. The rest is weather” (Beloved, 324).

Melville takes the Pequod to the bottom as a society, beginning with Ahab’s voice remembering

Fedallah’s prophecy:
 ’The ship! The hearse!—the second hearse!’ cried Ahab from the boat; ‘its wood could
only be American!’ […] And now concentric circles seized the lone boat itself, and all its
crew, and each floating oar, and every lance-pole, and spinning, animate and inanimate,
all round and round in one vortex, carried the smallest chip of the Pequod out of sight.
(426)

Like Beloved, eventually, the old society of the American Pequod and its crew will be forgotten,

even as a memory, as “[…] the great shroud of the sea rolled on as it rolled five thousand years

ago” (427).

What of rebirth and integration? Melville suggests that rebirth is accomplished on the

coffin of the past civilization. The image he provides is that the coffin “rising with great force,

[…] shot lengthwise from the sea, fell over, and floated by my side” (427). Of course the image

fits that of a whale breeching, but it also fits that of a birth from the water, coming from the

Mother’s womb, which just accepted and integrated the death of the old. Even after the complete

dismemberment of the Pequod, the keeper of the narrative is soon picked up and nurtured by the

mother, “the devious-cruising Rachel” (427). As in Beloved, the feminine provides the vehicle

for growing the new order of things.

To Morrison, rebirth and integration are intertwined more specifically. There is no rebirth

without rememory, which “means to transcend one’s past without ignoring it. It involves an

acknowledgement of one’s past (empathy) without allowing it to invade one’s present” (Blanco

146). To accomplish rememory, we have to re-experience the past, break it down into bits and

integrate it so that we can transcend it, something Sethe is not able to do, even though she

recognizes the way in which experience refuses to let go. She remembers Sweet Home, watching

her own mind sort through the conscious and unconscious, her perspective well beyond herself.

“Boys hanging from the most beautiful sycamores in the world. It shamed her—remembering the

wonderful soughing trees rather than the boys. Try as she might to make it otherwise, the
sycamores beat out the children every time and she could not forgive her memory for that”

(Beloved, 7). Rather than rememory, she is trapped in remorse, a word with its roots in the Latin

remorsur, “to bite again.” She laments that her brain accepts everything without her permission.

She grasps the unconscious nature of repression:

Why was there nothing it refused? No misery, no regret, no hateful picture too rotten to
accept? Like a greedy child it snatched up everything. Just once, could it say, No thank
you? I just ate and can’t hold another bite? […] But her brain was not interested in the
future. Loaded with the past and hungry for more, it left her no room to imagine, let alone
plan for, the next day. (83)

Paul D. keeps his memories locked up as well, but closer to his heart than Sethe.

Ironically, while she sees her brain as the reservoir, he speaks of his terror as emotional. “It was

some time before he could put Alfred, Georgia, Sixo, schoolteacher, Halle, his brothers […} one

by one, into the tobacco tin lodged in his chest. By the time he got to 124 nothing in this world

could pry it open” (133). He is liberated by Beloved’s seduction, but does not express the

freedom until long after the first occurrence. He reflects: “And afterward, beached and gobbling

air, in the midst of repulsion and personal shame, he was thankful too for having been escorted to

some ocean-deep place he once belonged to” (311). Perhaps most profoundly, as he learns that

Denver is being taught by Miss Bodwin, a white woman, “[…] he didn’t say, ‘Watch out. Watch

out. Nothing in the world more dangerous than a white school-teacher.’ Instead, he nodded and

asked the question he wanted to” (314).

Sethe’s liberation, like Ishmael’s, comes from the women, as they sing her into rage, and

then from Paul D., who, knowing the territory of her terror, and thinking that he wants to “put his

story next to hers,” accepts her completely, and implores, “me and you, we got more yesterday

than anybody. We need some kind of tomorrow” (322). “Memory is at the heart of this cultural
retrieval; without it, a people risks existing simply in space without the sedimented history that

accompanies and defines place” (Slattery, Nar. Mem., 335).

The elements of epic: the consort with the divine, the movement from past to present to

future, the memory, rich with what has been lost, and the death and rebirth; all are desperately

needed in today’s world; and perhaps first, in our own nation. Yet when I compare our own

nation’s progress with this epic model, or with Eliade’s process for initiation, I see little hope. As

Cowan suggests, this new order […] is as elusive as the god-like White Whale, who hides

himself as he likes and manifests himself only when stressed to the utmost” ( B. Cowan 234).

How, for example, do we connect with the universal metaphysical in our time, in our

society or in our world as a whole? There is pronounced polarization, as the Christian right in the

United States and the Muslim Islamic Jihad of the Middle East make headlines each day with

their claims of exclusive righteousness. Given the current global political leadership, these

extremes will evolve into our international myth if we let them. In the global secular world,

books and films like the Harry Potter series and Star Wars implore metaphysical forces to guide

their heroes and heroines to their victories over evil. Yet the picture of earth from space,

frequently referred to as “the most compelling image of our time,” was an acknowledgement of

our whole earth’s place in the universal order of things. In Joseph Campbell’s words, “Our

divided, schizophrenic worldview, with no mythology adequate to coordinate our conscious and

unconscious—that is what is coming to an end. […] the idea that there is a single religious group

that is in sole possession of the truth—that is the world as we knew it that must pass away”

(107). Even today, the pictures from the space shuttle, the Mars photos and the acknowledgement

of the space station as international in scope are vehicles to bring the world together around a

single deity of survival and the hope of greater consciousness, as we explore the universe beyond
our current limits. Epic movement could be made around such a myth, and perhaps it is here,

hidden, waiting to be discovered—but we see little movement in that direction.

Myth-building could also be anchored on images of Tsunami victims or starving peoples

of Africa, being fed or nurtured by the proceeds of universal concerts and by the actual political

initiatives which aim at forgiving debt and building internal stability. Individual nations, most

notably South Africa, have been capable of making epic changes, with appeals to larger more

inclusive values; but to date, the world has been unable or unwilling to universally adopt such a

focus due to a lack of perspective, a view that this hunger is a condition, part of the content of

our world society, rather than part of a larger world context.

At one time, The United States truly united around the words “In God we Trust,” but it is

now losing that capacity, even around the great foundational values of freedom, democracy and

human rights. Our primary media extol the dominant American twentieth century myth; the stock

market and world economic development. While politicians speak of freedom and democracy in

any context they wish, we no longer sing the National Anthem together, opting instead for the

new tradition of a celebrity “performing” that song at our public events. Of course, that practice

reinforces our real national values, those of stardom, elitism and capital accumulation. We don’t

participate, like the thirty women of Beloved, exhorting their values with sound, with a song of

praise and exorcism, powerful in their ability to voice their desire for a future free of “past errors

taking possession of the present” (302). We might as well have a recording of James Earl Jones

reciting The Pledge of Allegiance in our first-grade classrooms. At present, we have little

connection to the universal, to the transcendent, in America or in the world.

Our real national values seem fixed, inflexible, and inappropriate for the world in which

we live. Geographer Jared Diamond, best-selling author of Gun, Germs, and Steel, suggests that
it is a society’s core values that often spell its ruin. He cites historical cases, but when asked

about the United States, he offers two contemporary examples to support his thesis:

One is the consumerist idea of infinite resources. The United States has long thought of
itself as the land of infinite plenty, and historically we did have abundant resources. But
now, we are gradually exhausting our fisheries, our topsoil, our water. On top of that,
we’re coming to the end of world resources. The other value is isolationism. […] now,
particularly after September 11, it’s clear that isolationism no longer works. We can’t
wait until each of several dozen already fragile countries blows up and then intervene at
the cost of billions per country. (qtd. in Joseph, 44-45)

Like the characters in these epics, our nation is already scarred, our world body already

marked with the losses of the past. The holes of the World Trade Center are just the most recent

and most obvious. In the early 1990s, a student of mine, an environmentalist, spoke eloquently to

the class of MBA candidates. A native of Canada, he related his own personal experience of

observing lakes near his home town lose their fish population to acid rain, and in the process,

quoted a space-shuttle astronaut’s observation that there were only two man-made landmarks

visible from space—the Great Wall of China and a massive old-growth clear-cut near his home

in British Columbia (Pearce 24). This cut, of course, is just the most visible one. Slattery

suggests, “Within the scars and pains of our wounds is the blossoming flower of freedom; the

wound has the capacity to open up to liberation, even when the origin of such freedom is so

tender and vulnerable” (Nar. Body, 213). If this be true, then it is time to begin the blossoming.

Epic brings us the knowledge of the possible from the actual; it presents in narrative

terms what we have lost and what we have the power to will into existence. Our past is rich and

our present is filled with opportunity to lead in a new order of things, but as architects, we have

lost our imagination and our inspiration. Our universal muse is narrow-minded and fearful.

Today, it feels like we are in that whale-boat with lines twisted and moving with abandoned,

smoking rope threatening to grab and pull us to our graves. Perhaps, as Melville suggests:
 “All men live enveloped in whale-lines. All are born with halters round their necks; but it
is only when caught in the swift, sudden turn of death, that mortals realize the silent,
subtle, ever-present perils of life. And if you be a philosopher, though seated in the
whale-boat, you would not at heart feel one whit more of terror, than though seated before
your evening fire with a poker, and not a harpoon, by your side. (229)

Unfortunately, this feels very familiar. May we find our way home.
 Works Cited

Armstrong, Robert G. “The Etymology of the Word “Ogun.” Africa’s Ogun. Ed. Sandra Barnes.
Indianapolis: Indiana University, 1997.29-38.

Blanco, Ángel Otero. “The African Past in America as a Bakhtinian and Levinasian Other.
“Rememory” as Solution in Toni Morrison’s Beloved. Miscelánea. 22 (2000): 141-158.

Campbell, Joseph. Thou Art That. Ed. Eugene Kennedy, Ph.D. Novato, CA: New World, 2002.

Cowan, Bainard. “America Between Two Myths: Moby-Dick as Epic.” The Epic Cosmos. Ed.
Larry Allums. Dallas: The Dallas Institute, 1992. 217-246.

Cowan, Louise. “Introduction, Epic as Cosmopoesis.” The Epic Cosmos. Ed. Larry Allums.
Dallas: The Dallas Institute, 1992. 1-26.

Eliade, Mircea. Myths, Dreams, and Mysteries. New York: Harper & Row, 1975.

Joseph, Pat. “Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed.” Seirra (May/June 2005): 44-45.

Melville, Herman. Moby-Dick. 2nd ed. Ed. Hershel Parker and Harrison Hayford. New York:
Norton, 2002. 7-427

Morrison, Toni. Beloved. New York: Vintage, 2004.

–. “Memory, Creation and Writing.” “The Anatomy of Memory.” Ed. James McConkey. New
York: Oxford, 1996. 212-218.

–. Interview, 1988.

Pearce, Terry. Leading Out Loud. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2003.

Slattery, Dennis Patrick. “The Narrative Body and the Incarnate Word in Toni Morrison’s
Beloved.” The Wounded Body: Remembering the Markings of the Flesh. Albany: Suny P,
2000. 177-206.

–. “The Narrative Play of Memory in Epic.” The Epic Cosmos. Ed. Larry Allums. Dallas: The
Dallas Institute, 1992. 331-352.
 Exploring the Libation Ritual in Greek and Roman Myth

By Sean Froyd

Libation, said to be one of the “least understood rituals in mythology” by the

Encyclopedia of Religion, is prevalent in the myths of the Greeks and Romans. Many cultures

have made use of the ritual, but to understand the ritual requires a solid base of evidence. The

Greek and Roman cultures have left us that in the form of their myths. Can anything be learned

about the libation ritual from looking at this art?

Libation is commonly made up of a one or a combination of different liquids, examples

often being water, wine, and oil. These liquids are poured out onto the ground in the ritual.

There are also several different times where the ritual is enacted such as at religious ceremonies,

at certain meals, and at funerals and rites for the dead.

The myths will allow a foundation for exploring the ritual. It is within these that the

culture stored not only the act of libation, but perhaps as well the reasoning behind it. Using

examples from the Homeric poems, the plays of the tragedians, and the epic of Virgil, will allow

an exploration of how the libations were used. Then, with that knowledge, looking at the

prevalent liquids in the ritual might give an understanding why they were poured out onto the

ground.

Libations in Homeric Epic

The epics of Homer have numerous times where libations are used. A couple of

examples from the Odyssey to begin with. The first example comes from book eleven, when

Odysseus must traverse to the underworld to speak with Tiresias. He begins by pouring out

libations of three kinds for the shades. Odysseus, having dug the trench, “poured libation about it
for all the dead,/first of honey mixture, and then of sweet wine, and the third one of

water”(11.26-27). He does this before he sacrifices to the dead, to preface the ceremony.

It is in the hall of the Phaeacians when libations are mentioned in a different context than

rites for the dead. Odysseus had arrived in the hall of the king, Alcinoos, and applied for

hospitality. First Echeneus, eldest member of the court, followed by Alcinoos himself, called out

for wine for libation. Using the same phrase, they both call out so they “may pour a libation/ to

bolt-hurling Zeus, who protects pious suppliants” (Echeneus-7.164-65, and Alcinoos-7.180-81).

This seems to suggest that libations are used to gain the attention of the gods. Examples from

Homer’s other epic, the Iliad, are in similar circumstances.

In book 16 of the Iliad, Achilles prays to Zeus for two things, the winning of the battle

and the safe return of Patroklos. He pours libation in the form of wine first, and then asks for

these favors. It says, “When Achilleus had poured the wine and prayed to Zeus father” (16.253),

and it seems to support the view of libations to gain the attention of the gods so that prayers may

be made to them. Not just the main gods, seemingly, but other supernatural powers were also

called in this way. For instance the north and west winds, Boreas and Zephyros, were called after

libations to blow so that the flames at Patroklos’ pyre would rise. As Homer describes it, “He

stood apart from the pyre and made his prayer to the two winds/Boreas and Zephyros, north wind

and west, and promised them splendid/offerings, and much outpouring from a golden goblet

entreated them” (23.194-96). These are representative samples of how libations were used

throughout the two Homeric epics. How are libations portrayed in the time of the tragedies?

Libations in Tragedy

Libations in Homeric epics tend towards supplication to the gods, pouring out liquid

before and amongst prayers, though in the case of Odysseus and the dead, it was poured for the
shades’ benefits. The benefit for the dead is the theme that is brought up most forcefully in

Aeschylus’ Oresteia. This theme is most prevalent in The Libation Bearers and The Eumenides.

Firstly, in The Libation Bearers, as clued in from the title of the play one would assume

that it has much to do with the ritual act. And so it does, but it focuses on libations for the

funeral aspect instead of the gods. Orestes notices the women coming towards the graves,

bearing the libations to the tomb where he is. As he speaks to his dead father, “Or perhaps they

come to honour you, my father,/bearing cups to soothe and still the dead” (16-17). Orestes is

correct, and the chorus tells of the libations they bear to calm the angry dead. “The proud dead

stir under earth,/they rage against the ones who took their lives’/the gifts, the empty gifts/she

hopes will ward them off”(44-47). Clytemnestra has ordered the libations to be poured in

response to the rage of her murdered husband Agamemnon.

The act and the reasoning behind the libations are best portrayed by Electra’s words,

however. She pours the wine, and then prays to her father.

What kindness, what prayer can touch my father?

Shall I say I bring him love for love, a woman’s
love for a husband? My mother, love from her?
I’ve no taste for that, no words to say
as I run the honeyed oil on father’s tomb.
Or try the salute we often use at graves?
‘A wreath for a wreath. Now bring the givers
gifts to match’… (87-94)

Electra speaks of who had sent the libations to be poured over the tomb, her mother who

murdered Agamemnon. What is interesting here, however, is the mention of an even return for

the gifts for the dead. The libations are not only for the dead, but open a path of communication

to help. Electra prays then to Hermes, the lord of the dead for her father to hear her. At the end

of her prayer, she says “these are my prayers. Over them I pour libations” (154). This opens up
the possibility that the libations here are used (as in the epics) as a necessary addition for prayers,

in addition to the liquids being gifts for the dead.

In The Eumenides an interesting aspect of libations is brought up in the effort to placate

the furies, as Clytemnestra had attempted to do for the shade of Agamemnon. The ghost of

Clytemnestra is raging at the quiescent furies for not pursuing Orestes for murdering his blood

kin, and for not remembering her for the libations she had sent to them. “And after all my

libations…how you lapped/the honey, the sober offerings poured to soothe you” (110-111). So

here we have an interesting combination of the gifts for the dead and the supplication of the

otherworldly powers: libations were used as gifts for the furies, rather than gifts for the dead.

So, in the examples from the Greek myths, libations are used in a twofold function: the

first as part of prayer to the other world of the gods; and the second to treat with the dead, either

in prayer or placation. Does the Roman Aeneid paint a different picture?

Libations in the Aeneid

The great epic of Imperial Rome, the Aeneid, has its depictions of libations as well. Like

those in the Iliad and the Odyssey, they are used to gain the attention of otherworld powers, be

they departed relatives or gods.

In books 1 and 7, the libations are poured to the gods. After Dido calls upon the god to

grant a day of happiness, she dumps her wine. Per Virgil, “her words were done. She offered her

libation/, pouring her wine upon the boards” (1.1026-27). Aeneas later uses libations as well. In

the spirit of supplication in book 7 before praying he says “Now let us pour our cups to Jupiter”

(7.170). Both of these show the effect that spilling liquids has in order to gain the attention of

the gods. However, Aeneas also pours libations to call up his father from the grave, in the spirit

of Odysseus and Electra.

 The difference of this funeral rite is the form of liquid, rather than oil, water, or wine, the

libations poured here are wine, milk, and consecrated blood. Aeneas “pours a ritual libation/out

on the ground: two pure bowls of wine and/two bowls of new milk, two of victims’ blood”

(5.106-108). He does this in order to honor his father. There is a change in liquid here, but the

reasons for this are not hinted at in the Aeneid, though it may correspond to Odysseus’ liquids:

the honeyed liquid was not defined, and Odysseus shortly after the pouring of libations sacrificed

animals, which parallel the cups of blood here.

So, what then the purpose of libations being used in different aspects here, yet called the

same thing? Is there an overarching theme that can be found? It is here that The Encyclopedia of

Religions helps us understand parts of the ceremony while leaving others tantalizingly empty of

meaning. For the parts that it leaves open, other sources may help dispel confusion.

Libations in Society

According to the Encyclopedia of Religion, “while the gift offerings continued in

Classical Greek religion, libations also made their way into a variety of other rituals and became

a part of them”(5433). Indeed, as we have seen in the previous examples, the libation ritual has

elements of what the Encyclopedia of Religions called libation’s origins as ‘gift offering’,

especially when in The Libation Bearers and The Eumenides the libations are poured in order to

quiet and soothe the dead. But what does the societal writings of the Greeks and Romans have to

tell us about Libations outside of myth?

Some writings in the Greek society tell of libations poured out at symposiums. The

Encyclopedia of Religions mentions that all participants of the symposiums were involved with

the libations which were followed by prayers and invocations. Xenophanes tells that libations

were poured with prayers and hymns. “Men of good cheer must first hymn the god with reverent
words and pure speech, pouring libations and praying to be able to do right”(as quoted by P.E.

Easterling in his essay “Greek Poetry and Greek Religion”, 40).

As well, libations of water were used in the Eleusinian mysteries according to the

Encyclopedia of Religions. At the end of the ceremony, there were two jugs filled with water and

overturned one to the east and one to the west. The shouts accompanied this were asking the

heavens to rain, while imploring the earth to conceive.

So, having all these examples, what can we know about the libation ritual?

The Meaning of Libation

According to the Encyclopedia of Religions, “the meaning of libation offering can vary as

much as the way it was performed” (5433). It may help to break down the offering into the

composite liquids used, and explore from there.

The Encyclopedia of Religions is the most helpful on water libations. It claims that water

libations, whatever they may have been at the beginning, were later understood as purifiers.

Water was poured for “ablution of hands” at the beginning of offering ceremonies. Also, as

mentioned before, water was poured out at the end of the Eleusinian mysteries before the sky and

the earth were entreated.

Oil libations were used, as seen above, at tombs and for the dead. We may make a

parallel, though not definite by any means, that the ‘honeyed liquid’ of Odysseus was similar to

the honeyed oil that Electra brought to her father’s grave or to the new milk that Aeneid offered

to his father. The similarity is there, though as pointed out not definitive.

So oil was used in funerary rites, but also on marker and territorial stones according to

both the Encyclopedia of Religion and Walter Burkert in his book Structure and History in Greek
Mythology and Ritual. Setting aside the funeral rite for the time being, exploring Burkert’s

views on the marker stones may give some clues to the basis of use of oil.

Burkert points out that though the sacrificial aspect of pouring out the liquid as a sacrifice

not to be regained is part of the libation, the way that oil leaves a mark is a possibility for the

ceremony as well. “the communicative function of leaving marks, establishing centers or

borders, especially in the case of pouring oil on stones, is not negligible”(42). He goes on to

parallel the pouring of libations on stones to the way animals ‘mark’ their territory. He says

“marking a territory by pouring out liquid is a ‘ritual’ behavior quite common in mammals,

especially predators; we are all familiar with the dog’s behavior at the stone” (43). He then goes

on to say that we have evolved this way: “in fact, divers[sic] species of mammals have evolved

special glands for scent marking; cultural evolution has supplied man with utensils for similar

functions” (42).

While Burkert’s points are a possibility, I believe the Greek words are indicative of the

actual use for the oil. He speaks of its prevalence for the dead. He says “especially common in

the cult of the dead; this may be explained by the idea that the dead are ‘thirsty’, though the

Greeks preferred to speak about a ‘bath’” (42). That idea of a bath is an important one. When

was oil, specifically scented oil per our examples from the mythology, used for humans? As

Burkert quotes the Greeks’ own word: bathing.

This procedure is described in the Encyclopedia Britannica’s article on the “thermae”

(buildings for public baths). The person going in for a bath was first coated in oil before

indulging in rigorous exercise. After that, the oil was scraped from the body with a strigil, and

the person would go into the swimming pool. The person was again anointed by oil, completing

the bath. This description applies to the Romans, but is very similar to a process described for
Greek athletes. Here we can see that the assumption that the dead are ‘thirsty’ is in error here,

and the Greeks speaking of bathing may have been closer to the mark. The oil was a cleansing

substance for the dead, and could be tied in with the use of water as a purification substance. As

for pouring oil on the stone, it is possible that it was an act of ‘bathing’ the stone, in order to

purify the marker or border.

Not only a cleansing substance, but it may have operated practically as well: to improve

the smell of the tomb. This can be seen especially in the examples shown above. Honey has a

very pungent aroma, and when mixed with oil, it would last longer than usual. Unfortunately,

that is conjecture, not explicitly stated in any of the myths or sources.

What of wine libations? For explanation of this, we can look above at the funeral libation

examples of the tragedians. Wine is poured out as a drink offering for the dead. So why the

usage in beseeching the gods? Looking to the mythological origins of wine, Dionysius gave the

gift of the vine to Oeneus (Apollodorus, The Library of Greek Mythology, 1.7-8). Since the drink

was given by the gods, it may be seen as the method to gain their attention again for prayers, by

offering it back. That would be a possible explanation for wine libation in Greek and Roman

society.

Is there an overarching theme to the libation ceremony, some aspect that would explain

the multitude of uses for libations? There are arguments that it is sacrificial, the pouring of these

liquids out on the ground because they cannot be regained. There is an issue with that because

though the libation ceremony is present with sacrificial acts, it is never explicitly that I’ve found

referred to in and of itself as sacrificial in Greek and Roman myth. Libations have an aspect that

is something else entirely than sacrifice, that can be inferred from the myths.. So what is that
aspect, the reason for libation’s presence in so many different ceremonies may be found in

Mircea Eliade’s concept of the Sacred and the Profane.

Libations: the Path to the Sacred

The sacred is defined as “reality of a wholly different order than ‘natural’ realities” (10).

The profane would be everyday existence, the ‘natural’ order spoken of, where rocks are rocks,

trees are trees, and tombs are tombs. The sacred, in other words, is the manifestation within

those things of the other, something that cannot be seen in profane existence of everyday. As

Eliade says, “the first possible definition of the sacred is that it is the opposite of the profane”

(10).

Eliade says of the archaic person that their lives are on two different planes: the common

everyday (profane), and on the plane of the gods (sacred). Eliade says “life is lived on a twofold

plane; it takes its course as human existence and, at the same time, shares in a transhuman life,

that of the cosmos or the gods” (167).

It is in the example of a door that will be most useful to parallel with the act of libation.

There is a separation of the space of the sacred and the profane, and in Eliade’s example, the

door is a solution to this separation. “The threshold, the door show the solution of continuity in

space immediately and concretely” (24). It connects two different planes. Is the libation that

different from the threshold in connecting the profane world of the Greek and roman to the

sacred world of their gods?

Understanding this, what was one thing that the practitioner of the libations hoping to

achieve? In funerary aspects, like Odysseus and Electra, the aim was to initiate contact with the

dead. In the rites of the symposium and sacrifice, it was to initiate contact with the gods, to pray
and implore them for favors. It was, in essence, to cross over from the profane existence to the

sacred.

This possibly explains the usage of libations, but Eliade also notes that the archaic person

wanted to be in the sacred. “The man of the archaic societies tends to live as much as possible in

the sacred” (12). This might give insight to the branching out of the libation ritual into other

aspects that the Encyclopedia of Religion mentioned.

Conclusion

As seen from the myths and literature given us by the ancient Greeks and Romans the

libation ritual was widespread and actively practiced. The liquids varied as to the purpose of the

libation, and there were numerous possible reasons why they were poured in myth.

Overarching though, acknowledging the libation ritual is acknowledging the way that the

Greeks and Romans may have lived in their world. The libation ritual could be seen as a way in

which humans could connect to the other worlds beyond theirs, or in Eliade’s words, the sacred.

They could commune with the dead, those who had gone on to the next world; they could also

commune with the gods or otherworld beings for gifts or favors. All that was required was the

tipping of the liquid onto the ground in libation.

These conclusions, while not definitive, offer a meditation on why libations were

practiced by the Greeks and Romans, and why this ritual may have been so prevalent and

important.
 Works Cited

Aeschylus. The Libation Bearers. The Oresteia. Translated by Robert Fagles. New
York: Penguin, 1979. 173-226.

Aeschylus. The Eumenides. The Orestia. Translated by Robert Fagles. New

York: Penguin, 1979. 227-277.

Apollodorus. The Library of Greek Mythology. Trans. by Robin Hard. Oxford:

Oxford UP, 1997.

Burkert, Walter. Structure and History in Greek Mythology and Ritual. Berkeley:
University of California Press, 1979.

Easterling, P.E. “Greek Poetry and Greek Religion”. Greek Religion and Society. Ed. by
P.E. Easterling and J.V. Muir. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 1985. 34-49.

Eliade, Mircea. The Sacred and the Profane: The Nature of Religion. Translated by
Willard R. Trask. New York: Harcourt, 1987.

Homer. The Iliad. Trans. by Richmond Lattimore. Chicago: U of Chicago P, 1951.

Homer. The Odyssey. Trans. and Ed. By Albert Cook. 2nd ed. New York: Norton,
1993. 1-268.

"Libation." Encyclopedia of Religion. Ed. Lindsay Jones. Vol. 8. 2nd ed.

Detroit: Macmillan Reference USA, 2005. 5432-5435. 15 vols. Gale Virtual
Reference Library. Thomson Gale. Pacifica Graduate Library. 12 January 2006.
<http://find.galegroup.com/gvrl/infomark.do?&contentSet=EBKS&type=retrieve&tabID
=T001&prodId=GVRL&docId=CX3424501834&source=gale&userGroupName=carp39
441&version=1.0>.

"thermae." Encyclopædia Britannica. 2006. Encyclopædia Britannica Premium Service.

12 Jan. 2006. <http://www.britannica.com/eb/article-9072064>.

Virgil. The Aeneid. Translated by Allen Mandelbaum. Berkeley: U of California P, 1971.

 Shout and Speak: Possession in African Diasporan Religion in the United States

By Jeff Levering

And so most striking to me, as I approached the village and the little plain church perched aloft,
was the air of intense excitement that possessed that mass of black folk. A sort of suppressed
terror hung in the air and seemed to seize us, - a pythian madness, a demoniac possession, that
lent terrible reality to song and word. The black and massive form of the preacher swayed and
quivered as the words crowded to his lips and flew at us in singular eloquence. The people
moaned and fluttered, and then the gaunt-cheeked brown woman beside me suddenly leaped
straight into the air and shrieked like a lost soul, while round about came wail and groan and
outcry, and a scene of human passion such as I had never conceived before. (DuBois 137-138)

W.E.B. DuBois wrote these words in response to his first experience of a black Christian

revival in the southern United States. DuBois recounted his experience in 1903, almost three

centuries after the first African slaves were brought to Jamestown, Virginia in 1607 (Conniff and

Davis 123). Although three-hundred years had passed since Jamestown, the African religious

practice of possession is remarkably evident in DuBois’ description. African diasporan religion

in the United States, like diasporan religion in the Caribbean and South America, continued the

African spiritual heritage of possession. The continuation of possession occurred because the

African tradition was adapted to accommodate the new environment encountered (Johnson 9). In

the United States, African transplants originally adapted possession into the practice of shouting;

today, the tradition of possession continues in the glossolalia of Pentecostal Christianity. Thus,

the African religious tradition of possession, brought with the first slaves in 1607, has persisted

for nearly four centuries in the African diasporan religion of the United States.

When the first slaves arrived from Africa in 1607, the heritage of possession

accompanied them. Possession occurs in one form or another in nearly every African society

(Mbiti 80). The pervasiveness of possession in African society stems from the belief in a

universe filled with divinities, spirits, and ancestors (Grillo 6). The ubiquitous presence of these
divine powers is why, according to Laura Grillo, the “[. . .] principal vision that all African

religions share is that humans must vigilantly maintain a harmonious relationship with the divine

powers of the cosmos in order to prosper” (8). Grillo explains that ritual is how this beneficent

connection with the divine powers is preserved (8). Possession is the most intimate form this

ritual connection can take (Grillo 8). As such, possession is often purposefully induced and has

become elemental to African religious traditions (Mbiti 80; Grillo 8).

In Africa, spirit possession is typically induced through rhythmic drumming (Mbiti 80;

Grillo 8). Drumming, however, could not be used to produce possession in North America

because drums were forbidden (Lincoln and Mamiya 347). Jon Michael Spencer, in his article,

“The Rhythms of Black Folks,” states:

While there was continued use of the drum in the West Indies and South America, the
instrument was essentially disallowed in North America by legal mandate because of the
fears slaveholders had of its ability to ‘talk’. But while the use of the drum was deferred
in the diaspora, the drumbeats of Africa endured the slave factories and the middle
passage and were sold along with the captive Africans on the auction blocks of the New
World. (39)

The African slaves not only transported the ritual of possession itself but also the rhythmic means

necessary to produce possession. With the prohibition of drums, however, the inducing rhythm

required new expression. The slaves successfully achieved the requisite rhythm through the

shuffling of feet, clapping, humming, stamping, swaying and singing (Spencer 40; Hurston 91).

Spencer concludes: “Thus [. . .] in the absence of the drum, other sources of rhythm were capable

of summoning the spirit and mobilizing them into possessive action on the people” (Spencer 40).

The entire process of the transplant of possession with the slaves is well summarized by

John S. Mbiti:

Wherever the African is, there is his religion: he carries it to the fields where he is sowing
seeds or harvesting a new crop; he takes it with him to the beer party or to attend a funeral
 ceremony [. . .]. Although many African languages do not have a word for religion as
such, it nevertheless accompanies the individual from long before his birth to long after
his physical death. Through modern change these traditional religions cannot remain
intact, but they are by no means extinct. (2)

The Jamestown slaves brought not only the heritage of possession with them but the method of

inducement as well. But as Mbiti astutely notes, the traditional way of possession could not

remain intact but needed to adjust. Thus, instead of outlawed drums, the slave learned to produce

the rhythm necessary for possession trance in novel ways.

Along with the interdiction of drums, African slaves in the United States needed to

accommodate another situation: Christianity. Christianity permeated the Atlantic World where

African slaves were brought; as such, all African diasporan religions in the Atlantic World

needed to accommodate Christianity. Fortunately, Christianity was not difficult for peoples of the

African diaspora to assimilate because of the structural similarities between Christian and

African cosmologies (Paris 36). While African religions conceive of a cosmos filled with many

divinities, African religions also believe in a spiritual hierarchy with one God who made the

universe (Grillo 6). Maya Deren explains the confluence:

Throughout Africa this first deity, the source of the universe, was considered too greatly
elevated to be concerned with the petty affairs of human beings, and consequently was
rarely worshipped. When Christianity taught that such a primal figure was concerned with
human affairs, and was to be personally and intimately addressed, this was accepted as a
welcome modification to the African tradition. (Deren 55)

Thus, African diasporan religions synthesized Christianity relatively seamlessly.

However, the fusion of Christianity to traditional African beliefs and practices differed in

the United States from that of the Caribbean and South American amalgamations. In the

Caribbean and South America, Christian symbols and ideas were incorporated into the African

religious practices, and the traditional African deities and forces presently still play a prominent
role in the rituals and worship of the people (Lincoln and Mamiya 3). A distinct example is in

Haiti where Christian saints are thought to be representations of the Voudoun Gods, the loa

(Deren 56). Whereas in the United States, African traditions have been incorporated into

Christianity, and the Lord Jesus Christ dominates worship and belief (Lincoln and Mamiya 3).

Possession ritual provides evidence of this divergence between African diasporan religions. In

other African diaspora religions, possession still occurs by more traditional African deities, like

loa in Haitian Voudoun and orixa in Brazilian Candomble. In the United States, however,

possession is solely by the Christian Holy Spirit (Lincoln and Mamiya 3).

The unique reaction to Christianity by slaves brought to the United States is the product

of the institution of slavery itself within the country. Initially, slaves in the United States were

forbidden to practice either their traditional religions or Christianity (Elkins 60). Slaveholders

feared that teaching the slaves religion would lead to insurrection and rebellion (Elkins 60).

Furthermore, slaveholders feared Christian baptism might cast slaves in a different light, giving

them more equality as well as souls to be saved (Albanese 1710). In the Caribbean and in South

America, however, African slaves retained much of their ethnicity and ability to practice religion

(Noel 66). In fact, Spanish law required slaves to be baptized (Elkins 76). Thus, slaves in the

Caribbean and South America had much greater autonomy, especially in the practice of religion,

and were able to continue their religious practices in an altered, though uninterrupted, way. In the

United States, the practice of religion in any identifiable form was disrupted and discontinued for

nearly a century (Lincoln and Mamiya 347).

When slaves in the United States were permitted to practice religion after this forced

hiatus, their religious practice came under strict rules and stipulations. Following several large

slave insurrections at the start of the eighteenth century, slaveholders became convinced of the
practical value of converting slaves to Christianity for social control and to “civilize” them

(Albanese 1710; Johnson 10). As such, Christianity was brought to the slaves on the plantations.

Slaves, however, were forbidden to meet before sunrise or after sunset, and slaves were only

allowed to hear the preaching of a white minister (Elkins 60). Therefore, Christianity, and only

Christianity, was permitted to be practiced by the slaves in the United States. This strict

limitation resulted in the slaves blending their traditional African traditions into the framework of

Christianity.

During this initial period of introduction to Christianity in the early eighteenth century,

few slaves adopted Christianity (Albanese 1710). The lack of reception was due in large part to

the reserved, stoic nature of Anglican Christianity dominant in America at that time (Albanese

1710). Then, in the 1730s through 1740s, The Great Awakening swept through the American

colonies. The Great Awakening was characterized by passionate and emotional preaching, which

appealed much more to the African slaves than the detached, passive listening style of Anglican

Christianity (Albanese 1710). Also more attractive to the slaves was The Great Awakening’s

evangelical style that stressed conversion through personal contact with God (Lincoln and

Mamiya 6; Conniff and Davis 62). Slaves could relate to The Great Awakening’s emphasis on

outward manifestations as signs of God’s inward work (Albanese 1710).

The Great Awakening caused many slaves to embrace Christianity (Noel 66). The

explanation is simple: the passionate, physical nature of The Great Awakening reflected

traditional African religion. Following the period of The Great Awakening, slaves began to

cultivate their own form of Christianity. Catharine L. Albanese explains the process:

In the years that followed [The Great Awakening], two kinds of Christianity evolved.
First, there was the official church Christianity that slaveholders fostered and controlled.
Second, there was the so-called invisible institution, a form of unchurched Christianity
 created and controlled by blacks, blending elements of their African past and their lived
experience on the plantations with Christian language. An ‘instant’ (conversion-oriented)
Christianity, unlike the gradualism of the Anglicans [. . .]. (1709)

The unchurched, “instant” Christianity that Albanese speaks of incorporated the African tradition

of possession. Possession took the form know as “shouting” or the “ring shout.”

W.E.B. DuBois’ opening description captures a moment of possession through shouting.

DuBois observed leaping, shrieking, wailing, groaning, and outcry (137-138). DuBois explains

that shouting occurs “[. . .] when the Spirit of the Lord passed by, and, seizing the devotee, made

him mad with supernatural joy [. . .].” (138). Shouting is a form of possession that elicits

peculiar, nonordinary behavior, all of which are forgotten by the shouter (Hurston 104). C. Eric

Lincoln and Lawrence H. Mamiya describe the ring shout, which followed regular services and

required removal of all the benches (Lincoln and Mamiya 352):

The dancers or ‘shouters,’ as they were called, would form a circle, and to the cadence of
a favorite shout song or ‘running spiritual’ would begin a slow, syncopated shuffling,
jerking movement ‘bumped’ by the handclapping or body slapping of those waiting on
the sidelines. The tempo gradually quickened, and during the course of the dance (which
might last for seven or eight hours), shouters who became possessed, or who dropped
from sheer exhaustion, were immediately replaced by others waiting to take their places.
(352-353)

Lincoln and Mamiya explain that the shouters were described as “getting the power” or

being “filled with the Spirit” (Lincoln and Mamiya 353). Zora Neale Hurston describes shouting

as “[. . .] an emotional explosion, responsive to rhythm” (91). Hurston notes that shouting is

called forth by sung rhythm, spoken rhythm, humming rhythm, foot-patting, and/or hand

clapping, all of which imitate the drum (91). Shouting, with its state of possession induced by

rhythmic activity, is clearly a continuation of African religious tradition (Hurston 104).

Shouting, though a continuation of the African spiritual heritage, is not identical to

traditional African forms of possession. Most notably, shouting is an individual expression;

while general, recognizable characteristics distinguish shouting, no formal prescription exists

(Hurston 91). Shouting can range from loud vocalizations to silent weeping, from violent

movements to catatonic states, and can range in duration from a few seconds to several minutes

(Hurston 93). The individuality present in shouting is absent in other African diasporan religions.

Deren, speaking of possession in Voudoun in Haiti, states: “The actions and utterances of the

possessed person are not the expression of the individual, but are the readily identifiable

manifestations of the particular loa or archetypal principle” (16). Deren explains that the

individual does not benefit from Voudoun possession because the possessed person’s conscious

personality is temporarily absent and has been replaced by that of the loa (Deren 29-30).

Shouting, on the other hand, is viewed as a possession by power and not by a personality

(Goodman 3506). Shouting, ultimately, is a personal expression of the power of the Holy Spirit

(Goodman 3506).

The emphasis on individualistic experience in the United States is due to a point noted

earlier: the black Christianity that developed following The Great Awakening was an instant,

conversion-oriented religion. The conversion ritual within black Christianity is called “Seekin’

the Lord” (Johnson 16). Seekin’ (as the ritual is called) is the experience that gives the individual

entrance into both the church and the religion, and seekin’ is an intensely private endeavor

(Johnson 16). Alonzo Johnson argues that seekin’ has transformed from a mere conversion ritual

into a rite of passage (17). Johnson compares seekin’ to African initiation rites, where the

adolescent is initiated into adulthood (17). As the name suggests, the crux of seekin’ the Lord is

the individual’s quest to have direct experience with the Lord.

The direct experience sought in seekin’ can take many forms, from a vision, to a dialogue

with the Lord in a prayer, to asking God for proof through a physical manifestation , to
possession [like shouting] (Hurston 85; Johnson 19). Johnson notes that the seekin’ experience

often follows Victor Turner’s three-stage ritual process for initiation rites: separation from the

community, marginality that strips the individual of identity, and return to the community with a

new individual identity (20). Individuals may spend several days in a swamp or cemetery,

praying and fasting to induce an experience with the Lord (Hurston 85). For others, seekin’ may

occur during a revival meeting or church service (Johnson 20). Above all, the experience of

seekin’ is individualistic and does not follow set guidelines (Johnson 28).

Seekin’ the Lord is called “baptism in the Holy Ghost” by Pentecostal Christianity

(Lincoln and Mamiya 77). Pentecostalism developed in the late nineteenth-century (Anderson

7029), and today is the fastest-growing segment of the black religious family in the United States

(Noel 67; Lincoln and Mamiya 77). Pentecostalism places supreme importance on individual

religious experience, specifically on being filled with or possessed by the Holy Spirit (Anderson

7028). Pentecostals believe that possession by the Holy Spirit is revealed through “speaking in

tongues,” or glossolalia, and that glossolalia is the initial evidence of Spirit Baptism (Anderson

7031). Pentecostals believe glossolalia to be a mark or a sign of divine power (Goodman 3504;

Lincoln and Mamiya 76). This particular belief originates in the biblical history of

Pentecostalism. The name “Pentecostal” derives from the account of the day of Pentecost, when

the Holy Spirit descended upon the Christians: “And they were all filled with the Holy Spirit and

began to speak in other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance” (Acts 2: 1-4) [Anderson

7028]. Like shouting, glossolalia allows for direct, individual experience and expression of the

Lord through possession.

Glossolalia, like shouting, occurs during an altered, trance-like state of consciousness,

which is stimulated by rhythmic activities, such as singing, dancing, clapping, and drumming
(Goodman 3506). Glossolalia, once induced, is characterized by nonordinary speech behavior

that cannot be reproduced during ordinary states of consciousness (Goodman 3506). Linguistic

analysis has refuted the idea that glossolalia is a form of xenoglossia, or speaking a foreign

language that could be understood by others who spoke it (Goodman 3505; Anderson 7031).

Felicitas D. Goodman has studied glossolalia both in the field as well as in the laboratory and has

come to an interesting conclusion: glossolalia does not follow linguistic patterns but instead

follows musical concepts (3505). According to Goodman, phrases of glossolalia can “[. . .] be

divided into bars, each of which is accented on the first syllable, [. . .] caus[ing] the bars to

pulsate and throb rhythmically in a sequence of consonant-vowel interchanges” (3505).

Goodman further notes the never varying intonation present in glossolalia: “[. . .] it rises to a

peak at the end of the first third of the unit utterance and drops to a level much lower than that at

the onset as it comes to a close” (3505). Thus, glossolalia itself produces a pulsating rhythm,

which again harkens back to traditional African spiritual tradition.

Through glossolalia and shouting, the African religious heritage of possession has

continued in the African diasporan religion of the United States. Both shouting and glossolalia,

which are states of possession trance induced by rhythmic activity, reflect the African ritual of

possession. However, both shouting and glossolalia are markedly different than customary

possession ritual. In the African diasporan religion of the United States, possession is an

individualized experience and expression of the power of the Christian Holy Spirit. Within this

distinct conception of possession ritual, DuBois’ famous idea of double-consciousness is

revealed. DuBois explains this concept:

[. . .] the Negro is [. . .] born with a veil, and gifted with second-sight in the
American world, - a world which yields him no true self-consciousness, but only lets him
see himself through the revelation of the other world. It is a peculiar sensation, this
 double-consciousness, this sense of always looking at one’s self through the eyes of
others, of measuring one’s soul by the tape of a world that looks on in amused contempt
and pity. One ever feels his two-ness,- an American, a Negro; two souls, two thoughts,
two unreconciled strivings; two warring ideals in one dark body, whose dogged strength
alone keeps it from being torn asunder. (3-4)

Though much has transpired in the way of Civil Rights since DuBois wrote this in 1903,

his idea of double-consciousness, or two-ness, is evident in the African diasporan religion of the

United States. The African tradition of possession continues, but the ritual has taken a decidedly

American form.
 Works Cited

Albanese, Catharine L. “Christianity: Christianity in North America.” Encyclopedia of

Religion. Ed. Lindsay Jones. 2nd ed. 15 vols. San Francisco; Thomson Gale, 2005.
1708-1717.

Anderson, Robert Mapes. Encyclopedia of Religion. Ed. Lindsay Jones. 2nd ed. 15 vols.
San Francisco; Thomson Gale, 2005. 7028-7034.

Conniff, Michael L. and Thomas J. Davis. Africans in the Americas: A History of the
Black Diaspora. New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1994.

Deren, Maya. Divine Horseman: The Living Gods of Haiti. New York: McPherson &
Company, 2004.

DuBois, W.E.B. The Souls of Black Folk. New York: Vintage Books, 1990.

Elkins, Stanley M. Slavery: A Problem in American Institutional & Intellectual Life.

Chicago: U of Chicago P, 1959.

Goodman, Felicitas D. “Glossolalia.” Encyclopedia of Religion. Ed. Lindsay Jones. 2nd

ed. 15 vols. San Francisco; Thomson Gale, 2005. 3504-3507.

Grillo, Laura. “African Religions.” Encyclopedia of Women and World Religion. 2 vols.
Macmillan Reference USA, 1999. 6-11.

Hurston, Zora Neale. The Sanctified Church. New York: Marlowe & Company, 1981.

Johnson, Alonzo. “’Pray’s House Spirit:’ The Institutional Structure and Spiritual Core of
an African American Folk Tradition.” “Ain’t Gonna Lay My ‘Ligion Down”: African
American Religion in the South. Eds. Alonzo Johnson and Paul Jersild. Columbia, South
Carolina: U of South Carolina P, 1996. 8-38.

Lincoln, C. Eric and Lawrence H. Mamiya. The Black Church in the African American
Experience. Durham, North Carolina: Duke UP, 1990.

Mbiti, John S. African Religions and Philosophy. 2nd ed. Oxford: Heinemann, 1990.

Noel, James Anthony. “African American Religions: An Overview.” Encyclopedia of

Religion. Ed. Lindsay Jones. 2nd ed. 15 vols. San Francisco; Thomson Gale, 2005.
65-71.
 Works Cited Continued

Paris, Peter J. The Spirituality of African Peoples: The Search for a Common Moral
Discourse. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1995.

Spencer, Jon Michael. “The Rhythms of Black Folks.” “Ain’t Gonna Lay My ‘Ligion
Down”: African American Religion in the South. Eds. Alonzo Johnson and Paul
Jersild. Columbia, South Carolina: U of South Carolina P, 1996. 39-51.
 Riding on Horses’ Wings

By Janet Rich

Running free, with their manes and tails flying, horses inspire the mythic imagination. As

they gallop across fields and prairies as well as through legends, myths, fairytales and dreams, the

spirited creatures lift the hearts of those who befriend them. Horses have special meaning for

Native Americans who love to tell stories about the days when their horses are plentiful

(Sherman 9). In these stories, horses speak, dance, fly, or dash faster than the wind, often in the

service of taking their riders to accomplish great deeds. As live horses carry people farther and

faster than they can walk, symbolic horses empower people to ride on inner journeys, traverse

passages and pathways, and charge forth into spiritual skies to explore the mysteries of the soul

and carry the human spirit forward (Campbell, Hero 8-11).

Native Americans possess immense knowledge about horses. To learn the best ways to

approach the steeds, they watch horses relate to each other, for they believe that each species has

its own language and mental and emotional life. Traditionally, they believe that animals are not

simply peoples, “but families within that peoplehood. It [is] therefore possible to establish

intimate relationships with specific […] animals and gain the precise knowledge that they

[possess] about the world” (Deloria, Jr. 59). Imitating horses and other animals is not an option

for Native Americans, but is an imperative as it speaks of the intimacy of organic life (60).

Native Americans have always marveled at the behaviors of nature. For them, stories

about horses and other animals can only be told in particular places and seasons out of their

respect for the species. The key to understanding Native American knowledge of the world is to

appreciate their emphasis on the particular rather than on the general laws of how things work,

and to remember their “willingness to remain humble in spite of one’s great knowledge” (22).
They are interested in personal relationships with nature and for them, all relationships have

moral content. Therefore, their relationship with animals and nature is never separated from other

sacred knowledge about ultimate spiritual realities. Thus, Native Americans focus on the

completion of relationships and on the effect of their actions, such that to kill a horse requires the

payment of respects to the species. Native Americans attend to the ways in which horses perceive

and think about the world and attempt to understand their emotional experiences. Their stories

reflect their respect for the horses’ specific qualities and powers that they come to know (21-24).

From Carl Gustav Jung’s perspective, “ ‘Horse’ is an archetype that is widely current in

mythology and folklore” (Jung, Dreams 107). As an animal, it represents the non-human psyche

or the persons’ animal side, the unconscious. According to Jung, that is why horses in myths

sometimes see visions, hear voices and speak. As a beast of burden, it is related to the mother

archetype and stands for life in its origin (as in the Greek mythical Trojan Horse); as an animal, it

represents the lower part of the human body and the impulses that arise from there (as in the

Greek mythical centaurs). Jung states that “The horse is dynamic and vehicular power: it carries

one away like a surge of instinct” (107), a power that is reflected in many tales.

Many Native American myths and tales reveal not only the dynamic and vehicular power

and magic of the horse, but also the special relationships they share. The North American

Pawnee have one such horse tale. “Lone Boy and the Old Dun Horse” (Sherman 10) tells of a

time when the Pawnee wander freely over the plains. In the story, an orphan boy named Lone

Boy is so poor that he does not even have a horse to ride when his tribe packs up and rides on

from one place to another. As he is walking after the tribe one day, he hears a feeble whinny and

hurries down into a small ravine where he finds an old dun horse. Though he is laughed at for

bothering with such a sad animal, Lone Boy chooses to care for the old horse, and later when the
chief promises his beautiful daughter’s hand in marriage to the hero who brings him a certain

spotted calf hide, the old horse speaks to Lone Boy. “Don’t worry,” comforts the horse.

Lone Boy gasps, “You – you spoke!” (11).

“Don’t be afraid of me either. Come cover me with this nice, cool mud. […] Give me the

strength of the earth,” he beseeches (11). When the boy fulfills the request, the old horse is strong

enough to transport Lone Boy to the spotted calf that immediately falls to the boy’s arrows. After

the boy proves himself worthy by caring for the horse and giving meat to those in need, the dun

horse bestows upon the boy a herd of shining horses. As a result, with his wealth of horses and

the spotted calf hide, Lone Boy becomes the true hero that can wed the chief’s daughter. They

live happily together and the old dun horse remains their treasured friend all their lives (10-12).

The simple story conveys the power of the horse as a symbol of transformation. It can be

appreciated as a morality tale, with god in horse form. In a fanciful way, it suggests that doing

good deeds may reap rewards.

When the Spanish come to the Great Plains in the sixteenth century in search of land to

conquer and goods to sell, they bring horses with them, some of which escape and raise offspring

in the new land. The horses’ arrival transforms Native American life. The nomadic tribes that had

been foot wanderers can suddenly ride to grazing lands to hunt for buffalo and dash into battle

against neighboring tribes. They replace their portable shelters with tipis and even develop a

horse medicine cult. As Peter Nabokov recounts in Native American Testimony: A Chronicle of

Eastern-White Relations from Prophecy to the Present, 1492-2000:

When Antonio de Espejo first rode into Hopi land in 1583, the Indians—who had
never before seen a horse—paved the grounds with ceremonial quilts for the
sacred beasts to walk upon. By the end of the seventeenth century, Wyoming
Shoshonis were getting horses from Colorado Utes […]. The rapid spread of the
horse throughout the Plains caused the flowering of an entirely new Indian way of
 life characterized by the Appaloosa-riding, war-bonneted warrior who would
symbolize American Indianism around the world. (35)

The best horses are the Mustang of Barb, Arabian, and Andalusia blood, that once inhabit North

America, become extinct about 10,000 years ago and are absent from the area until the Spanish

Conquistador Cortez reintroduces them. When Native Americans first behold them, their riders

appear to them as godlike creatures (www.mustang-horses.org).

Great Plains people become adept at riding horses, often riding bareback, using a single

leather band as a bridle. For them, horses rapidly become the source of transport, warfare, and

mobility, and the symbols of wealth: the more they own, the greater their status in the tribe

(McNeese 128-129). Widely used as a medium of exchange, a man would give horses to a

woman’s family as a dowry. Stealing horses from neighboring tribes become acts of bravery.

Referred to as “sky dogs” by people of the far western plains, horses “inspired a cultural

revolution” (Nabokov 42). Trading and raiding times shorten, and mounted tribes, like the

Shoshoni, become lords of the northern plains. In the early nineteenth century, Wolf Calf, a

Piegan, or member of the southernmost Blackfoot tribe, tells a story to the Plains Indian scholar

George Bird Ginnell of the tribes’ first sight of horses and of a chief whose name changes from

Dog to Many Horses. The story begins with a band of Piegans who camp at a spot where they

jump buffalo and are having a great day, with much meat to eat. A Kutenai, their enemy, is

buffalo hunting on horseback and is having a bad day. Rather than starve his family, the Kutenai

rides over to the nearby Piegans to ask for meat. Upon seeing the horse, the Piegans are

bewildered and afraid. As it comes closer, they can see that it is a man on some sort of animal

and ask their chief to go forward and talk to him. Hesitantly, the chief approaches the Kutenai

and together they agree to exchange a horse for a meal for his family. Soon they become friends
and the Kutanai brings over all of his horses, becomes head chief of the Piegans, and changes his

name from Dog to Sits-in-the Middle to Many Horses. He and the tribe that becomes his people

have enough horses to trade some for fine things, including their first guns from white men (42-

44). Such stories change with each teller and telling, and are enjoyable for the meanings that

audiences both bring to them and find in them. For some, this is a tale that speaks of the horse as

an agent of cultural change. While its meanings are specific to the Native American experience,

the images that are represented reveal patterns that exit in the collective psyche.

George Eagle Elk at Parmelee, Rosebud Indian Reservation in South Dakota shares a

Brule Sioux story, “Tatanka Iyotake’s Dancing Horse,” as recorded by Richard Erdoes in

American Indian Myths and Legends. The tale is of a magical white horse that dances and

prances to honor its dead master “in the only way it knew” (269), though onlookers think it is

possessed “in the spirit way.” It begins with a ghost dance at Wounded Knee. Now, for those

with a clear conscience, a ghost dance can be peaceful, but for the white people who had “taken

away half of the remaining Indian land just a few years before” (267), it is not peaceful, for they

bring to it a bad conscious and their own fears. At the time, Sitting Bull, or Tatanka Iyotake as he

is called in Sioux, is the holy man and spiritual leader of the Sioux nation, and he always said, “I

want the white man beside me, not above me” (267). Tatanka Iyotake befriends Buffalo Bill

Cody who gives him his favorite white circus horse that can perform many tricks. At the same

time, Tatanka Iyotake opposes, and becomes the enemy of, those who want Native Americans to

lose their identity to the ways of the whites. The ghost dance becomes the occasion to get rid of

Tatanka Iyotake who is accused of protecting the ghost dancers and standing in the way of

progress for those who want the Native Americans “to die out” (268), and he is shot to death by

Native American warriors in police garb. The shooting triggers his white horse to perform circus
tricks, as it had done routinely in Buffalo Bill Cody’s Wild West Show. The horse dances and

prances late into the night after the fight is over; thus, Tatanka Iyotake and the white horse live

on as a legend of its people (267-269). This is a legend, and it changes in the retelling as legends

always do. It reveals the inhumane treatment of Native Americans by American officials and

shows the loyalty of the horse that symbolizes the dancing god and life eternal. While there are

many ways to understand legends, Erdoes and Ortiz suggest, “They are emblems of a living

religion, giving concrete form to a set of beliefs and traditions that link people living today to

centuries and millennia past” (xv).

A tale comes to life in Leslie Marmon Silko’s Storyteller that demonstrates the fondness

and friendship between the Navajos and their horses. “A Geronimo Story” opens with scouts in a

corral saddling up so they can hunt for Geronimo, and as they do, their horses bolt and try to back

away. The horses of the storyteller and her Uncle Siteye are missing, so she concludes that they

are not going to help track Geronimo. But her uncle assures her that they are going, so she finds

her uncle’s tall strong horse, Rainbow, and saddles it up as it sighs “like horses do when you

cinch them up good and they know you’ve got them” and then she saddles her old-time Indian

horse, “the kind […] that can run all day and they don’t get tired” (213). They enjoy the beauty of

the journey as they feed and care for the horses that take them up the mountains, across canyons,

rocks and streams on what has becomes their deer hunt, as they covertly steer the enemy away

from Geronimo to protect him in their masquerade of trying to find him. When the storyteller

comments to her Uncle Siteye, “[Geronimo] always gets away,” he stares up at the stars and

replies, “but I always like to think that it’s us who get away” (222). In this lovely tale, Silko

expresses the plight of her people as she describes an uncle in the cunning act of misleading
Geronimo hunters in order to protect Geronimo and, in effect, himself and their people. The

horses are their friends, each horse knowing its rider so very well.

In Flight of the Wild Gander, Joseph Campbell speaks of Black Elk’s account of a sick

boy who spiritually rises from a teepee to a landscape of cloud where he receives a visit from a

bay horse. The bay speaks to him of its history that he wants the boy to see, which is as follows:

Westward stand twelve black horses; Northward, twelve white ones; Eastward, twelve sorrel

horses; and Southward, stand twelve buckskin. Forty-eight horses stand firmly in formation

behind the bay, a “storm of plunging horses in all colors that shook the world, neighing back.

‘See,’ said the bay, ‘how your horses all come dancing!’ And there were horses everywhere, a

skyfull, dancing, that changed then to all kinds of animals and vanished to the quarters” (88-89).

Adventures ensue as the bay, with the procession of fine horses behind him, carries the boy

through a series of ascents. As Campbell affirms, “the high roles of […] the horse […] are [part]

of the architecture of the mythic world of the North American plains heritage” (91).

The dynamic, vehicular and inspirational power of the horse transcends the boundaries of

time and place and speaks to people of many nations and cultures through dreams, myths,

fairytales and legends. In the Indian Buddhist tradition, Padmapäni or Avalokiteshvara is a

polyvalent character like Vishnu that is possessed by divine powers and is able to assume at will

a form, or manner of manifestation, needed to assist a particular group of living beings on the

path of salvation through enlightenment; he may become a person or, as an animal, may appear

as a “fabulous winged horse named ‘cloud’ or ‘valähaka’” (Zimmer 97). In another myth, the

Buddhisattva or Future Buddha enters the “homeless path of the nameless, anonymous ascetic,

severs his hair, exchanges his garments for the robe of the ascetic beggar, and dismisses his

faithful charioteer, first requesting that the latter inform his parents that he is doing well before
he departs. Kanthaka, the horse that is standing by and listening, is unable to bear his grief at the

thought, “I shall never see my master anymore” and dies of a broken heart. The horse is then

reborn as the god Kanthaka in the Heaven of the Thirty-Three Gods. Here, the horse is the

symbol of the bodily vehicle and the rider is the spirit; when the latter comes to an end of its

reincarnations, the vehicle necessarily dies, but with a delightful empathy for the animal’s

feelings, the horse’s discreet protest and sadness are expressed (161-162).

In Greek mythology, the mythical horse Pegasus emerges, widely regarded as a symbol of

celestial ascent. The magical winged-horse arises from the foam of the powerful sea god

Poseidon and the blood that drips down from the decapitated Medusa, and is taken by Athena to

Mount Helicon to be raised by the Muses (Grant 146). One day the muses begin to sing, filling

the mountain with such ecstasy that it begins to rise to the heavens until Pegasus, under

Poseidon's command, kicks his hoof and stops the mountain's upward progress. A fountain of

water, known as the Fountain of Hippocrene, springs forth which the Muses believe to be a

sacred source of music and poetic inspiration. According to legend, the birth of both wine and art

occur when Pegasus' hooves unleash the sacred spring of the Muses (Bulfinch 124). The act of

Pegasus striking the fountain with its hoof to allow water to gush forth is very symbolic. For in

the act, the horse’s foot becomes the dispenser of the fruitful moisture, with fruitfulness being

symbolic of growth (Jung, Symbols 278, 238). The prospect of spiritual fruitfulness is worthy of

highest aspirations and for many people, is a vital necessity. Following a myriad of adventures,

Pegasus comes to live in Mount Olympus, is entrusted with bringing lightening and thunderbolts

to the powerful Zeus, and is honored for his earthly and heavenly deeds as a constellation in the

skies (Bulfinch 125).

 As indicated earlier, Greek myths also speak of the Trojan War, “the theme of the greatest

poems of antiquity, those of Homer and Virgil” (212) in which the Greeks give a giant wooden

horse to their foes, the Trojans, allegedly as a peace offering. But after the Trojans drag the horse

inside their city walls, Greek soldiers that are enclosed in the horse's body sneak out, open the

city gates to their friends, and allow their compatriots to capture Troy (229-232). The centaurs,

creatures that are half man and half horse and are better at mastering than at taming their

instincts, are also part of Greek mythology. Chiron, known for his exceptional goodness and

wisdom, is the only immortal centaur. When a fight erupts between Heracles and the centaurs,

Chiron is accidentally wounded and, as an immortal, is destined to live forever in terrible pain.

Instead, he relinquishes his gift of immortality to Prometheus and dies in peace (Grimal 89-90).

Again, regarded by many for centuries as magnificent, powerful and magical beings,

encounters with horses have inspired some fantastic creatures to spring from the human

imagination that lift spirits and touch hearts. Jung, in Symbols of Transformation: An Analysis of

a Prelude to a Case of Schizophrenia, discusses a vision that is told to him of a buckskin-clad

Indian named Chiwantopel who arrives on horseback. In this vision, Chiwantopel refers to the

horse as “his faithful brother” (274), revealing that the horse and rider have an intimate

connection that is to lead them to a shared destiny. In Jung’s work, the libido directed toward the

mother symbolizes her as a horse (275). According to Jung, “legend attributes properties to the

horse which psychologically belong to the unconscious of [humans].” For example, there are

path-finding horses to lead lost wanderers to their destinations (277). In the Brihadaranyaka

Upanishad, one finds that “Dawn is the head of the sacrificial horse” with the horse symbolizing

time and the world (280). The horse that stands strong, runs free, draws chariots and transports

many warriors, heroes and kings is highly symbolic, signifying everything from thunderbolts to
sexual organs to trees, wind, and time, and plays a variety of roles in dreams, fairytales and

myths across all boundaries of time and place.

Within the Native American mythologies is a story of the great Oglala Sioux leader,

Crazy Horse, who bears the name of the powerful steed. As a youth, he loves horses and, being

given a pony when he is very young by his father, becomes a fine horseman. A gentle warrior and

a true brave, Crazy Horse stands for the highest ideals of the Sioux and with a big heart and

personal commitment to public service, he earns recognition as a visionary leader who is

determined to help preserve the traditions and values of the Lakota people. When bayoneted by a

Sioux guard at Fort Robinson, Nebraska in 1877, his final words are thought to be these: “My

friend, I do not blame you for this. [...] At times, we did not get enought to eat, and we were not

allowed to leave the reservation to hunt. […]. We preferred our own way of living. We were no

expense to the government then. All we wanted was peace and to be left alone” (Nabokov 178-

179).

He believes that soldiers are sent to destroy their reservations. When General Custer, or

“Long Hair” as they call him, comes to fight, the Sioux want to leave with their squaws but know

they must defend themselves and, thus, massacre Custer’s troops. Afterward, Crazy Horse

attempts to live in peace in Canada, but the American government pursues him. He returns to the

Red Cloud Agency to discuss ways to achieve peace and is killed. His final speech ends with the

memorable words: “I have spoken” (179); his vision and deeds live on in the hearts of his people

and of those who read about him in such writings as Black Elk Speaks as recorded by John G.

Neihardt, a Nebraskan poet.

Joseph Campbell is introduced to the Native Americans when Buffalo Bill Cody brings

the Wild West Show to Madison Square Garden. His interest grows as he reads their myths and
digs for their arrowheads in the backyards of Delaware (Campbell, Power 10). He comes to

understand that the people of the Great Plains do not regard animals in the way that humans

commonly do, “as subspecies” (75), and appreciates that the people of the Plains believe as

follows:

Animals are our equals at least, and sometimes our superiors. The animal has powers that
the human doesn’t have. The shaman, for example, will often have an animal familiar,
that is to say, the spirit of some animal species that will be his support and teacher.[… .]
They ask the animals for advice, and the animals become the models for how to live. (75)

Campbell goes on to explain a Pawnee’s belief, which states that “in the beginning of all

things, wisdom and knowledge were with the animals,” and that the One Above sent certain

animals to let humans know that he shows himself through the animals as well as the sun, moon

and stars, and that it is through these that humans need to learn. With this, Campbell senses a

stirring in the mythic imagination, the wonder of things (79).

Campbell observes that when the Native Americans receive horses from the Spaniards

and are then able to venture out of the plains and take part in the great hunt, their “mythology

transforms from a vegetarian mythology to a buffalo mythology,” and from this he learns that

people are able respond to the environment (85). For him, this is an example of myth that is alive

and able to inspire people to continue in the process of mythologization of the environment and

the world (85).

As long as horses continue to charge forth, carrying riders into streams, onto

mountaintops, along pathways and through passages, they will continue to inspire the mythic

imagination. According to The Penguin Dictionary of Symbols by Jean Chevalier and Alain

Gheerbrant, the horse is seemingly an archetype that is embedded in folk-memory, symbolically

linking day and night, light and darkness, and life and death in continuous manifestation, or life,
continuity and time itself, as it forcefully darts into the depths of the underworld and then soars

to the celestial heavens above, playing the hero in many wonder-tales (516-525). The image gives

rise to tales of old dun horses that can speak and transform lives, white circus horses that dance

to honor their masters and carry the human spirit forward, and majestic horses that rise out of sea

foam and blood with unfolded wings to perform its celestial ascent in the service of music and

poetry. The horse also bears witness to the need to respect and protect the Geronimos and Crazy

Horses of the world, whose plights are a painful part of our human history.

As horses harness themselves to the winds and dash forward with their manes

and tales flying, they inspire the human heart and the mythic imagination. Through the legends,

myths and tales of the Native Americans and other cultures, we can appreciate the myriad of

roles that the horse plays in lifting the human spirit. Tending to horses as the Native Americans

do, watching them relate to one another and getting to know their particular ways, allows us to

gain enhanced perspectives for understanding animals, nature, and our own place and meaning in

the world.
 Works Cited

Bulfinch, Thomas. Bulfinch’s Mythology Including the Complete Texts of The Age of
Fable, The Age of Chivalry, The Legends of Charlesmagne. New Jersey: Gramercy
Books, 1979.

Campbell, Joseph. The Flight of the Wild Gander: Explorations in the Mythological
Dimension (Selected Essays 1944-1968). Novato, California: New World Library,
2002.

---. The Hero With a Thousand Faces. Bollingen Series. 17. Princeton: UP, 1973.

---. The Power of Myth with Bill Moyers. Ed. Betty Sue Flowers. New York: Broadway
Books, 2001.

Chevalier, Jean and Alain Gheerbrant. The Penguin Dictionary of Symbols. Trans. John
Buchanan-Brown. New York: Penguin Books, 1996.

Deloria, Jr., Vine and Daniel R. Wildcat. Power and Place: Indian Education in America.
Golden, Colorado: Fulcrum Resources, 2001.

Erdoes, Richard and Alfonso Ortiz, eds. American Indian Myths and Legends. New York:
Pantheon Books, 1984.

Grant, Michael and John Hazel. Who’s Who in Classical Mythology. London and New
York: Routledge, 2002.

Grimal, Pierre. The Penguin Dictionary of Classical Mythology. Trans. A.R. Maxwell-
Hyslop. Oxford, England: Blackwell, 1991.

Jung, Carl G. Dreams. Trans. R.F.C. Hull. Bollingen Series XX. Princeton: Princeton UP,
1974.

---. Symbols of Transformation: An Analysis of a Prelude to a Case of Schizophrenia.

Bollingen Series XX. New York: Pantheon, 1956.

McNeese, Tim, Ed. Myths of Native America. New York: Four Walls Eight Windows,
1999.

Nabokov, Peter, Ed. Native American Testimony: A Chronicle of Eastern-White

Relations from Prophecy to the Present, 1492-2000 (rev Edition). New York:
Penguin Books, 1999.
 Works Cited Continued

Neihardt, John G. Ed. Black Elk Speaks. Introduction by Vine Deloria, Jr. Lincoln and
London: Nebraska UP, 1979.

Sherman, Joseph. Magic Hoofbeats: Horse Tales From Many Lands. Cambridge, MA:
Barefoot Books, 2004.

Silko, Leslie Marmon. Storyteller. New York: Arcade Publishing, 1981.

Zimmer, Heinrich. Myths and Symbols in Indian Art and Civilization. Ed. Joseph
Campbell. Bollingen Series, 6. Princeton: Princeton UP, 1972.

http://www.mustang-horses.org/
 The Huichol Trinity

By Pam Bjork

The retreat was called “Fire Feather Dream”, lead by a Jungian analyst and Huichol

initiate, Barry Williams and his wife, Renata Ritzman, fellow Huichol initiate and practitioner of

Plant Spirit Medicine. Their only instruction was to bring a wrapped gift, something of personal

significance and difficult to let go of, to place in the gifting circle, a ritual where potential

blessings are bestowed in direct proportion to one’s attachment to the gift. I carefully wrapped a

precious bronze Buddha for the gifting circle. In exchange for the Buddha, I received a beautiful

skull of a deer, complete with teeth and antlers. To my amazement, it was Barry’s offering! He

explained that the deer is the divinity of the Huichol Indians from the Sierra Madre Mountains in

northwestern Mexico. It is through sacrifice of the egos’ attachment that there exists the

possibility of reaching the deeper Self and it’s relationship to the Cosmos.

I knew just a little about the Huichol Indians, through their art. I had purchased a Huichol

yarn mask in Santa Fe, New Mexico, on a pilgrimage after my father’s death. A number of years

later I found an exquisite beaded deer head in Cancun, Mexico. I had lived with the art of the

Huichol for a number of years, knowing only that their imagery is sacred and representative of

their visions of peyote. The deer as a living presence and guiding divinity for me has also been

significant in other ways as well. I have purchased two houses due to deer gracefully bounding

across my path, one in Kansas and one in the mountains of Colorado where deer are plentiful. In

Bali, I was fascinated with the carved wooden deer heads with horn antlers that grace their

personal temples. I have a Burmese lacquer ware deer head and a Twelfth Century Tibetan

Monks Chest with an extraordinary painting of a mystical deer on the front.

 Who is this divinity of deer? We have seen their beautiful images as shamanic art in the

cave paintings of Les Trois Freres in Lascaux, France dated c. 14,000 BC (Campbell 76). We

know deer as a gentle and graceful animal, swift and nimble in its movements and keenly attuned

to its environment. It is a favorite animal of the hunters, yet our hearts are captured by the fawn’s

innocence, especially when we think of Bambi. It is said, “[…] they cry when dying, and their

tears are precious medicine” (deVries 132). Their antlers, located behind the eyes, are shed yearly

and made of bone. Peter Furst, who has studied, written about and apprenticed with the Huichols

since 1964, suggests, “In art […] deer antlers identify the sacred and thus play the same role as

the halo does in Renaissance paintings” (27).

In looking at the mythology of deer, we find in the Indian epic, The Mahabharata, a story

of Pandu killing a deer and doe in the act of mating. This large and beautiful deer was really a

Rishi’s son who proclaimed Pandu’s fate to be the same as his, that is, death in the act of making

love, which did of course eventually happen. In Greek mythology, the deer is sacred to Artemis,

the goddess who is the personification of wild nature and the hunt. One story tells of Actaeon,

who watched Artemis bathing in her sacred waters. This outraged her so, that she turned the King

into a deer and no matter how fast he ran, his own hounds hunted him down and tore him to

pieces. From these two stories we can see that deer is associated with sacrifice and the hunt. On

the other hand, though, it is said that Buddha gave his first teachings in a deer park, the teachings

of compassion.

Who are the Huichols? Due to their relative isolation in the mountains, the Huichols are

the only indigenous peoples in Mexico who have not been unduly influenced by Catholicism,

thereby preserving their traditional religion and ways of life. The Huichols hold the worldview of

all things being sacred and interrelated. As Barbara Meyerhoff says in Peyote Hunt, “The sacred
for the Huichol is continuous with the mundane in that it is the very fabric of everyday concerns

and everyday life as it is supposed to be” (75). She goes on to say, “An evil man is not truly

Huichol, for to be Huichol is to live in the proper manner. […] to be Huichol is to be sacred and

this applies to all behavior, objects, and ideas that make up the culture” (74). Arnold Mandell

describes their culture as a “[…] metaphysically complete peyote world of peaceful joy […]”

(81).

In order to understand the divinity of the deer for the Huichols we must first look at their

creation stories. The theme is one of a “[…] First Time, when men and animals were one […]”

(Peyote Hunt 58). Their origins tell of a time of unity, a primordial oneness. Their yarn paintings

portray visions “[…] of the Huichol world as it came into being […] and the ongoing magic of a

natural environment that is alive and without firm boundaries between the here and now and the

ancestral past” (Visions of a Huichol Shaman preface).

The oldest god of the Huichols is called Tatewari, Grandfather Fire and was personified

as the first mara’akame, or priest-shaman. “He reveals the messages and wishes of all the deities

to the mara’akame, either directly in dreams and visions or indirectly through Kauyumari, the

Sacred Deer Person and culture hero” (Peyote Hunt 77). Kauyumari, part animal and part man is

the connecting link between human consciousness and the deeper layers of reality of the

ancestors and nature spirits, the world soul. The individual self in this worldview has permeable

boundaries where nature reflects self and self is in direct relationship with nature. Robert Ryan in

Shamanism and the Psychology of C.G. Jung speaks of this relationship as a “[…] intensely

experienced reality of divine meaning and power unfolding in the world […]” (46). Through the

ritual of the peyote hunt, the Huichol Indians have a felt sense of the I-thou relationship and thus

the unity of the entire world.

 Upon arrival at the retreat in New Mexico we were introduced to Grandfather Fire,

Tatewari, who was built by “[…] crossing two logs on east-west and north-south axes” (Peyote

Hunt 106) leaving room at the center of the fire for the Ancient Ones, the ancestors, passage

between worlds. Meyerhoff explains this center as “[…] a manifestation of the axis mundi, the

pole which pierces the layers of the cosmos […] and symbolizes the conjunction of the layers of

the world” (106). The opening is called the nierika and “It can be understood as mirror, likeness,

face, aspect, or image of Otherworlds, and conversely as doorway or portal into “non-ordinary

reality,” the realm of the divine, creation, and transformation” (Furst 33). An artist, shaman or

healer beholds the nierika as a prelude to creation, possibly catching a glimpse of the

unknowable, in the space between worlds where psyche and matter meet, called the psychoid by

Jung. If the manifestation is numinous, we can feel the radiance of the divine in the form or

activity.

We were shown how to ritually enter and exit the teepee and how to keep the fire well fed

and alive, with offerings of tobacco. Why tobacco and what is its relationship to peyote? We all

know that tobacco is ritually used in many Native American traditions, in pipes in medicine

bundles and as offerings. Tobacco is related in structure and function to peyote as, “[…]

scientists have found links on a molecular level between mescaline, which is present in peyote,

nicotine in tobacco, and a naturally occurring hormone in the central nervous system” (“The

Crossing of Souls” 155). Thus the interrelatedness between Grandfather Fire who is the first

shaman and Kauyumari is explained. “Huichols tell me that Kauyumari “formed” the sacred

tobacco, and they smoke it because it is part of the gods. Peyote is also deer” (“The Crossing of

Souls”155). By continually feeding Grandfather Fire the world of the shaman remains accessible.
 Each year the Huichol go on pilgrimage to partake of the blessings of plant and animal

magic, to receive their life. In preparation for the arduous yearly pilgrimage to Wirikuta, the

magical place that is home to the visionary peyote, the mara’akame and peyoteros partake of

minimal food and sleep and forgo salt, sexual relations, and bathing for twenty days as means of

purification. In the initiations that Barry and Renata participate in, they must physically adhere to

the process for forty days, symbolizing the original journey and the return. All peyoteros

acknowledge all of their sexual partners to Grandfather Fire in order to embody the state of

innocence that is required for entrance to the sacred lands of Wirikuta. In “Peyote and the Mystic

Vision” Meyerhoff says the “[…] peyoteros must be transformed into the deities. The complex

cluster of ceremonies and rituals which prepares them for this return includes a rite wherein the

mara’akame dreams their names and the names of the Ancient Ones and thus determines their

godly identities” (56). This dreaming back unites the present with the past, the individual with

the collective unconscious. At the retreat, each of us, like the pilgrims of Wirikuta, would tend

the living fire overnight as part of the initiation, only sacrificing sleep rather than the more

difficult sacrifices of the Huichols.

What is the connection between peyote and deer and maize in this hunt that sustains,

informs and is the life of the Huichols? In The Peyote Hunt, Meyerhoff states, “Zingg sees the

deer hunt as a ‘mystic participation in the making of sunshine, because the first peyote

pilgrimage enables the sun to shine’ (1938:43)” (175), referring back to their creation story. The

Huichols call peyote hikuri and believe this mandala-shaped hallucinogenic cactus “[…] leads all

the initiates on their path to knowledge, to completion” (Egan 37). They call it “[…] ‘peyote

knowledge’ […] it attunes then to the eeyahlree neeahrhi’tuahlri – the heart of god which is lent

to them while in the peyote state […]” (Egan 39). The flower of the peyote is the blossoming of
life in the arid mountainous region of Wirikuta. Joseph Campbell, in The Inner Reaches of Outer

Space, writes: “[…] the mountaintop that is everywhere, beyond opposites, of transcendental

vision, where, as Blake discovered and declared, ‘the doors of perception are cleansed and

everything appears to man as it is, infinite’” (96). It takes the communal pilgrimage, the wisdom

of the mara’akame and the trinity of the peyote, deer and maize to open the door, allowing access

to the divine.

Once in Wirikuta, the mara’akame follows the deer tracks to search for the peyote that is

also deer. As the deer is slain “Blood gushes upward from it in the form of an arc of rays”

(Peyote Hunt 58). The arc of rays is brilliant and luminous, a glimpse of divinity similar to what

Arjuna saw in The Mahabharata as he was awed by the brilliance of the colors and patterns of

Lord Krishna on the battlefield. “With his sacred plumes, the mara’akame gently strokes the rays

back into the body” (Peyote Hunt 58). The slain deer is treated with great reverence as he is

sacramentally placed on an embroidered cloth, fed his favorite grasses and given sacred water to

drink. “The peyoteros weep with joy at having attained their goal and with grief at having slain

their brother […]” (Peyote Hunt 58). The deer’s ‘bones’, which is the actual root of the peyote

plant, is buried in the brush to allow for both symbolic and actual rebirth confirming the

widespread belief that “[…] bones are the seat of life […]” (Art of the Huichol Indians 23). It is

an ambivalent time for the initiates, carrying those bittersweet feelings about those moments of

life, death and sacrifice necessary for rebirth and the continuation of life.

What is propitiated by means of sacrifice? Jung writes, “The presence of the Godhead

binds all parts of the sacrificial act into a mystical unity, so that it is God himself who offers

himself as a sacrifice in the substances […]” (Jung, CW 11:378). When the Huichol partake of

the deer in their favorite form of venison soup, they are ingesting the gods in order to
communicate with and become one with them. In a similar vein, Catholics partake of Christ as

they drink wine and eat the host during Holy Communion. “The most important part of the deer

is his blood, which is the emblem of sustenance and fertility and his blood is sprinkled over the

seed corn that it may be equally sustaining. The deer is the sacrifice most valued by the gods and

without him rain and good crops, health and life, cannot be obtained” (Peyote Hunt 175). “It is

through the sacrifice of the creatures of time, i.e., the individual deer-peyote, that the eternal form

of the Master Animal is revealed to the peyoteros” (Ryan 208).

In the Huichol trinity of deer, peyote and maize, maize is the plant god. Eliot Cowan,

Renata’s teacher says, “Nature is dreamed by the gods. The gods are dreamed by God. To

commune with nature is to commune with the divine, so healing is truly a religious rite with

healer as priest” (55). Maize, when it is made into beer, can also alter one’s consciousness,

although to a lesser degree than peyote. Meyerhoff explains their similarities, “Peyote, like

maize, can ‘read one’s thoughts’ and punish one for being false or evil. The peyote rewards or

punishes a person according to his or her inner state and moral standing. The sanction is

immediate, just and certain, a most effective regulator of behavior in a small, well-integrated

society” (“Peyote and the Mystic Vision” 68). According to Meyerhoff, “Only the mara’akame’s

visions have deep meaning, the others are primarily for beauty” (Peyote Hunt 164). The peyotero

is not to speak of his visions, as each is different, just as each human being is unique. Ramon, the

Huichol shaman, in “Peyote and the Mystic Vision” explains: “[…] You keep it in your heart.

[…] It is like a secret because others have not heard the same thing, others have not seen the

same thing. These visions have no purpose, no message: they are themselves ” (59). For the

peyoteros the visions are about immediate experience, “[…] process of actual divinity

developing from the people’s experience” (Turner 3). This is a process that has a felt sense
through the body. “Peyote may be viewed as the Huichol provision for that dimension of

religious experience which can never be routinized and made altogether public – that sense of

awe and wonder, the mysterium tremendum et fascinans, without which religion is mere ritual

and form (“Peyote and the Mystic Vision” 60).

There has been much research and experiential discoveries about hallucinogens from

Gordon Wasson to Timothy Leary, Terrance McKenna and Stan Grof to name just a few. “Non-

ordinary” states of consciousness can be reached not only by substance but also by deep

meditation, certain forms of yoga, fasting, silence, drumming or chanting. The scientific view

states, “Recent discoveries have suggested that most known drugs or their analogues are already

in the brain. That is, the brain has its own […] hallucinogens (dimethyltryptamine)” (Mandell

73). In recognizing the importance of peyote as a plant spirit medicine he says, “Egoless energy,

a feeling of divine completeness, and spiritual insights […] may be the plant’s most significant

message both to man and about man” (Mandell 73). Man is divinity and divinity is man in the

substance of peyote. Peyote is the facilitator, the intermediary substance that connects through

ritual and presence of experience. Jung says, “In the ritual action man places himself at the

disposal of an autonomous and “eternal” agency operating outside categories of human

consciousness […]” (Jung, CW 11:379). In both the ritual use of peyote and the process of the

ritual pilgrimage, god is present. Through the peyote plant who is deer, and the consecration of

the maize with the blood of the deer; plant, animal and man are united and become one with the

world and cosmos. The mara’akame is the bridge for the ascent to god, “The soul of the shaman

[…] ascends in ecstasy by virtue of a different vehicle of ascent, the peyote” (Ryan 46).

The Elder in every Huichol rancho is usually a shaman or shaman/healer, similar to the

family compounds in Bali - another culture where the deer is revered. “For the Huichol, art is
prayer and direct communication with and participation in the sacred realm. It is meant to assure

the good and beautiful life: health and fertility of crops, animals and people; prosperity of the

individual, the kin group, and the larger society” (“The Art of Being Huichol” 19). As a means of

sustenance the yarn paintings were first intended for the market place, yet according to Furst their

sacredness is not affected. On the contrary, they make devotional yarn offerings for pilgrimage,

again reminiscent of the Balinese who make flower and rice offerings daily to their gods. The

wax that is used to hold the yarn in place must come from a sting less bee found only in Mexico.

As Furst relates, “Wax came into the world for use in the sacred arts when the body of one of

their number, named Bee Boy, was cremated, and liquid wax flowed from his body in place of

blood” (Art of the Huichol Indians 30). These Huichol yarn paintings are exquisite in detail and

remind one of the complexities of a Buddhist Wheel of Life tangka painting, where the sacred

knowledge is coded in the deities, colors and forms. For the Huichols, their art also is a means of

“[…] channeling sacred knowledge, insuring the continuity and survival of the legacy […]”

(Egan 36).

Humans in the Huichol worldview experience themselves as an un-alienated part of the

cosmos as a whole where all life is a coherence of pattern. There is meaning in cycles and

seasons, in the movements of nature, in the deer-peyote-maize that “[…] complete one another in

a dynamic, kaleidoscopic unity” (Lemaistre 309). The life cycle of maize occurs during the rainy

season and the deer lose their antlers, their “staffs of power” during the rainy season. Thus while

maize is in its prime, the deer loses his power temporarily. “Thus the sun, the deer, and the

peyote are here seen as the opposites of the night, of growth, and of maize, just as, more

abstractly, the lucidity of knowledge is the opposite of the mystery of life. For what unites the
peyote and the deer, the assistants of the mara’akame, is the fact that they are two elements in the

speculative knowledge possessed by the later, each reflected in the other” (Lemaistre 310).

Will this rather isolated society maintain its cultural heritage and integrity in these times

of great change? On the one hand, Mandell believes “It may be that the Huichols, combining

drug experience and ritual, have given us an ideal model to follow in what may be anticipated as

an era of brain-chemical religions. Their art-manic-full, bright, strong, and clear in embroidery

and yarn paintings-conveys the feeling of unapologetic belief in their symbols, the truths of their

existence still alive in this era of Mexican Indian alcoholism, poverty, obsequious fear, and

despair” (75). On the other hand, deer are scarce; there are even valiant efforts to airlift deer to

Wirikuta, yet bulls are often substituted for deer as the sacrificial animal. “[…] The Huichols are

being faced with this dilemma: in order to find their ‘life’ they must hunt the deer, but today the

hunt risks the destruction of the very animal that is the source of their joy and their power”

(Lemaistre 326). The shaman/healers are initiating those from other cultures to carry the sacred

knowledge forward. According to Barry and Renata it is a difficult and demanding path that one

would not necessarily choose – it chose them and they are now deep into their ninth year of

initiation. Their shaman/healer/teacher told them “When you need to reconnect with the past, we

are holding it for you.”

We end with a Huichol story of the end times as told to Barbara Meyerhoff during her

peyote pilgrimage in 1966:

When the world ends, it will be like when the names of things are changed, during the
peyote hunt. All will be different, the opposite of what it is now. Now there are two eyes
in the heavens, Dios Sol and Dios Fuego. Then, the moon will open his eye and become
brighter. The sun will become dimmer. There will be no more difference. No more man
and woman. No child and no adult. All will change places. Even the mara’akame will no
longer be separate. That is why there is always a nunutsi [Huichol, little baby] when we
go to Wirikuta. Because the old man, the tiny baby, they are the same. (“Peyote and the
Mystic Vision” 57)
 Works Cited

Art of the Huichol Indians. Ed. Kathleen Berrin. New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1978.

Campbell, Joseph. The Inner Reaches of Outer Space. Novato, California:

New World Library, 1986.

---. The Way of the Animal Powers, Vol. 1. San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1983.

Cowan, Eliot. Plant Spirit Medicine. Columbus, North Carolina: Swan Raven &
Company, 1995.

deVries, Ad. Dictionary of Symbols and Imagery. Amsterdam: North-Holland

Publishing Company, 1984.

Egen, Susan. “Huichol Women’s Art.” Art of the Huichol Indians. Ed. Kathleen Berrin.
New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1978. 35-53.

Fikes, Jay C., Weigand, Phil C., Garcia de Weigand, Acelia. Introduction. Zingg, Robert
M. Huichol Mythology. Tucson: University of Arizona Press. 2004. xii-xxxvi.

Furst, Peter T. Visions of a Huichol Shaman. Philadelphia: U of Pennsylvania Museum

Of Archaeology and Anthropology, 2003.

Jung, Carl Gustav. “The Psychology of the Mass.” Trans. R.F.C. Hull. The Collected
Works of C. G. Jung. Vol.11. Bollingen Series 20. Princeton: Princeton UP,
1976. 247-296.

Lemaistre, Denis, “The Deer that is Peyote and the Deer That Is Maize.” People of the
Peyote. Albuquerque: U of New Mexico P, 1996.306-329.

Mandell, Arnold J. “The Neurochemistry of Religious Insight and Ecstasy.” Art of the
Huichol Indians. Ed. Kathleen Berrin. New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1978.
71-81.

Meyerhoff, Barbara. Peyote Hunt, The Sacred Journey of the Huichol Indians.
Ithaca, New York: Cornell UP, 1974.

---. “Peyote and the Mystic Vision” Art of the Huichol Indians. Ed. Kathleen Berrin.
New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1978. 56-70.

Ryan, Robert E. Shamanism and the Psychology of C.G. Jung. London: Chrysalis
Books, 2002.
 Works Cited Continued

Schaefer, Stacy B., “The Crossing of Souls: Peyote, Perception and Meaning among the
Huichol Indians.” People of the Peyote. Albuquerque: U of New Mexico P, 1996.
136-168.

Schaefer, Stacy B., and Furst, Peter T. “Introduction.” People of the Peyote.
Albuquerque: U of New Mexico P, 1996. 1-25.

The Sacred Mushroom Seeker, Ed. Thomas J. Riedlinger. Rochester, Vermont: Park
Street Press, 1997.

Turner, Edith. Experiencing Ritual. Philadelphia: U of Pennsylvania P, 1992.

Williams, Barry. Personal communication. 2005-2006.

Zingg, Robert M. Huichol Mythology. Tucson: University of Arizona Press. 2004.

 The Hopi Wedding Belt: Cosmic Text and Textile

By Linda Vogelsong

In 1976, as part of an interdisciplinary masters degree combining anthropology,

mythology and art, I researched the Hopi Wedding Belt for Barre Toelken, an exciting, young

professor of folklore at the University of Oregon. When I “googled” him about a year ago on the

Internet, I found an article in a 1995 issue of Parabola devoted to the archetype of “The

Stranger.” Professor Toelken’s essay, entitled “Fieldwork Enlightenment,” focuses on the

“bothersome realization” that after over forty years of scholarship and a respected career in the

field of folklore, his fieldwork had brought him to “things beyond his capacity to understand or

control.” “That it took me forty years to learn enough to know I was over my head should stand

as a cautionary example for anyone engaged in fieldwork outside his own culture” (28). This

paper represents just that – fieldwork done by the proverbial stranger in a culture not my own. It

is the study of the most ancient and revered textile of the Hopi people, their sacred wedding belt.

Of the three levels of fieldwork -- the surface level describing the tradition; the second level

revealing the worldview assumptions inherent in that tradition; and the third level exploring the

tradition’s power to transform its world -- this paper collects a rare combination of material at the

first level, glimpses the tip of a mountain of mythological associations at the second, and only

hints at the implications for our world of the third.

Beginning at the first level of tradition description, this snow white, braided sash (Wo-ku-

quay-wa), known as the Hopi Wedding Belt, has been continuously made and used for well over

two thousand years by the Hopi people, now living in the North American Southwest, (Amsden

2) (Fig 1). In that time the textile has changed very little, testifying to an enduring tradition that

has central ceremonial, mythological and historical ties to the core of Hopi culture. The sash
itself, braided of two-ply hand spun cotton, spans an eight to ten inch width and an eight to ten

foot length, finished on either end with long, lovely strands of loose fringe (Fig. 2). Bridging the

solid white field of the braid to the flowing fringe on both ends is a row of spherical, cotton-

covered, cornhusk beads. A downy white eagle feather and a small yellow warbler feather are

tied at one of the belt’s four corners. Braided for the bride in the kiva of the bridegroom’s clan,

Hopi men are the ceremonial weavers, priests and storytellers that preside over not only the

wedding sacraments, but also all the other ritual occasions where the belt is used.

The bride carries the newly woven sash, as part of the wedding ritual, to the home of her

parents from the home of her in-laws where she waits for her wedding garments to be woven. On

the formal walk between the houses, she carries the belt in a reed mat from which the long fringe

hangs like falling rain. After she is married, the bride will wear her wedding belt and attire four

times: at the close of the Niman kachina ceremony, at the Snake Dance, at the time her first child

is presented to the sun, and at her death. Her male relatives however, will wear the belt more

frequently as part of their kachina costume in the annual ceremonial cycle of ritual dances.

Although the ancient finger woven or braided textile can be traced continuously from

prehistoric pueblo periods down to the present day in an unbroken line of descent, the belt’s

prevalence and quality has ebbed and flowed with historic periods of cultural feast and famine

(Kent 46) (Fig 3). When I visited the Rio Grande pueblos to do my fieldwork in the summer of

1976, including San Ildefonso, San Juan, Santa Clara, Santa Domingo, Acoma and Tesque, with

few exceptions, the Hopi remained the sole weavers of sacred cotton garments, including the

traditionally braided belt, which they supplied to all the Pueblos for important ceremonial

purposes. One change in the age-old character of the belt, perhaps as dramatic as the change from

dog hair to cotton in a very early period, is the appearance of a woven versus braided version of
the belt, which is much easier and quicker to make. Needless to say, the “knock off” lacks the

mysterious beauty and charm, not to mention the cultural and cosmological power that is

preserved in the traditional braided textile.

Also called the “rain sash,” the Hopi Wedding Belt probably survives among the Hopi

because they, more than many Native peoples, have remained aloof from outside contact and

therefore more immune to change. Rooted in a reverential, ritual-based way of life the traditional

Hopi Wedding Belt represents much more than an accessory to be worn on ceremonial occasions.

The Hopi, their belt, and their religious rites have coexisted for two thousand years intertwined in

a sacred collaboration between the people and the cosmos to sustain life in deep ecological

balance. Living secluded on a high barren plateau in the four corners area of the Southwest with

no rivers or streams for irrigating, the Hopi have never forgotten their dependence on a living

cosmos for water, hence their unceasing prayers for rain enacted in an annual cycle of ceremonies

tied to their mythic origins (Waters, Book 135). The Hopi creation myth describes four worlds

from which the people emerge to be in this world:

The first creatures lived in the lowest cave. When it grew overcrowded and dirty, twin
brothers came from heaven with all the plants of the world, hoping that one would prove
tall and strong enough to allow every being to climb to the world above. The cane proved
ideal. After a time, the second cave also became full and the creatures climbed the cane
into the third cave. There, the two brother gods found fire and, by its light, people built
houses and could travel. But a time of evil came upon them and the people climbed up
out into this, the fourth world, led by the two brothers. (Willis, World Mythology 223)

From this myth, imbued with primal, archetypal patterns of world creation, preservation,

and destruction, comes a way of life that is timelessly encoded in the text of this pivotal textile,

in the intense core of its mythology, and in its central ceremonial role at the heart of Hopi culture.

Before cultivation of cotton ceased, the ginning of cotton was a ceremony in itself. The

men brought a painting of the sun to the kiva. This sun, painted on a deerskin, was laid for a
moment on a large bed of clean sand and sprinkled with cornmeal. After this opening ritual of

prayer and purification, the painting was removed and the cotton was laid in its place to be lightly

beaten into a fluffy mass by a group of men with slender, pliant sticks. The process, in effect,

cleaned and whitened the cotton, making it ready to card and spin (Underhill 34-38). This

ceremony is one of many manifestations of the sun in its mythological role as the most powerful

creative force in the universe: “Personified as the Sun Father, he is the creator, the original

impulse, the primal source of all life” (Waters, Masked 196). As such, “when the cotton

blossomed, it received its first fertilization from the Sun Father, creating a cord within itself, the

bud, to receive the life fluid from the Sun” (Waters Book, 162). Cotton’s potent association with

Father Sun is never lost in its translation into cord, which in turn is braided into the belt used to

celebrate and strengthen the relationship between the Hopi and their creator.

The ritual of spinning takes place most actively in the winter months when the men are

not needed in the fields. It is traditionally a good time to gather in the kiva, an underground

ceremonial chamber, which represents the four worlds of Hopi emergence. In this sacred space,

which is both womb and tomb, the elders transfer the oral traditions, initiate the young into their

clan responsibilities, and introduce them to the techniques of weaving. By the age of twelve to

fourteen, the young men are well inculcated into the male activities of kiva life (Waters Masked,

368). Almost all men among the Hopi at one time knew how to spin the cotton cord, which is

used for making countless pahos or prayer feathers, the prime requisite for any ceremony. Used

to tie the sticks and feathers of the paho together, the cotton cord, measured from the wrist to the

tip of the middle finger, appends a downy eagle feather to the body of the paho. That cord,

conceived in the cotton bud by the Sun Father to receive his life force, is considered the “life
cord.” When the end is tied to an eagle feather, it symbolizes the “breath of life,” and the length

of that cord represents “long life” (Waters Book 162).

Spinning, a symbol of the great spiral in world mythologies says An Illustrated

Encyclopeadia of Traditional Symbols, represents the great creative force of expansion and

contraction, growth and death. Its winding and unwinding defines the cyclical course and

dynamic aspect of creation in all its forms. Universally associated with spinning and weaving, the

spiral represents the web of life, the controller of destiny, and the weaving of the veil of illusions.

The spiral also signifies the labyrinth wanderings of the psyche. The double spiral embodies the

increase and decrease of solar and lunar power, the alternating rhythms of evolution and

involution, life and death, the two hemispheres, the two poles of day and night, the rhythm of

nature, yin and yang, shakta and shakti, the manifest and the unmanifest, and the all important

continuity between cycles. Symbolic of healing power, the double spiral, of which each Hopi

cotton two-ply cord is made, also appears as the caduceus associated with the Egyptian god

Thoth, the Greek god Hermes, and in alchemy the combined two-way action of the masculine

and feminine (Cooper 156-157).

Representing for the Hopi an archetypal pathway or axis mundi referred to as “The Road

of Life,” the spun cotton cord represents the duality inherent in the nature of human existence --

the interaction of sentient beings with their world, of the Self with “other”, of the conscious with

the unconscious (Waters, Book 189). From a linear perspective this dialectic exchange looks like

a sine wave of undulating ups and downs, similar to a chart of the rhythmic rise and fall of

civilizations in human history (Smith). From a psychological perspective, this same interaction of

Self with “other” or the conscious with the unconscious looks more like a spiral. Describing the
contours of this royal soul-making road in “Introduction to the Religious and Psychological

Problems of Alchemy” Jung asserts:

The way is not straight but appears to go round in circles.† More accurate knowledge has
proved it to go in spirals:† the dream-motifs always return after certain intervals to
definite forms, whose characteristic it is to define a centre.† And as a matter of fact the
whole process revolves around a central point or some arrangement round a centre, which
may in certain circumstances appear even in initial dreams. (Collected Works Vol. 12, 28)

The ritual of braiding of these myth-laden spiral cotton cords into a belt takes place on a

simple, horizontal loom, once again in the sacred underground womb/tomb of the kiva. The

loom itself consists of two poles, one fitted into a hole in the kiva wall and the other into a hole

in a large stone lying on the floor. The warp is strung on the loom in multiples of twelve, usually

two hundred and four, or two hundred and sixteen revolutions plus one floater for braiding. The

braiding, done on the foremost plane or “upper world” of the continuous circular warp, is

accomplished by interlacing the floater over two cords and under two cords one row at a time,

moving first from right to left and then returning left to right. After manipulating the floaters of

each row the weaver inserts a rod to first push the row of braids forward into place one way and

then to carry the braid’s backflow in the opposite direction around and under the loom to create a

corresponding row of braids simultaneously on the opposite half of the belt (Fig 4). This rare

braiding technique can be traced back to ancient beginnings in Peru where the Hopi are said to

have journeyed north from to settle in their present location.

When the main body of the belt is completed, with the entire warp either braided or held

in place by rods, the rods are removed and the belt is cut off the loom. At this point, the men

separate and braid the fringe into six independent sections of one to two inches in length. These

sections hold the ornamental cornhusk rings in place out of which dangles the lengthy fringe of

meticulously twisted cords. These are the strands which can be seen flowing from the mouth of
the reed mat in the hands of the bride during her wedding walk, and can be seen dancing like

falling rain from the waists of the kachina dancers moving in ceremonial consort with the

cosmos. During the entire braiding process the weaver dips his hands into white, clay liquid,

called kaolin to retain and enhance the symbolically white character of the belt (Roediger 135).

White is the symbol for a great cluster of concepts close to the heart of Hopi life. When

spider woman created mankind she mixed four colors of earth, wetted them with the liquid of her

mouth, molded them and covered them with her white substance cape representing the fecundity

of creative wisdom itself (Waters, Book 6). When a boy is still too young to be initiated at Niman

kachina ceremony, he is given a toy bow marked with segments of different colors. The middle

section is white, representing the untainted perfection that existed in the First World, the Golden

Age of Hopi mythology (Waters, Book 251). Of the four directions each designated with a color,

the east is the most sacred. Its color is white, a composite of all the colors to symbolize the Sun

Father’s radiant light (Waters Book 196). These culturally instilled concepts of white create the

visually and emotionally stunning aura of the belt when it appears at birth, at marriage, and at

death, as well as at every annual sacred ceremonial dance in between.

When a mother presents her child to the Sun Father twenty days after birth, she wears her

wedding sash. In the early dawn, she uncovers her baby to greet the first sunlight since birth,

prays for a long life and calls out the names the baby has received in order that the Sun Father

might hear them and recognize the newborn (Talayesva 32). When a couple is married, the bride

wears a borrowed wedding sash and carries her newly braided belt in the reed mat along with a

small wedding basket (Fig 5). The long fringe of the sash, which hangs from the mat, represents

her preparedness for the next world symbolized as rain falling from a pure white cloud (Colton

and Nequatewa 47). At death, the Hopi woman is dressed in her wedding sash and blanket to
make her entrance into Maski, where the souls of the dead abide. Only those who have led a

worthy life may enter and they may not pass wearing a garment that is not pure or anything that

has been boiled. Therefore all wedding garments, if dyed, must be dyed with a color that may be

applied and removed by soaking only. When the soul of the woman arrives at the entrance to the

next world, which is at the bottom of the Grand Canyon, she spreads her white robe, steps on it,

and floats down (Colton and Nequatewa 53). The belt serves as the tail of the bird guiding the

bride in her spiritual flight (Talayesva 220). Birds in general, and the eagle in particular, are

mythological messengers of prayers for life-sustaining rain. They are represented on the sash as

the eagle and warbler feathers attached to the one corner. After death, the woman, like the bird

will also become a messenger, a kachina ancestor who returns to bring her people rain.

In the yearly cycle of dances, the wedding belt, referred to in this context as the rain sash,

is considered one of the most sacred and potent of the rainmaking garments (Roediger 132). Its

structure of corresponding halves, simultaneously braided out of a midpoint on the circular warp,

symbolically mirrors the same conceptual framework that underlies the ceremonial dances in

which the sash functions. The superstructure of an annual cycle of ritual drama and dance is

based on the Hopi concept of two worlds, an upper and a lower world contained in a single

creative unifying circle. This sense of a cosmic, unbroken wholeness inherent in all earthly

duality is symbolically reflected in the braiding of the belt. The upper world, earth, which

symbolically occurs on the topside of the loom where the belt is actively braided, is considered

the path from birth to death. The lower world, represented by the bottom side of the circular warp

where the passive braids travel on rods to create the opposite half of the belt, conversely is

considered the path from death to birth. The Hopi like the braided belt travels a circular Road of

Life from birth to death and death to birth seeking no short cuts or diversions from this
indigenous initiatory cycle. “He is content to move slowly and in unison with all around him in

this pattern into which he has been inducted at birth” (Waters, Book 192).

Based on the premise that there is life taking place in an underworld that duplicates and

corresponds to life in the upper world, the ceremonial cycle of dances enacted on earth are also

enacted below in the spirit world. For example, a ceremony such as Powamu, taking place in

February on earth, would correspondingly take place in the lower or spirit world during

September (Waters Book 232-233). The underworld or lower world, as in depth psychology, does

not mean underneath the earth, but rather refers to the world of soul within and beyond the

physical world. Represented symbolically in the two halves of the belt, one set of braids moves in

a circle clockwise, earth wise movement, and the other set of braids moves counter clockwise, in

keeping with the contrary nature of the spirit world. Cooperation and consciousness between the

two worlds in every aspect of the Hopi life, including the braiding of the Wedding Belt,

symbolically manifests the eternal in linear time and the spirit in corporeal space.

In a collaborative worldview, the kachinas, as spirits of invisible life forces, are

interlopers who not only ritually bring rain to the earth, but they take back the people’s prayers

for rain when they return to the lower world where they prepare the life plan for the year to come.

For example, in the ceremony of Soyal, the kachinas appearing at winter solstice are present on

the upper world for six months to harvest prayers for rain. During the Niman kachina just after

summer solstice, they return home to the lower world for the next six months to plant those

prayers in the cosmic realm, where they perpetuate and renew the ongoing cycle of life. The

nature of the sash’s structure, which reflects a cosmic pattern and the conceptual structure of the

ceremonial cycle in which the sash operates, demonstrates the intimate, perfectly aligned, living

correspondence between mind and matter that exists in every great culture.
 Another exceptional indigenous culture, the Dogon of West Africa, like the Hopi, have a

societal container, which mirrors their worldview of cosmic architecture. The Dogon original

creator god is Amma, “The One Who Holds” (World Mythology 24). The Dogon, like the Hopi,

conceive their artifacts, organizations, institutions, inventions, and ritual celebrations of life

passages from birth to death in the image of Amma. The creations of the human family in the

Dogon worldview are autonomous sub-totalities of the creator’s greater totality. Although each

sub-totality is imprinted with its own unique blueprint, its archetypal particularity of that

wholeness is contextualized within the greater fabric of societal and the cosmic architecture. Like

the Hopi, in the Dogon culture, one of many examples of this “cosmocultural” holograph occurs

in the craft of weaving and its association with marriage. French anthropologist Marcel Griaule,

in his seminal study of Dogon cosmology, Conversations with Ogotemmeli, sheds a cross-

cultural light on the Hopi ceremony and its signature belt:

The cooperation of man and woman, in storing the seeds, sowing and growing the cotton,
has the same meaning as spinning and weaving, symbols of love. Spinning cotton and
weaving clothing is exactly the same as a man and a woman entering the house to sleep
together and produce children. The weaver…is also the male who opens and closes the
womb of the woman, represented by the heddle. The stretched threads represent the act of
procreation. The cotton threads of the weavers and the numerous men [and women] in the
world are all one. The making of the cloth symbolizes the multiplication of mankind. The
craft of weaving in fact’ said Ogotemmeli in conclusion ‘is the tomb of resurrection, the
marriage bed and the fruitful womb.’ (73)

The distilled symbolism of the Hopi Wedding Belt is also synonymous with birth, death,

marriage and all the ceremonies that bring the renewal of life and creative wisdom to their

society. The braided belt represents a worldview, which like Dogon weaving, is based on a unity

at the center of all creation, continuously capable of spinning out other unities (Pelton 172).

Ceremonially the wedding sash braids together the sacred and the profane in a rounded way of

life. Absent of any formal priesthood aloof from the rest of society, or a religion separated from
the daily functions of ordinary life, the Hopi who puts on the belt as a kachina or bride returns to

the fields, the hearth or to the law office after the ceremony to cooperate in the manifestation of

the prayers that have been offered. Likewise the Hopi Wedding Belt, an unusual and rare textile

is not divided into warp and weft, but instead is fabricated out of one continuous thread loop,

rendering the sacramental sash symbolically well suited to represent the underlying cosmic unity

within the earthly fabric of duality.

To the Hopi, the circular course of the sun’s path and humankind’s circular Road of Life

are synonymous. Both are conceptualized as running in a “clockwise circuit” that describe a

“perfect rounded whole” divided into the upper and lower worlds, time and space, day and night,

life and death (Waters, Book 189). The rhythmically altering upper and lower worlds are

“represented laterally on the floor of the kiva as a line of cornmeal running west and east, toward

the rising sun, which ever heralds the beginning of a new cycle” (Waters, Book 192). After the

belt is cut from the circular loom, it becomes likewise a lateral representation of a creative unity

and balance within the Hopi universe. As our natural world continues to devolve in ecological

crisis, great indigenous cultures like the Hopi parallel this crisis and from all accounts are slowly

disintegrating. The preservation of the sash, which represents Hopi preservation of the principles

of harmony between psyche and cosmos, may signify the first and final fiber from which their

ancient civilization is woven. The fate of the fourth world say the Hopi, “depend on whether or

not its inhabitants behave in accordance with the Creator’s plans” (Willis 26).
 Works Cited

Amsden, Charles. Navaho Weaving. Chicago: Rio Grande Press, 1934.

American Indian Myths and Legends. New York: Pantheon Books, 1984, Ed. Richard Erdoes.

Bandelier, Francis. The Delight Maker. New York: Harvest Books, 1971.

Bartlett, Katherine. “How To Appreciate Hopi Handicrafts.” Museum Notes. Vol. 9, #1.
Flagstaff: Museum of Northern Arizona, 1936.

Bartlett, Katherine. “The Hopi Indian Costume.” Museum Notes. Vol. 9, #1. Flagstaff: Museum
of Northern Arizona,1949.

Collingwood, Peter. The Techniques of Sprang. New York: The Lyons Press, 1999

Colton, Mary. “The Arts And Crafts Of The Hopi Indians.” Museum Notes. Vol. 11, #1.
Flagstaff: Museum of Northern Arizona, 1938.

---. “Hopi Courtship And Marriage.” Museum Notes. Vol. 5, #9. Flagstaff: Museum of Northern
Arizona, 1933.

---. “The Hopi Craftsman.” Museum Notes. Vol. 2, #12. Flagstaff: Museum of Northern Arizona,
1930.

Cooper, J.C. An Illustrated Encyclopaedia of Traditional Symbols. New York: Thames and
Hudson, Inc., 1988.

Douglas, Frederich, “Main Types of Pueblo Cotton Textiles.” Leaflets 92-93. Denver: Denver
Art Museum, 1940.

---. “Weaving In The Tewa Pueblos.” Leaflet 90. Denver: Denver Art Museum, 1939.

---. “Weaving Of The Keres Pueblos. Weaving in the Tiwa Pueblos and Jemez.” Leaflet 91.
Denver: Denver Art Museum, 1939.

Griaule, Marcel. Conversations with Ogotemmeli: An Introduction To Dogon Religious Ideas.

London: Oxford UP, 1975.

Jung, Carl Gustav. “Introduction to the Religious and Psychological Problems of Alchemy.”
Trans. R.F.C. Hull. The Collected Works of C.G. Jung. Vol. 12. Bollingen Series 20.
Princeton: Princeton UP, 1967. 1-37.
 Works Cited Continued

Kent, Kate Peck. “Archeological Clues To Early Historic Navaho And Pueblo Weaving.”
Plateau. Vol. 39 #1. Flagstaff: Museum of Northern Arizona, 1966.

---. “The Braiding Of A Hopi Wedding Sash.” Plateau. Vol. 12, #3. Flagstaff: Museum of
Northern Arizona, 1940.

---. “Notes On The Weaving Of Prehistoric Pueblo Textiles.” Plateau. Vol. 14, #1. Flagstaff:
Museum of Northern Arizona, 1941.

McGregor, J. C. “Prehistoric Cotton Fabrics of Arizona.” Museum Notes. Vol. 4, #2. Flagstaff:
Museum of Northern Arizona, 1931.

MacLeish, Kenneth. “Notes On Hopi Belt-Weaving Of Moenkopi.” American Anthropologist.

Vol. 42, 1940.

Pelton, Robert D. The Trickster in West Africa: A Study of Mythic Irony and Sacred Delight.
Berkeley, California: U of California P, 1980.

Roedeiger, Virginia and Eggan, Fred. Ceremonial Costumes Of The Pueblo Indians. Berkeley:
University of California Press, 1992.

Smith, Evans Lansing. “Native Mythologies of the Americas, Lecture Two.” Pacifica Graduate
Institute. Carpinteria, California, March 2006.

Spier, Leslie, “Zuni Weaving Techniques.” American Anthropologist. Vol. 26, 1924.

Stephen, Alexander. Hopi Journal of Alexander M. Stephen. New York: Ethnographic Arts
Publications, 1999.

Talayesva, Don. Sun Chief: The Autobiography of a Hopi Indian. New Haven: Yale University
Press, 1963.

Tanner, Clara Lee. Southwest Indian Craft Arts. Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 1968.

Toelken, Barre. “Fieldwork Enlightenment.” Parabola Vol XX, No. 2 (Summer 1995): 28-35.

Underhill, Ruth. Pueblo Crafts. Washington D.C.: R. Schneider, 1984.

Wade, Edwin and Evans, David. “The Kachina Sash: A Native Model of the Hopi World.”
Western Folklore Vol. 32, #1 (1973).

Waters, Frank. Book Of The Hopi. New York: Penguin, 1977.

 Works Cited Continued

---. Masked Gods: Navaho And Pueblo Ceremonialism. New York: Swallow Press, 1950.

Whiting, Alfred. “The Bride Wore White.” Plateau. Vol. 37, #4. Flagstaff: Museum of Northern
Arizona, 1965.

Willis, Roy, gen ed. World Mythology. New York: Henry Holt and Company, 1996.
 The Wind Beneath Our Wings:

Divine Inspiration and Shadow Exaltation in Rites of (Gas) Passage

By Craig Titley

Adolf Hitler, according to Pulitzer Prize winning historian/biographer John Toland,

“suffered from meteorism, uncontrollable farting” (402). To deal with this embarrassing ailment

the F2hrer began ingesting Dr. K$ster’s anti-gas pills in 1936. By 1941, when he was invading

Russia, Hitler was popping “120 to 150 anti-gas pills a week” (678). Three years later Dr. Erwin

Giesling, the newest of Hitler’s private physicians, examined the pills and “was horrified to learn

they contained strychnine and atropine”--two deadly poisons (825). The toxic effects of atropine:

delirium, hallucinations, and paranoia (CFNP 35). Considering the thousands and thousands of

these pills Hitler had been consuming during his rise and reign, it seems quite possible that

farting, or rather the attempt to suppress the act of farting, may have driven Hitler mad(der), lead

to World War II, and resulted in the extermination of over six million Jews.

Farts are, to be sure, no laughing matter.

As early as 420 B.C. Hippocrates had warned of the dangers of holding in a fart: “It is

better for it to pass with noise than to be intercepted and accumulated internally” (qtd. in Dawson

4). In 1518, Sir Thomas More, in an epigram entitled In Efflatum Ventis, wrote “’Wind, if you

keep it too long in your stomach, kills you; on the other hand, it can save your life if it is properly

let out. If wind can save or destroy you, then is it not as powerful as dreaded kings?’” (qtd. in

Dawson 5). And as recently as 1994, two scientists in Holland recommended, “for good health

you need to fart about fifteen times a day” (Dawson 11). Yet despite the fact that fart suppression

can lead to health problems, death, and the occasional world war, farts and farting are still

considered taboo in most cultures, including our own.

 Doctors Eric S. Rabkin, PhD, and Eugene M. Silverman, M.D., have detailed many of the

punitive rites and practices associated with farting in their detailed study of multi-cultural

flatulence. For example when a member of the Selkinam people of Tierra del Fuego breaks wind,

“the whole group breaks up, running around and chasing the offender away” (45), and if an adult

member of the Kapuaka of New Guinea willingly breaks wind they “may be punished by

expulsion from the group while children may be beaten with sticks” (46). Scientist John Gregory

Bourke (1846-1896), who spent a decade of his life researching scatalogic folklore and rites for

his book Scatalogic Rites of All Nations, notes that among many Arab tribes, “the voiding of

wind is considered to be the gravest indecency” (89), resulting in expulsion, beatings, or even

death...and not just for those who dealt the smell. According to Bourke, “[t]he Bedawi [...] has a

mortal hatred to a crepitus ventris, and were a by-stander to laugh at its accidental occurrence, he

would be at once cut down” (89). Beatings and violence seem to be a common response to the

fart. One of the most interesting customs detailed by Rabkin and Silverman is that of the Thonga

goatheards of South Africa:

[...] when one of them is detected to have let a fart, they yell Fakisa at him--what has
happened? Everything is fine if he will just respond simply with the words Cita
munyakanya goben--I have let wind out through the rectum. But if he does not know the
formulaic admission, he is beaten and made to take over the herding until the end of that
day. (46)

A variant of this confessional rite found its way to my own childhood backyard in rural

Illinois. If anyone among us farted he had to call out “Beats” before any of the non-farters yelled

“No Beats.” If a “No Beats” came first the non-farters were allowed to pummel the farter until he

grabbed the nearest doorknob. A marital variation on these confessional rites was witnessed

among the African Chagga where “if a man farts at the dinner table, his wife must pretend that it
was she who let it fly. In fact, she must allow herself to be scolded about it by her husband”

(Rabkin 51).

In other cultures, because the shame associated with farting is so intense, the punishment

is often self-inflicted. When a young man of the Tikopia of Polynesia farted in front of his tribal

chiefs he was so ashamed that he “committed suicide by impaling himself through the rectum”

(Rabkin 49). Similarly, in the Truk Islands, “’a young chap let out a noise that filled him with

such shame that he went into the forest, reviled his rectum, and ripped it open with a sharp shell

so that he bled to death’” (Rabkin 49). Bronislaw Malinowski, who studied the Trobriand

Islanders of Melanesia, detailed one of their folk stories that seems to capture the general

worldview of farting in both primitive and modern cultures: “In the tale of the louse and the

butterfly, the joke consists in the louse emitting a resounding noise from the rectum, by which

explosion he is thrown off the butterfly’s back and drowned in the sea” (Malinowski 403).

The moral of the story is quite clear: you fart, you die, and you deserve it. Suffice it to say that

one must be very cautious before attempting the “pull my finger” gag in a strange land.

Although there are some examples of cultures that embrace farting, for the most part farts

are, quite literally, on a culture’s “shit list.” In Purity and Danger, anthropologist Mary Douglas

posits that anything coming from the body’s margins is likely to suffer this type of negative

stigmatism: “...all margins are dangerous [...]. We should expect the orifices of the body to

symbolise (sic) its specially vulnerable points. Matter [...] by simply issuing forth have traversed

the boundary of the body” (122). Along with excrement, saliva, blood, and urine, the traversing

fart is considered a pollutant and a defiler of all that is sacred and clean. Perhaps farts are even

more dangerous because they are not solid, tangible matter, thus enabling them to disperse and

penetrate like a toxic wind. Or like the sly Devil himself.

 Norman O. Brown notes that the Devil is often associated with “a sulphurous or other evil

smell, the origin of which is plainly revealed in the article ‘De crepitu Diaboli’ in an eighteenth-

century compendium of folklore” (207). Martin Luther himself made “wood-cut sketches of

small demons being forcefully expelled from the Devil’s asshole” (Dawson 90) and told the story

of a Lutheran pastor “to whom the Devil appeared in the confessional, blasphemed Christ, and

‘departed leaving a horrible stench’” (Brown 208). This suggests that the fart is something evil,

the spawn or tool of Satan if not the stench of his very own soul. Yet Martin Luther also believed

that a fart could be used against Satan. In fact Luther himself had used this anal weapon,

recording that “in one encounter, when Lutheran doctrines had not sufficed to rout the Devil, he

had routed him ‘mit einem Furz’” (Brown 208). Now we know why Jesus, in the Gospels, said

“Get thee behind me, Satan.”

Luther’s faith in and respect for the power of farting is not surprising considering that the

foundation of the Protestant Reformation--the doctrine of justification by faith--came to Martin

Luther, by his own documented admission, when he was more than likely breaking a little wind:

“’This knowledge the Holy Spirit gave me on the privy in the tower’” (qtd. in Brown 202).

Apparently modern Christianity, like World War II, might also have been the indirect result of

the common fart. This wind does indeed seem to have the power to save and destroy.

There is an ambivalent duality in the fart. They are at once repulsive and attractive (ever

pull the covers over your head after letting on in bed?); filthy and healthy; silly and sublime.

And, it would appear, sacred and profane. Is it possible that Sir Thomas More, no stranger to

spiritual insights himself, was not merely discussing the medical implications of farting when he

said they could save or destroy us like “dreaded kings”? Perhaps there is a salvific component to
farts that transcends their physical properties and transforms farts and the act of farting into our

spiritual saviors.

Freud’s psychoanalytical theory of infantile sexuality and its sublimation “insists that

there is a hidden connection between higher spiritual activity and lower urges of the body”

(Brown 203). Among certain Brahmins, a spiritual blessing was required after each bite of food:

He takes a little rice soaked in melted butter and puts it into his mouth, saying: “Glory to
the wind which dwells in the chest!’ At the second mouthful, “Glory to the wind which
dwells in the face!” At the third, “Glory to the wind which dwells in the throat!” At the
fourth, “Glory to the wind which dwells in the whole body!” At the fifth, “Glory to those
noisy embullitions which escape above and below!” (246)

The ancient Pelusians of northern Egypt prayed to a fart-god called Bel-Phegor and “did

venerate a Fart, which they worshipped under the symbol of a swelled paunch” (Bourke 87), and

Medieval Catholics suffering from an acute case of the wind britches could pray to Saint

Erasmus who was in charge of the gastrointestinal system for fast relief (Bourke 86).

Where there is worship and praise, there is sacred and holy. Or, in this case, “holey.” It is

interesting to note that the most common cause of farting is, according to Drs. Rabkin and

Silverman, “lactose [...] ingested in milk or milk goods” (151-2). Mythically and historically,

milk is “the nectar of life” (Chevalier, “Milk” 654) and is considered a symbol of “absolute

knowledge” and “immortality” (Chevalier, “Milk” 654-5). Thus farting, at its most common

source, may be related to enlightenment and spirituality. Furthermore, the word flatulent,

according to the Chambers Dictionary of Etymology is “borrowed from the Middle French

flatulent, an irregular formation from Latin flatus (genitive flatus) a blowing, a breaking wind

[...]” (389). Like the Holy Spirit or the Breath of God, the wind you hear passing down below

might very well be playing the first notes of your “Redemption Song.”
 How then can the fart lead us to enlightenment and salvation? The first step is through

“the magical violation of prohibitions” (Makarius 68). In other words, we must learn to get dirty.

Mary Douglas equates dirt--synonymous with farts and other marginal body matter--with

disorder. And just as there is an ambivalent duality in the fart, so there is in disorder:

Granted that disorder spoils pattern; it also provides the material of pattern [...]. This is
why, though we seek to create order, we do not simply condemn disorder. We recognise
(sic) that it is destructive to existing patterns; also that it has potentiality. It symbolizes
both danger and power. (95)

By violating the cultural prohibition against farting--after all farting may be the easiest and most

enjoyable taboo to violate if the number of farting jokes and games is any indication--we can

unleash this potentiality in ourselves and in the world.

Enter the Trickster.

A psychopompic mediator between heaven and earth (Makarius 84), the Trickster is often

associated with anality. In the Trickster myth of the Winnebago Indians he “treats his own anus

as if it could act as an independent agent and ally” (Douglas 80), and in one tale, after

swallowing a strange bulb, he farted so much that he was lifted into the air. As the people piled

on top of him to hold him down--

[...] he began to break wind again and the force of the explosion scattered the things on
top of him in all directions. They fell apart from one another. Separated, the people were
standing about and shouting to one another; and the dogs, scattered here and there,
howled at one another. There stood Trickster laughing at them till he ached. (Radin 25)

Norman O. Brown views this as a creative act; Mary Douglas sees it as destructive. Perhaps both

are right because the Trickster, like the fart, is ambivalent: “It is as though each virtue or defect

attributed to him automatically calls into being its opposite” (Makarius 68). This makes him our

perfect guide between the sacred and the profane.

 Laura Makarius describes the Trickster as “a mythic projection of the magician who in

reality or in people’s desire accomplishes the taboo violation on behalf of his group, thereby

obtaining the medicines or talismans necessary to satisfy its needs and desires” (73). The all-

powerful fart is one form that these medicines or talismans may assume. Claude Gaignebet and

Marie-Claude Floretin detail an interesting fart-related ritual found in La Chandeleur, the French

Candelmas ceremony (also known as “The Feast of the Presentation of Our Lord” and “The

Purification of the Virgin Mary”):

It’s at the Chandeleur-Carnival that for the first time we see the rise of the psychopomp,
the savage man or the bear that emerges from hibernation, bringing from the underworld
in his belly or his bladder, in the form of farts or urine, the souls of the departed” (123-4).

This sacred bear fart at the end of hibernation “liberates [the souls] at this moment” (Gaigenbet

11). Here, the bear is an embodiment of the Trickster. Jung considers the bear “the symbol of the

dangerous aspect of the unconscious” (Chevalier, “Bear” 76) and he describes the Trickster as

“represented by countertendencies in the unconscious [...] of a puerile and inferior character”

which he later calls “the shadow” (Jung 202). It is interesting to note that Candelmas, a

celebration of light, is by default a celebration of shadow. Hence its transformation into our own

Groundhog Day--when the duration of winter is based on a groundhog’s reaction to seeing or not

seeing his own shadow.

Like the groundhog and Martin Luther, we must face our own shadow--in Luther’s case

personified as the Devil--but rather than chase him away with a fart, we must ingest him, take his

foul stench into our own bellies and make it our own. The process is one of “eating the shadow”

(Bly 38) or honoring our shadow material. “The image of the Wild Man [or bear],” according to

Robert Bly, “describes a state of soul that allows shadow material to return slowly in such a way

that it doesn’t damage the ego” (Bly 53). By venturing down our very own bunghole into the
literal bowels of the unconscious we, like the trickster/savage man/bear of La Chandeleur, can

bag our shadow components, bring them back to the surface in the guise of farts, and liberate our

souls.

The journey of the fart from bowel to break is our own journey. It is a rite of (gas)

passage that transforms the profane and destructive into the sacred and creative. “The man who

comes back from these inaccessible regions,” Mary Douglas reminds us, “brings with him a

power not available to those who have stayed in the control of themselves and of society” (96). A

very real farting custom in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries--immortalized in Victor Hugo’s

The Hunchback of Notre Dame--provides a perfect metaphor for this transformative power.

Prostitutes near Paris at the time were required to “make a payment of a fart when they crossed

the toll bridge at Montluc” (Dawson 95).

It is fitting that prostitutes who, it could be said, are more in touch with their primitive

animal instincts are the ones who can “fart” their way across the threshold. In fact three of the

most common euphemisms for farting--“passing air,” “passing wind,” passing gas”--imply a Van

Gennepian “passage,” a transition and transformation not only for the fart, but for the farter as

well. Jim Dawson has noted that the root word pass in these phrases “is possibly derived from

the Latin stem pass, “to suffer”--the source of the word passion, which [...] once referred to the

torture and crucifixion of Jesus Christ” (22). The fart, by allowing us to embrace and integrate

our shadow can be our savior. It can be the world’s savior as well.

“The culture,” says Bly, “has a longing for primitive modes of expression as an antidote

to repression” (52). The early Christian tradition of Carnival once provided the perfect venue for

these magical and disorderly modes of expression. Maria Julia Goldwassrer, in describing

Carnival’s psychological and curative effects, analogizes “[...] just as fermenting barrels of wine
sometimes need ventilation to prevent them from exploding, the wine of human madness must

have an outlet at least once a year in order to transform itself into the good wine of pious

devotion” (99-100). She may very well have been describing the fermenting activity within the

gastro-intestinal system and the “fart of human madness” which produces the “good wine” of

spirit and its intoxication byproducts: change, insight, inspiration, and dare we say, genius. But

why wait for once a year when, according to Douglas, “purity is the enemy of change, of

ambiguity and compromise” (163)? In A Tale of the Tub, Jonathon Swift writes: “If the Moderns

mean by Madness, only a Disturbance or Transposition of the Brain, by force of certain Vapours

issuing from the lower Faculties; then has this Madness been the Parent of all these mighty

Revolutions, that have happened in Empire, in Philosophy, and in Religion” (qtd. in Brown 196).

The time is now. We must fart to grow smart. And in so doing, release the winds of change upon

the world.

The products of Swift’s “Shadow eating”--his scatological satire and his “excremental

vision”--were deemed by many to be “a product of insanity” (Brown 181). Yet, as Bly points out,

“[i]f the ancients were right that darkness contains intelligence and nourishment and even

information, then the person who has eaten some of his or her shadow is more energetic as well

as more intelligent” (Bly 42). Indeed, farting and genius seem to go hand in hand. Both Mozart

and Salvador Dali, for example, were obsessed with farts and farting. Mozart “had a strong

coprophilic streak. He often joked about eating shit, licking or smelling assholes, and of course

letting farts” (Dawson 111). Dali “had a lifelong fascination with farts” (Dawson 114). Benjamin

Franklin wrote about the fart so often that all his “windy” stories were compiled into a single

book: Fart Proudly: Writings of Benjamin Franklin You Never Read in School. Like the young

Apache warrior who “claimed to receive supernatural knowledge from his ass fart” (Rabkin 57),
Mozart, Dali, Franklin, Swift, and countless other fartistes, because they had gleefully embraced

their shadows through the veneration of the fart, were able to tap into the unconscious and to

know (or at least smell) the very mind of God.

The fart is the perfect duality: a unity of sacred and profane; conscious and unconscious;

shadow and light (just don’t try to light one). Consequently, a wholehearted embrace of farting

can lead us across the threshold to a more spiritually intuitive existence, the touch of genius, and

psychological wholeness. We, as individuals, as cultures, and as a unified race of human beings,

must learn to fart boldly and proudly in private and public. If one man’s suppression of the fart

might have lead to World War II, then it is not unreasonable to think that a nation or a world of

farting enthusiasts might prevent the next World War and build the bridge to peace. The toll is

only one measly fart. And it may very well be God’s will that we pay it. For what was he doing in

Michelangelo’s “Creation of Adam” if not beckoning Adam, and us, to pull his finger?
 Works Cited

Bourke, John G. The Portable Scatalog: Excerpts from Scatalogic Rites of All Nations. Ed. Louis
P. Kaplan. New YorK: William Morrow, 1994.

Brown, Norman O. Life Against Death: The Psychoanalytical Meaning of History. 2nd ed.
Hanover: Wesleyan UP, 1959.

Bly, Robert. A Little Book on the Human Shadow. Ed. William Booth. San Francisco: Harper,
1988.

Center for Food and Nutrition Policy (CFNP). Technical Advisory Panel Report. Alexandria,
VA: Virginia Tech., August 2002.

Chevalier, Jean and Alain Gheerbrant. “Bear.” The Penguin Dictionary of Symbols. Trans. John
Buchanan-Brown. London: Penguin, 1994. 75-7.

---. “Milk.” The Penguin Dictionary of Symbols. 654-5.

Dawson, Jim. Who Cut the Cheese? A Cultural History of the Fart. Berkeley: Ten Speed, 1999.

Douglas, Mary. Purity and Danger: An Analysis of the Concepts of Pollution and Taboo.
London: Routledge, 1996.

Dubois, AbbÈ J.A. and Henry K. Beauchamp. Hindu Manners, Customs and Ceremonies: The
Classic Fist-Hand Account of India in the Early Nineteenth Century. Mineola, NY:
Dover, 2002.

“Flatulent.” Chambers Dictionary of Etymology. Ed. Robert K. Barnhart. Edinburgh, Eng.:

Chambers-Chambers Harrap, 1988.

Franklin, Benjamin. Fart Proudly: Writings of Benjamin Franklin You Never Read in School. Ed.
Carl Japiske. Berekely: Frog, Ltd., 2003.

Gaignebet, Claude and Marie-Claude Florentin. Le carnaval: essais de mythologie populaire.

Paris: Payot, 1974.

Goldwasser, Maria Julia. “Carnival.” The Encyclopedia of Religion. Ed. Mircea Eliade. 16 vols.
New York: Macmillan, 1987.

Jung, C.G. “On the Psychology of the Trickster Figure.” Trans. R.F.C. Hull. The Trickster: A
Study in American Indian Mythology. New York: Schocken, 1956. 195-211.
 Works Cited Continued

Makarius, Laura. “The Myth of the Trickster: The Necessary Breaker of Taboos.” Mythical
Trickster Figures: Contours, Contexts, and Criticisms. Ed. William J. Hynes and William
G. Doty. Tuscaloos, AL: U of Alabama P, 1993. 66-86.

Malinowski, Bronislaw. The Sexual Life of Savages in North Western Melanesia. Whitefish, MT:
Kessinger, 2005.

Rabkin, Eric S. and Eugene M. Silverman. It’s a Gas: A Study of Flatulence. Riverside, CA:
Xenos, 1991.

Radin, Paul. The Trickster: A Study in American Indian Mythology. New York: Schocken, 1956.

Toland, John. Adolf Hitler. New York: Anchor-Random House, 1976.

 What is “African Art?” An Exploratory Debate in Two Parts

By Sarah Holloway

Art, art-making and the role creativity plays in a society fascinates me as a craft artist and

theater performer. Considering that a great many academic theories about multicultural religious

traditions, social values, and political systems have been inspired by cave drawings, sculptures,

pottery, epic poetry and other artistic expressions, I believe that a discussion of a culture’s

relationship with art is vital in order to deepen one’s understanding of that particular culture. A

wonderful sentiment by Cornel West, in his introduction to a book celebrating the exhibit

“Africa: The Art of a Continent, 100 Works of Power and Beauty” (Royal Academy of Arts and

the Guggenheim Museum, October 1995-September 1996) explains this concept more clearly:

Art never simply reflects reality. Rather it forces us to engage our past and
present so that we see the fragility and contingency of our prevailing views of
reality. In this way, art can and does change the world. This unparalleled
exhibition at the end of a barbaric century confirms the tenacious human will to
survive and thrive – with artistic beauty and worldly engagement – in history, then
and now. (1)

This is what I initially set out to do in this essay: to explore African and African Diaspora

religious traditions as expressed through the tremendous examples of artistic works now

available to the public eye. I was eager to show how everyday objects used by the Dogon,

Yoruba, Haitian Voudon practitioners and those of the Santeria faith were infused with spiritual

and communal power through artistic symbolism. However, partway through my research on

this topic, I came up against the confounding issue of the diversity of definitions for “art” that

exist in the world today. Research into this question revealed several important, and disturbing,

misconceptions I had about African art in general, and more specifically about the Euro-centric

lens through which I was idealizing African and Diaspora spirituality.

 Therefore, the first part of this essay will incorporate my initial research on artistic

expression of spiritual values in several African societies, including a working definition of “art”

and “craft” for clarifying purposes. The second half will illustrate where Westerners, by and

large, fail to take into consideration the astonishing diversity of African and Diaspora cultures

and how my own unconscious bias led to an oversimplification of African religious practices.

Debate #1:

I hypothesize that African art is alive with spiritual energy and, of equal importance, African

spirituality is brought to life through artistic expression.

In their book Art and Human Values, authors Melvin Rader and Bertram Jessup note that

there is a clear delineation made between “art” and “craft” in most modern Western societies. In

essence, “art” is aesthetically stimulating (whether pleasing or not) and “craft” is the creation of

something functional and common. But what happens when the two worlds collide? Is a

decorative chair art or craft? How about an intricately carved walking stick? To these authors,

the usefulness of an object automatically places that object into the “craft” category, no matter

how aesthetically arresting it may be. “In the mixed experience in which art or beauty in

common life occurs,” Rader and Jessup state, “the aesthetic interest and the aesthetic quality are

often obscured and easily overlooked or neglected in the midst of practical pursuits” (122). In

this perspective, the hand-carved walking stick has more significance as a useful tool than as art

because it cannot be appreciated purely for its aesthetic qualities alone.

Although obviously not everyone in Western societies agree with the above sentiment,

my personal experience supports the prevalence of this cultural view. For several years I was a

member of the administrative staff at the Oregon College of Art & Craft, a recognized degree-

granting institution of national renown. During my time at OCAC I directed the fundraising
auction that was held each year, during which Portland’s elite could bid on fine arts and crafts

valued as high as $10,000. Yet even in an institution dedicated to the preservation and

inspiration of new artistic works, a clear distinction was made between “art” and “craft” as

defined by Rader and Jessup. Paintings, sculptures and multimedia installations with no

“functional” purpose sold at consistently higher value than did beautifully carved benches,

meticulously crafted jewelry, and other creative works with a useful quality. In most cases the

Art Procurement Committee for the auction deemed these items “lovely,” but “too crafty.” As

someone who is considered a “craft artist” (creating jewelry, puppets, dolls, knitting, etc.) I was

often frustrated by this dichotomy.

This polarization of thought has also negatively affected the Western view of African

artistic expression until very recent decades. As Michael Kampen O’Riley notes in his

voluminous work Art Beyond the West:

In the past, Western thinkers had generally regarded African art as craft (objects
with functional uses) rather than as ‘fine art.’ This view limited the appeal of
African art to Western art collectors and art historians […] [who] also failed to
appreciate the expressive forces of the powerful, rhythmic forms and patterns of
African art and its deeply rooted basis in religious thought and ritual
performances. (27, 30)

This assertion rang true for me, in part because of a series of lectures I have been listening

to entitled Artlife™ by Jane Seaton. Seaton is an art therapist and spiritual advisor who

encourages people to explore creativity as a natural, and accessible, extension of human nature.

In an interview with Sounds True™, the company that produced her audio series, Seaton was

asked the origin of the term “artlife.” An excerpt of the interview offers an interesting look into

Seaton’s philosophy:

Seaton: For the last few centuries, art and life have been separated from each
other in Western cultures. I think that this has a lot to do with the deep malaise of
 the spirit we are experiencing in the West. I teach that when we bring art and life
back together, as they are meant to be, then we take a step toward finding our
integrity – both as individuals and as a society.

Sounds True: Isn’t it true that many non-Western cultures don’t even have a word
for “art?”

Seaton: Right. They see no need to have a word for art because art is so
embedded in life. In native cultures certainly, art was so intrinsic to every daily
task of life – from making fishing nets to conducting burial ceremonies – that they
had no need for a distinct word for it.

Needless to say, as an artist I was thrilled by this idea: art as a daily activity, art-making as a

journey to our “roots,” a return to a time when our lives were infused with creative symbolism

and spiritual expression.

With this attitude in mind, I was greatly inspired by projected images of exquisite objects

that served a practical purpose as well as an aesthetic one in my African and African Diaspora

Traditions class at Pacifica Graduate Institute (Dr. Laura Grillo, Fall 2005). To my eyes these

images were the perfect marriage of art and craft that O’Riley had referred to. We were shown

slides of stunning ritual masks, a decorated granary door, carved support beams in a men’s lodge,

beaded headdresses and many other symbol-laden objects of beauty and functionality (See Figure

1, pg. 16 of this paper). In my notes for that class (Grillo, 10/10/05) I wrote about how the

Dogon people of Mali lived mythically in a way that offered no separation between spirituality

and daily life – a flowing interface between the sacred and the profane. The shapes of their

homes reflected the symbolic power of the anthill as an image of divine female fertility. Textiles

boasted complex patterns with clear narrative significance. Everything from the laying of their

fields, the way food was prepared, grooming, bathing and animal husbandry reflected the Dogon

cosmology and belief system.

 The Yoruba, of the Nigerian region in West Africa, had a similar relationship with

creative expression, spirituality and everyday life. A door panel to a palace (see Figure 2) is a

wonderful example of this concept – as described by Suzanne Preston Blier in The Royal Arts of

Africa: The Majesty of Form, the door depicts preparations being made for a royal ceremony

attended by Eshu, the trickster and messenger god who is integral to all rituals in which offerings

are made (86). Other objects, such as a wooden vessel used in Yoruba divination rituals (Figure

3) and brass sculptures worn around the neck of an Ogboni society elder (Figure 4) use

recognizable (and beautifully rendered) religious symbols to signify, respectively, an offering to

the orisha deity and the importance of the triad in Yoruba earth worship (90, 97).

In reference to the Benin people, also of Nigeria, Blier describes the “complex symbolic

links” between certain animal figures and political power and how the arts play a central role in

the construction of community identity, social dynamics, history and worldview (76). An

illustration of this idea can be found in a description of the pythons (Figure 5) that figure

prominently in Benin royal architecture:

Stretching the length of the turret, these pythons also function as a visual link
between earth and sky. In life, similarly, pythons not only swim and move readily
on land, but also mount trees. From this latter position, they fall on their prey,
suffocating them in their coils before swallowing them whole. With the turret
python’s mouth open, it no doubt gave the impression to those entering the palace
that they too were being transported to another time and place. (59)

In other words, in many parts of Africa a unique hybrid of art (beauty), craft (functionality), and

spirituality could be found in everyday tools, ritual paraphernalia, architecture, clothing,

agriculture; just about every aspect of a culture’s daily existence.

In an unfairly (but necessarily) brief discussion of the African Diaspora, it can be seen

that despite the brutal, disassembling tragedy of slavery, the African tradition of expressing
religious values through art still thrives to this day in the Haitian spiritual practice of Vodou and

the Cuban Santeria, to name two contemporary examples. In the article “I Am Going to See

Where my Oungan Is,” by Anna Wexler (in the book Sacred Possessions), the author describes

the wonderful artistic and spiritual skills of a Haitian Vodou flagmaker. “The oungan (priest)

and the flag double as points of entry for the lwa (spirits),” Wexler asserts, “directing their

energies into the ceremony” (59). The unique talent of each flagmaker combined with an

honoring of traditional symbols, colors, materials, etc. “both recapitulate and transfigure the

history of the form, moving the past into the present through improvisation, which heightens

recognition of the beauty and vitality of traditional design features and techniques” (74). Said

another way, these artistic expressions of deeply held spiritual beliefs are “a conscious exercise

of the imagination” (Grillo, 11/7/05) in which the fluidity and transformation of “New World”

African traditions is clearly evident. Figure 6 shows this adaptation well: the flag depicts St.

James the Elder (representing the Christian New World influence) who also evokes Ogou, the

warrior spirit, and Danbala, the snake lwa of cosmic patriarchy (Wexler, 74).

Santeria is another example of a thriving New World religion with roots in Africa.

Among many art forms, the Santeria altars are a repository of profound spiritual power as well as

astonishing aesthetic complexity (Figure 7). Santeria incorporates Yoruba orishas (spirits) into

existing Catholic saints to create an amalgam similar to that of the saints and lwa of Haitian

Vodou. Miguel Barnet, also writing in the book Sacred Possessions, discusses one of these

fascinating hybrid figures in “The Religious System of Santeria:”

Oricha Oke is the god of agriculture, protector of laborers and peasants […] an
old and highly respected androgynous santo, protector of the ill […] [and] the
aged. Identified with Our Lady of Carmen, he has to be made many offerings and
treated with subtlety because, as an old man, he is bothered by everything. (98)
Barnet also celebrates the richness of Santeria’s mythology, songs, dances, rituals and

contributions to Cuban culture. “Its philosophical and cosmogonic patterns,” he asserts, “will

also be validated in art and literature […] [as] Cuban Santeria spreads throughout the world. Its

extraterritoriality responds to the universal values that define it” (99). Again, we can see that

African Diaspora spirituality (as a whole) is not a random, disorganized conglomeration of Old

World religious practices, but malleable belief systems sensitive to time, place and circumstance

– which is what keeps this vital spirituality alive.

In my deep admiration (and envy) of this cultural respect for creative expression, the

obvious questions why and how present themselves. O’Riley (and many others) inquires: How is

it that “over the last 30,000 years, artists living in the vast region known as sub-Sahara Africa,

with about 1,000 distinct languages, have produced a variety of art works in many distinct styles

[…] [and yet] no single religious or cultural idea can explain why so many African cultures and

individuals placed such a high value on art?” (25). One answer to this vast question has been

alluded to; with the world of the spirits so present in the everyday life of most African

communities, the expression of these profound mysteries will most naturally find expression in a

language of symbols – in other words, through artistic expression using the cosmological images

of each community’s particular belief system. Whether they create an object, a ritual, a dance, a

song or (more than likely) a combination of all of the above, artists “become embodiments of the

otherworldly characters they represent and focal points for the worshipers around them, acting as

visible symbols of the union of the past and present, this world and the other” (O’Riley, 25).

Another intriguing perspective on this question comes from Dr. Laura Grillo’s African

and African Diaspora Traditions course as I again discovered in my notes. The Dogon (as well

as many other African peoples) revel in the deliteralization of “truths” – because their perspective
of life is so deeply rooted in symbolism, these cultures celebrate ambiguity, the richness of

subtlety, the unpredictability of intuition, and, in general, resist the codification of the unknown

mysteries of the universe. The Western desire for explanation (which literally means “to render

flat”) does not interest those whose belief systems are dynamic, innovative, adaptive, flexible.

Unlike (some) monotheistic religions which espouse a depersonalized dogma being forced upon

converts without diverse representation, African religions incorporate deeply intimate and

personalized rituals of divination, initiation, blood sacrifice and the rich personalities of deities

expressing themselves through possession trances. Contrary to some misconceptions, African

traditions are not strange conglomerations of esoteric mythic figures or empty ritualistic

activities, but neither have the traditions been swallowed by the destructive, unpredictable and

fickle forces of history (Grillo, 11/7/05). Said another way, African religious traditions would

appear to be an admirable balancing act between ever-changing innovation and steadfast,

committed dedication.

Debate #2:

The concepts of “spiritual art” and/or “artistic spirituality” have some merit but are easily

oversimplified and idealized by our continuing Western misconceptions of Africa itself.

Suzanne Preston Blier, already quoted in this essay several times from her book The

Royal Arts of Africa, wrote a very compelling chapter for Africa: The Art of a Continent entitled

“Enduring Myths of African Art.” I had mostly finished my research, had started writing and felt

confident about my thesis topic when I read this article. With my own biases and unconscious

prejudices staring back at me from the page, I was overwhelmed by the idea of completely

rewriting the essay, either from an alternate point of view or, if this proved too difficult, on a

different topic altogether. However, I realized that rather than wrong or offensive, my ideas on
art and spirituality were fine – surface, naïve, and idealized – but not so off that a total rewrite

was warranted. Therefore, in the interest of full disclosure and posterity, I decided to use Blier’s

article to debate with myself on some of the points I so emphatically made above. My hope is to

open my own mind, and possibly the minds of those helping me proofread, to the understanding

that even the best of intentions can be undermined by the deep-seated racism still alive and well

in our collective Western unconscious, no matter how “liberal” or “modern” we deem ourselves

to be.

The first myth Blier discusses in her article is that of the “primal, timeless” Africa.

“Regardless of its age,” she asserts, “African art is often assumed to be early or primeval. In

essence, it is seen as existing outside the realm of real time. In exhibitions and on the printed

page, ninth- and nineteenth-century works are commonly presented side by side, as if the

difference in a millennium were inconsequential” (26). Case in point: in my zeal to illustrate the

beauty and “timelessness” of Dogon, Yoruba, Benin, Vodou and Santeria art in relation to

African religious expression, I lumped together art examples spanning from the 1700’s to the last

decade without making note of the significant historical discrepancy in these examples. This

discrepancy does not negate my point, per se, but an oversight of this kind is a clear indication

that my perceptions of African art differ from how I would arrange Western art in a similar

situation. For example, it would never occur to me to compare images of Byzantine chapels in

Italy alongside da Vinci’s Mona Lisa and works by Lucio Fontana (founder of the Spazialismo

movement in the mid-1950’s) and make a broad, generalized assumption of what characterizes

“Italian art.”

A second prevalent myth of African art as “bound by place” often leads to the

identification of “particular types of objects or particular styles” with “carefully circumscribed

regions, as if objects and styles did not travel over time and space” (27). Blier goes on to say that

partitioning sub-Saharan Africa into Western divisions of the continent, which is common in

general texts and exhibitions, does not take into account “fundamental social and historical

concerns” of the communities that are creating and using the art for their own, unique purposes.

While I do not blame myself for my unfamiliarity with all of the different nations of people in

Africa, I do recognize that geographic diversity was not a factor in my deciding which cultures to

feature in my examples of art objects. For a truly diverse look at African art I should have

explored multiple regions, for a more broad cross-section of styles, and made note of how those

cultures may have influenced each other over centuries of trade, war and migration.

The third and fourth common myths Blier discusses are the assumptions that all African

art is “communitarian” and “tribal.” This misconception imagines that “Africa is a place of

predominantly small-scale and essentially isolated communities” where “political power goes no

further than the village level” (28). This fallacy was supported by early colonial images of

tyrannical kings and heathen barbarians running amok. “Indeed,” Blier reminds us, “the

denigration of Africans and their cultures served to justify not only slavery but also missionary

activity and the later overflow of local authorities” (29). In reality, Africa is crisscrossed with

mutually influential relationships of “initiation associations, religious complexes, and traditions

of healing, divination and jurisprudence that cut across cultures, linking communities both large

and small” (28). This myth also underplays the vastness and power of Africa’s great historical

monarchies and urban civilizations, which had a profound influence on the development of

African art as we experience it today.

While I certainly did not imagine the subjects of my study as “primitive” by any means, it

is true that I was shocked to learn of the size of some of the great monarchies and urban
civilizations present in Africa, today and historically. Because so many of our modern

perceptions of Africa come from turn-of-the-century ethnographic and anthropological studies of

“primitive” rites and rituals, it is all too easy to hear of an African subculture and picture a small

group of people living in the grasslands, insulated and homogenized into a specific, unique

“tribe.” Imagine my surprise (and discomfort at my surprise) when I learned, in Dr. Grillo’s

aforementioned course, that the Yoruba people alone number in the twenty millions!

The fifth and sixth myths of African art involve the ubiquitous Western terms “intuitive”

and “primitive” to describe an artistic style in which it is perceived that no amount of conscious,

intellectual or intentional thought goes into the form, style or function of a creative object or

ritual. Blier states, “In discussions of African art as a primal entity, little is said about real artists

who grapple with the history of art forms in their own region and with the arts of other, foreign,

peoples as well” because African art is seen as responsive solely to needs of the community

rather than as the self-expression of an individual artist (30).

Herein lies the reason – not a good excuse, but a reason – for my over-idealization of

African and African Diaspora expressive spirituality and creative freedom. Without realizing it, I

did what so many Westerners tend to do when studying “early” or “native” or “naturalistic”

cultures: valuing the primal, intuitive qualities of these nations over the seemingly empty

existence of a mechanized Western civilization. To re-quote a portion of Jane Seaton’s interview

with Sounds True™:

Seaton: They [non-Western cultures] see no need to have a word for art because
art is so embedded in life. In native cultures certainly, art was so intrinsic to every
daily task of life – from making fishing nets to conducting burial ceremonies –
that they had no need for a distinct word for it.
While it may be true that there is what Seaton refers to as a “deep malaise” in Western societies, I

have come to realize how disrespectful and shortsighted it is to overvalue any community based

on a perceived “harmony” without taking into consideration the efforts, challenges, growth,

decline and change that every civilization goes through as a matter of course. My enthusiasm for

Dogon, Yoruba, Vodou and Santeria spirituality and creative expression, while meant to pay

homage and respect to these rich cultures, diverted me from a more honest, candid exploration of

each tradition’s special uniqueness as well as intricate, cross-influencing connections. Rather

than looking at different cultures through a Western-centric lens, we do them, and ourselves, a

much higher service in experiencing African and African Diaspora traditions as created by an

astonishing diversity of fellow human beings struggling to make sense of a complex world of

constant political, cultural, physical and religious transformation.

In conclusion, I defer to the wisdom of Kwame Anthony Appiah, a native of Ghana, who

wrote about the exhibition featured in Africa: The Art of a Continent in an article entitled “Why

Africa? Why Art?” Although I am going against the good advice of Dr. Grillo (“I discourage

ending a paper with a quote”), I have to admit that his gentle, but firm, reminder of what

everyone from anywhere can learn about art made by anyone from everywhere perfectly sums up

the invaluable lesson I learned in the writing of this research paper. Appiah writes:

These artifacts will speak to you, and what they will say will be shaped by what
you are as well as by what they are. But that they speak to you […] should be a
potent reminder of the humanity you share with the men and women that made
them. As they speak to you, they will draw you into an exploration of the worlds
of those who made them (this is always one of our central responses to art). What
you will discover in that exploration is not one Africa, but many, a rich diversity.
(8)
FIGURE 1 (O’Riley, 26, 1959) FIGURE 2 (Blier, 86, 1920’s)

FIGURE 3 (Blier, 90, 1945) FIGURE 4 (Blier, 97, 1949)

FIGURE 5 FIGURE 6
(Blier, 15, 18th century) (Wexler, 74, 1993)

FIGURE 7
(Barnet, 103, 1994)
 Works Cited

Appiah, Kwame Anthony. “Why Africa? Why Art?” Africa: The Art of a Continent, 100
Works of Power and Beauty. New York: Guggenheim Museum Publications,
1996.

Barnet, Miguel. “La Regla de Ocha: The Religious System of Santeria.” Sacred
Possessions. Eds. Margarite Fernandez Olmos and Lizabeth Paravisini-Gebert.
New Brunswick: Rutgers U P, 1997.

Blier, Suzanne Preston. “Enduring Myths of African Art.” Africa: The Art of a Continent,
100 Works of Power and Beauty. New York: Guggenheim Museum Publications,
1996.

---. The Royal Arts of Africa: The Majesty of Form. New York: Calmann & King Ltd,
1998.

Grillo, Laura. “African and African Diaspora Traditions MS 506.” Pacifica Graduate
Institute, Carpinteria, California. Fall 2005.

O’Riley, Michael Kampen. Art Beyond the West. New York: Harry N. Abrams Inc, 2002.

Seaton, Jane. “Artlife: Creative Journeys for Life Healing.” Boulder, Colorado: Sounds
True Inc, 2001.

West, Cornel. Introduction. Africa: The Art of a Continent, 100 Works of Power and
Beauty. New York: Guggenheim Museum Publications, 1996.

Wexler, Anna. “I Am Going to See Where My Oungan Is: The Artistry of a Haitian
Vodou Flagmaker.” Sacred Possessions. Eds. Margarite Fernandez Olmos and
Lizabeth Paravisini-Gebert. New Brunswick: Rutgers U P, 1997.
 Approaching the Beat of a New (Female) Drummer:

West African Tradition in Transition

By Emily Afanador

A cursory glance at West African drumming reveals a male-dominated tradition

where women are restricted from beating the skins, and limited to the musical expressions

of singing and dancing. It is easy, though perhaps reckless, to impose the western

feminist interpretation upon these cultural practices: namely that these women are

oppressed by their men who dictate societal roles to ensure their own dominance.

According to some African feminists, this perspective threatens to turn feminism into

racism with the assumption that the social conditions of Western women are

fundamentally akin to those in Africa, the latter of whom require rescuing from

conditions the former have progressed beyond (207 Ogundipe-Leslie). It is my intent to

explore the social factors and spiritual beliefs that resulted in centuries of taboo against

women drumming, to examine recent changes in this tradition of gender delineation, and

to question what effect such apparent “modernization” has on the socio-spiritual status of

women in West Africa.

When undertaking the study of African culture it is critical to acknowledge the

rich diversity of peoples and practices found therein. It is presumptuous to claim any

single point of commonality across all West African societies, and yet, in contrast to that

which is (equally inaccurately) pan-European/Western/American, distinctly African

similarities emerge. Thus, while recognizing the heterogeneity of African culture, I will

hereafter, unless otherwise specified, refer to West African culture homogenously.

 Beginning with an overview of drumming traditions, I turn to the Northern Ewe of

eastern Ghana, for whom there is no single word for rhythm (Agawu 6). Rather than

indicating an absence of the concept, this fact exposes the complex way in which rhythms

are thought of and talked about, requiring more specificity to capture the multi-faceted

concept. V. Kofi Agawu, professor of music at Princeton University and native to

Northern Ewe, proffers that “[t]he absence of a single word for ‘rhythm’ […] refers to

[…] an across-the-dimensions instead of a within-the-dimensions phenomenon” (7). That

is to say, rhythm cannot be isolated, pertaining only to music, only to dance, only to

breathing, or only to the heart’s pulse. Furthermore, music is not conceived of having

microscopic infrastructures referred to by technical concepts (i.e. rhythm, tempo, etc.)

that dissect and dehumanize music in its fundamental characteristics. Instead rhythm

inherently reaches across the boundaries of sound and music and binds together diverse

media and concepts. When commenting on the rhythm of the drums, then, an Ewe might

request that the drummers “put more fire in” their playing, referring both to tempo and

energy, or might point out “the gourds do not agree” if the rattles have fallen out of

synchronicity (6 Agawu).

Maya Deren’s discussion of the treatment of drums in voudoun practice further

creates an understanding for the African way of regarding both rhythms and the drums as

alive, animated, or ensouled. Drums are ritually dressed, baptized, fed, or put under

guard (245 Deren). The drum is believed to have a loa of its own, the Hountor, which is

an unfortunate guest at the possession rituals, for the drumming of the Hountor is so

astonishing that it dominates and subsequently disrupts the entire ceremony. While the

practitioners prepare to be mounted by the loa, the role of the drummer requires him to
resist possession, remaining outside the ritual, a point I will return to later. In contrast,

the West African Adabatram drum, used in the dance of the same name, is expected to

choose and possess its carrier who then parades it through the village in the directions

ordered by the drum. Possession is required, but not of its player, only its carrier. People

remain a safe distance from it and dare not cross its path under threat of being beheaded.

Animals who cross its path are immediately killed and carried off for later consumption

(96 Agawu).

As these examples show, drums are latent with agency and further evidence

suggests their association with the power of men. According to an audio CD by The

Drummers of Burundi, “[t]he word ingoma translates both as ‘drum’ and ‘kingdom’.

Even today there remains an ancient network of ‘drum sanctuaries’ […] which once

existed as the dwelling places of both drums and kings” (liner notes). Again we see how

language creates and reveals the perception of the world, and here, one that allies drums

with men.

Returning to the Ewe, their word vu refers simultaneously to music, dance and

drumming, expressing the interpenetration and communion of these three (7 Agawu).

Where no single word can refer to the concept of rhythm, also no word can refer

exclusively to dancing or drumming, both of which are conflated with each other and

music. While these linguistic realities represent the inseparable qualities of music and its

expressions through drumming and dancing, this culture still distinguishes between these

ideas at least insofar as drumming is practiced solely by men, while dancing is done by

all.
 For many West Africans music is a daily part of life. From the pounding rhythms

of girls at home grinding grains, the nailing and drilling patterns of carpenters, and the

clapping games of school children, to evening recreational music, funerary mourning

songs, and church choir competitions, rhythm is created, shared, and recreated nearly

continuously throughout the day (12 Agawu). I personally agree with the popular

Western notion that African music is rhythmically complex, and this seems a natural

development in a culture where rhythmic learning is woven into recreation, work, and

spiritual practices; where embodied knowledge of the way rhythm works is achieved early

in life, and challenged throughout maturity; where traditional rhythmic patterns invariably

evolve greater complexity over time (94 Murphy; 1 Agawu; 241 Deren).

Thus far I have provided a general overview of the ways in which various West

African cultures understand and incorporate drums, rhythms, and their roles in

community life. Drums play a pivotal role in the West African spiritual traditions, as

well, and it is in this arena that I theorize a predominant reason for female exclusion from

the drumming tradition. In Candamble, Santeria, and Voudoun, diasporic religions

currently found throughout the Americas in Brazil, Mexico, the U.S. and Haiti, and also

still practiced in West Africa, a common practice exists of calling down the spirits to take

embodied form through temporary possession of the living. In both instances it is the

drum rhythm that harkens the spirits. The orishas of Candamble, as in Santeria, each

have specific, favored rhythms that are used to address the particular one being called for

(165 Murphy footnote 7). “By knowing before hand or being able to tell by what the

person is wearing [i.e., the color of the orisha] or by which song that person came up to

salute the drums on, [the drummer can] start playing something directed at that orisha or
that person [in order to bring the orisha into that person and conduct possession]” (Sworn

to the Drum). The drum plays such a liminal role in these rites that in the voudoun

practice of calling down the sprits, various norms and practices seem to guard the semi-

permeable boundary between drummer, drum, and ritual possession. Returning to Maya

Deren’s accounts of voudoun rituals, the drummers, while “[…] at times [appearing] to

be the persons most in control during a ritual,” are in many ways situated outside the

ceremonial hierarchy of power (244). Identified more as a hired craftsperson than a

religious practitioner or even participant, the drummer, despite apparent status of power

and influence in the rites, “[…] may frequently neglect to make ritual salutation at the

altar […]” or even “[…] wander away from the peristyle [during prayer]” (244 Deren).

Deren expresses the importance of further differentiation of the drummer from the drums,

“[the latter of] which are sacred, and it is understood that salutations addressed towards

the drum do not include the men who happen to be beating them” (245). It appears that

the clear distinction of boundaries around the drummer and his relationship to the

organization of the hounfor and to the drum all create important safety parameters within

which the potential risks inherently associated with the boundary transgressions of

possession can be undertaken.

Although one of the most obvious characteristics of West African drumming is its

male domination, traditionally to the complete exclusion of women, this characteristic is

so normative to the culture that it is frequently overlooked as noteworthy by researchers.

In his African Rhythms, a comprehensive expose of the rhythmic culture of the Ewe

people, Agawu mentions only that

 “[a]s in many other African societies, drumming is the exclusive preserve of male
members of society. It seems unimaginable to the Northern Ewe that a woman
would, for example, beat a sacred drum […]. While such a pattern of exclusion
reflects one aspect of a larger societal distribution of power, it is subject to
questioning and undermining in artistic circumstances. Thus, the main burden of
a performance of Adevu, a hunters’ dance, by the Ziavi Zigi group is carried by its
female members.” (91)

He proceeds, moving his discussion into aspects of closely related dance, without further

explanation for the origins of or meaning behind this gender delineation.

The lack of discourse around the taboo against women beating skins is as

revealing as the taboo itself. Clearly this cultural norm is so embedded in the social

fabric that it elides exploration. Like asking the question of our own culture, “Why are

women not allowed to urinate standing up as the men do?” the question seems ridiculous,

for why would a woman want to participate in such an activity or even consider it a

privilege? This analogy became clear to me when professional African Ballet dancer

Mabiba Baegne, originally from Congo and currently residing in San Francisco, came to

Eugene to teach three days of dancing and one morning of dunun drumming. The

opportunity to speak with a woman raised in her African tradition, and yet who had

learned to drum, provided invaluable insight into the complex entanglements of social,

religious, and mythological structures. When asked point blank why women have not

been allowed to drum, Baegne’s response was that she, herself, was never given adequate

explanation for this. She speculated that perhaps pregnant women might endanger a very

small and fragile fetus through the intense vibrations that drumming produces. But she

quickly dismissed this with the recognition that pregnant women are not restricted from

dancing. She finally resorted to the Western feminist interpretation that men want to hold

this power over the women.

 Seeking additional context to her story I inquired what it was like growing up

drumming in a culture where women do not drum. Baegne clarified that she did not grow

up drumming, though she was always drawn to the drums. She remembered as a child

seeking out and playing her grandfather’s drum, only to be rustled away with his demand:

“What kind of woman are you?” Clearly her fascination with the drum and attempt to

break into its joys and mysteries was an act of gender-bending. When she returned to

Congo in young adulthood, after years of international travel as a professional dancer, she

found her uncle teaching African drumming to a group of European women. When she

asked to be included her uncle would not allow it on the grounds that she is a woman.

Even pointing out the hypocrisy of his argument, given that his other students were

women, could not penetrate his enculturated understanding of their drumming tradition.

Teaching the others was different, apparently, because she is African and they were

European.

Reasoning such as this is perhaps indicative of sexist discrimination, but also

reminds us that drumming, an “across-the-dimensions phenomenon” in West Africa, is

not just musical but religious as well. While the European women were being instructed

in the playing of the drums, they were not being initiated into the whole matrix of African

culture that is associated with it. Bringing African drumming into their European

lifestyles for recreation does not carry the implications that initiating an African woman

into the vast drumming tradition does. By learning the traditional rhythms, a female

African drummer would hold a new, unconventional, possibly ambiguous role in the

religious context of drumming that has evolved many centuries’ worth of safeguards both
subtle and overt for maintaining the safety and security of community members during

ritual.

Here again we must turn to African feminism to better understand how the women

of these cultures make sense of the gender delineations they live within.

“The sacredness of the woman’s body and its products such as milk or menses,
also has to be understood for there is a tendency to homogenize all women’s
histories and experiences. It is not misogyny that causes African men especially,
to fear women’s menses, but a conceptualization of the female reproductive
system and excretions and body parts as powerful and potent. Menstrual blood is
believed to have the power to disrupt, interfere with or cause to happen. Thus
women’s monthly blood is also considered very effective in making potions.”
(213 Ogundipe-Leslie)

This statement reveals that African traditions have imbued women’s bodies and fluids

with spiritual power both effective and ambiguous. If women are believed to be able to

make or prevent things from happening, it is no wonder that they have been restricted

from drumming, the religious role of which requires one to be an open channel, an

uninterrupted spiritual conduit for the communion of the seen and unseen worlds. As

drumming cannot be limited to exclude its religious role, so too the women could not be

instructed in a fraction of the drumming tradition, allowed to drum recreationally but not

spiritually.

This perception of women, and the inherent potency of their very beings,

continues to exist in Africa today.

“People still regard the female body as sacred. She can even use it for political
action. She can threaten to curse while touching her breasts or her reproductive
parts. If she threatens to strip and go naked, even government will back down.
Recently, however, military governments are not backing down. In fact, some
just round up the women and jail them. But, if a woman threatens to strip and
show a man her nakedness, he is scared and will do what she asks to avoid the
kind of breasts from which he fed. He will also avoid seeing the passage that he
came through to enter the world.” (212 Ogundipe-Leslie)
 The tension of changing beliefs is exposed in this passage. No longer do all men

fear women’s bodies or respect the accompanying power once represented within.

Hence, as women vie for gender equality, they appear also to be losing special status.

This leveling of the gender playing field is carrying over into the drumming tradition as

well. While Mabiba Baegne was not allowed to drum as a young girl, eventually her

uncle resigned to teach her. Women in Africa have been demanding to drum as

evidenced by the new touring group, The Women Drummers of Guinea, who performed

internationally in 2005 with three stops in the United States. Though I have not been able

to confirm this, it is rumored that The Women Drummers of Guinea were required to

petition their government for permission to perform. If this is true, it reveals the depths to

which the social and religious norms of drumming have become embedded in

institutional infrastructure. Regardless, it is indicative of the climate of change that in

2005, for the first time, the once strictly male Les Percussions de Guinea shared the stage

with women master drummers.

Change is slow, however. Mabiba Baegne shared her observation that when she

teaches drumming she attracts far fewer students than when she teaches dancing (a

statistic I would corroborate from her recent visit). She also perceives that she gets fewer

attendees than male drumming teachers. While this held true of the two drumming

workshops I participated in over the fall, the male instructor attracting close to fifteen

attendants and Baegne attracting only six, it is also true that the man was teaching the

djembe, a popular drum in the west with lead and improvisational potential, while

Baegne’s instruction was in the “chorus” drums, the dununs, which are less attractive to

the Western lay-musician. Still, her observations are based on years of touring and
instruction, and would denote a sexist assumption that carries over from Africa,

perpetuating the notion that men are the experts of drumming.

This exploration of women’s roles in the drumming traditions of West Africa

holds many complications. As acknowledged before, the specific traditions have not

been addressed in isolation here, instead this initial look into the subject weaves varied

traditions of and from West Africa, with cross-cultural generalizations tying the picture

together. A clearer, more accurate assessment of the situation could be found by

remaining within a particular cultural context, i.e., voudoun, Ewe, Guinean. Future

research in this area would benefit from an in-depth look at individual cultures, staying

within each for a comprehensive understanding of the social and religious trends both

historically and currently found therein.

Rather than answers, further questions emerge from this exposition. First, how is

African feminism helped and/or hurt by Western feminism? Is the gender equality gained

through the drumming tradition lifting women of West Africa to the status of their men,

or disempowering them through the de-spiritualization of women’s bodies? As a woman

drummer, I come down on the side of women’s rights to drum. The expression of the

traditional rhythms seems to have a power that I idealize all people getting to have access

to, regardless of sex. Conversely, as a woman in a culture that has largely secularized

women’s bodies and leveled women’s unique qualities in the name of equality, I feel

admiration for the powerful identity women in Africa have had by very nature of their

bodies and fluids being associated with spiritual potency. I am conflicted by the

recognition that equal rights may come at a cost to special status. As a western woman

longing for spiritual tradition and mythological meaning, feeling myself turning back to
old ways for guidance, I want to suspend Africa in time, and ask her people to resist

western notions of equality and progress, and avoid the social and spiritual globalization

that might strip that which remains sacred in their culture, and sacred in our world. This,

too, requires reflection, for it is a mistake to assume that just because the rhythms played

in West Africa today may be four hundred years old, this does not indicate that they are

played the same way today that they were centuries ago. Despite long cultural histories,

Africa is not quintessentially as it was then, nor has it ever been cut off from the rest of

the world’s influences. Innovation has occurred in Africa as it has everywhere on the

planet, and such an assumption or fantasy that they are suspended in time, or could be,

reduces the West African to the romantic notion of the primitive that remains a

troublesome obstacle to clearly seeing Africa’s people.

Change requires both the birth of something new, and the death of something old.

Africa remains in the flow of intergenerational change in its social and musical

dimensions, which invariably affects the direction of its ongoing religious evolution.

While African women may lose their special status in their strides toward equality in

regards to the drums, they will gain access to new forms of expression, perhaps

simultaneously finding alternative forms of respect and renewed special regard.

 Works Cited

Agawu, Kofi. African Rhythms: A Northern Ewe Perspective. New York, N.Y.:

Cambridge University Press, 1995

Baegne, Mabiba. Personal interview. 6 - 8 November, 2005.

Deren, Maya. Divine Horsemen: The Living Gods of Haiti. New Paltz, New York:

McPherson & Co., 1970.

The Drummers of Burundi. Les tambourinaires du Burundi, 1992 performance.

New York, NY: Caroline Records, 1992.

Murphy, Joseph. Santeria. Boston: Beacon, 1993.

Ogundipe-Leslie, Molara. Re-creating Ourselves : African Women & Critical

Transformations. Trenton, N.J.: Africa World Press, 1994.

Sworn to the Drum : a Tribute to Francisco Aguabella. Dir. Les Blank. Videocassette.

Flower Films, 1995.

 Plato, Poets, and the Virginia Standards of Learning

By Lynda Burns

In the fifth and fourth centuries BCE in the city-state of Athens, Greece, a battle

raged. This was not a military battle, although Athens fought many battles during this

time, against foreign enemies as well as those within Greece. Rather, it was a battle for

the minds of the people, fought between the philosophers and the poets. Traditional

Athenian education was largely in the hands of the poets, while the philosophers were a

fringe group, often ridiculed. The philosophers derided the poets precisely because they

were the group in power. Plato took this battle to a new level when creating his ideal

society in the Republic, banning the poets completely and placing the philosophers in

charge. The ability to think critically and morally became the standard by which people

would be judged, and that would determine their place in society. To be fair, in Book

Ten he states that poetry may be allowed back into the Republic if an argument could be

made, in either prose or poetry "not only that she is pleasant but also useful to States and

to human life" (Plato 265). In other words, poetry would be permitted in his ideal state,

but only if it passed rigorous censorship and demonstrated moral value.

The traditional Greek education consisted largely of memorization, derived in

large part from the study of the Iliad and Odyssey. Plato felt that one should learn to

think for oneself, rather than memorizing and imitating what a poet who lived centuries

earlier had written. A similar battle is taking place in the United States over education.

Fueled by the No Child Left Behind Act, many states have adopted measures that seem to

value the memorization of names and dates over teaching students to think critically and

be capable, functioning members of society. The Greeks involved in this battle called
each other "the mob of sages circumventing Zeus" or "the yelping hound howling at her

lord" (Plato 265). Modern participants in this battle have also resorted to name calling,

with a former US Secretary of Education calling the National Education Association a

"coalition of whining" and "terrorist organization," (Feller) showing how little things

have changed over the past 2,500 years.

Much of the controversy in ancient Athens was related to the opposition between

anamnesis, championed by Plato, and mimesis, used by the poets. To Plato, anamnesis

was an extremely important concept, closely related to his idea of the Forms. Anamnesis

was recollection, but not in the sense of recalling something which had been explicitly

learned earlier in life. Rather, anamnesis was a process by which someone recalled an

idea he or she had never learned, but still knew. Knowledge of certain concepts was

common to everyone, because those concepts, such as equality, beauty, or justice were

absolute, and not relative. Anamnesis involves a type of critical thinking and logical

deduction, of which Plato believed everyone capable. He provides an example in his

Meno, where using an illiterate slave he "demonstrates by asking him questions that the

slave boy knows the Pythagorean Theorem, but he does not know that he knows it"

(Edinger 61). In the Phaedo, he has Socrates argue that since these concepts are

universal, the knowledge of them must have been acquired before birth. An educator

should not pour knowledge into a student; rather he should educe what is already known.

He felt that the poets were causing many problems in Greek society through their use of

mimesis as a teaching tool.

It is important to realize that the term mimesis had several different meanings to

the ancient Greeks, and did not mean only "simple" imitation as it is used most
commonly today. Havelock contends that mimesis was the entire process by which

knowledge was transmitted through poetry. It was a sensual experience, including

rhythm, meter, music, and movement, which is why Plato felt it was so dangerous. One

did not just remember a passage from the Iliad, for example. Instead, one remembered

the entire event surrounding it. One would almost become the characters in the poem as

they were depicted by the poet from whom they originally heard the information. This is

in large part what made memorization of so much material possible. (Havelock 20-35,

145-164). In America, children initially tend to learn not the alphabet itself, but "The

Alphabet Song," because the melody in some way enhances retention. As another

modern example, many people have a catalog of hundreds if not thousands of songs in

their heads. One does not recall just the lyrics to a song, instead the melody,

accompanying instrumentation, and in the video music era, often the visual and dance

images, are recalled as a coherent whole. Generally, even if the individual has heard one

song performed by different artists, or different versions, only one specific image of the

song is recalled at a time. Songs in other languages can be memorized in this fashion,

even with no knowledge of the language, through recalling the song as a coherent

experience, and not a list of words.

Plato felt this type of learning was particularly dangerous because it led to

identification with and imitation of, not the performer, but the characters and emotions in

the poem. He reasons that when listening to epic or tragedy, one would identify with the

rage in battle scenes or the grief in a funeral oration where a hero is:

weeping, and smiting his breast--the best of us, you know, delight in giving way
to sympathy, and are in raptures at the excellence of the poet who stirs our
feelings most.... But when any sorrow of our own happens to us, then you may
 observe that we pride ourselves on the opposite quality--we would fain be quiet
and patient.... Now can we be right in praising and admiring another who is doing
that which any one of us would abominate and be ashamed of in his own person?
(Plato 263)

He states that showing emotions such as grief is not manly, and is "the part of a woman." These

emotions should have no place in his perfect society, and therefore even the simulations of them

found in poetry must be banned.

In the Republic, Plato lays out a specific course of education for the members of his

society that would not create the emotional hazards of learning from the poets. All children

begin with what he calls "simple" music and gymnastics. While discussing early education in

Book Three, this type of music and poetry is allowed, although the poetry must be purged

according to his guidelines. However, in Book Ten poetry "is to be unceremoniously thrown

out" (Havelock 15). In Book Seven, he turns to the education of the ruling class, the

philosophers. While they go through the same early stages as everyone else, they are then

subjected to a rigorous course designed specifically to enhance their analytic thinking skills.

Learning to think analytically is the highest achievement possible in education. This phase of the

education begins with arithmetic. Plato is careful to stress how useful this is, if understood to be

for abstract purposes and not bookkeeping, so that one must see numbers in the mind only. The

next subjects studied are plane geometry and solid geometry. These subjects are still used today

fairly early in a mathematical education as a solid introduction to thinking analytically. The next

step would be astronomy, which he categorizes as the motion of solids. However, again he is

careful to make it clear that the actual motions of the stars, as a ship's navigator might study them

for example, are not the true concern. "In astronomy, as in geometry, we should employ

problems, and let the heavens alone if we would approach the subject in the right way and so
make the natural gift of reason to be any of real use" (Plato 192). The next subject is harmonics,

not the study of music, but rather the natural harmonies of number. At this point, the potential

philosopher would be about thirty years of age, and would study philosophy itself for five years.

The crowning glory of this education is dialectic, which is studied with the intellect only. By

mastering this, one would be ready to take one's place among the rulers of the society, at

approximately fifty years old. Plato realizes many of the pitfalls in this system, and is careful

that the potential philosopher is carefully watched and judged for moral character and stability

throughout the education, as well as intellectual ability.

In the United States, many changes have been proposed to the public school system over

the past several decades. Most recently, the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (NCLB) was

passed, mandating adequate yearly progress from each school in the country. Each state has

adopted certain measures in response to this. As an example, in the Commonwealth of Virginia,

the Standards of Learning and the accompanying testing program, both of which are generally

referred to as the SOLs, are being utilized to fulfill part of the NCLB provisions. These multiple-

choice tests are be administered in the core curriculum areas of English, science, mathematics,

and history, and used to evaluate not only the students, but also the teachers and schools. They

are administered in grades three, five, and eight through twelve. If a particular public school

does not have the state-mandated percentage of students passing in each area, the school can lose

its accreditation. Similarly, the students can be kept from advancing to the next grade, or

graduating, if they do not pass the SOL tests, even if they receive an "A" in the class.

The concept behind the program is to ensure that all students learned the same basic

material, regardless of which school they attend, a goal that almost all applaud. However, there

has been a backlash against the tests themselves and how they are used. A major concern is that
teachers are required to "teach to the test," and that memorizing facts has become more important

than critical thinking. The tests are designed to measure the minimum that a student should get

out of a course, and by teaching to the test, the fear is that nothing beyond this minimum will be

taught. While in certain content areas, such as mathematics, a multiple choice test may give a

fairly accurate indication of what the student has learned, in areas such as history, memorizing

names and dates in order to pass the test can take the place of truly learning the material. Indeed,

not all the Standards are tested because, according to the Virginia Department of Education, "In

some content areas, there are SOLs that do not lend themselves to multiple-choice testing"

(Blueprint). For example, the Tenth Grade English Reading/Literature and Research test

excludes eleven Standards of Learning completely. These include oral presentations and small-

group learning activities, which certainly could not be tested in multiple-choice format, as well as

the following Standard:

10.3 The student will read and critique literary works from a variety of eras in a
variety of cultures.
a) Explain similarities and differences of structures and images as represented in
the literature of different cultures.
b) Identify universal themes prevalent in the literature of all cultures.
c) Describe cultural archetypes in short stories, novels, poems, and plays across
several cultures.
d) Examine a literary selection from several critical perspectives. (Blueprint)

Some fear that the Standards such as these, which are not on the tests, are not being given priority

in classrooms, or are even ignored completely in practice. Comparing similar themes across

cultures and gaining different perspectives from which to view ideas are certainly critical to

becoming an educated world citizen, but as this is not on the test, it is not emphasized in many

classrooms.
 There is a heated debate taking place in Virginia, with the teachers, their union, and

school administrators largely on one side, and the state legislature on the other, over these tests.

A similar fight is occurring across the country as states try to implement the requirements of the

NCLB. Unfortunately, the students are caught in the middle. While the goals of the SOL

program are not in question, the fight has turned into a battle between whether students should be

taught largely to memorize for specific goals, or to think critically, even at the expense of

memorization. One Virginia Tech researcher states:

It is preposterous to suggest that success in the 21st century will depend upon
acquiring what nationally recognized education writer Alfie Kohn has referred to
as the "bunch o' facts" represented by the SOLs. However, lack of success is
virtually assured for those who are denied a standard high school diploma simply
because they failed an end-of-course SOL test.... The implicit assumption is that
all children can learn the same challenging subject matter if only their teachers
would implement the SOLs conscientiously. However noble in spirit, this policy
cannot be supported by experience, research or common sense. (Cross)

The two camps, while both claiming to want to find middle ground, are in strong opposition,

with rhetoric rather than reason often triumphing.

In many ways, this fight is similar to the battle between the philosophers and poets in

ancient Greece. The discussions stress the either/or nature of current education, with little

attempt to find a way to hold the tension by finding a both/and solution that might be in the

students' best interests. The concerns with the testing seem to be focusing mainly on the

humanities and social sciences. Some teachers are struggling to find a both/and solution that will

be in the best interests of their students, but this involves a great amount of work. For example, a

history teacher at Gloucester High School in eastern Virginia has completely discarded the

county provided textbooks, and written his own material, as he feels this is the only way the

students can both learn the concrete facts and learn to see history thematically and analytically
(Zuger). The fact that teachers are being forced to radically change the materials provided if they

want their students to do more than memorize facts is feeding into the protests against using this

type of measurement tool exclusively.

Of course there are many significant differences between Plato's Athens and 21st century

America. However, the educational systems in both experienced significant criticism from both

within and without. While all sides certainly want what is best for the students, what exactly that

entails is hotly debated. In Plato's time, a shift from an oral culture to a literate one mandated

some changes take place in education. He perhaps went to extremes, trying to alter radically the

process of education, and banning what had previously been dominant. In his Republic, those

previously marginalized, the philosophers, would hold all the power, and the poets who had

educated the society would be forbidden. In our time, in a growing subsection of the population,

literacy is no longer extant, and people receive information orally and visually through radio and

television. A large part of the impetus behind the NCLB and the SOLs is fighting this trend,

making sure the society stays literate. However, the battles over how best to achieve this are

fierce, fueled by a fear that minimum educational standards will become the only ones. The

battle is in many ways ideological, with each side convinced their way is the only possible way.

Those teachers who are seeking compromise, to fuse the different ideas into a solid teaching

strategy that works for their particular students, are often criticized precisely because their

method only works for their group of students, and is not something that can be applied to every

student. The search for one solution that replaces all others, marginalizing those who search for

effective results, is no different than the conflicts between the philosophers and poets in ancient

Athens.
 Works Cited

"Blueprint for Secondary English: Reading/Literature and Research." Standards of Learning

Assessment Program. Richmond, VA: VA Dept of Ed, 1997. 20 April 2005.
<http://www.pen.k12.va.us/VDOE/Assessment/soltests/readsec.html>.

Cross, Lawrence. "Virginia Schools: Accountability Needed For Tests As Well As Tested: SOL
Tests Fail Mission Says Virginia Tech Researcher." Virginia Journal of Education. 14
April, 2005. <http://www.veaweteach.org/articles_search_results_detail.asp?ContentID
=194>.

Edinger, Edward F. The Psyche in Antiquity, Book One: Early Greek Philosophy. Toronto:
Inner City, 1999.

Havelock, Eric A. Preface to Plato. Cambridge, MA: Harvard UP, 1963.

Feller, Ben. "NEA, School Districts Fight No Child Law." 20 April 2005.
<http://news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20050420/ap_on_go_ot/education_law
suit>.

Plato. The Republic. Trans. Benjamin Jowett. Mineola, NY: Dover, 2000.

Zuger, Warren. "Is Trivia Driving Meaning from History? Maintaining sense and SOL success."
Virginia Journal of Education. 14 April, 2005. < http:// www.veaweteach.org/articles
_search_results_detail.asp? ContentID=1316>.
 Strange Fruits of the Soul: Epic as Orphic Guide to Nectar

By Cheryle Van Scoy-Mosher

Southern trees bear strange fruit

Blood on the leaves and blood at the root
Black bodies swinging in the southern breeze
Strange fruit hanging from the poplar trees

Pastoral scene of the gallow south

The bulging eyes and the twisted mouth
Scent of magnolia sweet and fresh
Then the sudden smell of burning flesh

Here is a fruit for the crows to pluck

For the rain to gather, for the wind to suck
For the sun to ripe, for the tree to drop
Here is a strange and bitter crop
(“Strange Fruit” Lewis Allan)

“Strange Fruits,” as Billie Holliday notes in her live recording, was written specifically

for her (Lady in Autumn). The image-laden message was envisioned by the author as being

delivered through the soulful voice of this powerful black songbird. Perhaps Allan’s artistic

intuition knew the beauty of her voice could bear the weight of the song’s contained memory,

releasing it from dark burial grounds to the imagination where it might become constructive

fodder. I sense that the deeper the darkness, the greater the beauty required to transport and

transform harsh reality into imaginal nourishment.

Just as Billie Holliday could slide these horrific images into the psyche through her gifted

croon, Toni Morrison’s remarkable talent with the written word allows us to tolerate an even

more intense encounter with the holocaust of slavery in Beloved. Great art allows us to see what

we could not otherwise, and often we don’t even understand what is happening as it is
experienced. All we know is that we are moved by the encounter. Great art touches and

transforms the soul. Great art perhaps should be termed deep art, for it speaks to us because it

pierces directly to the riches of the perceiver’s unconscious precisely because that is its origin,

the archetypal, God-dwelling, primal source.

Christine Downing invites us to recognize the presence of Orpheus in poetic art: “We do

not need to look for other names. Where there is poetry, it is Orpheus singing” (quoting Rainer

Maria Rilke 4). The Orpheus myth lends insight into my reading of Beloved, for he is the tension

bearing bridge “between the form-giving power of art associated with Apollo and the disruptive

death-dealing power of passion associated with Dionysos” (Downing 6). Though Downing

asserts that the myth can be read both ways, “with art as triumphant or with death” (6), I contend

it can be utilized in regard to Morrison’s art from the position of the bridge itself. The dark

vicious realities unveiled in Beloved are Morrison as Orpheus diving into the underworld

bringing back song so that we may finally hear the lessons from our dead. Beloved is art from

death.

Beloved, according to Louise Cowan, is of epic stature (12). Epics, in her opinion,

articulate an entire human cosmos and require divine intervention to guide the artist in fulfilling

such a grand task (10). “A primary feature of the epic cosmos is its penetration of the veil

separating material and immaterial existence, allowing an intimate relation between gods and

men and a resultant extension of space” (11). A mere mortal is incapable of penetrating this

mystery. Cowan asserts that “[artists] are able to speak the epic word because they have been

allowed to see the physical order as permeated by the spiritual; in a sense, everything is sacred”

(12). She further suggests that not only does the epic artist intuit the possibilities within their
stories, but they also recognize their impotence in executing the work without the assistance of

forces beyond themselves.

Epics, as articulated by Dennis Slattery, arise out of chaotic, chthonic times when a

culture’s primary myth is disintegrating and the energy flow is “jammed” (27 July 2005). The

hero/heroine of the epic, he asserts, is sacrificed to unblock the forces and allow the energy to

move forward, allowing a new myth to arise to lead the culture. It might be postulated, therefore,

that the culture is blinded to learning from its own behavior and

something transpersonal must intervene to show the way. “In the quite distinct world of epic,

[…] the gods descend, to cooperate directly with the mortal protagonist (and the poet) in

fashioning an order in which myth can be reinterpreted to redeem history” (Cowan 13).

Epics are grand works of archetypal art; they provide an overarching view of culture in a

particular point of time, and in doing so, allow its myth, its story, to come into consciousness and

extricate its memory from a dead and unreachable place (16). James Hillman argues that “only

when things fall apart do they open up into new meaning” (Re-Visioning Psychology 111). He

perceives ideas are our way of psychic seeing; ideas are the “eye of the soul” and that as our ideas

change, our soul changes (121). In combining these notions, I imagine authentic epic art as

interacting directly with the unconscious (a numinous injection), delivering fresh ideas of an

emotionally charged and repressed historical construct, thereby allowing the soul to reimagine

and consciously extract and integrate its lessons.

“The soul seems to suffer when its inward eye is occluded, a victim of overwhelming

events” (123). When life events force a closing off of an experience, the soul suffers because

that reality is not then available to serve the psyche. When a functional story cannot be created to
house the trauma, the incident(s) descend into the underworld of our being, trapped in the body,

unavailable for processing. The wound is open but buried under sword and shield.

She wished for Baby Suggs’ fingers molding her nape, reshaping it, saying, “Lay em
down, Sethe. Sword and shield. Down. Down. Both of em down. Down by the riverside.
Sword and shield. Don’t study war no more. Lay all that mess down. Sword and shield.“
And under the pressing fingers and the quiet instructive voice, she would. Her heavy
knives of defense against misery, regret, gall and hurt, she placed one by one on a bank
where clear water rushed on below. (Morrison 100)

In the midst of literal hell, having been physically and psychically slaughtered beyond any

degree we can humanely imagine (nor want to), grace enters Sethe’s field, always as a Hermes

guide, opening borders, assisting through boundaries and over thresholds to new territory. First,

grace arrives in the presence of Amy Denver, helping her to deliver her child (crossing into

motherhood yet again), and then as Stamp Paid who helps her “across to the other shore.”

Waiting on the other side is Baby Suggs, Holy, who embodies not only Hermes but Orpheus as

well. Baby Suggs seductively opens happiness in those around her and sings to heal the wounded

hearts.

In the presence of a living acknowledgement of the truth her body wears (any of the

figures of grace), Sethe can hold the devastation within her psyche. She remembers the reality of

suffering yet uses it to inspire her survival. Despite the unbelievable pain and loss she has

endured, she can stay on the side of life, hopeful of a new tomorrow.

Just as Billie Holiday no doubt awakened dark unreachable corners of her audiences’

heritage, so can reading Toni Morrison’s Beloved do for us. Morrison’s use of language is her

voice, and certainly a tantalizing vehicle for the horrific reality that is our nation’s past. Her

language is a seductive draw, allowing us to claim what we must, in order not to forget or repeat.
I propose that all of these characters and their stories reside within each of us who bear the tag of

United States citizen.

Beloved is within those of us born in the United States; the characters, the stories, the

reality of slavery, is in our bodies and our psyches, containing important lessons. If we cannot

acknowledge this awareness, the nectar may not be drawn. As Sethe retreats from the

unspeakable acts she had endured and created, we retreat from the ills of the individual and

humanity. Beloved teaches that isolating from such reality can be equally life threatening, and

culturally destructive, as the original acts.

Reading Beloved is a visceral experience. Morrison’s language engages the reader so

magnetically that it becomes impossible not to call those figures forth from one’s own psyche. It

is impossible to read this work and not contemplate one’s reactions to both the aggressors and the

victims. Morrison makes us feel our history, our ancestors. Beloved as epic calls the archetypes

forth, opening Hillman’s eye of the soul, so that we may imagine them as ideas and integrate

their wisdom.

In trying to make the slave experience intimate, I hoped the sense of things being both
under control and out of control would be persuasive throughout; that the order and
quietude of everyday life would be violently disrupted by the chaos of the needy dead;
that the Herculean effort to forget would be threatened by memory desperate to stay
alive.” (Morrison xix)

What, then, is the larger meaning of this work? That is the question that stays behind and

haunts. There has been considerable commentary written about Morrison’s prize winning

Beloved, from popular magazine reviews to scholarly essays and including an entire text devoted

to a survey of literary criticisms (Andrews and McKay). Easton perceives Sethe as symbolic of

the destructiveness of not only slavery, but also patriarchy; she is the female written upon by

male hands:
 A female tradition, Virginia Woolf's thinking back through our mothers, is thus all but
lost to Sethe along with her mother's African language, and what she learns, 'picking
meaning out of a code she no longer understood' (p. 62), is that her mother murdered
Sethe's siblings--the erasure, so to speak, of the children whom white men fathered on her
in yet another form of inscription. (Easton)

Luckhurst follows a trail closer to mine, choosing a view from the distant mountain,

beyond the details of the story to one encompassing a wider frame.

[T]he ghost that fractures the enclosure of the home is the trace of a disavowed history,
specifically, of a genocidal history. […]Fragmented, allusive, elusive, both are forced to
be cryptic precisely because they address a crypt that has not been sealed and ghosts that
haunt because their history has been disavowed. […]Ghosts are the signals of atrocities,
marking sites of an untold violence, a traumatic past whose traces remain to attest to the
fact of a lack of testimony. A haunting does not initiate a story; it is the sign of a blockage
of story […]. (Luckhurst)

Here, I believe, we are led to the full potential of Morrison’s brilliance, its capacity to allow

us to look at ourselves, and not limit the Beloved story to something ‘other’ and separate,

something not within our own being. Donald Kalsched guides us in this regard. In The Inner

World of Trauma, he carefully delineates the process by which unspeakable trauma is managed

by the interior psyche. Although there are multiple layers in his dissection, in essence, he

proposes that the more devastating the incident(s) the more deeply the experience is imbedded in

the unconscious. Not merely are these realities placed in the shadow arena of the personal

unconscious, but those with greater potential for damaging the vulnerable ego are captured and

imprisoned at the archetypal level by a numinous protector. The barricade is an amnesic frame,

arresting the individual in a self-sustaining fantasy construction (22-27).

Kalsched perceives the numinous protector that rushes in to save the psyche from complete

dismemberment as Jung’s archetype of the Self (18). Once cordoned off, any threat to its escape

will generate a defensive reaction from the darker side of the Self (24-5). An equally numinous

inner attack will generate, reminiscent of the original incidents, carrying the violent aggressive
energies of the original psychic split (13). A cycle often repeats of “hope, vulnerability, fear,

shame and self-attack” (25). Thus explains the potent impact of Paul D’s energy on the

household in Beloved. Unfortunately, Kalsched points out, the only way for this buried memory

to be healed requires it be exhumed from the tomb, a re-traumatizing encounter (26).

I see Beloved, the character, as symbolic of this process. She is the traumatized inner

child of Sethe, whom she kills to survive. Sethe symbolizes, in my opinion, the dissociated

person who becomes psychically ill rather than face her tormentors again.

Previous to this in the novel, Sethe can tolerate less psychic splitting, for grace has always

been at her side. In the haven of Baby Suggs’ care she is sustained. When the community balks

at Baby Suggs’ too God-like generosity, her capacity is diminished. The community’s belief and

need for Baby Suggs to carry a sacred presence had, in fact, energized her. Without full measure

of her protection, the return of the tormentor demands nothing less from Sethe’s psyche than a

blood sacrifice. The memory is driven in a transpersonal wash to the deepest part of her

unconscious, enveloped in a fantasy cocoon. What she kills is the beautiful, hopeful for a free

future, young woman within her. She is buried violently and returns violently. The light side of

the Self ultimately resists, insisting that the suicidal act be confronted, the young girl given life,

and access to the gods restored.

Epic speaks at the archetypal level, in symbolism. Morrison, guided by the gods, can be

heard as a dream, as Orpheus returning from the underworld with music from the divine.

Morrison’s own narrative technique self-consciously uses music as a model for resisting
logocentric narratives, both through the use of repetition as a narrative device and through
the prominence of song in her stories. Morrison herself describes how she wishes to apply
the open-ended quality of black music to her novels: “Classical music satisfies and closes.
Black music does not do that. Jazz always keeps you on the edge. There is no final chord.
There may be a long chord, but no final chord. And it agitates you. Spirituals agitate you,
no matter what they are saying about how it is all going to be. There is something
 underneath them that is incomplete. There is always something else that you want from
the music. I want my books to be like that—because I want that feeling of something held
in reserve and the sense that there is more.” (Wolfe quoting from “Interview”429)

I am reminded of the unconscious, its inability to be fully comprehended, always full of mystery

and suggesting wisdom beyond the literal.

Slattery, in his eloquent admiration of Morrison’s text, addresses the body’s wounds and

specifically, the potential meaning of Sethe’s gruesome yet beautiful scarred back; his statement

speaks to me again from that more distant trail: “ Within the scars and pains of our wounds is

the blossoming flower of freedom; the wound has the capacity to open up to liberation, even

when the origin of such freedom is so tender and vulnerable” (213).

Sethe is a vision, equally imposing as the spectre Beloved. Her body bears the crucifixion

she endures; she wears the tree on which she is hung. The scars on her back become her frame.

The structure that symbolizes the human foundation, the back with its central core of vertebral

column is the human representation of the axis mundi. It houses the life-sustaining spinal canal,

allowing the body to communicate with the brain, representing the source of inspiration and its

means of execution. Sethe’s back reminds us that all is not light. She symbolizes the sufferings

of an entire people, both he who marked and she who is marked. She (as are all the characters in

my humble estimation) is our shadow; on Sethe is drawn art from pain. The message is twofold:

here rests evidence of evil and salvation.

“ […] In the case of mysteries, the larger the island of knowledge, the longer the shoreline

of wonder” (The Big Picture 2). I heard this quote from Christina Rossetti’s “The Long Hard

Climb” through the wise voice of Huston Smith. It stayed with me and leads me to search the

greater landscape. That search within the mysteries underlying Beloved is further aided by

Edward Casey. He unveils the ‘bigger’ picture of Morrison’s work for me through the notions of
spirit and soul, imagination and memory, and links these individual processes to a world

perspective (Spirit and Soul). I want to keep in view the image of Sethe’s back and its engraving

of the tree, the anatomical structure that is its framework, and the concept of the world soul. I

suggest there is a vital connection that calls to be remembered, particularly, what lies not only

within, but that which is buried under the tree. I suggest Rossetti hints that the extent of our

passion, our sense of wonder and imagination, is based on our range of awareness (memory).

Casey articulates the concept of spirit as related to imagination. He perceives the

movement in imagination as inherently upward, from body to soul and from soul to spirit; these

are directive desires to bring understanding and meaning to bodily experience (xv). In contrast,

he suggests memory is associated with soul and is a compelling downward move, from spirit to

soul and soul to body, emphasizing, “A disembodied soul feels itself to be as homeless as a

soulless spirit” (xvii). The thrusts of memory and imagination simultaneously desire to penetrate

and infuse one another.

I imagine Sethe as the axis mundi, and for much of the novel, bound and submerged in the

lower half of a vertical plane. She is trapped by a disembodied soul. Paul D is a soulless spirit.

Their reunion unleashes memory in Sethe and imagination in Paul, but as Kalsched warns, the

energies are explosive, equivalent to the initial dismembering split. Their union triggers an

energy flow within the entire surrounding field, rupturing the barriers to the gods and the world

soul.

In contemplating epic genre, an image surfaced: a vertical axis, crossed by a horizontal one

encased in a sphere, the gyroscope. It occurs to me that the counterbalancing movements from

above and below along the vertical plane, when in equilibrium, create the energy which forges

the horizontal plane. Further, I sensed the relationship between the two planes as directly
correlated: the wider the movements along the vertical plane, the greater the extension

horizontally. This is, of course, the ancient concept of the axis mundi. For the culture or the

individual, restricting the flow of those vertical forces in either direction directly impacts the

forward horizontal movement or its constructive advancement.

Casey sees images as the outgrowth of a fluid movement between imagining and

remembering (xviii). The vertical plane can be visualized as spirit and imagination in the upper

half and memory and soul in the lower region. Images, then, may be viewed as the forces that

drive the culture or individual along the horizontal axis. The horizontal plane becomes the anima

mundi, the sparking energy that animates and drives life (Hillman The Thought of the Heart and

the Soul of the World 102). I understand Hillman to assert that the relationship between the

individual and the culture are symbiotic; as we animate the world, so it animates us (103). To

kill a part of our soul, our history, to deny its reality, is an assault on the world. As Morrison

reveals through Sethe, the consequences are deadly.

I have limited this discussion to Beloved, not denying the merit of two other powerful

epics, The Odyssey and Moby Dick, but due to its pressing relevance today. For me, Moby Dick

directly speaks to our destruction of the planet; as we destroy parts of our self, so we violently

destroy that which sustains us in the natural environment. No doubt such is of critical

contemporary import. Beloved, however, reigns prominent due to the human consequences that

get less public attention. To heal the environment is a less threatening focus than looking at our

role in human atrocities. With the genocide that continues in our world, with the tendency of

individuals and governments to dissociate from the evils that exist within us and perpetuate the

horrors not only through aggression but through lack of serious effort to effect a more healing
process in the world soul, Beloved’s atrocities speak ever more strongly. Are they not enough to

make us listen and change the way we approach our past and our future?

[…] memories, like wounded people, may always be seeking a home, like the ghost of her
murdered daughter. Rememories are ways that the past gestures itself into the present;
remembering itself is an imaginative gesture that intertwines past with present, the souls
of the dead with the living, those who have perished through deep suffering and their
offspring, in a seamless confluence. (Slattery 213)

124 Bluestone is Sethe’s home address: from nothing comes one, which gives rise to two,

between two is created the nebulous third, the anima mundi, toward the unity of four. Blue stone

is the alchemical lapis. Indeed it asks: look deeply within, remember, and imagine a better

future. Morrison, as Orphic epic guide, reveals the nectar.

 Works Cited

Andrews, William L. and Nellie Y. McKay, eds. Toni Morrison's Beloved: A

Casebook. New York: Oxford UP, 1999.

Cowan, Louise. “The Epic as Cosmopoesis.” The Epic Cosmos. Ed. Larry Allums.
Dallas, Texas: The Dallas Institute Publications, 1992. 1-26.

Downing, Christine. “Looking Back at Orpheus.” Spring 71: Orpheus 1(2004):

1-35.

Easton, Alison. “The body as history and ‘writing the body’: The example of Grace
Nichols.” Journal of Gender Studies 3.1(1994): 55-68.

Hillman, James. Re-Visioning Psychology. New York: HarperPerennial, 1992.

---. The Thought of the Heart and the Soul of the World. Putnam, CT: Spring
Publications, Inc., 1992.

Kalsched, Donald. The Inner World of Trauma: Archetypal Defenses of the Personal
Spirit. New York: Brunner-Routledge, 1996.

Luckhurst, Roger. “Impossible Mourning in Toni Morrison’s Beloved and Michele

Roberts’ Daughters of the House.” Critique 37.4(1996): 243-261.

Morrison, Toni. Beloved. New York: Vintage Books, 1987.

---.“Interview with Nellie McKay.“ Conversations with Toni Morrison, Ed. Danielle Taylor
Guthrie. Jackson: UP of Mississippi, 1994. (referenced in Wolfe)

Slattery, Dennis Patrick. “The Body and the Word in Morrison’s Beloved.” The Wounded
Body: Remembering the Markings of Flesh. Albany: Suny P, 2000.

Wolfe, Joanna. “Ten Minutes for Seven Letters: Song as Key to Narrative Revision in
Toni Morrison’s Beloved.” Narrative 12.3(2004): 263-281,

Slattery, Dennis Patrick. Epic Imagination (MS604). Pacifica Graduate Institute,

Carpenteria, CA. 27 July 2005.

Holiday, Billie. “Strange Fruit.” Lady in Autumn: The Best of the Verve Years. New York:
Polygram, 1991.

Smith, Huston. The Big Picture: What the Religions of the World Teach Us About the
Nature of Ultimate Reality. Boulder, CO: Sounds True, 2002.
 Astrology and Jung: Bridging Science and Synchronicity

By Susan Paidhrin

Carl Gustav Jung’s theory of synchronicity stands as a bulwark for astrologers against the

reductive scientific fundamentalism of 20th and 21st centuries. Although a few scientific studies

have netted qualified empirical evidence in support of astrology (Gauquelin study (Birthtimes);

Nelson radio waves (Propagation Wizards); Hill redhead study (Mars-Redhead Files)), astrology

cannot be proven based on any known theory of causality. For this reason, astrologers have for

the most part abandoned linear cause and effect explanations, taking their stand on wide deck of

Jung’s ship and adopting synchronicity--Jung’s concept of coincident arising of phenomena

connected through resonance or meaning--as vindication for their craft. Nevertheless, when

astrologers cite Jung’s theory, it is often with a reflexive and defensive posture.

Jung was himself only a lay or amateur astrologer, yet astrologer Geoffrey Cornelius writes

that Jung “is probably the most important single, intellectual influence for astrologers in the 20th

century” (Div 5). Jung crafted a brilliant and poetic interpretation of the astrological Age of

Pisces in Aion (72-94), and the centerpiece of his essay on Synchronicity, “An Astrological

Experiment,” correlates cross aspects between planets in the birthcharts of marriage partners with

aspects that have traditionally been recognized as auspicious for successful marriage (43-68).

Jung’s experiment didn’t produce statistically valid results; however, as he says, “[...] one has to

have a very thick skin not to be impressed that [...] those turned up as maxima which are

regarded by tradition as typical” (62).

Jung had much more than a trifling interest in astrology: Jung wrote, “[...] astrology

represents the sum of all the psychological knowledge of antiquity” (Syn and Para 84), and in

Mysterium Coniunctionis he called her “Alchemy’s elder sister” (CW 14 par 222). In Jung and
Astrology Maggie Hyde quotes Jung in a 1911 letter to Freud: “‘At the moment I am looking into

astrology [...]. There are strange and wondrous things in these lands of darkness [...] I shall return

laden with rich booty’” (55).

In his Analytic Psychology, more commonly called “Jungian Psychology,” Jung has

bequeathed to astrology a treasury of supporting and guiding metaphors, concepts, images and

historical and esoteric knowledge. For several decades astrologers have swum in the wake of

Jung’s wide bow, emboldened by his intellectual curiosity and rigor, buoyed by his singular

courage. Astrologer Maggie Hyde admits Jung’s “extensive” influence on astrology, citing “the

use of the mythical amplification of astrological symbols” and “the links between his structure of

the psyche and the horoscope,” resulting in the idea of the horoscope as “‘a map of the psyche’”

(11) to navigate obscure waters. In actuality, there is little in Jung’s thought that doesn’t have a

corollary representation in astrology, which is under-girded by Jung’s theory of synchronicity.

Jung was always both a scientist and a visionary: this duality, sometimes a collision of two

perspectives and at others the progenitor of a third, framed both the beginnings and endings of

his career as a psychologist. He boldly based his doctoral dissertation--“later published as ‘On the

Psychology and Pathology of So-Called Occult Phenomena’” (Main 3)--on the mediumistic

activities of his cousin, Helene Preiswerk, establishing his willingness to confront the existence

of empirical phenomena that science would prefer to ignore. Rather than deny the evidence, Jung

sought a new theory. However, as tenaciously as Jung hounded the trail of the cryptic theory

which could reveal the source for the irrational, a-causal phenomena he refused to dismiss, even

as he neared death, it eluded him. In Quantum Mind Arnold Mindell recounts Jung’s last dream:

In the last dream he had before dying, Jung dreamed he was wandering through different
spaces trying to find a mathematical formula with which to understand synchronicity.
 Apparently he was walking forward, but had a mirror in which he could look backward.
There were triangles around. (351)

Astrology is both a scientific and a symbolic discipline. It is a natural or descriptive science

in that observable, measurable phenomena in the sky are correlated with actual experienced

events; it is a symbolic discipline in that these interconnections are ascribed meaning, and

through the measured and expected cyclic return of astronomical occurrences, meaningful human

developments are anticipated.

As a natural science, astrology can demonstrate coincidences that exist, yet with no causal

theory to explain them. In On Divination and Synchronicity Marie-Louise Von Franz points out

that “Causal thinking is, so to speak, lineal” (10). With cause and effect, material phenomena or

events are inevitable linear stages in a “self-running process” that operates mechanically and “by

absolute necessity” (Jung Syn and Para 116). In actuality, causality is itself a theory, a leap

positing a relationship between two discreet phenomena: as Jung says in Synchronicity,

“Causality is the way we explain the link between two successive events” (115). In contrast,

astrology is based on cycles and is experienced through interwoven fields of influence. As

Michael Conforti writes in Field, Form and Fate: “archetypal fields [...are] dynamic, not static,

and involve interrelationships” (23) with their existence empirically “inferred from their effects”

(41).

Causality can only be “proved” by isolating variables and controlling conditions. What can be

physically isolated in astrology is an event at a moment of time in a specific place and a snapshot

of the astronomical factors conjoining it. Together these form the basis of the phrase, “As Above,

So Below,” which astrologers have used for decades to justify their art, but are what Geoffrey
Cornelius calls “pseudo-causation disguised (and misunderstood) as synchronicity” (Div 8). Jung

describes this idea in Synchronicity:

The old theory of correspondences was based on the evidence of such connections--a theory
that reached its culminating point, and also its provisional end in Leibniz’s idea of pre-
established harmony, and was then replaced by causality. (115)

Jung also explains that the scientific method depends upon “regular events which can be

repeated” (6). Astrological happenings do not occur in one-to-one correspondences; they happen

in constellations, patterns and syndromes--what astrologer Dennis Elwell calls

“multiconvergence” (44), so specific cases and symbols cannot be isolated. In this sense they co-

arise in clusters of physical episodes perceived through what Von Franz calls “synchronistic

thinking” which “one could call field thinking, the center of which is time” (7-8). Each

astrological event is unique, unrepeatable, with pluralistic symbols recombining through the

astrological chart as their prism. Astronomical snapshot, worldly event, and human agency array

in infinite combinations.

Elwell further expresses that the symbolic parallels in astrology operate through “vertical

strands of meaning” and that “each strand expresses itself at different levels, resulting in what

seems at first sight to be a bewildering diversity” (69). Astrology’s complexities exclude it from

current scientific analysis: as Geoffrey Cornelius says, “[...] they definitely belong in this strange

realm that is challenging at the corners of science” and may only fit into “a science of the future”

(Div 4). Astrology mirrors what Jolanda Jocobi says about the life of the psyche: “Its essence

remains forever ambivalent and evades all efforts to unveil it” (4). Even before contemplating

questions of meaning or inner significance, the actual physical correspondences are baffling.

Jung writes in his commentary on The Secret of the Golden Flower that, “Science is not,

indeed, a perfect instrument,” and that the “Scientific method must serve; it errs when it usurps a
throne” (82). Science becomes scientism--a limiting theism with matter as God--when its

methods and assumptions define the limits of reality. Marie-Louise Von Franz restates this

saying:

We make the same fatal mistake when we think that a statistical truth is the truth, for we are
really only handling an abstract concept and not reality itself, and into that thought then
sneaks identification with the godhead. (32)

In his introduction to Wilhelm’s translation of the I Ching Jung says, “The heavy-handed

pedagogic approach that attempts to fit irrational phenomena into a preconceived rational pattern

is anathema to me” (xxix). As a phenomenologist, Jung sought to let experience reveal itself to

him on its own terms, suggesting its own questions, posing its own hypotheses. Elwell says that

we should not ask nature or the heavens to speak our language (11); rather, that “The essence of

the problem is to discover the categories in which the cosmos itself operates, instead of inviting it

to endorse some ready-made category” (18).

Jung used the analogy of the spectrum of light to express his experience of nature as a

continuum:

[...] beyond the ultraviolet and infrared ranges of light there are phenomena that we do not
perceive; yet they are real because we can build instruments to measure them, [...]. Perhaps
the ultraviolet extends in a spiritual direction and the infrared in the biological direction:
spirit and matter. (Es Jung 292)

Astrology is an ancient technology to measure and find meaning in the points of light suspended

in the vast blackness of the night sky; alchemy is a technology to release and transform the light

of nature, the lumen naturae--those “sparks scintillating in the blackness [...that] should, for

Paracelsus, change the spectacle of the ‘inner firmament’ and its stars” (Jung On the Nat 105). In

these two sister sciences heaven and earth combine.

 Jung thought that many scientific experiments attempt to “force” nature to answer narrow

questions that can be statistically verified, giving us an averaged but not actual depiction of the

world (Syn and Para 117). Pauli advocated for an evolving “theory of nature” (in Adler 31)--one

that counterbalances the imprisoning march of causality with the apparent freefall into chance.

Chance happenings are individual, particular, uncommon, and occur without apparent periodicity

or predictability. Jung calls them “just-so” stories--singular in themselves.

In scientific parlance, chance is pejorative. As Marie-Louise Von Franz says, “Chance is the

enemy--chance is what you have to eliminate by as much repetition as possible,” yet,

inconveniently for science, “Chance is an objective factor and exists, but in science one speaks of

a chance accident, something to be regretted” (48). Ironically, as Von Franz points out, “the

actual historical root of probability is gambling” (33) which is based on chance; and an

unforeseen disaster is called “an act of God” (48). She expands on this saying that divination is

“a different complementary approach [to the scientific], namely one that takes chance as the

centre [...]. So, in one, chance is the source of the information, and in the other chance is the

disturbance or the factor one eliminates” (50).

Jung’s genius and common sense was to accept what he clearly saw and experienced and to

acknowledge that if causality couldn’t account for phenomena then another theory was needed,

an a-causal theory--“an intellectually necessary principle which could be added as a fourth to the

recognized triad of space, time, and causality” (Syn and Para 95). Jung posited synchronicity as

one “particular instance of general acausal orderedness” separate from a “wider conception”

which would include “a priori factors such as the properties of natural numbers, the

discontinuities of modern physics, etc.” (Syn 100)--and perhaps the perceivable correspondences

between celestial and terrestrial phenomena.

 With synchronicity Jung goes beyond matter to include psyche and the observer. Jung

differentiates synchronicity from mere physical coincidence or simultaneity, adding the

qualifying “psychic” factor of “meaning.” In There Are No Accidents Jungian analyst Robert

Hopcke says, “It is the meaningfulness of such chance events which makes a synchronistic

coincidence different from other sorts of coincidences” (5). Jung defines synchronicity as a

meaningful coincidence of a psychic state without any discernable causal connection with any of

three external variables: 1. a simultaneous, present external event; 2. a simultaneous but remote

or distant external event; and 3. a not-yet-existent future external event (110). Jung refers to

meaning, in this context, as the significance for the experiencer and/or for the observer, present

or remote. He also sees meaning as arising from the freedom that is an attribute of acausality

(Syn and Para 116).

Divinatory or mantic methods exist to provoke experiences that disclose meaning--the

message behind--or within--matter. In Listening to the Oracle Diane Skafte defines divination,

from the Latin for deity, divi, as follows: “to divine a thing is to discover the intention or the

configuration of the Sacred in relation to that matter” (31). In The Myth of Meaning Aniela Jaffe

describes meaning similarly to Skafte’s definition of divination: “The experience of meaning

depends on the awareness of a transcendental or spiritual reality that complements the empirical

reality of life and together with it forms a whole” (21). Divination is meaning-making, and it

rests on synchronicity (Von Franz 7).

Seemingly, divination stands opposite science as a method for understanding our existence

and the time-space “world.” Science operates quantitatively, cataloguing material effects and

data; divination operates qualitatively, through feeling and “an approximate determination of

intensities” (Jung Syn and Para 127). In the Jungian view the qualitative affect or feeling
coinciding with divination and synchronicity is key to ascertaining their authentic presence along

with their accompanying archetypes. Roderick Main writes in his introduction to Jung on

Synchronicity and the Paranormal: “Jung notes, for instance, that the meaning which

coincidences have for their subject, including their attendant emotional charge or numinosity,

seems to stem from the underlying presence of an archetype [...]” (9). But as Jacobi says,

“[archetypes] can be recognized only from the effects they produce” (31). The archetypes cannot

be defined, measured or contained; rather they can only be understood through gnosis and

feeling. Jacobi writes, “They are channels, predispositions, river-beds into which the waters of

life are dug deep” (52), and “the archetype represents a profound riddle surpassing our rational

comprehension” (31).

What may be experienced as “incompatible” between divination and science may, in fact, be

“complementary” (Von Franz 108). Psychic energy and physical energy may both be of the same

core energy, just operating at different frequencies (82). Perhaps science will eventually discover

that they are actually an antinomy--two poles of one thing, together suggesting a more

encompassing third. For Jung this third was the collective unconscious and its inhabitants, the

archetypes, which Jung “referred to as psychoid [...], meaning by this that the archetypes were

neither physical nor mental but partaking of both realms” (Storr Es Jung 26).

Steeped in Theosophy and Western metaphysics, for decades astrologers have been arguing

that their study is a high science elevated above the questionable divinatory practices of fortune-

telling and mediumship. During most of the 20th century, identification with the difficult and

abstruse psychology of Jung has provided conditional shelter from astrology’s harsher critics.

However, one of the current divides in astrology is between those who seek professional

validation as a helping profession on a par with psychology and those who choose a more radical
lineage--that of divination. Primary among the latter are Geoffrey Cornelius and his colleague in

the British Company of Astrologers, Maggie Hyde. In his Moment of Astrology Cornelius calls

astrology “Western civilization’s most beautiful and sophisticated divinatory language” (277).

Cornelius and Hyde admit to both a natural astrology--corresponding to a general acausality--

correctly under the purview of science (though maybe a science of the future) and a judicial

astrology--corresponding to Jung’s synchronicity. Judicial astrology is interpretive with

divinatory roots, focused on the participatory aspects between the astrologer and the “chart,”

between the astrologer and the client, and between the client and both astrology and its

practitioner. Hyde has ingeniously separated two types of Synchronicity, Types I and II, to

account for both these astrologies:

The relationship between the objective events and the subjective psychic state of the observer
is not clear. This in effect allows two versions of synchronicity which I will designate
synchronicity I and synchronicity II. The first emphasizes the meaningful interdependence of
objective events among themselves [...]. The second version brings to light the subjective
participation of the observing psyche [...]. (128)

However, this distinction between general acausal orderedness and Jung’s version of

synchronicity becomes fuzzy logic when it lumps the highly ordered and complex symbolic

system of astrology into Synchronicity I, while separating its more subjective and person-based

phenomena into Synchronicity II.

Evan M. Zuesse in The Encyclopedia of Religion describes three categories of divination:

[...] those based on the immediate context when interpreted by the spiritual insight of the
diviner (intuitive divination); those based on spirit manipulation (possession divination); and
those reflecting the operation of impersonal laws within a coherent divine order (wisdom
divination). (375-376)

As a symbolic discipline astrology participates in all three of these divinatory divisions

and all three relate to Hyde’s conception of synchronicity II : 1. the intuitive interpretive skill of
the astrologer is the fundamental and essential key to a meaningful divination; 2. in order to

access intuition, the astrologer must lower the conscious threshold so the activated archetypes

and the psyche of the querent (possession) can reveal themselves; 3. and the astrologer must be

thoroughly trained in systems of astrological symbolism.

Jung’s astrological experiment didn’t conclusively validate classical astrology; what it did for

Jung was validate the synchronicity between the statistical results and the psychic state of the

experimenter. This extra step beyond meaningful coincidence into observer effect is what

astrologers are currently confessing. Rather than clinging to a moment in time and its attendant

“chart,” astrologers are admitting wider divinatory participation in their craft, and in so doing

stepping away from the implied causality between heaven and earth.

Jung found that “divinatory methods [acted] as catalysts of intuition” (Sun and Para 118).

Astrologers experience this by having uncanny experiences and synchronicities surrounding

“chart” divinations: sometimes the astrologer’s own chart will be activated; the astrologer may

have an anticipatory dream of the client; the client before the current client may bring needed

information--and many, many other occurrences. In embracing the “intuition” and “possession”

components of their craft, divinatory astrologers are shortsightedly rejecting the “wisdom” aspect

of divination, which, as Zuesse writes, “depends on a cumulative effort of generations and a

specialized learning [...]” (378). These three categories need not cancel each other out--all can

co-exist, as well as the science they complement, in what Jung calls “the absolute knowledge of

the unconscious.” Gerhardt Adler says:

[...] the human psyche stretches far beyond time and space, and indeed far beyond the world
we know. [...] one is forced to the conclusion that we are, as it were, surrounded by psyche. In
other words, the psyche is not within us; rather we are contained within the psyche. We are in
the realm of what Jung called “the absolute knowledge of the unconscious,” a knowledge of
what is, what has been, and what is going to be. (24)
 Works Cited

Adler, Gerhardt. “Reflections on ‘Chance,’ ‘Fate,’ and ‘Synchronicity.’” Psychological

Perspectives. Spring-Summer 1989. 16-33.

Conforti, Michael. Field Form and Fate. New Orleans: Spring, 2003.

Cornelius, Geoffrey. “Is Astrology Divination and Does it Matter?”

http://cura.free.fr/quinq/01gfcor.html, 1998-1999.

--- The Moment of Astrology. Bournemouth, Eng.: The Wessex Astrologer, 2003.

Elwell, Dennis. Cosmic Loom. London: Unwin Hyman, 1987.

Gauguelin, Michel and Francoise. Birthtimes. New York: Hill and Wang, 1983.

Hill, Judith, A. The Mars-Redhead Files. Portland, OR: Stellium, 1998.

Hopcke, Robert H. There Are No Accidents. New York: Riverhead Books, 1997.

Hyde, Maggie. Jung and Astrology. London: The Aquarian Press, 1992.

Jacobi, Jolande. Complex Archetype Symbol. New York: Princeton UP, 1959.

Jaffe, Aniela. The Myth of Meaning. New York: Penguin, 1975.

Jung, Carl Gustav. Aion. Trans. R.F.C. Hull. Princeton: Princeton UP. 1979.

---. The Essential Jung. Ed. Anthony Storr. Princeton: Princeton UP, 1983.

---. Foreword. I Ching. Trans. Richard Wilhelm. Bollingen Series XIX. Princeton: Princeton UP,
1977. xxi-xxxix.

---. “Mysterium Coniunctionis.” Trans. R.F.C. Hull. The Collected Works of C.G. Jung. Vol. 14.
Bollingen Series 20. Princeton: Princeton UP, 1955-56.

---. “On the Nature of the Psyche.” Trans. R.F.C. Hull. The Collected Works of C.G. Jung. Vol.
14. Bollinger Series 20. Princeton: Princeton UP, 1954.

---. Commentary. The Secret of the Golden Flower. Trans. Richard Wilhelm. San Diego: HBJ
Books, 1962. 79-137.

---. Synchronicity. New York: Princeton UP, 1973. Trans. R.F.C. Hull. Princeton: Princeton UP,
1973.
 Works Cited Continued

---. Synchronicity and the Paranormal. Ed. Roderick Main. Princeton: Princeton UP 1997.

Main, Roderick, ed. “Introduction.” Jung on Synchronicity and the Paranormal. By C.G. Jung.
Princeton: Princeton UP, 1997.

Mindell, Arnold. Quantum Mind. Portland, OR: Lao Tse Press, 2000.

Nelson, John H. The Propagation Wizard’s Handbook. 73, Inc: Petersborough, NH, 1978.

Skafte, Diane. Listening to the Oracle. New York: HarperCollins, 1997.

Von Franz, Marie-Louise. On Divination and Synchronicity. Toronto: Inner City Books, 1980.

Zuesse, Evan M. “Divination.” The Encyclopedia of Religion. Ed. Mercea Eliade. 375-382.
 Baptism: Social Order or Initiatory Rite?

By Gary Wilson

The “purifying” and “regenerative” qualities of water have long been associated with the

ritual act of baptism. Since the rise of civilization, sacred rivers such as the Nile, have welcomed

believers into their healing waters, serving as a medium for both rites of lustration and initiation.

With the passing of time, the Christian tradition, in particular, has placed greater emphasis upon

baptism as a ceremonial cleansing away of “Original Sin,” rather than as a powerful rite of

initiation. African traditions, such as Santeria and Voudou, on the other hand, have effectively

maintained the integrity of water symbolism by actively incorporating immersion into forms of

ritual cleansing, as well as initiatory rites of passage. In current western culture, the absence of

meaningful and psychologically significant rites of initiation is evident. With baptism, we find a

rite that is steeped in the symbolism of death and rebirth. Yet today, as Mircea Eliade observes,

the sacred rite maintains only a “vestige of a mystery that is initiatory in structure” (Rites ix).

Current culture’s relationship to this ritual act invites the following question: Is baptism today

merely a socially ordained prerequisite, or does it still hold an efficacy as initiator into the

mysteries?

Prior to addressing this question, it seems most appropriate to identify the sensitive nature

of an inquiry into the sacraments. As can be expected when it comes to any such matter where

interpretation is variable, there are many vantages from which to gain perspective. So, to be as

explicit as possible, it is important to state first the assumption that informs the posing of this

question. The assumption is that Christians have an unwavering belief in the cross, and baptism,

as indelibly linked. Hugo Rahner, in his article “The Mystery of Baptism,” speaks to this core

belief: “The mystery of baptism can only be understood in connection with the mystery of the
Cross—the water of life springs up at the foot of the tree of life. For only through the redeeming

power of God’s death on the Cross has the water gained the power to give life” (387). Here,

Rahner identifies the doctrine that is the foundation of Christianity. For the devout Christian,

Jesus literally died on the cross, and was resurrected three days later for the remission of

mankind’s sin. This is not to imply that the literal interpretation is the only rendering that

Christians have assigned to the story of Christ, but it is the dominating viewpoint that has shaped

their tradition.

Let it be emphasized that the historical accuracies involving the life of Christ are not

intended to be in dispute with the raising of this question on baptism. To suggest that the

sacraments should be interpreted literally, symbolically, or both, for that matter, is to risk

entering into the fray of a never-ending debate. What is of interest, however, is where the

Christian Church has decided to place its emphasis when it comes to these matters of the sacred.

“Emphasis” can be defined as placing special importance, value, or prominence upon something.

For the “institution” of Christianity, primary emphasis is given to the conversion of sinners,

rather than initiation into the mysteries. This is quite understandable when the guiding principle

holds that the Cross and baptism are indelibly linked. Understandable, yet distinctly different

from the approaches of Santeria and Voudou. For the African traditions, “the focus is not on

salvation, but rather on the renewal of human affairs in this world” (Grillo, African Religions 6).

Christianity imparts dogmatic meaning upon ritual activity; whereas, the Diasporan traditions

(who have no main temples or texts) seek for personal experience, instead.

Christianity’s “application” of ritual activity, performed in the name of salvation, is

evident by the Spanish slave codes that upheld the mandatory baptism of slaves. Joseph Murphy,

in his book on the African-Cuban religion of Santeria, outlines the slave code of 1789 that
ordered Africans to be baptized within one year of their residence in Cuba (27-28). Murphy

elaborates: “To justify the terrible sufferings of slave life, Spanish law insisted that slaves be

baptized as Roman Catholics as a condition of their legal entry into the Indies. Spanish jurists

argued that a life of servitude was a small price to pay for the opportunity of eternal life with

Christ” (27). An account, such as this, emphatically supports the viewpoint that baptism has

predominantly been used to uphold a socially ordained prerequisite. The mandatory baptism of

slaves, in no way, seeks to create a container for a profound initiatory experience, but rather

becomes a generic antidote for the plague of “Original Sin.”

Joseph Campbell in the Foreword of Maya Deren’s Divine Horsemen: The Living Gods of

Haiti agrees: “The arcanum has been lost to popular Christianity (which is today largely

dogmatic rather than initiatory, moral rather than metaphysical)” (xi). Baptism in the name of the

Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, as merely a mandatory prerequisite for salvation,

robs the ritual participant of an opportunity for initiation and individuation. C. G. Jung, for whom

the term individuation is associated, defines “true salvation as equated with the process of

psychological healing,” rather than rote participation within a sterilized ritual act (Corbett 107).

The truly revelatory power of baptism is its effectiveness to convey the “regenerative” symbolism

associated with death and rebirth. Here, the use of the word “power” is particularly effective,

because it relates not to dominion, but rather to an ability to effect change (Grillo, “1st Class

Session” 2005). This theme of transformation, as Laura Grillo points out in the article “African

Religions,” is a “fundamental dynamic of the universe” (10). Rites of passage, of which baptism

is just one example, are means by which the initiate may reconcile himself with those

transformations that are necessary for psychological growth and healing.

 For the initiate, the physical act of baptism follows along a path of “liminal” transition

(Van Gennep 11). According to Michael Meslin, the word “baptism” derives from the Greek

verb, baptein, which means “to plunge, or to immerse” (59). This progression of being immersed

into the waters, and then brought forth, is similar to the motion of a spiral. It is also a perfect

metaphor for the movement of psyche: “The way down is the way up” (Slattery, “1st Class

Session” 2005). James Hillman in The Dream and the Underworld echoes Heraclitus and

Aristotle with the view that “the essence of psyche is the principle of motion” (125). Not unlike

Dante’s spiraling pilgrimage “down” to hell and “up” through the realms of heaven, baptism,

both as a symbol and as a ritual act, carries the revelatory power to effect change.

Joseph Campbell makes a provocative distinction: “The Way of the individual is the

microcosmic reiteration of the Way of the All and of each” (Flight 22). Keeping this in mind, the

relationship between baptism, and the movement of psyche (both as a spiral and the principle of

motion), is particularly interesting. From the cosmological perspective, physical immersion is a

return to the waters which “precede every form and support every creation” (Eliade, Sacred 130).

And from the anthropological perspective, immersion could be considered a return to the

amniotic fluid of the womb, as Otto Rank points out in The Myth of the Birth of The Hero (73).

In fact, it is in the opinion of Mircea Eliade that aquatic symbolism is the “only system capable of

integrating all of the particular revelations of innumerable hierophanies” (Sacred 131). Aquatic

symbolism is so rich, and psychologically powerful, that it seems a gaping omission to

emphasize baptism in only its purifying aspects, and not in its initiatory qualities, as well.

C. G. Jung describes the physical act of immersion as an “example of second birth or

rebirth,” in which the initiate is “born again in a mysterious manner” (155). Similarly, Victor

Turner describes the process of liminal transition as “likened to death, and being in the womb”
(Liminality and Communitas 512). It is in willing submission that the neophyte steps beyond the

world of the “profane” and into the realm of the “sacred.” Upon entering the redemptive waters,

the initiate is plunged into its mysteries, and brought forth, as Eliade has termed, a “new man”

(Sacred 131). The symbolism of baptism is in accord with a relinquishment of control, and an

opening up of self to the Divine. Yet, as Joseph Murphy points out in Santeria, the Christian

baptism of slaves does not support the use of the symbolism in an integral way. Conversely, “By

Christianizing Afro-Cubans, the church enforced the mores of a repressive society and controlled

or channeled the creative life of Afro-Cubans into socially acceptable directions” (Murphy 29).

To ascribe definitive meaning to the symbol negates the very function that it stands to

serve. The symbol is ambiguous, and best described as pointing beyond itself to that which can

never fully be known. Embracing the mysteries asks of the initiate to “let go” of agendas and

preconceived notions, or as James Hillman would suggest: “Essential for working with what is

unknown is an attitude of unknowing” (194). In the African traditions, where possession trances

are customary, an attitude of surrender is necessary. In Santeria, the chant of “Open up, open up”

resounds in an effort to encourage the ashe, or “life force of God,” to flow. Maya Deren in Divine

Horsemen recounts her experience of struggling to “Hold together, hold, hold” (253), until

ultimately she releases control, and is “mounted by the gods.” Here, the anthropologist/artist

provocatively uses the metaphor of water to describe her encounter: “This sound will drown

me!” and “Darkness floods up” (260). Deren reenforces this theme of “letting go” with the

following advice: “The serviteur must be induced to surrender his ego, that the archetype become

manifest” (249). For the Christian Church to assign specific meaning to baptism, and then to

uphold that with the strictest of dogma, strips away any of the rite’s truly symbolic potentialities.

When baptism stands as the only road to salvation, the dynamic potency of the archetype is
deflated. At this point, the sacred ritual is static and representative of nothing more than a

flattened-out stereotype (Grillo, “1st Class Session” 2005).

So, to raise the question once again: To what end does the ritual act of baptism serve? Is

it merely a socially ordained prerequisite, or does it still hold an efficacy as initiator into the

mysteries? As evidenced by the Reformation of the sixteenth century, this question has long been

held in debate, and has served as a major foundation for dissent. According to Michael Meslin,

the controversy between Orthodoxy and the views of other dissident Christian movements, is

twofold: the simplification of the baptismal rite, and also the movement toward the baptism of

infants as the modus operandi of this ancient rite of passage (62). One characteristic (of a much

larger simplification process that occurred from the time of Christ onward) involves baptism by

immersion being replaced by the rite of spiritual infusion. A more systematized and domesticated

approach, spiritual infusion consists of pouring, or sprinkling holy water upon the head of a ritual

participant at the baptismal font. While full-bodied immersion would most likely induce a greater

degree of affect, the act of spiritual infusion still preserves the initiatory symbolism of death and

rebirth. Yet, nonetheless, by simplifying the process and reducing its potential for affect, the

rite’s efficacy as initiator into the mysteries seems immediately inhibited.

The purpose of the initiatory rite is to provide an experience; often of shock, wonder or

awe, that provokes the initiate out of the “profane” and into an “unfamiliar” relationship with the

world around them. Such ritual activity carries a high degree of affect for the initiate, and could

be characterized by a quality that Rudolf Otto describes as “numinous.” But the attitude and

belief in western culture today is that the ordeal is no longer necessary. In the case of baptism,

initiatory components such as: full-bodied immersion in a natural setting, nudity, the changing of

one’s name, fasting, isolation, and other elaborate ritual practices have been discarded. Did not
Jesus enter into the desert for forty days following his ritual immersion? Yet today, baptism is a

streamlined process that emphasizes the assigned function of cleansing away “Original Sin,”

rather than creating a container for the experience of the “numinous.” Lionel Corbett describes

this “literalizing of the image” as a “narcissistic defense against its numinosity” (101). Entering

the waters, or having them sprinkled upon one’s head, merely to satisfy a condition of salvation,

reduces the baptismal rite from the realms of mystical initiation into a literal construct.

In the early days of Christianity, the ritual processes associated with baptism were quite

similar to those of Santeria and Voudou. Not unlike the ordeals documented and encountered by

Joseph Murphy and Maya Deren, elaborate Christian initiation processes could take up to several

years. In fact, “the earliest sources noted baptism as accompanied by a sudden manifestation of

the gifts of the Holy Spirit,” which is similar to the possession trances associated with the

African Diasporan religions (Bell 213). The early third century Treatise on the Apostolic

Tradition of Saint Hippolytus of Rome describes fasting, all night vigils, nudity, and being

dressed in new clothing as part of an intensive initiatory induction into the Christian Church

(214). Joseph Murphy in his elekes (beaded necklace sacred to an orisha) ceremony, encounters

similar ordeals. The ceremony begins with a limpieza (purification) in which he is stretched out

over a tub. Four women proceed to wash Murphy’s head with a compound of herbs, blood, and

river water that has been made sacred. Then, standing in a running shower, he is instructed to

“Rip off the old clothes, stand firmly on top of them, wash his whole body, and then dress in new

white clothing” (79).

The ceremonies of initiation in the Voudou tradition also reflect similar attributes to those

of the early days of Christianity. “All in all, from the moment when the candidate withdraws

from the world as bossale to the moment he is led out as canzo, the ceremony of initiation is a
process of death and resurrection, a re-creation of spiritual genesis” (Deren 220). Chrysostom, in

the fourth century, expresses similar sentiments: “Baptism represents death and the sepulcher but

also resurrection and life. Just as the old man is buried in the sepulcher, so we immerse our heads

in water. At the moment when we come out of the water, the new man appears” (Meslin 61). For

the Voudou initiate, some of the aspects of their intensive process include: isolation, meditation,

repeated ritual baths, anointing with oil, and wrapping in a white sheet, as if in the “shroud of a

corpse” (Deren 220-221). However, Catherine Bell notes the streamlining that has occurred

within the Christian tradition: “By the third century, the orthopraxy of the early phase of Jewish

Christianity began to give way to an emphasis on orthodoxy” (215). The elaborate Christian

rituals (similar to those of the Sabians, Essenes, Elkesaites, and Mandaeans) were simplified,

reflecting the Church’s reduction of sacred rites from an emphasis upon the mystery, to support

of Papal doctrine.

In the Voudou tradition, baptism is the ceremony which occurs most often. Any objects

related to the ritual activity, such as drums and rattles, must be properly baptized. The purpose of

the ritual immersion of objects related to ceremony is “to infuse the object with divine essence”

(Deren 185). Maya Deren makes a poignant distinction, however: “Baptism does not so much

confer divinity upon the object per se as it makes of that object a ‘door’ by which divine energy

may be drawn into this world by those who possess the key. The baptized object is sacred only in

action [. . .] and can only be described as a constant ‘disappearingness;’ for when its function is

fulfilled, the object ceases to be sacred” (186-187). This approach is remarkably different from

the Christian interpretation associated with baptism, which grants eternal salvation through

participation in an isolated act. Here again, is reflected the major difference between Christianity
and the African traditions—meaning verses experience. For the Haitian practitioners of Voudou:

“Nothing is accomplished forever; it must always be done again” (187).

The popular philosophy in western culture is that bull-roarers, vision fasts, and animal

sacrifice are for the less-civilized, and today’s intellectual can get the point without ever needing

to truly enter into the experience. Yet, Cedrus Monte, in an article from Quadrant, raises an

interesting proposition that seems to support the initiatory value of experiential acts, such as

baptism. In the Journal of the C.G. Jung Foundation, Monte proposes: “The numen is contained

by and released from the flesh itself. By addressing the body, through the body, we can

experience the ‘peculiar alteration of consciousness’ that is available to us when we are grounded

in somatic experience and informed by the numen of the flesh”(13). Hence, the act of physically

stepping into the river’s flowing waters seem intrinsically to offer a greater opportunity for

“numinous” experience, more so than merely standing before the baptismal font.

Cedrus Monte’s claim supports John’s decision to baptize in the flowing waters of the

Jordan: “Without movement, there is no life. Without movement the numen of the flesh is not

activated” (19). Interesting to note that both the early Church (as evidenced by the Treatise), and

Santeria, specify “flowing” (Bell 214) river water for purposes of purification. The flowing

waters represent the “mesocosm—a mediating, middle cosmos through which the microcosm of

the individual is brought into relation to the macrocosm of the universe” (Campbell, Flight 123).

Keeping this in mind, the “hierophany” (Eliade, Sacred 11) seems truly lost when the river’s

flowing waters are traded in for the confines of a cup.

It was also in regards to the baptismal font that the other major point of contention was

raised by the Reformation. The second major rift was the baptizing of newborns. This decision

aroused heated debate over the validity of the ritual act when it is done without conscious choice.
Prior to the third century there was no certain evidence of infant baptism. Most of those baptized

in the early Church were converts to the religion, so the question of infant baptism was not of

concern until it became popular in the tenth and eleventh centuries (Meslin 62). The Reformists

share similar sentiments with the African traditions—active participation in the ritual is essential.

Lionel Corbett, in The Religious Function of the Psyche, makes a valuable point: “The symbol

does not merely indicate, but allows for an experience” (97). In the eyes of the Reformists, the

standing in of godparents, for the salvation of an uncomprehending child does not constitute

active participation, or personal experience. In light of their disapproval, it does not seem unfair

to suggest that the Anabaptists, and other dissident movements, would deem infant baptism a

social order, rather than initiatory experience, considering that conscious choice has been

removed from the act.

The questions that were raised by the Reformation still remain seminal today. The

simplification of the baptismal rite over time, and the Church’s propensity toward infant baptism,

could certainly be considered a by-product of a shift in emphasis from initiatory rite to socially

ordained prerequisite. Such changes over time reflect an attitude that places greatest importance

upon the conversion of ritual participants, rather than their experience of the Mystery. Joseph

Murphy addresses the prevailing attitude: “The idea of conversion in Catholicism has always laid

more stress on ceremony than on experience. As the practice of infant baptism implies, entry into

the Roman church is not dependent on knowledge of the Bible, theological understanding, or

emotional experience” (111). Further consideration of Murphy’s comments might cause one to

ask: What could possibly be attributed to this ritual act of infant baptizing other than the

upholding of a social order that deems necessary the cleansing away of “Original Sin?”
 The role of baptism in current culture is a subject matter that is quite prominent for me at

this time. I traverse feelings of anger, disappointment, compassion, understanding, bewilderment,

confusion, and acceptance, again and again. Merely asking the question has been to invite subtle,

and at other times, not so subtle pangs of guilt. In accord with Jung, it is my opinion that true

salvation is equated with psychological healing. I am not interested in whether or not one needs

to be baptized to satisfy a Christian interpretation of salvation, but am most interested in how our

society can revitalize the initiatory process. I believe that emphasizing the Mystery is of greatest

importance, and initiatory rites that serve that end are in desperate need today. Whereas, African

traditions have been flexible at integrating Christian ideology into their own religious practices,

the same cannot be said for the Occident. Not to romanticize, or literalize, the use of immersion

by Santeria and Voudou, but it seems to me that if more emphasis were placed on the initiatory

process (as it is in these traditions), then the ritual act of baptism would look quite different than

it does in western culture today.

 Works Cited

Bell, Catherine. Ritual: Perspectives and Dimensions. New York: Oxford UP, 1997.

Campbell, Joseph. Flight of the Wild Gander. Novato, CA: New World Library, 2002.

- - -. Foreword. Divine Horsemen: The Living Gods of Haiti. By Maya Deren. New Paltz, New
York: McPherson & Co., 1970.

Corbett, Lionel. The Religious Function of the Psyche. New York: Brunner-Routledge, 1996.

Deren, Maya. Divine Horsemen: The Living Gods of Haiti. New Paltz, New York: McPherson &
Co., 1970.

Eliade, Mircea. Rites and Symbols of Initiation: The Mysteries of Birth and Rebirth. Putnam, CT:
Spring Publications, Inc, 1994.

- - -. The Sacred and the Profane: The Nature of Religion. New York: Harcourt, Inc., 1987.

Grillo, Laura. “African and African Diasporan Traditions.” Pacifica Graduate Institute,
Carpinteria, CA. 2005.

- - -. “African Religions.” Encyclopedia of Women and World Religion. 2 vols. Macmillan

Reference USA, 1999. 6-11.

Hillman, James. The Dream and the Underworld. New York: HarperPerrenial, 1979.

Jung, Carl G. Jung on Mythology. Selected and Introduced: Robert A. Segal. Princeton, NJ:
Princeton UP, 1998.

Meslin, Michel. “Baptism.” The Encyclopedia of Religion. Ed. Mircea Eliade. 16 vols. New
York: Macmillan, 1987.

Monte, Cedrus. “Numen of the Flesh.” Quadrant: Journal of the C.G. Jung Foundation for
Analytical Psychology 35:2 (Summer 2005): 11-31.

Murphy, Joseph M. Santeria: An African Religion in America. Bronx, New York: Original
Publications, 1989.

Rahner, Hugo. “The Mystery of Baptism.” Ed. Joseph Campbell. The Mysteries: Papers from the
Eranos Yearbooks. Vol. 2. Bollingen Series 30. Princeton: Princeton UP, 1955. 387-401.

Rank, Otto. The Myth of the Birth of the Hero and Other Writings. Ed. Philip Freund. New York:
Vintage Books, 1959.
 Works Cited Continued

Slattery, Dennis Patrick. “Cultural Mythologies I: Joseph Campbell.” Pacifica Graduate Institute,
Carpinteria, CA. 2005.

Turner, Victor. “Liminality and Communitas.” Readings in Ritual Studies. Ed. Ronald L. Grimes.
New Jersey: Prentice Hall, 1996. 511-519.
 “Love is a Force of Nature”: An Archetypal Analysis of Brokeback Mountain

By John S. Gentile

Brokeback Mountain won multiple international awards and was the most controversial

film of 2005. Its outstanding critical and audience response led The Advocate to publish “The

Brokeback Phenomenon” as its 28 Feb. 2006 cover story. The film’s website invites viewers to

“Share Your Story,” indicating that the intense emotional impact of Brokeback Mountain

requires a communal forum to process. (See Appendix 1.) Such remarkable success suggests that

Brokeback Mountain achieves more than simply superb cinematic craftsmanship. It suggests that

the film resonates powerfully on the archetypal level. “Any image,” writes James Hillman in

Archetypal Psychology, “is immediately valued as universal, trans-historical, basically profound,

generative, highly intentional, and necessary” (22). This essay explores the archetypes at work in

Brokeback Mountain.

The poster advertising Brokeback Mountain gives a clue to its dominant archetype. Its

slogan, “Love is a Force of Nature,” suggests that the central deity of the film is Aphrodite. (See

Appendix 1.) The Goddess of Love is, indeed, powerfully present in Brokeback Mountain.

However, while I agree that Aphrodite functions as the film’s most important archetype, I argue

that she does so within a context containing other important archetypes with whom we see her

work both in accord and in conflict. In this sense, my analysis advances the polytheism of

archetypal psychology rather arguing for a monotheistic interpretation by limiting the discussion

to just one divinity.

The film’s slogan, “Love is a Force of Nature,” gives us further clues to its depiction of

Aphrodite. Rather than functioning within the realm of civilization, where we may expect to find

her, Aphrodite finds her place of power in Brokeback Mountain within the realm of nature, where
she is able to do her work in accord with other archetypes of nature. Her impact within the realm

of civilization in Brokeback Mountain, where she is not welcomed, is destructive. “By offering

shelter and altar,” continues Hillman, “the Gods can order and make intelligible the entire

phenomenal world of nature and human consciousness. [. . .] We discover what belongs where by

means of likeness, the analogy of events with mythical configurations” (46).

Aphrodite, Artemis, and Dionysos

The first image we see in Brokeback Mountain is the wide-open natural landscape of the

American West, a landscape charged by the national mythos of “Cowboy Country.” In archetypal

terms, we are in Artemis’s realm of wild nature, whose magnificent scope dwarfs even the large

truck driving through the countryside in the opening scene. Following a few brief scenes to

establish the story’s exposition, the two lead characters, Ennis Del Mar and Jack Twist, are left

alone to camp and herd sheep on Brokeback Mountain, far from town and any connection with

civilization. “Artemis,” writes Ginette Paris in Pagan Meditations, “delimits the frontier between

city and the wild; where the territory of Artemis begins, the city ends” (151). The images

throughout the scenes of the young men’s first summer on Brokeback are intensely Artemisian:

mountains, clear running streams, lush green forests, horses, a stag, a bear, and the moon.

Although they bring a few trappings of civilization with them and serve as shepherds, they live

within the solitude and beauty of Artemis’s world. It is within this landscape -- and in isolation

from society -- that Jack and Ennis grow to love one another.

Artemis is most associated with the freedom of adolescence. Jack and Ennis are both

about nineteen and free of the responsibilities of full adulthood and family during their first

summer in 1963. Nor are they tied to their parents; both are emotional orphans. Ennis is an actual

orphan (his parents died in a car accident while he was a boy) and Jack comes from a home
dominated by an unloving father. They are both robust, strong young men on the brink of

adulthood. In a later scene from that first summer, they frolic together shirtless -- like free young

stags themselves -- simply enjoying the sensuality and movement of body against body.

The young men experience both the beauty and the brutality of the Artemisian realm. The

early scenes are sublimely beautiful but Jack and Ennis must also face the potential threat of wild

animals and the capriciousness of mountain weather. It is not only Artemis’s freedom and

solitude, however, which conspire to bring these two men to Aphrodite’s altar but her

discomforts as well. Ennis’s encounter with a bear results in a minor head injury that prompts

Jack to care tenderly for his wound; it is their first touch. The hunting of a stag results in their

second physical contact. Like Artemis, whose Homeric Hymn praises her as “the Archeress who

with one shot strikes the stag” (qtd. in Paris, Pagan Meditations: 162), Ennis kills a stag with a

single shot from his rifle. Afterwards, the two men jostle and kid one another playfully,

demonstrating a growing familiarity and fondness for each other. The cold mountain night leads

the men to share a pup tent for the first time. Although Artemis and Aphrodite are usually

considered mutually exclusive divinities, in Brokeback Mountain they work together; Artemis

gives Jack and Ennis to Aphrodite.

Under the silver light of Artemis’s full moon, Jack and Ennis share a bottle of whiskey

around the campfire on a cold mountain night. As if Artemis was not quite enough to deliver

these young men to Aphrodite, another nature divinity, Dionysos, must appear as well. Dionysos

-- in the form of their drunkenness -- allows their boundaries to relax into a closer physical

familiarity and their sharing the pup tent.

Their first sex scene is Dionysian in its intensity. “Dionysus’s sexual urge,” writes Paris

in Pagan Meditations, “appears in a rough and impetuous way, akin to the brutality of the satyr
who hustles the nymph or to the wild-haired woman of the Bacchanals who throws herself upon

the prey” (19). However, the Dionysian frenzy does not preclude the arrival of Aphrodite, whose

growing presence has already been subtly suggested by the increasing fondness evident between

the two young men in their preceding scenes. The later episodes in the film support this

interpretation. If their first sexual encounter was only about Dionysian orgasm, then the two

could have separated without further thought for one another. In fact, that is how the two men,

particularly Ennis, wish to dismiss their first sexual encounter.

Ennis: It’s a one-shot thing we got goin’ here.

Jack: Nobody’s business but ours.
Ennis: You know I ain’t queer.
Jack: Me neither. (McMurtry and Ossana 20)

Yet, despite their attempts at denial, a romance blooms between them for the remainder

of that first summer on Brokeback Mountain and continues for the next twenty years. That is not

the kind of anonymous, body-to-body connection associated with Dionysos. Their relationship is

not “just about sex” as some Christian reviewers have tried to claim. “I just cannot justify any of

the supposed ‘love’ between the male characters,” writes Sheri McMurray in her review of the

film for Christian Spotlight on the Movies, a Christian website, “It is lust, definitely not love.”

Jack and Ennis share a kind of intimacy associated with Aphrodite; it is a romance between two

people who are forcefully attracted to one another for who they are as individuals. “Far from this

tumult [of Dionysos],” continues Paris, “Aphrodite, who dislikes haste, teaches lovers the

refinements of voluptuous delays and artistic subtleties unknown to the Dionysian approach”

(19). Their second sex scene is far more tender, vulnerable, and Aphroditic.

Having served as the landscape that gave Jack and Ennis to Aphrodite, the Artemisian

wilderness continues to serve as the safe haven for their love, which deepens throughout that first
summer. However, Artemis – like all Gods – both gives and takes. Their romantic idyll seems

painfully brief, a paradise all too quickly lost. The mountain weather abruptly changes that

August and Jack and Ennis are forced out of their romantic solitude back into civilization.

Anthony Lane, in a review for The New Yorker, where Annie Proulx’s short story that inspired

the film was first published, identified the essential problem of Brokeback Mountain. “Ennis and

Jack are possessed of an innocence, a virginity of spirit,” writes Lane, “that the rest of society

(which literally exists on a lower plane, below the mountain) will strive to violate and subdue”

(118). Lane’s review emphasizes that both Ennis and Jack spiritually belong to Artemis and that

their love holds the purity associated with the innocent soul. The film’s romantic idyll ends and

the lovers must leave the Artemisian realm for those of Athena and Hestia.

Aphrodite, Athena, and Hestia

When the film follows Jack and Ennis off Brokeback Mountain and back into town, its

tone changes from the anticipation and consummation of lyrical romance to lamentation. Louise

Cowan has helpfully diagramed the four major literary genres in her fine introduction to The

Terrain of Comedy. Working with Cowan’s cyclical diagram, we may understand that Brokeback

Mountain moves through the three phases of lyric (anticipation, consummation, lamentation).

During the film’s lyric sequences we see the lover’s moments of “wholeness, consummation, joy

– the right order of being – lovers in the garden” (Cowan 9). The film ultimately moves from the

lyric genre into that of tragedy. The tragedy of Brokeback Mountain is that of a community’s

inability to integrate true love. In this sense, the film is very similar to Shakespeare’s Tragedy of

Romeo and Juliet. In archetypal terms, the realms of Athena (as Athene Polias, Of the City, City-

Protector, Keeper of the City) and Hestia (Home) inflict great suffering on the lives of

individuals because they do not welcome Aphrodite. However, Brokeback Mountain deals with
a particular form of Aphroditic denial and repression – homophobia – that challenges the mythos

of the American West and its false image of masculinity represented by the “Marlboro Man.”

Both men, especially Ennis, suffer from their internalized homophobia and its accompanying

denial.

Even during the height of its lyric phase, the film suggests impending tragedy. When

Ennis rides back to the sheep after his first night of consummation with Jack, he finds a dead

sheep, a foreshadowing of the larger sacrifice yet to come. As Jack and Ennis frolic together, Joe

Aguirre, their employer, secretly and disapprovingly watches through his binoculars. Civilization

encroaches on their paradise and the film hints at further difficulties ahead for the two lovers as

they move from the realm of Artemis to those of Athena and Hestia.

Upon returning to town, Jack and Ennis go their separate ways. Their farewell is heavy

with suppressed feeling. Neither will admit his heartbreak at leaving behind the other. Ennis, in

one of the film’s most wrenching scenes, waits until Jack drives out of sight before ducking into

a dark alley to sob uncontrollably. After their separation, both men submit to social expectations

and marry.

Their marriages, at first, seem loving and even show some erotic charge. However, time

soon betrays the weakness of their marital connections. Two scenes particularly emphasize this

point. Soon after their marriage, Ennis and his wife Alma are sledding down a snowy hillside.

Their sled overturns and they frolic together. Their play, however, lacks the robust charge of

Ennis’s tussles with Jack. Ennis’s expression of wistful disappointment silently registers that

unfavorable comparison. His tepid marriage with Alma is compared against his heated romance

with Jack even more graphically in their lovemaking. Alma uses seduction, not for the joy in

itself, but as a way to persuade Ennis to buy a home in town. In their ensuing sex scene, Ennis
flips Alma on her stomach (to her disappointment) to enter her from behind, reminding viewers

of his first night with Jack. The marriage of Jack and Lureen proves equally disappointing. By

the time the two men reunite four years after their first summer on Brokeback Mountain, their

relationships with their respective wives are marriages of habit and convenience.

The Hestian realm in Brokeback Mountain is a microcosm of the polis, the Athenian

realm. The problems in the home are symptoms of problems within the larger society. We see

three different homes in Brokeback Mountain: the homes of Ennis and Alma, of Jack and Lureen,

and, lastly, of Jack’s parents. All three homes are sites of the disappointment, strife, and

suffering resulting from Aphrodite’s absence. Against the magnificent beauty of the countryside,

the towns and homes (particularly Ennis’ homes with Alma and, later, Jack’s parents) are devoid

of beauty, another aspect of Aphrodite. "[T]he road to beauty begins in pleasure," writes James

Hillman, "opening the soul's body to delight" ("Beauty" 271). The physical squalor of the towns

and homes in Brokeback Mountain depicts visually the emotional and spiritual squalor of social

and family life. The Athenian and Hestian realms are sick because they deny Aphrodite. In doing

so, they not only destroy the lives of Ennis and Jack but the lives of all the other people the

thwarted lovers touch. Alma and Lureen are also victims of repressed Aphrodite. Their children

and Ennis’ girlfriend (whom he dates briefly after his divorce, then from whom he silently

withdraws) are all victims, too. Denied, repressed, and rejected, Aphrodite turns destructive.

When Jack and Ennis reunite after their four-year separation, Aphrodite is suddenly

present once again. They kiss intensely; they look deeply into one another’s eyes connecting

soul-to-soul. Ennis rubs his face against Jack as if to breath deeply of his scent, reminding me

that smell is one of the most Aphroditic of all the senses. Nothing of their lovemaking with their

respective wives approaches the ferocity of need expressed by their reunion. Thus, the two men
begin a pattern of secret trysts in the wilderness of the mountains that continues for twenty years.

Once again, Artemis welcomes them and gives refuge to a love that Athena and Hestia deny.

Artemis’s running streams are significant each time the men return to the mountain wilderness.

They skinny dip together (as if they were adolescents again); they ride their horses through a

stream or simply camp streamside. Each time, they are baptized back into the purity of Artemis

and freed from the taint of civilization.

Three times in the film, the men have opportunities to move into a more open life

together: upon their first departure down the mountain, four years later when Jack proposes to

Ennis to get a ranch of their own, and, lastly, when Alma divorces Ennis and Jack travels up from

Texas to propose his plan again. Ennis refuses Jack's proposals. A traumatic childhood memory

of a man who had been mutilated and beaten to death (possibly by Ennis’s own father) because

he was suspected of living with another man in a sexual relationship established a dread and fear

of homosexuality that Ennis is unable to surmount. However, after years of brief, secret

meetings, Jack’s frustration leads him to turn to other men while continuing in his less than

happy arrangement with Ennis.

Jack: You know, friend, this is a goddamn bitch of an unsatisfactory situation. [. . .]

Tell you what, we could of had a good life together, a fuckin’ real good life, had us a
place of our own. You wouldn’t do it, Ennis, so what we got now is Brokeback
Mountain. Everything built on that. It’s all we got, boy, fuckin’ all, so I hope you know
that if you don’t never know the rest. Count the damn few times we been together in
nearly twenty years. Measure the fuckin’ short leash you keep me on, then ask me
about Mexico and then tell me you’ll kill me for needin’ somethin’ I don’t hardly never
get. You got no idea how bad it gets. I’m not you. I can’t make it on a couple of high-
altitude fucks once or twice a year. (pause) You’re too much for me, Ennis, you son of
a whoreson bitch. (pause) I wish I knew how to quit you. (McMurtry and Ossana 81 –
82)

After twenty years, the mountains remain their haven. But because their love cannot be

integrated into society, that Artemisian wilderness turns into a kind of prison as well. They live
out their true love lives "in the closet." Ironically, that closet is the wide- open space of the Rocky

Mountain West. The four main characters (the men and their wives) each physically show the

ruin wrecked by denying Aphrodite. They lose their youthful vibrancy to shrivel spiritually and

whither as they move into middle age.

The film gives us one last look at the lovers in their mountain paradise through a

flashback to the summer of 1963 when their happiness held its deepest promise, before

Aphrodite was denied. Returning to the present moment effectively contrasts Jack’s facial

expression at age 19 watching Ennis leave their campsite with Jack at age 39 again watching

Ennis leave. In those two contrasting scenes, we see his face turn from youthful optimism and

affection into middle-aged resignation.

Brokeback Mountain as Tragedy

The film inexorably moves towards tragedy, reaching its tragic climax in its last scenes.

By returned postcard, Ennis learns of Jack’s death. He immediately calls Jack’s wife, Lureen,

who coldly tells him that an exploding truck tire killed Jack. However, Ennis remembers his

childhood trauma and imagines that assailants murdered Jack using a tire iron. Viewers may

presume that Ennis’s suspicion is correct; we suspect that Jack was having an affair with a local

ranch foreman (not the foreman's wife, as Jack tells Ennis). However, the film never definitively

settles on an explanation of Jack’s death and, instead, leaves it for the viewers to ponder. The

film’s use of intentional ambiguity is masterful. We are always left with questions about our

nearest relationships, particularly when they end unexpectedly. Ennis, like sensitive viewers,

must live with the difficult questions of not knowing truly how Jack died.

The last scenes of the film are its most poignant. Ennis visits Jack’s parents at his

childhood home in Lighting Flat, Wyoming. The scene is heavy with years of unhappiness, lack
of love, anger, and unspoken resentments. Both the exterior and interior of the home are painted

white; the paint is peeling and dirty. It is the image of the Hestian realm drained or blanched of

any presence of Aphrodite. The exchange between Ennis and Jack’s parents is strained; Jack’s

father is a bitter man whose contained anger suggests the burden of his own unlived dreams and

the repression of Aphrodite in his life. He may also suspect the true nature of Jack’s relationship

with Ennis as well as Jack’s relationship to the ranch foreman. Jack’s mother shows the only

compassion present in this scene; she encourages Ennis to go up to Jack’s room.

Jack’s childhood room is a shrine made sacred by his absence. In the film’s single most

affecting moment, Ennis finds two shirts hidden in a nook in Jack’s closet, his plaid shirt that he

thought he lost twenty years ago that first summer upon Brokeback Mountain tucked inside

Jack’s blue denim shirt, “the pair like two skins” (Proulx 26; McMurtry and Ossana 91). It is an

affirmation of Jack’s love for Ennis even after years of frustration, compromise, and heartache.

Ennis holds the shirts close to his face and breathes deeply, “hoping for the faintest smoke and

mountain sage and salty sweet stink of Jack” (Proulx 26, McMurtry and Ossana 92). Proulx’s

memorable phrase (repeated in the screenplay) “salty sweet stink of Jack” recalls the connection

between the salty sea foam of Aphrodite’s birth and salty bodily fluids. The image of the two

shirts is repeated in the film’s last scene but reversed. Ennis has placed Jack’s denim shirt within

his own. An Internet Valentine’s Day card and the auction of those shirts at $100,000.00 confirm

the power of that Aphroditic image. (See Appendix 2.)

The film holds the suffering associated with a tragedy of repressed Aphrodite but does it

offer redemption? At the heart of tragedy is sacrifice. In Homo Necans: The Anthropology of

Ancient Greek Sacrificial Ritual and Myth, Walter Burkert writes:

 Sacrifice transforms us. By going through the irreversible “act” we reach a new
plane. Whenever a new step is taken consciously and irrevocably, it is inevitably
connected with sacrifice. [. . .] Killing justifies and affirms life; it makes us conscious
of the new order and brings it to power. (40)

Jack’s death is the film’s tragic sacrifice, enormously painful but necessary for

transformation. Ennis’s last scene, when he appears drained of all psychic energy and his home is

reduced to sparsely furnished trailer, still holds his redemption. When his daughter, now age 19

(the age of Ennis and Jack during their first summer on Brokeback Mountain), invites Ennis to

her wedding, he declines at first, giving her reasons similar to those he once gave Jack for

meeting him so seldom. He pauses and changes his mind.

Ennis: Supposed to be on a roundup over near the Tetons. [. . .] You know what? I
reckon they can find another cowboy. [. . .] My little girl is gettin’ married.
(McMurtry and Ossana 95 –96)

At last, Ennis gives Aphrodite her rightful place in his life, even if it is too late for him and Jack.

The significance of the sacrifice, however, transcends Ennis’s personal redemption and

the fictional world of Brokeback Mountain. As viewers of this film -- and as witnesses of this

powerful revisionist American myth -- we are implicated in this story. We are representatives of

that homophobic civilization; we are that sick Athenian polis that denied Jack and Ennis their

happiness and ruined their lives and the lives they touched. We are the ones who repress same-

sex love out of the Athenian realm into its shadow of Artemisian wilderness. How many lives

has American society ruined like those of the film’s fictional characters? No doubt this

revisionist myth is told at this moment because same-sex love is moving out of America’s

collective shadow and into its consciousness. The purpose of the sacrifice of Brokeback

Mountain is to move us, the greater community, forward so that we are able to welcome
Aphrodite out of the wilderness and into our hearts, homes, and society. Our redemption depends

upon it.

Appendix 1

http://www.brokebackmountainmovie.com/splash.html 14 April 2006.

Please note: “Share Your Story” and film slogan “Love is a Force of Nature”
 Appendix 2

Internet Valentine’s Day card using the image of the two shirts “the pair like two skins.”

Brokeback Mountain shirts sold at $100,000.00

 Works Cited

Brokeback Mountain. Dir. Ang Lee. Perf. Heath Ledger, Jake Gyllenhaal, Anne
Hathaway, and Michelle Williams. 2005. Widescreen DVD. Universal, 2005.

Brokeback Mountain. 14 April 2006. <http://www.brokebackmountain.com/

splash.html>.

Burkert, William. Homo Necans: The Anthropology of Ancient Greek Sacrificial Ritual
and Myth. Trans. Peter Bing. Berkeley: U of California P, 1983.

Cowan, Louise. Introduction. “The Comic Terrain.” The Terrain of Comedy.

Dallas: Dallas Institute of Humanities and Culture, 1984: 1 – 18.

Hillman, James. Archetypal Psychology: A Brief Account. 1981. Woodstock, CT: Spring,
1997.

---. "The Practice of Beauty." Uncontrollable Beauty: Towards a New Aesthetics.

Ed. Bill Beckley with David Shaprio. New York: Allworth, 1998.

Lane, Anthony. “New Frontiers.” Rev. of Brokeback Mountain, dir. Ang Lee.
New Yorker. 12 Dec. 2005: 117-18.

McMurray, Sheri. Rev. of Brokeback Mountain. Christian Spotlight on the Movies.

15 April 2006 <http://www.christinanswers.net/spotlight/movies/2006/
brokebackmountain.html>.

Paris, Ginette. Pagan Grace: Dionysos, Hermes, and Goddess Memory in Daily Life.
Putnam, CT: Spring, 1990.

---. Pagan Meditations: The Worlds of Aphrodite, Artemis, and Hestia.

Trans. Gwendolyn Moore. Woodstock, CT: Spring, 1986.

Proulx, Annie, Larry McMurtry, and Diana Ossana. Brokeback Mountain: Story to
Screenplay. New York: Scribner, 2005.

Vary, Adam B. “The Brokeback Phenomenon.” Advocate. 28 Feb. 2006: 36 – 41.

 Raven as Trickster, Messenger and Artist

By Nancy Weems

Corvus corax or the Common Raven is a ubiquitous bird that makes its home throughout

North America, Greenland, Europe, North Africa and Western Siberia (Black 1). Both ravens and

their smaller cousins crows (Corvus brachyrhynchos) belong to the same genus (Corvus) but can

be distinguished from each other by their wingspans, tail feathers and beaks. Ravens have a

wedge-shaped tail that is blunt, a hook-shaped beak and long, pointed throat feathers. (Feher-

Elston 106,107). Their vocal repertoire is comprised of deep croaks, honks, “… a high knocking

“toc toc toc”, a dry, grating “Kraa”, low guttural rattles, and musical calls” (Black 2). Ravens are

expert mimics and some have been taught to speak in captivity.

It is doubtful that these highly intelligent creatures with their ability to adapt to any and

all environments will ever land on the “endangered species” list. Yet this wily bird is more than a

successful forager, the raven is mythic. Distinct from its other relatives such as jackdaws, rooks,

magpies and jays (Black 1), ravens have been mythologized by a variety of cultures throughout

time. So much has been written about them that it would be impossible to discuss herein all the

myths that include ravens in their narratives. However, the mythic raven as described by the

Indians of the Northwest Coast of America – the Haida in particular - is one worth exploring.

The imaginal ravens of the Haida and Tlingit societies tell us a great deal about their perceptions

and feelings about life, death and the nature of truth.

For the Haida of the North Pacific coast, Raven is a trickster /demiurge who steals light

and water so that he may pursue his own appetites. In doing so he inadvertently brings both

elements to the world. In the Haida creation myth, “The Raven Steals the Light”, the story takes

place in a time,
 … before the great flood had covered the earth and receded, before the animals walked
the earth or the trees covered the land or the birds flew between the trees, even before the
fish and the whales and the seals swam in the sea, (when) an old man lived in a house on
the bank of a river with his only child, a daughter. (Reid and Bringhurst 1)

There is no light in this legendary world. Raven, who is present in this epoch because he

has always been present and always will be, does not like this situation because it thwarts his

efforts of finding food, enjoying sensual pleasures and rearranging and changing the world when

it pleases him.

Ultimately Raven finds himself fumbling around in the dark near the house of the old

man and hears him singing a song. “I have a box and inside the box is another box and inside it

are many more boxes, and in the smallest box of all is all the light in the world, and it is all mine

and I’ll never give any of it to anyone, not even my daughter, because, who knows, she may be as

homely as a sea slug, and neither she nor I would like to know that” (Reid and Bringhurst 4).

What an interesting contrast to elements of the Christian creation myth of Adam and Eve. Instead

of a father sky god setting up rules for his new human tenants in a light-filled garden, a bird sky

god bumbling around in the dark overhears an old man by a river tell of his treasure of light

which he intends to keep to himself forever as he would not like to look at the face of his

daughter for fear that she might be ugly.

After Raven hears the old man’s song, he knows that he will steal the light but it takes

him a while to do so. All sides of the old man’s house are described as “a smooth, unbroken

barrier” without a door (Reid and Bringhurst 5). Repeatedly Raven hears the daughter leave the

house to get water from the river. But she always seems to leave from the opposite side of the

house where he is standing. When he quickly hops around to the other side, he cannot detect an

opening from which the girl departed, only an even continuous wall (Reid and Bringhurst 5).
 Raven turns himself into a hemlock needle floating in the water and makes the daughter

thirsty. She takes a drink of river water and swallows him. “The Raven slithered down deep into

her warm insides and found a soft, comfortable spot, where he transformed himself once more,

this time into a very small human being, and went to sleep for a long while. As he slept he grew”

(Reid and Bringhurst 7). Rather than a seductive serpent talking Eve into taking a bite of

forbidden fruit, Raven, who is always seeking pleasures of the flesh, enters the woman by

allowing himself to be swallowed by her and subsequently makes himself comfortable inside her

body.

Although Raven is a creature that cannot be trusted and puts himself first, in almost all of

the Raven myths his essence is creative. Not so with the serpent in the garden whose sole raison

d’etre seems to be destruction in the traditional post-Augustinian interpretation. It is worth noting

that some early Gnostic Christians saw the serpent’s encouragement of Eve to partake of the fruit

much differently. In “On the Origin of the World”, a Gnostic version of the Judeo-Christian

creation myth, the serpent explains to Eve that eating from the tree of knowledge will allow her

mind to become like God’s mind. “For [god knows] that when you eat from it your mind will be

sobered and you will become like god, knowing the distinctions which exist between evil and

good men. For he said this to you, lest you eat from it, since he is jealous” (Young 55). In this

version, when they do eat the fruit, “… their mind opened. For when they ate, the light of

knowledge shone for them” (Young). In this telling of the story the serpent plays a similar role to

Raven as a bringer of light.

The daughter gives birth to Raven who looks somewhat like a little boy, but retains a few

feathers, a beak-shaped nose and the bright curious eyes of a bird. The grandfather grows to love

this child and cannot deny any of his requests, which of course, entail the precious nesting boxes.
At last, after Raven has wheedled, cajoled and demanded to be allowed to play with the boxes, he

convinces the old man to let him see the ball of light hidden in the smallest one. The moment it is

brought out of its box Raven changes back into bird form, plucks up the ball with his beak and

takes off through the smokehole of the little house (Reid and Bringhurst 11).

Joseph Campbell observed that when the hero returns to the world with a boon or element

that is necessary but missing component for civilization, the goddess or god supports this last

part of the journey if he has received their blessing. Conversely, if the hero’s magic flight

involves means that create resentment by the deities, “… then the last stage of the mythological

round becomes a lively, often comical, pursuit. This flight may be complicated by marvels of

magical obstruction or evasion” (Campbell 197). And so it is with Raven as he escapes from the

little house bringing light into the world. “And from far away, another great winged shape

launched itself into the air, as light struck the eye of the Eagle for the first time and showed him

his target” (Reid and Bringhurst 12).

Raven is having such a good time being able to see where he is going that he does not

catch sight of Eagle until it is almost too late. When he does spy the sharp talons about to sink

into his flesh, he swerves so quickly he drops half of the light he is carrying. It falls to the ground

and then bounces back up into the sky becoming the moon and stars. The Eagle chases Raven

beyond the edge of the world; but the clever thief evades his pursuer and that is where, in his

exhausted state, he drops his last piece of light that becomes the sun (Reid and Bringhurst 13).

Seen from an anthropological perspective, the contest between the Eagle and Raven in the myth

seems to reflect the social organization of the Haida. Gary Snyder points out in his book, He Who

Hunted Birds in His Father’s Village – The Dimensions of a Haida Myth, that although the Haida

had no unified tribal government, “The tribe was divided into two exogamous (unrelated by
blood) matrilineal moieties, called Ravens and Eagles, the Ravens being the most important”

(Snyder 21). These moieties or sides were forbidden to marry within their own group and could

only marry members of other moieties. There were lineages that developed from each moiety like

the Sealion people of the Eagle side and the Pebble Beach People of the Raven side (Bringhurst

15).

Returning to the mythic realm of “The Raven Steals the Light”, we are told that although

the old man cries bitterly over his grandson’s betrayal and the loss of his treasured light, when he

lays eyes on his daughter for the first time, he discovers that she is as “… beautiful as the fronds

of a hemlock against a spring sky at sunrise, and he began to feel a little better” (Reid and

Bringhurst 13).

Eden is found. A secret treasure is lost, but the world is gained. There is no explicit or

implicit moralizing. There are no laws that have been broken or punishments for doing so. What

might Western Civilization have been like if various episodes of The Raven Steals the Light had

been painted on the Sistine ceiling?

The Haida make a distinction between the Raven creation myths and a second group of

Raven stories where he is more of a greedy, sly trickster similar to mythic character “Coyote”

who appears in numerous stories told by Amerindians of the Southwest (Fleming 2) like the

Cheyenne, Tewa and Apache (Erdoes and Ortiz v). In a Tlingit telling of “Raven Lights the

World” we see this aspect of his character in the hilarious escapades he has after he escapes the

Eagle’s grasp.

As Raven continues his journey, he stops to visit another bird, Petrel. Petrel jealously

guards a spring that never dries up. At this time there is no water in the world. Raven invites

himself to spend the night and Petrel reluctantly agrees, but will not leave his precious spring.
When Raven suggests they go outside and “watch the moon,” Petrel tells his visitor he never

goes outside. After they go to sleep, Raven, who has only been pretending to be asleep, gets up

and fetches some dog dung from outside. He rubs it all over Petrel’s behind (Erodes and Ortiz

260).

In the morning Raven told Petrel: “Brother, you have beshitted yourself.” Petrel believed
him. He went outside to clean himself with moss. As soon as Petrel was outside, Raven
uncovered the spring and drank it dry. He cried, “Gaah,” and tried to fly away through the
smoke hole. He got stuck there. (Erodes and Ortiz 260)

Like the ancient Greek myths that describe the raven as a white bird, until he tells his

master, Apollo, the truth and is turned black by the angry god (Ovid 62), in the Tlingit tale,

Raven does squeeze himself free from the smoke hole, but not without singed black feathers. He

is forever black from that time on. (Erodes and Ortiz 260). A similar fate befalls the crow in

Ovid’s Metamorphoses. It seems it too had pale feathers before they were turned as black as

night by Minerva, who like her brother, was not fond of the message the poor crow had to

deliver. (Ovid 59).

In ancient and medieval Europe, ravens and crows were seen as interchangeable spirit

messengers who could easily move back and forth from the world of the living to the world of

the dead. Yet unlike the Northwest Indians, there is not the slightest hint of levity in Norse and

Celtic lore concerning these birds. Both ravens and crows were thought to have the gift of

prophecy but were more feared than loved, as they were associated with bad news and death. The

epitome of the raven in this role is, of course, the foreboding creature that Edgar Allan Poe

portrays in his poem, “The Raven.” “Ghastly grim and ancient Raven wandering from the

Nightly shore – Tell me what thy lordly name is on the Night’s Plutonian shore!” “Quoth the

Raven, “Nevermore.”” (Poe 72).

 The Norsemen pictured their god Odin with two ravens, Huginn (Thought) and Muninn

(Memory), perched on his shoulder that he sent out every day to bring him news of the world

(Feher-Elston 4). The Celtic trio of war goddesses, Badb, Macha and Nemain, could take the

shape of ravens or crows to magically empower warriors to win the day and step into the fray

themselves if need be (Davidson 58). But for the Northcoast Indians, ravens and crows were not

messengers, battlefield spirits nor were they interchangeable. The Raven stories from that region

tell of a greedy trickster whose actions are primarily creative, while the Amerindian crow stories

of the same regions are concerned with justice, even if a just conclusion is not reached (Fleming

3).

In the Canadian Salish tale, “Raven Gets Caught in a Lie,” angry crows take revenge on

Raven after they find out he has eaten all the berries they have all worked so hard to gather. “The

crows mobbed Raven and boxed his ears, and for his punishment, made him row all the way back

to the village to explain to everyone why there would be no blackberries for supper” (Feher-

Elston 39). In another Canadian story, “Crow Doctors Raven” that the Tse-Shaht people tell, the

crow simply tends to Raven after he makes a fool of himself, “She made no judgmental remarks

– she just took care of him” (Feher-Elston 34).

For this author, the raven epitomizes the archetype of the artist, encouraged by some

societies and admired and feared by others. Ravens are funny smart thieves who feed off

whatever comes before them whether crops, garbage or carrion. They are expert mimics with

their own sophisticated language, (Feher-Elston 108) who live in structured clans spending years

together, and although infamous nest-looters, they mate for life. They enjoy excitement, color

and activity (Feher-Elston 140, 141). And most importantly, artists like the mythical ravens,

make sport of their fellow creatures as they bring necessary but missing elements into the world -
- whether it be light, water or truth. And ravens, as with most artists, have an insatiable appetite

for life and death.

In February of this year the Los Angeles Times ran a story concerning Derrick Coyle, the

Tower of London’s Yeoman raven master, and his decision to keep the six ravens of the Tower

inside the building in special aviaries to protect them from the bird flu. “According to legend, if

the ravens leave the 11th-century fortress on the River Thames, its White Tower will crumble and

the Kingdom of England will fall. King Charles II decreed in the 17th century that there must

always be six ravens at the Tower” (Los Angeles Times 20).

The current six in the flock are Branwen, Hugine, Munin, Gwyllum, Thor and Baldrick.

Normally they are allowed to wander freely about the courtyard as their wings have been clipped

making it impossible to fly away. In spite of that, a raven by the name of Grog did get away and

was last seen in front of an East End pub called the Rose and Punchbowl in 1981 or so the wags

of the Tower proclaim (Los Angeles Times 20). I like to imagine Grog regaling his astonished

pub mates with stories of his life before he made his home in London, when he lived on the

North Coast and created the world.

 Works Cited

“British Tradition Adapts to Bird Flu.” Los Angeles Times 20 February 2006: 20.

Black, Susan. “Raven, Part One – Corvidology.” <http://www.druidry.org/

obod/lore/animal/raven.html> 1-19.

Bringhurst, Robert. Trans. Nine Visits to the Mythworld – Ghandl of the

Qayahl Llaanas. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2000.

Campbell, Joseph. The Hero With A Thousand Faces. Princeton:

Bollingen Series XVII, Princeton University Press, 1949.

Davidson, H.R. Ellis. Myths and Symbols in Pagan Europe.

Syracuse: Syracuse University Press, 1998.

Erdoes, Richard and Alfonso Ortiz. American Indian Trickster Tales. New
York: Penguin Books, 1999,

Feher-Elston, Catherine. Ravensong A Natural and Fabulous History of

Ravens and Crows. New York: Jeremy P. Tarcher/Penguin, 2004.

Fleming, Samantha. “Murders and Unkindnessess.” Samhain ed. of White

Dragon. 1998. Ravens in Mythology <http://www.ravenfamily. org.
html>. 1-7.

Hyde, Louis. Trickster Makes the World Mischief, Myth, and Art. New York:
North Point Press, 1998.

Mandlebaum, Allen, Trans. The Metamorphoses of Ovid. New York:

Harcourt Brace, 1993.

Poe, Edgar Allan. The Complete Tales and Poems of Edgar Allan Poe.
New York: Barnes and Noble Books, 1992.

Reid, Bill and Robert Bringhurst. The Raven Steals the Light – Native
American Tales. Boston: Shambala, 1996.

Snyder, Gary. He Who Hunted Birds in His Father’s Village – The

Dimensions of a Haida Myth. Bolinas, California: Grey Fox Press,
1979.

Young, Serenity. Ed. An Anthology of Sacred Texts by and About Women.

New York: Crossroad, 1999.
 Zombification: Fact, Fiction, or Function?

Bradford C. VanWagenen

[It is] by no means easy for minds attached to occidental logic to penetrate systems of thought
such as these in which analogies and the power of symbols have the value of facts. –Dieterlen
(Introduction to Conversations with Ogotemmeli)

Haitian zombification continues to be perceived and sensationalized as a magical process

in which a sorcerer seizes the victim’s spirit (i.e., ti-bon-ange) leaving behind an empty vessel,

which is then subject to the bokor’s command. The first zombie film, White Zombie, was

produced in 1932 and is credited as being based on Seabrook’s book, The Magic Island. Today, a

search of zombie on the world-wide web produced an astonishing 4.03 million results. A meager

eleven thousand results were obtained in searching zomibification. My contention is that within

all this data (and opinion) there must reside a concrete, rational, and scientifically validated

explanation for or against the phenomenon of zombification: is it fact or fiction? A scientific

explanation for or against zombification, however, would only address part of a much larger

question. Although zombification may be considered unlikely by those grounded in “occidental

logic,” it is viewed as empirically verifiable by most Haitians. For example, zombification is a

crime under the Haitian Penal Code (Article 246) where it is considered as murder. Given the

reality of zombification by the Haitian, I must question what function the zombie serves at a

mythological, psychological, sociological, and political level.

Wade Davis, of the Botanical Museum of Harvard University, published one of the

earliest documented cases of zombification. This case is expounded upon for the layperson in his

two books entitled Passage of Darkness and The Serpent and the Rainbow. Lizabeth Paravisini-

Gerbert states that “Davis’s anthropological work, supported by scholarship and science

(57)…has gone a long way to demystify a phenomenon long believed to be solely the result of
sorcery and black magic” (38). A summary of Davis’s rational explanation for the phenomenon

of zombies is summarized in a 1984 Lancet article:

Zombies are not “living dead” but victims of TTX [i.e., tetrodotoxin] poisoning. Voodoo
witch doctors (bokors) themselves believe that the poison always kills, and that the buried
victim dragged out of the grave is reanimated by magic, but it is conceivable that some
victims, paralyzed by TTX, are buried alive. Disinterred shortly after burial, the victim
recovering from TTX intoxication is beaten by the bokor, bound, and fed a past of
“zombie cucumber” (the hallucinogenic Datura stramonium), and given a new zombi
name. After such an ordeal, the victim, possibly suffering from anoxic brain damage and
no longer able to distinguish between hallucination and reality, may believe himself to be
dead and behave as an automaton, blindly obedient to the bokor. (Puffers 1221)

Davis’s rationale for TTX poisoning as being the mechanism for zombification was based

on five zombie poisons that he obtained in 1982 from several localities in Haiti (subsequent

samples were collected in 1984). Davis noted that four of the five original samples contained

pulverized broiled puffer fish from the genus Diodon and Sphoeroides in addition to other toxic

animals and plants (88). It is well established that puffer fish may contain TTX and that ingestion

of this toxin can cause paralysis and death. Captain Cook and naturalist J.R. Forester experienced

temporary paralysis aboard the Resolution in 1774 after eating the liver and roe of a new species

of puffer obtained from the natives of New Caledonia (Cook 534-5). Today, the puffer fish is a

delicacy in Japan (known as fugu) and represents a “gastronomic dilemma,” for certain organs of

the fugu can be particularly rich in TTX depending on the type of fish, its sex, and the season in

which it is harvested (Puffers 1221).

The phenomenon of puffer poison has been known to Japanese scientists since the

beginning of the twentieth century. TTX was isolated and its structure elucidated and reported on

in 1964 (Mosher 1100). Being a sodium channel blocker, TTX poisoning produces symptoms

consistent with those of zombification: initial tingling and prickling sensation in the face and

limbs, ataxia, numbness and paralysis of the whole body, respiratory distress, and possibly death.
If death occurs it usually happens within twenty-four hours; if not, a full recovery can be

expected. In support of this, Japanese accounts state that some victims of puffer-fish poisoning

were pronounced dead only to subsequently recover in the morgue or on the way to the

crematorium (Puffers 1221). Thus, there exists a large body of circumstantial evidence, which

posits that the phenomenon of zombification is possible through TTX poisoning by the puffer

fish.

Davis wasn’t satisfied with circumstantial evidence and sought chemical proof of TTX in

the zombie poisons he collected. Davis sent two zombie poisons (one collected in 1982 and one

from 1984) to Japanese scientists Yasumoto and Kao for quantification of TTX. The two

scientists followed standardized procedures for analyzing TTX from biomass. After an initial

purification, TTX concentrations were calculated based on chemical analysis (an ion-pair HPLC

automated TTX analyzer) and an in vivo dose–survival relationship in mice. Yasumoto and

Kao’s conclusion was that the “zombie potions” provided by Davis contained much less than 1.1

ug of TTX/g of sample (based on chemical analysis). Furthermore, mice tested at these

concentrations showed no signs of intoxication. They stated specifically that, “…there is, at best,

only insignificant traces of tetrodotoxin in the samples of ‘zombie potions’ which were supplied

for analysis by Davis” (748).

Yasumoto and Kao, provided a chemical explanation as to why Davis’s samples were not

found to contain significant amounts of TTX. Although standard acidic extract procedures (0.1%

alcoholic acetic acid, pH value of 5) were used, the resulting extract generated was basic (i.e., pH

value of 10). TTX is known to decompose into pharmacologically inactive byproducts when

exposed to basic conditions. It was reasoned that the other constituents of the zombie poison

served to generate a basic solution which, in turn, could have caused a significant amount of
TTX decomposition (747-8). Despite their own scientific reasoning for not finding significant

amounts of TTX in Davis’s samples, Yasumoto and Kao went on to state that, “from these

results it can be concluded that the widely circulated claim in the lay press to the effect that

tetrodotoxin is the causal agent in the initial zombification process is with factual foundation”

(748). As a chemist and relatively unbiased observer, I find this conclusion flawed, to say the

least.

During Yasumoto and Kao’s work, Davis sought independent verification of TTX

concentrations by Benedek and River. These two scientists did not use a traditional extraction

process. Rather, they added additional acetic acid to maintain a low pH (i.e., 5.5) during the

extraction process. As a result, they determined that Davis’s sample contained as much as 20 ug

of TTX/g of sample as analyzed by GC/MS and 5.4 ug TTX/g sample as analyzed by LC/MS.

Unfortunately, the two scientists did not determine a TTX concentration based on

pharmacological activity in an in vivo dose–survival relationship in mice, as Yasumoto and Kao

attempted to do. Benedek and River explain the possible discrepancies between their results and

that of Yasumoto and Kao’s as possibly being “…attributed to the heterogeneity of the sample, a

different extraction procedure and different methods of quantification.” They conclude their

paper by stating that: “The present physio-chemical detection of TTX in one sample of the

powder, obtained by two independent methods of analysis, partially validates Davis’s

hypothesis...” (479).

Given the conflicting results from these two independent labs, and the absence of

pharmacological activity, I can only conclude that at this particular point in time a definitive

chemical (i.e., TTX) and pharmacological mechanism for zombification remains only a

hypothesis. Despite my view, most researchers are, however, in agreement on three points: 1)
that puffer fish have been documented as an ingredient in zombie poisons; 2) that puffer fish may

contain TTX; and 3) that puffer fish poisoning, by TTX, produces symptoms consistent with

those of the initial zombification process. The few clinical studies done on zombies are also

inconclusive.

Littlewood and Douyon reported on three clinical cases of zombification in a Lancet

article published in 1997. They state that, “…whilst Haitian medical partitions are familiar with

the phenomenon of zombification they have not published its clinical characteristics” (1094). The

basis for the authors’ investigations were that previous studies of the one well-documented

instance of a returned zombi (referring to Davis’s work) concentrated only on the symptoms at

the time of his presumed death and that little to no work had been done on his mental and

physical state at the time of the post return. Based on DNA fingerprinting, Littlewood and

Douyon reported that two of the three cases (i.e., MM and WD) of the returning zombies that

they studied were cases of mistaken identity, even though one case (i.e., WD) resulted in a life

imprisonment charge of the bokor for zombification (1095). DNA fingerprinting was not done on

the third case. Despite this, the case of “FI” appears to be the most authentic in that she was

identified (based on facial marks) by her family, husband, village members, and local priest three

years after her “death.” A court authorized opening of her tomb revealed it full of stones. Rather

than returning to her family, FI was admitted to the psychiatric hospital in Port-au-Prince where

the presumptive diagnosis was that she suffered from catatonic schizophrenia, “which is locally,”

the authors note, “a not uncommon psychiatric illness” (1095).

Littlewood and Douyon’s conclusion is a general one: “It is unlikely that there is single

explanation for all zombies” (1096). Mistaken identification of a wandering, mentally ill stranger

by a bereaved family is one possible explanation, given the prevalence of chronic schizophrenia,
brain damage, or learning disabilities. Persons with these disabilities could easily be viewed as

lacking the volition and memory characteristics of a zombie. Even with this rational explanation,

the authors admit that it is difficult to understand the apparent acquiescence of the “return

relative” not only to being a zombie but to being a “relative” (1096). In this capacity, however,

the myth of the zombie may fulfill an important social role. Because death or mental illness of a

young adult is not considered “natural” within Haitian society, the zombie state, as a cultural

phenomenon, may serve as a mechanism for re-incorporation of those mentally afflicted back

into a family. Littlewood and Douyon support this by stating that, “…their generally considerate

treatment might be seen as an institutionalised restitution of the destitute mentally ill; [where]

recognition and incorporation of a zombie into a family provides public recognition and

sometimes material advantage” (1096).

There are also conflicting reasons as to why a person may be subjected to zombification.

Deren states that the notion – outside Haiti – of the zombie as an enormously powerful giant, is a

misconception. “The choice of physically powerful individuals for zombies,” Deren states, “is

precisely because their major function is not as instruments of malevolence, but as a kind of

uncomplaining slave-labor to be used in the fields, the construction of houses, etc.” (42). This

statement, however, is inconsistent with the clinical findings of Littlewood and Douyon, where

two of three cases evaluated involved women. Slave-labor to be used in the fields and the

construction of houses (etc.) implies a propensity toward male zombies. The authors of the

clinical study specifically state, “That bokors actually enslave zombies on secret agricultural

grounds is implausible given the high population density of Haiti.” They add one very important

point: “Zombies have never been identified in captivity but only on their return” (1096).
 This point is difficult to transcend when considering that as many as one thousand new

cases of zombification occur each year in Haiti (personal communication by L.P. Mars, qtd.

Littlewood 1094). Is it possible that zombies are nothing more than a mythological projection

onto the destitute mentally ill? Or is it a mechanism for maintaining a certain social code?

There is evidence for the belief that the fear of zombification serves to maintain a social

code in all three of the clinical studies of Littlewood and Douyon. FI’s parents accused her

husband of zombifying her because she had an affair. WD’s uncle (who was convicted of

zombification) “confessed that he had been jealous of his brother who had used his literacy to

register all the family land in his name” (1095). The family of MM made the general cry of

“revenge sorcery” (1095). I don’t know if these allegations are true. What is important to

understand, however, is that these people believe that zobification is a reality and that

compromising a social code (written or unwritten) puts one in the position of being subjected to

that process. Social codes of conduct appear to be very important in Haitian culture. “Any

departure from such codes of social conduct,” states Deren, “is censured by the epithet:

‘Maleleve’! (Ill-mannered! Uncouth!)” (43).

In providing possible social functions of the zombie, I would like to move into possible

psychological and mythological functions of zombification. Before doing that, I would like to set

the stage by drawing a comparison between the more modern Voudoun religion and that of its

ancestral African roots. In doing this, I am making the assumption that Maya Deren’s view of

Haitian Voudoun (as described in Divine Horsemen: The Living Gods of Haiti) is all-

encompassing. I am also assuming that the Dogon’s view of the living dead, as presented by

Marcel Griaule, is representative of the majority of African cultures integrated into what I would

like to call the Voudoun Phenomenon: a complex religious, mythological, and cultural
phenomenon which has a high capacity to change relatively quickly in an effort to meet societal

needs.

The Voudoun phenomenon sprang forth from a convergence of what might be viewed as

two polar opposites: the African and native Caribbean religious belief systems. This fusion can

be considered as an example of the emergent third way, where a hybridization of two antipodes

gives rise to a product of greater perceived value than the sum of the two individual parts. Deren

acknowledges the creation of this emergent third form by stating that the product of this fusion

represented a total cultural outburst with an ethos of a different tone (67). She goes on to state

that although a new form emerged, it is clear that it was not a fusion of opposites in the sense of

good (referring to the African culture) and evil (referring to the native Caribbean culture).

The fusion of the African with native Caribbean religious systems was born out of the

enslavement of both of these peoples by the white man. Negro slaves from Africa were imported

from dozens of culturally diverse West-African tribes, all having their own traditions, gods, and

rituals. Although culturally diverse, all of these African tribes, however, shared certain customs:

ancestor worship; the use of song, drumming, and dance in ritual ceremony; and the possession

of the worshipper by their deities (Deren 58).

These shared customs served as the foundation for the displaced Negroes’ integration and

unity. Although this integration represented a collective creation, it was the Dahomean culture

that was the most predominant, and today makes up the Rada branch of the Voudoun Religion

(Deren 60). The Dahomean culture was based in agriculture and grounded in principles of

organization and cooperation; their benevolent deities served primarily as protectors. What the

Dahomean culture lacked, however, was a certain aggressiveness, necessary for revolution while

in a state of disorganization. This need was fulfilled by the native Caribbean Indians.
 What the native Caribbean Indians brought to the table was an aggressive, imperialistic,

and active dynamic. More importantly, they had the capacity to work from a loosely

decentralized foundation (Deren 66). The violent and often bloody characteristics of this “Petro”

nation are inferred, by Deren, as being colored by the larger Aztec, Mayan, and Inca civilizations.

This violent world-view served as an outlet for the New-World rage of the African. The focusing

of this rage occurred through the medium of magic. “When divine power is to be put into action

by human beings it becomes magic.” Deren goes on to state that, “Whereas the divine principle

in itself is primarily natural and moral, and acts ‘in general,’ the magical principle which brings it

to focus and directs it to a desired end is deliberate, amoral and specific” (66-7).

It is conceivable that the revolution and subsequent overthrow of the white man by the

joint African/Caribbean Indian force was aided, to some degree, by magic; more specifically,

through the use of zombie poisons. I base my contention on the fact that the phenomenon of the

zombie is indigenous to Haiti and not practiced by their African ancestors, specifically the

Dogon. The Dogon’s religious system does have a concept of the “Living Dead;” however, it

differs dramatically from that of the zombie.

In Conversations with Ogotemmeli: An Introduction to Dogon Religious Ideas, Griaule

states that the souls of dead Dogon exist in a state of “impurity.” These deceased souls remain

with the family and community until they are given the appropriate ritual ceremonies (including a

masked dance) which, in turn, releases the soul to become an ancestor (180). The problem with

these ritual ceremonies is similar to that in Haiti: they cost money. As such, families of the

deceased put off the ceremonies until several dead exist. “In this way,” states Griaule, “the

expense can be shared, but as a result there may be an increasing number of unsatisfied dead,
whose condition is unstable, and who linger in the world of the living uncertain and mistrustful”

(181).

The departed souls seek to slake their thirst in the fermenting millet beer that the relatives

are preparing for secular services. In turn, their remaining energy is infused into the brew, giving

“…the liquor its intoxicating property” (182). The drinker, in an inebriated state, is viewed as

speaking for the deceased. In this capacity, intoxication is not only tolerated, but welcomed

(especially in the elderly); and serves the purpose of reminding the families of those deceased,

that they need to attend to their dead by providing ritual services.

An evolutionary line can be drawn from the Dogon religion to the Voudoun phenomenon,

“whose major preoccupation is, precisely, to re-activate the souls of the dead” (Deren 45). In

Voudoun, death is viewed as a release of the gros-bon-ange (the spiritual double of the body),

where it descends to the abysmal waters and resides for one year and a day. After that time and

through a specific ritual service (money provided), “it must be reclaimed, or reborn [and lodged

in a govi], if it is to achieve any degree of immortality” (Deren 46). Failure to do this is viewed as

bringing about the rage of both the loa and the gros-bon-ange; worse, it is viewed as breaking the

chain by which the divine heritage of the race is extended forward (Deren 45).

What is conspicuously absent in the Voudoun phenomenon, compared with the Dogon

religion, are any ritual practices of intoxication. Moreover, Deren states that, “…it is extremely

rare to see a Haitian in even the least stage of inebriation” (43). Why this is so is critical to

understanding the psychological and mythological role of the zombie. It is not that the Haitian

fears zombies, they fear being turned into a zombie. “The terror,” states Deren, “is of a moral

nature, related to the deep-rooted value which the Haitian attaches to powers of consciousness
and the attendant capacity for moral judgment, deliberation and self-control…which may result

from drunkenness” (43).

Because slavery is the antithesis of “self-control,” the strict emphasis on self-control, by

the Haitian, can be viewed as a collective enantiodromia that occurred as a result of the slave

experience. Marion Woodman states that an enantiodromia “…occurs when an energy [i.e., a

polarity] has been pushed too far in one direction, and suddenly switches into the resisting energy

it has been struggling to overcome” (30). The mythology associated with the zombie can

therefore be viewed as a direct outgrowth of the slave experience. “The zombie” states Laennec

Hurbon, “is thus the perfect realization of the slave condition, the very ideal sought by the master

in his slave” (192).

Marion Woodman’s definition of enantiodromia provides an avenue for discussing how

the function of the zombie and zombification can also be explained in terms of depth psychology.

The psyche, whether individual or collective, has a remarkable capacity to retain balance: what

exists in an individual’s or culture’s consciousness is balanced out by the opposing energy in the

unconscious. The more energetic the conscious belief or experience is, the more energetic the

unconscious energy must be to retain balance. The two opposing antipodes can be thought of as a

separation of electrical “charge.” The ego experiences this separation of charge as tension. The

merging of these two charges results in “the creation of consciousness,” which Edward F.

Edinger argues is “the purpose of human life” (17).

One way in which the charge may be dissipated is through an enantiodromia flip into the

opposing energy. The mythology of the zombie, and the corresponding value that the modern

Haitian places on control, can be viewed as a psychic mechanism for dealing with the slave

experience. Although the slave experience was imposed upon the blacks by the white man, in this
particular case, it has a ritualistic tone associated with it. This may support the theory that ritual

(even if imposed by another) comes before mythology.

Another way in which a psychic charge may be dissipated is through projection. From a

depth-psychological point of view, I can’t imagine a better way to validate one’s own moral

judgment, deliberation, and self-control than through the corresponding unconscious projection

of the opposite (i.e., oblivion) onto a zombie (or the destitute mentally ill). Ironically, this

mechanism of projection adds value to the reality of the Loa. The Loa are regarded in both the

ancient Dogon religion and the modern Voudoun phenomenon as being available to the

individual provided the individuals present themselves with sincere intent. “Vodou gives the

individual,” states Hurbon, “the chance to establish a relationship with the spirits of the cult

without the mediation of priests” (193). From a depth-psychological point of view, this rich

source of wisdom and comfort provided directly to the individual, by the deities, demands that

the opposite exist. Part of this opposing energy may be viewed as a cultural projection onto the

zombie. It is not clear, however, that the fear associated with zombification completely balances

out the depth and richness of the Loa.

In an Atlantic Monthly article entitled “Voodoo Politics,” Lawrence E. Harrison states:

The Haitian problem is anchored in the slave experience itself, from which it can hardly
escape – thus Haiti is condemned to dictatorship. Bound at once by history and by culture,
Haitian society can offer nothing but the spectacle of ‘Vodou politics,’ that is to say
irrational, uncontrollable, and infantile practices, such as Vodou inspires. (qtd. in Hurbon
194)

It seems that as long as the Haitians maintain their rich tradition of ancestral worship, they will

continue to be subject to our projections.

 Works Cited

Benedek, C. and L. River. “Evidence for the Presence of Tetrodotoxin in a Powder Used in Haiti
for Zombification.” Toxicon. 27 (1989). 473-80.

Cook, James. “Journals of Captain Cook.” The Voyage of the Resolution and Adventure 1772-
1775. (Vol. 2). Ed. J.C. Beaglehole. London: Cambridge U P, 1969.

Davis, Wade E. “The Ethnobiology of the Haitian Zombi.” Journal of Ethnopharmacology. 9

(1983). 85-104.

Deren, Maya. Divine Horsemen: The Living Gods of Haiti. Forward by Joseph Campbell. New
York: Thames and Hudson, 1953.

Edinger, Edward F. The Creation of Consciousness: Jung’s Myth for Modern Man. Toronto: Inner
City Books, 1984.

Griaule, Marcel. Conversations with Ogotemmeli: An Introduction to Dogon Religious Ideas.

Introduction by Germaine Dieterlen. London, Oxford, and New York: Oxford U P, 1965.

Hurbon, Laennec. “American Fantasy and Haitian Vodou.” Sacred Arts of Haitian Vodou. Ed.
Donald J. Cosentino. Los Angeles: UCLA Fowler Museum of Cultural History, 1995. 181-
197.

Littlewood, Roland and Chavannes Douyon. “Clinical Findings in Three Cases of Zombification.”
The Lancet. 350 (1997). 1094-96.

Mosher, H.S., F.A. Buchwald, and H.G. Fischer. “Tarichatoxin – Tetrodotoxin: A Potent
Neurotoxin.” Science. 144 (1964). 1100-10.

Paravisini-Gerbert, Lizabeth. “Women Possessed: Eroticism and Exoticism in the Representation

of Women as Zombie.” Sacred Possessions: Vodou, Santeria, Obeah, and the Caribbean.
Eds. Margarite Fernandez Olmos and Lizabeth Paravishni-Gilbert. New Brunswick, New
Jersey and London: Rutgers U P, 1997. 37-58.

“Puffers, Gourmands, and Zombification.” The Lancet. 350 (1984). 1220-1.

Woodman, Marion. Addiction to Perfection: The Still Unravished Bride. Toronto: Inner City
Books, 1982.

Yasumoto, Takeshi, and C.Y. Kao. “Tetrodotoxin and the Haitian Zombie.” Toxicon. 24 (1986).
747-49.
 The Silence of the Sage:

Jung’s Ambiguous Reactions to Charges of Anti-Semitism and Nazi Collaboration

By Benjamin Daniel Blatt

Last summer, many conservatives and other supporters of President Bush made much of

Senator Richard Durbin’s (D-IL) comparison of our military’s treatment of suspected terrorists at

the Guantanamo Bay Detention Facility to “Nazis, Soviets in their gulags, or some mad

regime—Pol Pot or others that had no concern for human beings” (Cong. Rec. S6594). Because

Durbin had compared our troops to the worst abusers of human rights of the last century, his critics

responded by focusing on the outrageousness of his comparison and so dismissed the substance of

his allegations. Perhaps had he not made such an extreme comparison, others might have paid

more attention to his claims.

Similarly, from the time I first read Carl Jung in 1990 until my first quarter at Pacifica last

fall, I dismissed allegations that Jung was an anti-Semite and Nazi collaborator with a wave of my

hand, calling them “ridiculous,” not meriting further discussion. In the first essay by Jung that I

had read, he had written that Germans’ “feelings of personal responsibility were overruled by a

rigid sense of duty” (1989: 5). These views corresponded with what I had observed as a Jew living

in Germany a few years previously. The German people seemed more interested in social order

than in moral values and so, during World War II, had silently stood by as their leaders murdered

millions.

Not only did I dismiss the allegations against a man whose writings I admired, I also

claimed that there was no substance to them whatsoever. Jung had countless Jewish associates and

chose a Jewish women to edit Memories, Dreams, Reflections. He couldn’t possibly be an anti-

Semite. If anything, I held, he was a friend of the Jews. Perhaps had Jung’s critics not insisted on
his anti-Semitism, they might have helped me gain a more complete picture of the man. For, while

Jung was neither an anti-Semite nor a Nazi collaborator, he did initially underestimate the Hitler

regime’s capacity for evil. Not only that. In his writings and public statements, he showed

insensitivity to the sentiments of Jews, particularly in the years immediately following the Nazi

takeover.

Allegations of Jung’s anti-Semitism long predated his unfortunate remarks in the 1930s.

“In The History of the Psychoanalytic Movement (1914), Freud wrote that Jung had certain ‘racial

prejudices’” (Stein 93). And the accusations against Jung have continued to this day. Aryeh

Maidenbaum holds that “topic will not go away” (2002: 194). Like me, many Jews who are

admirers of Jung or identify with his psychoanalytic school, find ourselves accused of admiring a

man who supported the Nazis and hated our people. In applying for a postdoctoral grant from

Hebrew University in Jerusalem, Maidenbaum was “put on notice” that it was “not acceptable” for

him to use that grant to study at the Jung Institute in Z2rich; a committee member “insisted” that

Jung was a Nazi (1991: 292). Some even refer to Jung’s anti-Semitism as established fact. In his

History of Psychotherapy, Jan Ehrenwald refers to “Jung’s indisputably anti-Jewish position during

World War II” (367).

A closer examination of the historical record, however, reveals that Jung did not in fact take

an “indisputably anti-Jewish position” during World War II. Indeed, he helped many Jews get out

of Germany (Bair 459-60). In 1936, in his essay “Wotan,” he described the Germans as in a

“’state’ of fury” (1978: 185). Yet, despite the assistance he provided to certain Jews and his 1936

essay, his assumption of the presidency of the General Medical Society for Psychotherapy in 1933

shortly after Ernst Kretschmer resigned caused many to accuse him of collaborating with the Nazis.
In the months that followed, his own words made it difficult for him to distance himself from those

accusations.

Just five days after assuming the presidency of the Society, Jung was interviewed for Radio

Berlin by a former pupil, Dr. Adolf Weiz‰cker. Jay Sherry writes that to “a series of leading

questions he offered a series of compromising answers” (124). Jung even appeared to praise

Hitler:

As Hitler said recently, the leader must be able to be alone and must have the courage to go
his own way. . . . the true leader is always one who has the courage to be himself, and can
look not only others in the eye but above all himself. . . . It is perfectly natural that a leader
should stand at the head of an elite, which in earlier centuries was founded by the nobility.
The nobility believe by the law of the nature in the blood and the exclusiveness of race.
(1977: 64-65)

At a time when the Hitler was trying to consolidate his power in Germany and gain respect in the

world, Jung’s words helped present the German dictator in a positive light. Moreover, the Nazis

could easily twist Jung’s words to support their racial theories.

The radio broadcast was the first of a number of actions that Jung took which made him

appear supportive of the Nazi regime and its ideology. Indeed, in the early 1930s, he “was

genuinely taken from a time with what he psychologically took to be a potentially positive

resurgence in German nationalism” (Maidenbaum 1991: 293). Like many Swiss Germans, he

sympathized with the Germans in the “traumatic aftermath” of their defeat in World War I as they

experienced political upheaval, armed confrontations in the streets, hyperinflation and humiliation

at the hands of the victorious nations, particularly France (Sherry 27). No wonder Jung was

initially taken with Hitler’s charisma and ability to revitalize his nation. His leadership offered a

hope of stability for Switzerland’s neighbor to the north. While Jung at first appeared optimistic,
even some Jews in Europe were not entirely pessimistic about the Nazi takeover. One month after

Jung spoke on Berlin radio, Freud wrote, “Perhaps it won’t turn out all that bad” (Wehr 273).

While many did not foresee the horrors that would follow, Jung was one of the few non-

Nazis who published works which seemed to support the Nazi’s racial theories. In his 1934 essay,

“The State of Psychotherapy Today,” in the Medical Society’s Zentralblatt, Jung described “the

formidable phenomenon of National Socialism, on which the world gazes with astonished eyes”

(1978: 166). As he had offered praise for Hitler’s leadership, in a journal published in Germany,

he praised his movement. But, the most damning parts of the articles are his descriptions of Jews

in terms which make them appear to be both an inferior race and parasites on civilized nations:

The Jews have this peculiarity in common with women; being physically weaker, they have
to aim at the chinks in the armour of their adversary, and thanks to this technique which has
been forced on them through the centuries, the Jews themselves are best protected where
others are most vulnerable. . . . The Jew, who is something of nomad, has never yet created
a cultural form of his own and as far as we can see never will, since all his instinct and
talents require a more or less civilized nation to act as host for their development. (1978:
165-66)

Despite his acknowledgment that “this technique” has been forced upon Jews, Jung’s suggestion

that Jews benefit from the vulnerability of others supported Nazi propaganda that Jews were to

blame for the German loss in World War I and the instability of the Weimar years. Moreover, the

notion of Jews requiring a civilized nation to act as host for their development played into the Nazi

notion of Jews as parasites.

To be sure, Jung had written about racial differences long before he published this essay.

His colleague Barbara Hannah notes that “since 1918, if not before, Jung had been emphasizing the

importance of realizing the great differences that exist not only between the Jewish and Aryan

races but between all races and all nations” (224). In 1918, however, no major European country

was governed by a political party which based its ideology on the inferiority of certain races. Even
his closest friends and colleagues acknowledge that the timing of this essay served to damage his

reputation: “Because of the racial fanaticism in Germany at the time, this was taken as an

expression of Nazi sentiment and continues to be interpreted even today as a further proof of

Jung’s anti-Semitism” (JaffÈ 1989: 86).

By talking about the racial differences “at a time when the Nazis could so easily use them

for propaganda,” Jung showed great insensitivity to Jews who were already suffering under Nazi

oppression (Bair 511). But, as the Nazis were preparing to convene a psychoanalytic conference at

Bad Nauheim with the express purpose of excluding Jews from the General Society, Jung

demonstrated that he was not entirely insensitive to Jewish concerns. He pleaded with Vladimir

Rosenbaum, a Jewish lawyer, to find a loophole in the statutes proposed by the Germans so as to

“render the exclusions and extermination of Jewish colleagues as not so inevitable” (qtd in Bair

449). In the end, Rosenbaum drafted a document which allowed German Jewish psychoanalysts,

excluded from their national society because of their religion, to “maintain professional status by

joining the international organization as individual members” (Bair 450).

Finding a loophole in the statutes was not the only thing that Jung would do at Bad

Nauheim to oppose Nazi ideology. In his address, the “Theory of Complexes,” he paid homage to

Freud for which he was attacked the following day in the German press. If he had wished “to

ingratiate himself with the National Socialist regime and its leaders,” he would not have so

publicly acknowledged a Jewish thinker they reviled (Harms 41). Not only that. In the first book

he published after the Nazis came to power, Wirklichkeit der Seele, he included an essay by Hugo

Rosenthal, a Jewish pupil, “The Type-Difference in the Jewish History of Religion” (Harms 43,

JaffÈ 1989: 86). Thus, a picture of Jung in the early 1930s begins to emerge, a man seemingly

blind (or indifferent) to the fact Nazis (and their sympathizers) could use his ideas for their own
hateful purposes, but also a man who acknowledged the achievements of Jews in his own

profession.

At the same time he published the writings of Jews—indeed as late as 1937 he was able to

insert an article by a Jew, Victor Frankl, into the Zentralblatt—he declined to speak out publicly

against the Nazis’ anti-Semitic ideas and policies (Maidenbaum 2002: 200-01, Neumann 74).

Jung’s friend Erich Neumann, a Jew who fled Germany shortly after the Nazi takeover, warned

him about the “terrible danger of the Nazi movement” and urged his colleague to come out clearly

against it (Neumann 74). Neumann agreed with Jung that there were differences between Jews and

non-Jews; he understood that Jung’s views on race did not make him a Nazi. Even so, in his letters

in the 1930s, Neumann deplored “Jung’s lack of knowledge and understanding of Jews, Judaism,

and the problem of Jewish identity” and implored his Swiss friend to learn more about his people

(80).

Herein perhaps lies one explanation for Jung’s insensitivity to Jews in the immediate

aftermath of the Nazi’s rise to power. He was simply unfamiliar with Jewish history, culture and

religion. “Jung’s first association with anyone Jewish was his relationship with Freud” (Stein 90).

And while culturally a Jew, Freud was not a practicing Jew, not as familiar with Jewish ritual as a

more pious Jew would be, not able to introduce his younger colleague to the traditions and

mysteries of his religion. Moreover, Jung began his correspondence with Freud in 1906 when was

he was 31, meeting him the following year. Thus, for the first three decades of his life, Jung had

little exposure to Jews or Jewish culture. Indeed, as late as 1934, in a letter to a Jewish doctor, he

acknowledged his own ignorance: “Your criticism of my lack of knowledge of things Jewish is

quite justified. I don’t understand Hebrew” (1973: 154).

 Perhaps had Jung taken it upon himself in the early 1930s to learn more about Judaism, he

might have spoken out, warning others of the dangers of Nazism. But, throughout the 1930s, Jung

held onto his neutrality. Had he perhaps made clear in public statements that he did not share the

Nazis ideology and distinguished his racial theories from theirs, others might not have accused him

of collaboration. Unfortunately, he saved his denials for private correspondence while insisting

publicly on his neutrality. In a 1936 letter, he wrote “I am no Nazi, as a matter of fact I am quite

unpolitical” (1973: 219). Jay Sherry holds that the “medical and political neutrality that he claimed

in the 1930s was unfortunately accompanied by a moral neutrality as well, which helps explain the

ambiguous tone of some of his contemporary comments” (2002: 70). In the early 1930s, Jung had

an attitude similar to that which, after the war, he diagnosed in the Germans.

Nonetheless, as the Nazis consolidated their power in Germany, Jung began to change. As

he maintained his public neutrality, he was gaining a greater private understanding of Jews, writing

to J. Wilhelm Hauer in 1937 that he had “personally treated very many Jews and know their

psychology in its deepest recesses, so I can recognize the relation of their psychology to their

religion” (1973: 233). Perhaps, it was the influx of Jewish refugees into Switzerland, some of

whom he took on as clients, in certain cases without fee, that allowed him just three years after

acknowledging his limited knowledge of “things Jewish” to gain a greater understanding of Jews.

To be sure, he had Jewish pupils for many years, but perhaps the private pressure from his Jewish

friends, especially Neumann, caused him to become more sensitive to their concerns.

Even as his Jewish clientele grew and the Nazi atrocities increased, Jung limited his

criticism of the Nazis to his scholarly essays. In March 1936, he published “Wotan” which Adolf

Guggenb2hl-Craig believes remains “still, even today, the best most frightening mythological

description of Nazism” (145). In this essay, Jung wrote: “The impressive thing about the German
phenomenon is that one man, who is obviously ‘possessed,’ has infected a whole nation to such an

extent that everything is set in motion on its course toward perdition” (1978: 185).

Although he recognized that Germany was on the road to perdition, he was still was not

willing to be identified publicly as a friend of the Jews, the people most victimized by the Nazis.

Only a few months after publishing “Wotan,” he wrote that a “disinterested discussion” of the

“difference between Jewish and non-Jewish psychology” was “well-nigh impossible in our time of

a new barbary. One risks being labeled as an anti-Semite or pro-Semite without being heard at all”

(1973: 224). He understood that things were getting worse in Europe, but still feared that if he

were identified as pro-Jewish, people might not pay attention to his ideas.

Perhaps he feared that by being so labeled, he could no longer continue to work with the

General Society and help Jews. Or perhaps it was something else. Whatever the case, Jung

continued to define his professional reputation by his public neutrality.

Just as, during the war, he had expressed concerns about the Nazis privately, so too, after

the war, would he express regrets about his writings and actions in the early 1930s privately.

Importantly, he did acknowledge his mistakes. He said that he would not have written his 1934

article “The State of Psychotherapy Today” the way that he had and considered it “nonsense”

(Maidenbaum 1991: 295).

As he recognized the errors he made in his writings, he also recognized his need to seek

forgiveness from individual Jews. The first thing he did when he saw his Jewish colleague James

Kirsch after the war was to apologize for those writings (Kirsch 64). Kirsch was not the only Jew

with whom Jung sought forgiveness. In 1946, Jung showed the depth of his contrition by going out

of his way to apologize to Leo Baeck when that distinguished rabbi and concentration camp

survivor came to Zurich. Although Baeck initially refused to see Jung because of the reputation he
had gained from his writings in 1933-4, Jung insisted on facing the rabbi and went to his hotel.

Jung and Baeck talked for two hours. Jung confessed that he had “slipped up.”

Michael Vannoy Adams points out that, on the basis of this talk, Baeck “renewed his

friendship with Jung” (255). Not only that. Baeck insisted that Gershom Scholem accept an

invitation to the Eranos meeting in Ascona (JaffÈ 1989: 100). We even have a visual record of that

friendship. In her book, C.G. Jung: Word and Image, Aniela JaffÈ includes a picture of Baeck

talking to Jung at the 1947 Eranos meeting (186).

Werner H. Engel, a Jewish psychiatrist who remained in Berlin until 1940, believes that the

translation of Jung’s comment to Rabbi Baeck as “slipped up” does not convey the full meaning of

the German word, ausgerutscht, that Jung used. It means to “lose one’s footing,” which, for a

mountain climber, like Jung, has life-or-death consequences. Thus, by using that word, Jung

conveyed to Baeck that his “’slippings’ of 1933-34’” had been “tragic and deadly serious missteps”

(164). Engel himself had a meaningful meeting with Jung after the war. When they met for the

last time in 1954, Engel and Jung sat together in silence, sharing “in human comradeship,” which

Engel felt, “was more convincing of the true category of that extraordinary man than any reading or

even speaking could be or have been” (165-66).

Another type of silence, however, would trouble other Jewish Jungians. While he sought

forgiveness with individual Jews, particularly those who had survived the Holocaust, Jung failed to

publicly acknowledge his errors. Kirsch regrets that Jung never put his apology in “public

writings” (64) while Jung’s “public silence on the subject of the Holocaust leaves” analyst Jerome

S. Bernstein “aghast” (136). Jung never made a “distinct public statement . . . . dealing with his

action and more questionable pronouncements during the 1930s” (Maidenbaum 1991: 294-95).

Kirsch believes that Jung felt his 1945 article, “After the Catastrophe” was “sufficient to state his
position” (64). Since he had written so clearly about the evils of Nazism, he didn’t see the need to

make public his regret at his past actions.

Still, it is clear that the war changed him. The man who confessed to knowing so little of

“things Jewish” in 1934 took it upon himself in his later years to study the Kabbalah, the chief

work of Jewish mysticism. Kirsch believes that he finally liberated himself from “any trace of anti-

Semitism” by writing Answer to Job (86). In that work, Jung “described Job’s encounter with the

biblical image of God and indirectly his own Auseindersetzung (encounter and clarification)” (86).

In his research and writing, he sought to better understand Jewish ideas as he wrestled with his own

demons.

It is the very German word, Auseindersetzung, that Kirsch uses, which, I believe, helps

explain Jung’s silence. In the traditional understanding of the word, an auseinandersetzung cannot

take place in solitude, but requires two individuals. Indeed, this compound word contains the

German word einander, one another, and setzung, sitting or placing. With the prefix aus, from or

out of, we get a confrontation or exchange between two individuals.

Such exchanges with individual Jewish patients helped Jung change his attitudes between

1934 and the years immediately following the Second World War. In their sessions together, he

and the client faced each other alone. Hearing their stories and reflecting on their dreams at a time

of increasing peril for Jews in Nazi-occupied Europe, Jung became increasingly sensitive to Jewish

concerns. As early as 1937, he acknowledged gaining a greater understanding of Jews through his

clients. Despite this understanding, he maintained his public neutrality just as, after the war, while

he sought forgiveness with colleagues in private, his silence became a kind of public neutrality.

Perhaps he felt that he didn’t need to apologize publicly because he had done so privately with his

Jewish colleagues.
 It is that very failure to publicly address his errors in the 1930s which has allowed Jung’s

opponents to continue to accuse him of anti-Semitism and collaboration. As a Jew and admirer of

Jung, at the same time that I find comfort in his private acknowledgment of his errors when he and

individual Jews sat alone together, I remain troubled that a man so outspoken did not take the time

to publicly address his own short-sightedness in the years leading up the war. For so long, I was

blind to this otherwise great man’s silence and so had an incomplete picture of a man whose ideas I

cherish.

In the end, I am left with this apparent ambiguity, the man who went out of his way to seek

reconciliation with Leo Baeck, a man, who apologized to Jewish colleagues for his writings in the

1930s, did not publicly atone for errors which he clearly acknowledged. As I recognize that Jung

(in the 1940s) came to terms with his own actions in the 1930s in part through these private

encounters, I gain a greater appreciation for the therapeutic value he discovered in individual

relationships. By securing forgiveness in private Auseinandersetzungen with individual Jews, he

may have assumed he achieved forgiveness with all Jews.

If one takes Jung’s public silence in the 1930s and his failure to apologize as proof positive

the Carl Jung was an anti-Semite and Nazi sympathizer, one ignores the insight he gained from his

Jewish clients during the war and his efforts to seek reconciliation with Jewish colleagues after the

war. As Senator Durbin’s remarks show, Jung’s adversaries are not the only ones to use the Nazi

reference. Just as such comparisons present a false picture of the individual (or group) charged,

investigation of the claims allows us to see the truth beyond the hyperbole. By examining the

accusations made against Jung, my image of the good doctor may be tad more tarnished than it

once was, but my understanding has been greatly increased.

 Works Cited

Adams, Michael Vannoy, “My Siegfried Problem—and Ours: Jungians Freudians, Anti-Semitism,
and the Psychology of Knowledge.” Lingering Shadows: Jungians, Freudians, and Anti-
Semitism. Ed. Aryeh Maidenbaum and Stephen A. Martin. Boston: Shambhala, 1991. 241-
272.

Bair, Deirdre. Jung: A Biography. Boston: Little, Brown, 2003

Bernstain, Jerome S. “Collective Shadow Integration of the Jungian Community: Atonement.”

Jung and the Shadow of Anti-Semitism. Ed., Aryeh Maidenbaum. Berwick, Maine:
Nicolas-Hays, 2002. 115-140.

Cong. Rec. 14 June 2005: S6594.

Engel, Werner H. “Thoughts and Memories of C.G. Jung.” Jung and the Shadow of Anti-Semitism.
Ed., Aryeh Maidenbaum. Berwick, Maine: Nicolas-Hays, 2002. 157-66.

Guggenb2hl-Craig, Adolf. “Reflections on Jung and Collective Anti-Semitism.” Jung and the
Shadow of Anti-Semitism. Ed., Aryeh Maidenbaum. Berwick, Maine: Nicolas-Hays, 2002.
141–146.

Hannah, Barbara. Jung: His Life and Work. Wilmette, Illinois: Chiron, 1997.

Harms, Ernest. “Carl Gustav Jung: Defender of Freud and the Jews.” Lingering Shadows:
Jungians, Freudians, and Anti-Semitism. Ed. Aryeh Maidenbaum and Stephen A. Martin.
Boston: Shambhala, 1991. 17-49.

JaffÈ, Aniela. “C.G. Jung and National Socialism.” From the life and work of C.G. Jung. Trans.,
R.F. C. Hull and Murray Stein. Einsiedeln, Switzerland: Daimon Verlage, 1989. 78-102.

----, ed. C. G. Jung: Word and Image. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1979.

Jung, C.G. Ein gro_er Psychologe im Gespr‰ch. Ed., Robert Hinshaw and Lela Fischli.
Freiburg, Germany: Herder, 1994.

----. “An Interview on Radio Berlin: Conducted by Adolf Weiz‰cker, June 26, 1933.” C.G.
Jung Speaking. Ed., William McGuire and R.F.C. Hull. Princeton: Princeton University
Press, 1977. 59-66.

----. “Introduction: the fight with the shadow.” Essays on Contemporary Events: The Psychology
of Nazism. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1989. 1-9.

----. Letters, Vol 1: 1906-1950. Ed., Gerhard Adler and Aniela JaffÈ. Trans., R.F.C. Hull.
Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1973.
 Works Cited Continued

----. “The State of Psychotherapy Today.” Civilization in Transition. Collected Works, Vol. 10.
Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1978. 157-173.

----. “Wotan.” Civilization in Transition. Collected Works, Vol. 10. Princeton: Princeton
University Press, 1978. 179-193.

Kirsch, James. “Carl Gustav Jung and the Jews: The Real Story.” Lingering Shadows: Jungians,
Freudians, and Anti-Semitism. Ed. Aryeh Maidenbaum and Stephen A. Martin. Boston:
Shambhala, 1991. 51-87.

Maidenbaum, Aryeh. “Lingering Shadows: A Personal Perspective.” Lingering Shadows:

Jungians, Freudians, and Anti-Semitism. Ed. Aryeh Maidenbaum and Stephen A. Martin.
Boston: Shambhala, 1991. 291-300.

----. “The Shadows Still Linger.” Jung and the Shadow of Anti-Semitism. Ed., Aryeh
Maidenbaum. Berwick, Maine: Nicolas-Hays, 2002. 193-217.

Neumann, Micah. “On the Relationship between Erich Neumann and C.G. Jung and the Question
of anti-Semitism.” Jung and the Shadow of Anti-Semitism. Ed., Aryeh Maidenbaum.
Berwick, Maine: Nicolas-Hays, 2002. 73-86.

Sherry, Jay. “The Case of Jung’s Alleged Anti-Semitism.” Lingering Shadows: Jungians,
Freudians, and Anti-Semitism. Ed. Aryeh Maidenbaum and Stephen A. Martin. Boston:
Shambhala, 1991. 117-132.

----. “Instead of Heat, Light.” Jung and the Shadow of Anti-Semitism. Ed., Aryeh Maidenbaum.
Berwick, Maine: Nicolas-Hays, 2002. 57-71

Stein, Richard. “Jung’s ‘Mana Personality’ and the Nazi Era.” Lingering Shadows: Jungians,
Freudians, and Anti-Semitism. Ed. Aryeh Maidenbaum and Stephen A. Martin. Boston:
Shambhala, 1991. 89-116.

Wehr, Gerhard. Carl Gustav Jung: Leben, Wirk, Wirkung. Munich: Diogenes, 1985.
 Chaos and the Sacred Moment

By Katherine Lansing Davis

I. Chaos

Beyond the deep,

lost, spinning, mad—
the children of Atom
in infinite clad.
Colliding, gliding,
by splendor surrounded—
black masses gather,
form darkness unbounded.
No fingers to touch,
No true hands to hold,
Still quick spirits grasp,
The substance to mold.

Somewhere there lives

a hope unfulfilled
In the core of its being,
not muted, not stilled.
A song with no sound,
a dream with no form,
a memory of future,
by Chaos foresworn.
With an aching unspoken,
the Universe bends—
a shudder, a sighing . . .
the moment begins…

Katherine Lansing Davis, from Creation: A Tale of Our Birth © March 2003

The chaos that exists before creation is an ancient concept and the theme repeats in infinite

varieties. We experience it ourselves before we search for the way to bring up from the depths that

within us which is profoundly connected to soul and its expression. Chaos is the Greek word for the

primal void, notes Leeming (60). In the myths of creation it often appears as the indeterminate,

undifferentiated “no-thing-ness” before some force brings form or reality to it, thus turning it into
cosmos. If one enters the images of creation from Native American and other traditions, it can be

seen that many of them remind us of our own most basic longings. The purpose of this paper is to

consider a few along with their richly suggestive implications. In that pursuit, it is possible to view

one initial response to the condition of immersion in the dark primordial compression as the act of

sending out feelers, tentatively reaching for a sense of the black that surrounds, and in that simple

motion, awakening to a perception of it as that which is not oneself. This realization is followed

by…a potently fertile thought—the first seed.

Hymn of Creation from Rig Veda X. 129:1. There was then neither non-existence
nor existence; /There was no air, nor sky that is beyond it […] 2. Death then
existed not nor life immortal; /Of neither night nor day was any token […] 3.
Darkness there was at first by darkness hidden […] 4. Desire entered the One in
the beginning: /It was the earliest seed, of thought the product. /The sages
searching in their hearts with wisdom, /Found out the bond of existence in non-
existence (Long 169).

And from Greek literature, we have the description of Chaos by Ovid in the introduction to

The Metamorphosis.

Before the sea and lands began to be, /before the sky had mantled every thing,
then all of nature’s face was featureless—/what men call chaos: undigested mass
of crude, confused, and scumbled elements,/a heap of seeds that clashed, of things
mismatched/[…] For though the sea and land and air were there,/the land could
not be walked upon, the sea/could not be swum, the air was without splendor:/no
thing maintained its shape; all were at war;/in one same body cold and hot would
battle; the damp contended with the dry, things hard/with soft, and weighty things
with weightless parts. (Ovid Book I: 3).

This description is at first negative, but then starts to take the turn that Ovid’s genius gives it.

It is a wild, undifferentiated mess, yet…there is a kind of war going on, the war of paradox. The

opposites have already been perceived: Hot and Cold are at war; Water and Land battle; Hard is at

odds with Soft, and iron is fought by feathers. It is a quantum world seeking language; only by
analogy, by poetry, can some of its reality be perceived. In her book Creation Myths, Marie Louise

Von Franz quotes from a book of Eskimo myths by German author Knud Rasmussen, called The

Eagle’s Gift:

Heaven came into existence before the Earth, but it was not older because when it
came into existence the Earth was also already forming. It had already a firm crust
before there was any land and before there was also the first living being about
whom we know anything. This being we called Tulungersaq, or father Raven,
because he created all life on earth and in human beings and is the origin of
everything. He was not an ordinary bird, but a holy life-power which was in
everything which existed in this world in which we now live (Von Franz 20-21).

Father Raven proceeds to discover his face, his nose, eyes, and mouth, then arms and legs,

etc., and realizes that he is separate from his surroundings. He continues his self-discovery, and after

he has continued and created all life and people, he decides to live and admonishes them not to

forget him. His parting gift is some fire stones which he throws up into the heavens to create stars

and sun. Von Franz comments, “I think this is a beautiful story to show you that the mood of the

awakening to a realization of reality is something like coming out of an unconscious state. You can

see that it is projected onto Father Raven who, as it were, slowly becomes conscious and in his light

of consciousness reality simultaneously comes into existence” (Von Franz 24).

The tendrils extend out from the primordial substance; the creator surrounded by chaos

reaches out through non-substance, non-air, non-sky, and each touches self-knowledge. This is

because a life-drenched something, sometimes erotic in its intense desire, has emerged from the

nothing. This something is akin to water, and therefore, like water, inspires reflection. Herman

Melville, in the beginning of his epic, Moby Dick, has Ishmael reflecting on the way he is drawn to

the water when life on land begins to drive him to consider passionate acts of aggression. He

observes to what an astounding degree all thoughtful persons are drawn to bodies of water, whether

lakes, rivers, or oceans, when they long to be lost in reflective thought. In alchemical thought, both
moon and water are seen as symbols of reflection. Each may mirror the self, pulling it toward

greater depth and more profound contemplation. The one lost in thought may become transfixed by

that which is resonant with soul.

Many creation stories contain the concept that the substance needed for creation always

existed, along with the potential to create. In our search for our own potential as creators, we are

invited to delve into these myths for relevant meaning. But how can we enter a sense of this chaos?

One invitation is through the dark itself.

At a time when the earth became hot/At the time when the heavens turned
about/At the time when the sun was darkened/To cause the moon to shine /The
time of the rise of the Pleiades. /The slime, this was the source of the earth/The
source of the night that made night/The intense darkness, the deep
darkness/Darkness of the sun, /darkness of the night/Nothing but night. From
Hawaiian myth (Farmer 9).

Genesis 1:2
The earth was without form and void, and darkness was upon the face of the deep
[…from Hebrew mythology] (May and Metzger 1).

In ZuÒi mythology, the emergence of life, particularly for man, is seen as a metamorphosis.

But it too begins in primordial blackness and moves out of a fecund, cave-like darkness, toward life.

[…] the lowermost womb or cave-world, which was Anosin tehuli (the womb of
sooty depth or of growth-generation because it was the place of first formation
and black as a chimney at night time […]) […became] overfilled with being […]
ZuÒi, Pueblo Indian myth (Long 38).

The texture of the darkness before creation is neither black velvet nor black satin. It is a

murky swamp—La Brea bubbling with tar and mud, hot and putrid smelling. It is the unconscious

which Jung suggests calls life to service by an ancient incantation like that to Blodeuwedd, the

maiden made of flowers, to “wake.” Jung’s interpretation of the dark chaos before creation is that of

the unconscious. He suggests that the unconscious contains the seeds of potential for awakening into
light. Jung considers this movement to be the thrust that gives meaning to life, the ever-emerging

consciousness that is the fabric of self-actualization—a duty that humankind is responsible to fulfill.

Man’s task is … to become conscious of the contents that press upward from the
unconscious.[…]As far as we can discern, the sole purpose of human existence is
to kindle a light in the darkness of mere being (Jung as qtd. by Edinger 16).

The Hebrew word to know (yada), with its double meaning of both sexual intimacy and

understanding, is an ancient link between these creative forces. The longing to understand the

divine, and our own divine nature, is no less emotionally filled than the deeply spiritual and erotic

longing to unite with another. If we see the Creator of life as having placed this longing within us,

the link is even more poignant and powerful. The following song from the Creation libretto offers

this sense.

Into each heart is placed the longing/to find the one love has sent/into each heart is
placed the longing/to live with love to the end/As morning star waits for dawn to
break/so lovers wait for their dreams to wake/bound by a dream, they reach
beyond the years /[…]/Into each heart is placed the longing/to live with love to the
end (Lansing, 2003).

The “world parents,” Sky and Earth, of Polynesian myth have been separated—man and

woman are no longer one being. The suggestion that man and woman are created as beings equal in

power is even possible in the Hebrew tradition of Adam and Eve if we realize that a possible

mistranslation of the word “rib” may have occurred. The word “rib” in Hebrew is more commonly

translated as “side.” Some controversy about this translation is presented by many religious groups.

Genesis 2:21-22. So the Lord God caused the man to fall into a deep sleep, and
while he was sleeping, he took one of the man’s ribs and closed up the place with
flesh. Then the Lord God made a woman from the rib he had taken out of the man,
and he brought her to the man. […] The creator formed the woman from material
taken from the side of the man. Ribs had nothing to do with it. Nowhere else is
this word (tslea in Hebrew) translated rib. The other forty-one times it is used it is
translated side, corner, chamber or flesh […] Eve was formed from Adam’s
substance. Both were of human substance, yet formed differently. She was the
 finishing touch and completion of God’s creation of mankind
(http://www.godswordtowomen.org/studies/scripture/Gen%201&2.htm).

Another aspect that emerges from this chaos before creation is described as a sense of

emptiness which a creative power often seems to float within. There are many images and emotions

which might be explored in this context. The following South Pacific myth came from the area

once called the Gilbert Islands.

Na Arean sat alone in space as a cloud that floats in nothingness. He slept not, for
there was no sleep; he hungered not, for as yet there was no hunger. So he
remained a great while, until a thought came to his mind. He said to himself, ‘I
will make a thing’” (148). A myth from Maina, Gilbert Islands.
http://www.angelfire.com/blog2/endovelico/CarlSagan-Cosmos.pdf

Thought surprises Na Arean. It comes in suddenly and unexpectedly. Before it comes he is an

unconscious being, simply a cloud drifting through a field of nothing, with not even a shred of sky.

The North American Mandan myth also depicts a god who has not yet realized a sense of

self. He is ignorant, but soon he will move, and, perhaps without knowing where it came from, will

hear the deep thundering sound of his own voice, like an old-time Hollywood film director, yelling,

“Action!”

All the world was empty and among the waters walked Lone Man. He knew
nothing. He did not know where he came from, how he had been born. He went
back, following his own track across the water […] (Farmer 37).

This emptiness is akin to one of several states of spiritual practice in the East. In Buddhism

it might be close to shikantaza, or emptiness meditation, which is often translated as “quiet

mindfulness.Ӡ The mind is filled with expectancy, ready for something to happen, but not attached

to anything. Sounds, smells, aches, thoughts, images—drift in and out, like puffs of dandelions

blown softly above a field.

 As we sit before a blank page, an empty canvas, or in a silent room, fingers resting on ivory

keys, we bear witness to an experience of the moment of “nothingness” that nevertheless is leaning,

ever so imperceptibly, toward hope, future, a new thing that has never been. Our perceptions are

intricately entwined with the ancient stories, if only we read, listen, and consider well.

Carl G. Jung writes,

[…] it is a fact that, in addition to memories from a long-distant conscious past,

completely new thoughts and creative ideas can also present themselves from the
unconscious […] They grow up from the dark depths of the mind like a lotus […]
The ability to reach a rich vein of such material and to translate it effectively into
philosophy, literature, music, or scientific discovery is one of the hallmarks of
what is commonly called genius” (Jung 23).

As we focus on the genius that is genesis—the stories of Native American traditions as well

as those found throughout the world—we appreciate the complexity and originality of the stories of

the beginning as well as the spiraling, repeating themes which have not been explained away by

“cross-cultural” pollination. In considering the texture of the emptiness that precedes Creation, we

find this image of Power as isolated and alone. At some point, a thought enters. Alone may then

become “loneliness,” a perception that one is incomplete. Then into this thought enters a new

awareness, a sense of longing, increasingly intense and profound. It may go on for quite a while,

eons upon eons, unformed in its object of desire. Then, “I am lonely, I want to make a world,’ cries

Bhagavan, one creator god” from Baiga, India (Farmer 3).

(From South America, Brazil) In the beginning there was only Mavutsinim. No
one lived with him. He had no wife. He had no son nor did he have any relatives.
He was all alone (Farmer 28).

(From North America, Potawatomi Tribe.) First there was only water. On the
water floated a birch bark canoe. Our Grandfather sat in the canoe. He was alone.
He wept. He did not want to be alone. Chief Muskrat saw Grandfather crying, and
came to the canoe. [He…] asked Grandfather why he cried. Grandfather told
Chief Muskrat he was alone, and there was no land. Chief Muskrat told
Grandfather the Earth rested under the Great Sea. [He…] asked Grandfather if he
 wanted a piece of the Earth. Grandfather said yes. Chief Muskrat dove into the
deep waters. He brought Grandfather a clump of Earth. Soon others came to
Grandfather: first Beaver, then Snapping Turtle, and Otter. They brought him
clumps of Earth. Grandfather created This Island from the clumps of Earth. […]
Grandfather planted a Tree on the island. He planted other growing things. With a
stick he cut out rivers. Still, Grandfather, he who is Master of All Life, had no one
(<http://students.ou.edu/K/Julie.D.Keel-1/story5.html>).

An addition to this loneliness, and possibly a divine interpretation of its significance, is a self

knowledge that wants to celebrate itself—an evolved consciousness within the divinity that the God

must create herself or himself again, must fulfill the longing to make a creature in his or her own

image. Other versions of this mythic detail present an extension, the concept that this “child of God”

will have, as a purpose for existence, the worship and adoration of the Creator.

From the Babylonian myth of Ea:

Ea said: ‘I will join blood to blood and that blood to bone. I will create my own
being to adore me. His name is Man’ (Farmer 37).

And from a modern Seneca tale of Creation published in a collection by Jeremiah Curtin and

J.B.N. Hewitt as Seneca Fiction, Legends, and Myths.

God created the sun and moon first, and then one day, as he walked lonely in the
world, he said, ‘I’ll make someone to keep me company.’ [After two ‘failures,’
making a man that was pale and sickly and hairy from the soil which made him,
then making a man that was too dark, from the earth under a walnut tree, he
finally…] came upon a sugar maple tree lying uprooted. The earth around the
upturned roots was a good rich color. So God took this wonderful earth in his
hand and shaped man. The body was smooth and firm and deep-tinted. And when
God saw him move, he said, ‘Ha! He looks like me!’ (Leach 87).

The celebration of self as a re-creation, born like the first thought from the nothingness in

the beginning, is a celebration of imaginatio. It is connected to one of the most basic abilities of

man: the ability to perceive. Yet it also contains the ever-changing nuance of perception which, in

this world, keeps “reality” from being frozen in place. In alchemy, comments Stanton Marlan in a

recent article from Spring magazine, “the imaginatio is as much a part of what is imaged as the
world is itself the substance of imagination.” He quotes Robert Romanyshyn, who makes a similar

point:

Imagining is not something which a subject adds to a merely perceivable world.

On the contrary, we imagine and the world is imagine-able […] In other words,
imagining belongs as much to things as it belongs to us (Marlan 21)

Romanyshyn cautions us “[…] not to collapse the difference between perceiving and imagining. He

underlines how the perceivable and the real exhibit a stubborn intractability which mark them as

different from the imagination even if we have destabilized their absolute difference. Romanyshyn

holds this distinction in place as he continues to subtly refine our understanding of the imaginary

and the real” (Marlan 22).

Romanyshyn’s point is that “[…] perception and imagination are like mirrors ‘facing each

other,’ independent of each other. For Romanyshyn, ‘the imagine-ability of other things, describes

the depth of the real’” (22).

The confusion is reflective of a mystery. Perception practiced by those involved in mystical

or other religious pursuits, and by those who meditate deeply, may be seen as active in creating what

is perceived, rather than being merely a passive activity. The scientific discovery that the outcome of

an experiment may be affected by the variable of an observer now leaves us to wonder—particularly

after coming out of a showing of a film such as What the Bleep Do We Know?—what ever happened

to the science we grew up with?

Depending on our respective ages and educational backgrounds, however, we may have

grown up without feeling the excitement of scientific discovery. Ironically, the disintegration of

strongly focused religious belief over the past century did not lead to more enthusiasm about

scientific thought. A slightly jaded attitude emerged, and the passion for research and discovery

waned. Certain scientists worked hard to counteract the lack of wonder that seemed to epitomize the
era of post-modernism, the “death of god,” and increasingly, the loss of connection with a mythic

imagination. One scientist who found a way to use astounding facts to re-open our wonderings was

Dr. Carl Edward Sagan. Before his death at 62, Sagan, an American astronomer, astrobiologist, and

highly successful science popularizer, had become world-famous for his popular science books and

for co-writing and presenting the award-winning television series Cosmos, which was the most

watched television show on PBS of all time. In his series, he scientifically presented the evidence

that the stars are literally our brothers.

… the matter out of which each of us is made is intimately tied to processes that
occurred immense intervals of time and enormous distances in space away from
us. Our Sun is a second or third-generation star. All of the rocky and metallic
material we stand on, the iron in our blood, the calcium in our teeth, the carbon in
our genes, were produced billions of years ago in the interior of a red giant star.
We are made of star stuff
(http://www.seti.org/site/apps/nl/content2asp?c=ktJ2J9MMIsE&b=194993&ct=22
1048).

A mythical echo of this scientific view comes from Gabon, West Africa. This Fang myth of

creation and destruction says that the stars were born of the first couple, sun and moon.

In the beginning sun and moon were man and wife. The moon bore the sun many
children and they were called the stars. This family did not eat food of the kind we
eat, it nourished itself on fire, and so the whole family shone and gave light to us
on earth. In the beginning sun and moon were man and wife. The stars were their
children (Farmer 131).

Among other aspects of Creation to be considered are the images and details which

encompass the impulse of the “sacred moment,” the instant when the divine thought is first born,

when the transforming word of power is about to be spoken. Creation by the power of the word is

found in African, Christian, East Indian, Egyptian, Gnostic, Maori, Muslim, Native American,

Samoan, and Zoroastrian myths. The Christian version is found in the initial words of John 1:1-3:
 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was
God. He was in the beginning with God; all things were made by him and without
him was not anything made that was made (May and Metzger 1284).

The power given to man to name the creatures (Mark Twain gives it more logically to

Eve) is a first fulfillment of Yahweh’s stated design to create humankind in his own image. One

who is like in nature, is correspondingly like in power and knowledge of how to exercise that

power.

In the Maori, Mayan and Hebrew myths, according to Charles Long, the supreme deity

also creates through his word. This form of creation is different from others, such as the

emergence myths wherein creation seems connected with the earth, usually a female principle.

In these myths creation seems to come from an involuntary activity inside the womb of earth.

The cosmos is created “through a process of metamorphosis.” This texture is much different

from, “And God said, ‘Let there be light;’ and there was light” (May and Metzger 1).

Long comments, “A conscious and deliberate effort lies behind the structures of the

cosmos, which participate in power and holiness, because they have been created through the

will of the deity” (Long 156). Or one might say, “through the conscious will of the deity.” The

word is somehow the beginning of a conversation with the gods and humankind. The God or

gods speak, and after people are created, there is an expectation that they will also speak, for

after all, they are in the image of their Maker. The gods who create a world from the spoken

word have first become conscious.

The gods spoke. By their word they made heaven and earth and clothed the earth
with trees and grass, with all kind of bushes and plants. They made animals to live
on the earth. But the animals did not know how to praise their maker […] ‘It is
not good,’ said the gods […] sending for the jaguar and the coyote, the parrot and
the crow, they ordered them to gather together the special food, the white and
yellow maize; they pounded it, and from the flour made men […] and as it was
true and special food, this was at last true man […] They had minds and hearts,
 their eyes could see far off, they knew the gods who made them, and they honored
them properly” (From Central American, Mayan)
(Farmer 31).

The gods and goddess who sing the world into being may be seen to have more of a

connection to the unconscious voice of creation, more roots in the ancient texture of chaos.

Their speech is often ritual praise and thanksgiving for all the gifts of creation.

From the Chuhwuht Indians we have the Song of the World.

The Song of the World

In the beginning there was only darkness everywhere—darkness and water. And
the darkness gathered thick in places, crowding and separating until at last out of
one of the places where the darkness had crowded there came forth a man. The
man wandered through the darkness until he began to think; then he knew himself
and that he was a man; he knew that he was there for some purpose […. The man
pulled a stick, and then little ants from his body, then the ants made a round ball
on the stick from the gum of the wood] Then the man took the ball from the stick
and put it down in the darkness under his foot, and as he stood upon the ball, he
rolled it under his foot and sang: ‘I make the world, and lo!/The world is finished./
Thus I make the world, and lo!/ The world is finished.’ So he sang, calling himself
the maker of the world. He sang slowly, and all the while the ball grew larger as
he rolled it, till at the end of his song, it was the world (Farmer 18).

As the thought of purpose enters, the god begins to move. He or she performs strange actions

that cause amazing results and is often the first one to celebrate this creation, before he/she creates

creatures to engage in ritual celebration of it.

The creator within us, the one who has exercised the power of the word to express and claim

this power, may be seen to move and be active through the art of poetry. A well-known Pablo

Neruda poem reaches to describe this revelatory moment:

And it was at that age…Poetry arrived/in search of me. I don’t know, I don’t know
where/it came from, from winter or a river./I don’t know how or when, […] /there
I was without a face/and it touched me [….] /and I wrote the first faint line,/faint,
without substance, pure/nonsense, /pure/ wisdom/of someone who knows
nothing,/and suddenly I saw/the heavens/unfastened/and open,/
planets,/palpitating plantations,/shadow perforated, riddled/with arrows, fire and
flowers,/the winding night, the universe./And I, infinitesimal being,/drunk with
 the great starry/void,/ likeness,/ image of/mystery,/felt myself a pure part/of the
abyss,/I wheeled with the stars,/my heart broke loose on the wind
(http://www.poemhunter.com/p/m/poem.asp?poet=6638&poem=32383)

We are led to understand that our purpose is hidden somewhere in our own bodies, in the

iron in our blood, the calcium of our bones, the carbon in our genes—that as we praise creation with

our being, we see the miracle of conscious perception as a way to create from the fabric which is the

dark. In the words of the 13th Century Kashmiri mystic, Lalla,

I didn’t trust it for a moment,/but I drank it anyway,/the wine of my own poetry./It

gave me the daring to take hold/of the darkness and tear it down,/and cut it into
little pieces (Bark 11).
 Works Cited

Barks, Coleman, trans. Naked Song, Lalla. Athens, GA: Maypop Books, 1992.

Cohn, Norman. Cosmos, Chaos, and the World to Come, 2nd Ed. New Haven: Yale UP,
1999

Farmer, Penelope. Beginnings: Creation Myths of the World. New York:

Margaret K. McEldery, 1979.

Freund, Philip. Myths of Creation. London: W. H. Allen and Co., 1964.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Genesis_1:1#Genesis_Rabbah

http://students.ou.edu/K/Julie.D.Keel-1/story5.html

http://www.csum.edu/~rcummings/sacred.html

http://www.poemhunter.com/p/m/poem.asp?poet=6638&poem=32383

http://www.seti.org/site/apps/nl/content2asp?c=ktJ2J9MMIsE&b=194993&ct=221048

Jung, Carl G. Man and His Symbols. Garden City, New York: Doubleday and Co., Inc.,
1976.

Lansing, Katherine. Creation: the Tale of our Birth. unpublished libretto for
chorus and orchestra. Musical Composer: John Kevin Hilbert. Premiere:
Westwood Presbyterian Church, March 2003.

Leach, Maria. The Beginning: Creation Myths Around the World. New York:
Funk and Wagnall’s Co., 1956.

Leeming, David Adams with Margaret Adams Leeming. Encyclopedia of Creation

Myths. Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, Inc., 1994.

Mandelbaum, Allen. The Metamorphosis of Ovid. Orlando, FL: Harcourt Brace &
Company, 1993.

Marlan, Stanton. "From the Black Sun to the Philosopher's Stone." Spring Journal
74(2006): 1-30.

May, Herbert G., and Bruce M. Metzger. The Oxford Annotated Bible with the
Apocrypha. 1st. New York: Oxford University Press, Inc., 1965.
 Works Cited Continued

Niditch, Susan. Chaos to Cosmos: Studies in Biblical Patterns in Creation.

Chico, CA: Scholars Press, 1985.

Von Franz, Marie Louise. Creation Myths. Dallas, TX: Spring Publications, Inc.,
1972.
 Sorrow So Lovely

By Susan Weir-Ancker

Lovely sorrow is an emotion I find in a Native American story retold by Leslie Marmon

Silko. Silko’s Aunt Susie first told the story when Silko was a child in the Laguna Pueblo, New

Mexico. The story is about a child I call Little-Girl-Who-Ran-Away. It is a sad and beautiful tale.

That story’s tragedy is not solely personal or cultural but universally human. Silko’s story is from

the Acoma and Laguna Pueblos yet I find the same beautiful sadness in Celtic traditions, Greek

myth, Hindu epic, Japanese fairytales, and Australian Aboriginal legends. My particular personal

reaction to a mother’s loss moves to an understanding of cultural expressions of loss as well as a

universal collective pleasant heartache.

Depth psychology as informed by Carl G. Jung, describes levels in the personal and

collective psyche that are populated with symbols, instincts, and archetypes. The images are not

inherited, but are primal, therefore all people, because of the structure of the psyche, bring

forward from myths and stories certain patterns of images common to all (Jacobi 51).

The tale about Little-Girl-Who-Ran-Away has a number of universal symbols that relate

to various eras and cultures around the world. The Native American plight, as the European

invasion smothered and smashed native people’s way of life and beliefs, brings forth the same

emotion in me of a softly despairing sorrow. The Japanese have one word for that particular

emotion: awarÈ. The world is changing, yet human beings need to understand that at root all

humans are the same. Various cultures grow, change, and disappear. The cultures of the ancient

Greeks or Celts are transformed as the clothes in Silko’s story are changed into butterflies.

Cultures, like daughters, die and are transformed as they are reborn. It is awarÈ.
 Little-Girl-Who-Ran-Away and her mother live in the Acoma pueblo on a high mesa. The

daughter requests that her mother prepare a favorite cornbread, yashtoah (corn bread crackles).

The mother sends her daughter down off the “precipitous cliff” into the forest to collect firewood

to prepare the fire to cook the bread (Silko 8). Important to the story is the tradition of calling

“upstairs” before entering a home. The Acoma people have a creation story that describes the

emergence of humans out of the earth and from that point they spread out to populate the earth

(Willis 223). As daughter and mother live high on a mesa, going down from the home relates to a

retracing of the steps back to the previous world.

Fairy tales mention going into forests that are not of the real world, a place between life

and death, like a dream world. The “Bush Warbler’s Home” is an example of a Japanese fairytale

that features being lost in a magical forest (Kawai 25). Similar to European fairy tales, a forest

may symbolize the unconscious or a place between consciousness and the unconscious

(Chevalier-Gheerbrant 401). Shinto reverence for nature is similar to the Native American

affinity with the natural world. A woodcutter finds a mansion inhabited by a mother and three

daughters who are transformed into birds. The Acoma daughter does not get lost in a forest but

she does encounter magic in a liminal space and is eventually transformed.

In the story the girl collects the firewood, but when she returns to her mother above on the

mesa the wood has changed to snakes. She is mortified and her mother sends her below again.

This time the girl returns the snakes/wood to where she had found them. Her feelings are hurt

and she does not want to go back up to her home on the mesa but wants go down into the lake

and drown. In Greek myth there is another maiden who is charmed in a magical world.

Persephone reaches for a beautiful flower, the narcissus, the lure for a trap set by Hades with the

aid of Earth. Earth opens. Hades darts out, grabs Persephone, takes her below, and makes her his
Queen (Rice & Stambaugh 26). Demeter mourns but cannot transform Persephone back into her

korÎ (maiden) daughter. Persephone thereafter reigns as Queen of the Underworld.

Girl-Who-Ran-Away reaches for a feather to put in her hair. It is a beautiful feather but

only used in that way in a ritual for the dead. Persephone reigns in the land of the dead and Girl-

Who-Ran-Away chooses to tie the feather in her hair and jump into a whirlpool in the center of

the west lake. West is where the sun sets. The reason Girl-Who-Ran-Away selects the west lake

indicates even though she sets, like the sun, she will rise again. The mother, like Demeter, is

powerless. The daughters reach for their destiny.

Girl-Who-Ran-Away’s mother is warned that her daughter intends suicide but delays

pursuit. Her postponement of action emphasizes the autonomy of the girl. First the mother cooks

the yashtoah, and then collects the child’s clothes and moccasins. By the time she races off to

prevent her daughter’s drowning it is too late. Though the mother calls to the daughter three

times, the child puts the feather in her hair and leaps. She is gone. Her destiny is realized.

Creation and death are equally important questions to human beings. How did people get

here and where do the go when they die? These two questions are pondered by all cultures.

Before considering suicide, bear in mind an Australian Aboriginal myth about how death came

into the world (Crumlin & Knight 18). A mother left her baby in the shade of a tree while she

busied herself with a forbidden encounter. When she returned to her child the sun had moved and

the baby had succumbed to over-exposure. The father, Purukuparli, distraught with the First-

Grief-of-the-World, then refused to restore the child. He walked into the sea carrying his dead

child. The first suicide accompanied the first grief. The site is marked to this day by a whirlpool.

The Acoma story about Girl-Who-Ran-Away is strikingly similar because she also jumps into a

whirlpool. Mothers, again, cannot always protect their children from unexpected or changing
situations. The shade of the tree, like the firewood changing to snakes, changed position. As the

sun moved the tree no longer gave protection.

Suicide by drowning is immortalized in the painting of Shakespeare’s character, Ophelia

by John Everett Millais. Ophelia, Hamlet’s spurned lover, in her madness is unaware of her

doom. In Hamlet, Ophelia’s body is recovered and a funeral rite enacted. Girl-Who-Ran-Away is

not recovered. It is as if she lives on somewhere, perhaps in the lake?

A Celtic tradition about sacred waters in Faery places is that those lakes have guardians.

An example of water deities transforming into Faeries is the Lady of the Lake (Knight 117-118).

In the Arthurian legend, she gives King Arthur his sword, Excalibur. She is magical and powerful

and associated with both fertility and death, creation and destruction. The magic of water is

symbolic of unconscious energy (Chevalier & Gheerbrant 1089). Ophelia is unconscious in her

madness. Girl-Who-Ran-Away is in another world, a fantasyland when she goes down to the land

below the mesa. She is in her unconscious. Water symbolizes purity, cleansing, and regeneration

(Chevalier & Gheerbrant 1081-1086).

In the story about Girl-Who-Ran-Away the symbol of water’s regenerative power is

important as supported by the snakes. As well as symbolizing regeneration, the serpent is

reported to be one of the most important archetypes that personifies the human soul (Chevalier &

Gheerbrant 845). Serpents are thought to be able to change shape. As mentioned the firewood

changed to snakes and that fact may foreshadow the child’s clothes changing to butterflies. Water

and fire are primal elements. They may be poles of the same element. Chevalier and Gheerbrant

note relationships between butterflies and the fluttering of flames, the soul, and the breath of life

departing the body (140-141).

 Fire and the Hindu ritual of trial-by-fire are featured in the epic The RÂmÂyana. Her

husband RÂm commands Sita to prove her purity by jumping into flames but “that fire was

scorched by her burning faithfulness” (Shulman 104). Another scene that relates to Girl-Who-

Ran-Away’s plight is when Sita is questioned a second time. Like Ophelia, she has had enough.

Sita calls for Mother Earth to come for her (Buck 414). A crevasse opens, like the opening in the

earth for Persephone, and instead of fire, “rippling silver scales like moonlight on the ocean

waves at night” surround a throne on which Mother Earth is seated. On the four corners are

serpents; cobras dancing, weaving, and ejecting fire. Earth, like a whirlpool, engulfs Sita

lovingly. They sink back underground together. Sita calls for her destiny.

David Shulman’s article “Fire and Flood: The Testing of Sita in Kampan’s

IrÂmÂvatÂram” discusses the relationship of water, fire, and the fluid quality of life in the body.

The Hindu believes in reincarnation. For the Hindu, time and eternity are two aspects of the same

thing and can be experienced as a wholeness that includes both birth and death (Campbell 140).

The life force can flow into and out of a succession of bodies. The significant “image is of life

separating from and rejoining the body” (97). The flow includes sorrows and joys as does

creation and destruction. Sita’s ordeal by fire and her retrieval by Mother Earth are sad and

beautiful. Shulman explains that the asymmetry between the divine and the human is integral to

the human condition. The sweet and bitter are always both present. Although Sita and RÂm are

incarnations of gods, they must be subjected to the human condition: misunderstanding and pain.

The human condition for Girl-Who-Ran-Away is a painful misunderstanding of the

situation with her mother. The child is so very sad, rejected, and alone. No other solution is

apparent for her. She performs her own ritual for the dead by tying the feather in her hair and

disappears. After watching her daughter from afar and seeing the whirling feather the grief-
stricken mother climbs to her mesa home above the lake. She scatters the child’s clothes, shoes,

and the yashtoah in the four directions. Yashtoah, manta dresses, shawls, and moccasins, all turn

into beautiful colorful butterflies that, they say, can still be seen today at the Acoma Pueblo. As

mentioned the butterfly symbolizes purity, the source of life, a vehicle of cleansing, regeneration,

and the soul (Chevalier & Gheerbrant 1081-1087). This beautiful story builds to an awesome and

thrilling moment when the butterflies appear. The colorful butterflies transform the sadness into

“excitement and wonder” (Silko 15). Though the listener has been warned by the magic of the

shape-changing wood, the story takes on impressive numinous proportions. The sense of the

experienced moment when the butterflies encompass the mesa soaring in the four directions,

east, south, north, and west, is of a divine wonder. Who was the child? What was she saying?

Jung saw importance in the child archetype in dreams, tales, and myths. Ultimately the

child symbolizes the concept of wholeness (Segal 123). For the Pueblo culture Girl-Who-Ran-

Away symbolizes the entire course of the culture from creation to death. The whirlpool that pulls

Girl-Who-Ran-Away down is a spiral. In Man and his Symbols, Jung understands the spiral,

ascending and descending, to relate to restoration of order at the same time adding new

ingredients of creation (248). For the Pueblo culture death precedes transformation and like the

transformation of clothes to butterflies, rebirth. One of the most important characteristics of the

child archetype is potential (Segal 129). Evolution towards autonomy and independence is the

job of a growing child but the child archetype as personified by Girl-Who-Ran-Away must

change to achieve her goal.

The goal of the universal collective archetype is the well being of the whole species. In

this Pueblo story, the language of the culture is used to convey the message. The yashtoah, manta

dresses, shawls, moccasins, feather, and mesa are cultural elements in the story. The symbols
(snakes, spirals, butterflies, mother, child, the four directions, and the concept of above/below)

all point to a message that originates outside of the Acoma or Laguna Pueblos at the primary

level of all humans. The communication is from the universal psyche or Self. According to Jung,

the Self is “an inner guiding factor” that I believe is present in cultures as well as individuals and

is instinctual. It can be compared to the instinct of the babe to root for the mother’s nipple.

Instinctively each species strives to survive. The will of the species overrides the cultural will in

order to survive.

The Native American culture had been radically changed by the time Leslie Marmon

Silko heard Girl-Who-Ran-Away’s story. Silko is not a full-blood Pueblo Indian and like my

sister-in-law and niece, who are Qua-Paw/Kiowa and Irish, were raised in both worlds (see fig 6).

Silko’s stories have archetypal messages for all people. The butterfly is associated with sacrificial

fires as well as the freed soul (Chevalier & Gheerbrant 141). Sacrifice and the soul’s freedom

apply to whole cultures. The ancient traditions are transformed and live again. The Celtic Lady of

the Lake, Persephone the Greek Queen of the Underworld, Sita the incarnated Hindu goddess,

and the Acoma Girl-Who-Ran-Away all are personifications of the archetype of transformation.

As they change so can a culture and a way of life alter. The Australian Aboriginal legend of the

creation of death, grief, and suicide is gloomy. Yet the Aboriginal people believe that death

makes room for more people. It is both sad and beautiful.

There is always loss and gain. All of the cultures mentioned in this paper have drowned in

the whirlpool of life. The ancient Celts are gone, the ancient Greeks are gone, and the Native

Americans, Native Australians, and the Native Hindus are souls flying like butterflies or flames

beautiful and destructive. The Greek poet Sappho’s words outlive her culture.
 Sleep darling
I have a small
daughter called
Cleis, who is
like a golden
flower
I wouldn’t
take all Croesus’
kingdom with love
thrown in, for her
Sappho c. 700 BCE.

Sappho and Edvard Munch, the 19th & 20th century artist were masters at personifying the

universal with a personal image that indicates a deeper relationship with the world and informs

us about the human psyche and collective unconscious. When a culture dies, it is like losing a

child. The loss of a child is the worst grief. As mentioned above, symbols and motifs that

spontaneously arise throughout the world may be compared while identifying the cultural overlay

of customs, community, and culture. Sappho’s description of how precious her daughter is to her,

that fact that she would not trade her for a whole kingdom prefigures the demise of the ancient

Greek civilization as well as both Sappho and Cleis. Regarding Munch’s painting of a mother

with a sick child, it is clear that the child will succumb. The beautiful painting illustrates both the

mother’s love and the sadness of the illness. The world for Munch in 1885 was changing. His

painting of his personal suffering mirrors the pain and suffering that began with the industrial

revolution and continued into the future world wars. Archetypes as defined by C. G. Jung

become identifiable underneath the regional, cultural, and epochal overlay- “an inner

correspondence to the world as a whole” (Jacobi 60). The important message from the archetypal

personification of the child, Girl-Who-Ran-Away, suggests change or transformation. The

communication originates in the collective unconscious and is to be understood by the collective

conscious.
 The Japanese fairy tale “The Bush Warbler’s Home” takes place in a magic forest. A

woodcutter violates taboos and causes a mother and her daughters to turn into birds and

disappear. The woodcutter’s interruption has ruined something sacred and the strong feeling of

loss is similar to the grief felt when Girl-Who-Ran-Away disappears. Yet the feeling turns to

relief, then joy at the sight of the birds’ release. It is sad when a culture and its customs are

altered. The Japanese tried for many years to keep western influence from affecting their lives.

Eventually the inevitable happened. Western ways have invaded Japan just as completely as did

the European invasion of the Native American. Asian influence on American culture

demonstrates a mutual influence. The Japanese still practice the divine tea ceremony. The ritual

of preparing a frothy bitter tea, macha, while honoring the silence of the empty moment, bring

forward in the new culture a little of the old (Campbell, 155). Now, many Americans are

drinking Genmai-cha (green tea with brown rice) and eating sushi.

Pueblo peoples must bring forward in their new life some of the old. I do not believe that

the message of change means to learn the Anglo way and conform. All Americans are relatively

new as their heritages span the globe. Jung talked with a “governor of a pueblo” many years ago.

The Native friend conveyed distrust of the European invaders who had forced his people onto

reservations. His assessment was that “they are all crazy” (Jung 213). Years later the American

government must still appear crazy to Native Americans. Jung realized his personal myth (Judeo-

Christian creation and afterlife) no longer worked for him. He noticed that other Europeans and

Americans were equally adrift without working myths. When myths no longer live and grow new

myths will emerge. The depth psychology that Jung, Campbell, and others offer honors the

feelings and beliefs of Native peoples and expanding cultures. Studying and learning from all the

cultures of the world helped Carl Jung and Joseph Campbell form new personal myths. I believe
the study of all cultures and their stories will encourage the formation of a new world awareness

and appreciation of human similarities. While honoring the particular stories, the universal

human myths make themselves known.

Aunt Susie’s story is relevant for the Pueblo peoples, all Native Americans, all Native

Peoples, as well as all invading peoples. History illustrates that all civilizations will eventually go

up in flames or down in whirlpools. Aunt Susie’s story provides the hope that accompanies the

grief, sadness, and loss. The souls of the collective transform, regroup, and reincarnate. Leslie

Marmon Silko is a perfect example of a personification of the new cultural collective. The

universal collective is “the inner equivalent of Creation, an inner cosmos as infinite as the

cosmos outside of us” (Jacobi 59). The serpent is also a symbol of the passage of time with

which comes eternal death or rebirth (Jacobi 141). New myths are forming and like childbirth

when the delivery is breach, the process is painful but the baby can be born. Like mothers who

have lost a child, the new cultural collective can go on to love a new baby without forgetting its’

love or its’ grief at the death of the other.

 Works Cited

Buck, William. RÂmÂyana Retold by William Buck. Berkeley, CA: California UP, 1976.

Campbell, Joseph. The Hero with a Thousand Faces. Princeton, NJ: Bollingen, 2004.

Chevalier, Jean. and Alan Gheerbrant. The Penguin Dictionary of Symbols. Trans. John
Buchanan-Brown. New York: Penguin, 1996.

Crumlin, Rosemary and Anthony Knight. “How Death Came into the World.” Aboriginal Art
and Spirituality. Victoria, Australia: Collins Dove, 1991. 18-20.

Jacobi, Jolande. Complex, Archetype, Symbol. Trans. Ralph Manheim. Princeton, NJ: Bollingen,
1974.

Jung, Carl G, Modern Man in Search of a Soul. Trans. W. S. Dell and Cary F. Baynes. New
York: Harvest, 1933.

Kawai, Hayao. The Japanese Psyche: Major Motifs in the Fairy Tales of Japan. Trans. Hayao
Kawai & Sachiko Reece. Dallas, TX: Spring, 1988.

Knight, Sirona. Celtic Traditions: Druids, Faeries, and Wiccan Rituals. New York:
Citadel, 2000.

Kikuchi, Ghost of a Mother by Her Child’s Bed, 1788-1878. Ghosts and the Japanese.
Logan, UT. Utah UP, 1994.

Millais, John Everett Opelia. (Tate, London. 1852).

Munch, Edvard The Sick Child. National Gallery Oslo, 1885-86.

Rice, David G. and John E. Stambaugh. Trans “The Homeric Hymn to Demeter”. The
Long Journey Home. Downing, Christine. Ed. Boston, MA: 1994. 26-37.

Sappho. Sappho. Trans. Mary Barnard. Los Angeles, California UP: 1986.

Segal, Robert A. ed. & intro. Jung on Mythology. Princeton, NJ: Princeton UP, 1960.

Shulman, David. “Fire and Flood”. Many RÂmÂyanas. Ed. Paula Richardson. Berkeley,
CA: California UP, 1991. 89-113.

Silko, Leslie Marmon. “The Little Girl Who Ran Away” Storyteller. New York: Arcade,
1981. 7-15.
 Works Cited Continued

Triest, Shirley …took her only child… 1975. RÂmÂyana Retold by William Buck.
Berkeley, CA: California UP, 1976.

Unknown, Kore from Chios. Acropolis Museum, Athens. C. 520 BCE.

Unknown. Purkuparli Story. Aboriginal Art and Spirituality.Victoria, Austral: Collins

Dove, 1991. 20.

Willis, Roy. ed. World Mythology. New York: Henry Holt: 1993.
 Lyric Poetry and Soul Tending

By Cynthia Smith

The early Greek lyric poets gave expression to the rise of the individual voice coming to

terms with the anguish and ecstasy of the soul’s experience. Of the early Greek lyricists I will

focus on Sappho, because unlike her Lesbian contemporary, Alcaeus, who preferred subjects of

political intrigue, Sappho writes about the delicacies and heartache of romantic love, especially

with women. As a poet-composer myself and as a music therapist, I believe the act of song

writing is a therapeutic one, and one that seeks to bring some balance to the psyche and

consolation to the heart. Sappho as an artist bridges the two complementary worlds of music and

lyric poetry, wedding them harmoniously in the sense of a fortunate synergistic creation,

experienced by the writer and the listener or reader. When the artist expresses the longings of the

soul in such a way, the corresponding archetype is acknowledged and given voice, thereby the

artist participates in the restoration of balance within the psyche. But it is not just the expression

of joys or sorrows that is therapeutic, it is also the fixing of them in time and space through

music and the psychological processing that is the lyric itself in composition and performance.

For me, music and lyric poetry have the capacity to frame, contain, and express

experiences, as well as the capacity to create relationship with the contents of the unconscious.

This capacity is built into the patterns of our biology and psychology, and is able to provide for

the vibrational attunement of body and soul. This essay will address a few of the biological and

psychological components of music itself, such as rhythmic entrainment, inherent meaning, and

movement of emotional affect.

Before describing Sappho’s contributions as an innovator in the poetic and musical sense,

a brief background of the spread and development of the musical scales, called the modes, may
be helpful. First of all a mode is a musical scale with a specific arrangement of the intervals

between the notes. If we think of the modern major scale we think of note intervals arranged in

the familiar Western pattern of “do-re-mi-fa-sol-la-ti-do” musical scale, also known as the Ionian

mode. The names of the Greek modes have much to do with Greek immigration. Warren D.

Anderson, in Music and Musicians in Ancient Greece, describes the transmission of the modes,

or “harmoniai”. He writes:

Establishment of a Greek presence along the western seaboard of Asia Minor created the
conditions that brought the harmoniai into being. When all but isolated parts of the Greek
mainland fell to the Dorians during the eleventh century B.C., Greek immigrants headed
east, the only place where there was extensive, desirable, and attainable land. They went
chiefly to the coastal plains of Asia Minor across from Greece, and also to the larger
islands, such as Lesbos or Samos, which lay close to the Asia Minor coast. Three spheres
of influence came successively into being: Aeolis (including the large island of Lesbos) to
the north, Ionia (with Samos and Chios) in the middle, and Doris (with Rhodes) to the
south. (Anderson 48)

Near Lesbos are the island regions of Phrygia and Lydia. The modes that have come

down to us are called: Ionian, Dorian, Phrygian, Lydian, Mixolydian, Aeolian, and Locrian. The

Ionian mode is Western music’s major scale, and the Aeolian mode is our “natural” minor scale.

It is likely that the actual pitches we use today for the “major scale,” are not what was

used in the seventh and sixth centuries B.C.E., but the relationship between the notes could be

relatively accurate. The Greeks, like modern cultures of that area, use more finely subdivided

musical scales (a blending of Asia Minor influences) than does northern European music. This

subdivision can include the use of quarter tone intervals.

Being a native of Lesbos, Sappho is a member of the Aeolian peoples. The Oxford

Companion to Classical Literature states:

 Sappho’s poetry, which was almost entirely monody, was divided into nine books
according to metre: book 1 consisted of poems in the Sapphic metre, book 2 of poems in
dactylic pentameters, and so on. The ninth book contained those Epithalamia which did
not fit into the other books for metrical and other reasons. Her dialect was the Lesbian
vernacular, a branch of Aeolic Greek. (506)

Monody means single voice and metre refers to the rhythmic structure of the poetry. Epithalamia

include choral lyric poetry for weddings.

The modes are particular musical scales with characteristics feelings and ethics related to

them. It is possible that Sappho composed in the Aeolian mode (among others) which is

characterized as plaintive, mysterious and dramatic. In an entry for lyric poetry from the same

source above, it is stated: “Of monody relatively little survives. It was sung to the

accompaniment of a lyre. The intimate nature of the subject matter--friendship, love, and hate--

suggests that it was performed by a single individual on private occasions, for example after a

banquet among friends” (336). Sappho is known to also have composed choral songs, mainly to

be sung at festivals and weddings. It is believed that even in choral singing the singing was in

unison, without the harmony singing we are familiar with today.

Kay Gardner in her book Sounding the Inner Landscape attributes the development of the

Greek modal system to certain poet-composers. She writes: “The earliest Greek modes are

attributed to Terpander of Lesbos (750 B.C.), Sappho of Lesbos (610 B.C.), and Pythagoras of

Samos (500 B.C.)” (132). While regional musical scales were in use long before these poets, the

relative development of the modes is taken to a very high form in their time. With whatever

contributions these poets gave to lyric poetry and its musical accompaniment, the standardization

of our musical octave is attributed to Pythagoras and his experiments in measuring the frequency

of vibrating strings in motion. It is the pattern of vibrations in music that gives us musical scales

or modes. Joscelyn Godwin in The Harmony of the Spheres, describes Pythagoras’ contributions
to our sense of Western musical scales as beginning with experiments in frequency, or rates of

vibration on weighted strings set in motion. Pythagoras found a relationship between tension

exerted on a string and its resonate frequency when set in motion. He found a 2:1 ratio in the

interval of the octave. An octave is the same note expressed by doubling or halving its frequency

rate, as in “middle c” on the piano and the “c” below or above it. Pythagoras is reported to have

divided a string under tension at its midpoint, plucked either side of that midpoint and discovered

the octave harmonic. The note sounded on the original length of string is exactly twice as slow in

vibrating frequency than the “midpoint” length of string, which vibrates twice as fast as the

original vibrating length. By further experiments he found other natural intervals within the

octave, such as the fourth and the fifth which are landmarks in our Western musical scale (12-

14).

In Sappho’s time there were several modes in popular use, but the Phrygian, Aeolian,

Lydian, Mixolydian (what author Kay Gardner calls the “Lesbian” mode), and Dorian modes

were in use regionally. The Love Songs of Sappho, translated by Paul Roche (and with chapter

notes) describes Sappho as an inventor in the musical sense. He writes: “As a musician Sappho

seems to have been something of an innovator. A new form of harp with twenty strings is

attributed to her by Athenaeus, and also the plectrum for striking the strings with. According to

Aristoxenus she invented the mixolydian mode” (191). The modes are thought (and by many still

today) to embody certain feeling tones and qualities, and the healing properties of music were

still held in esteem in Aristotle’s time. Kay Gardner, in Sounding the Inner Landscape describes

the attributes of a mode as threefold. She writes: “ In ancient Greece, a single mode had three

characteristics: (1) melodic, (2) instrumental (i.e., whether it was a mode particularly suited to
string or wind instruments), and rhythmic. Each mode had a different ethos, or character, and had

a specific emotional effect” (96-97).

There is a common story in music therapy textbooks and in those addressing the healing

qualities of music that features Pythagoras himself. It goes like this. One day as he was walking

through a town he saw a young man, enraged by the infidelity of his lover, about to set the

latter’s house on fire. Pythagoras noticed an aulos player nearby playing a heart-rending Phrygian

melody (the Phrygian mode is still used in Spanish Flamenco music today). He went directly to

the piper and asked him to immediately play a tune in the Dorian mode, and when the piper

complied, the enraged young man stopped himself, dropped his plan, and returned quietly to his

own home.

This story shows how the young man was resonating first with the passionate and active

Phrygian mode and then with the noble and sober Dorian mode. And this is where knowledge of

these effects ties into musical soul tending, which is one the foundations of music therapy today.

In music therapy when one plays music that initially resonates with where the patient is

psychologically, it is called following the isomoodic (or same mood) principle. This meeting the

patient where he/she is “vibrating” is part of the creation of rapport and the opportunity for

mutual understanding. Once the therapist and patient are on the “same wavelength,” then the

therapist can gradually move the patient musically to another possibility of being.

Now, from the perspective of a professional musician, poet-composer, and music

therapist, I know that writing songs is therapeutic. The singing of songs can also be very

therapeutic as can the listening to certain music. The Phrygian mode is associated with

excitement, passion, and action, while the Dorian is often associated with feelings of nobleness,

dedication and propriety, and was carried on in the Gregorian chants of the Middle Ages. The
Aeolian mode is associated with feelings of longing, sadness, and also beguilement. The

mixolydian mode is still common in some Appalachian music of the United States.

Kay Gardner writes that the mixolydian mode “was used for open and joyful music.

Another scale used often in the religious chants of the day, it was extroverted and happy” (136).

The American (mountain or lap) dulcimer to this day is configured modally in its tuning and fret

arrangement on the fingerboard. Many of the ballads transmitted by northern European and

Scandinavian immigrants to the South East portions of the United States retain their Mixolydian

modal natures. The American dulcimer is tuned most often to an Ionian, Mixolydian, or Aeolian

“tuning.” Although all seven of the traditional Greek modes can be played on the dulcimer, there

have been many more modes invented, and old ones have also been inverted or otherwise

rearranged.

What can be seen here is that musical scales, which have unique relationships between

the intervals of the notes, inherently carry meaning in their soundforms (my term). Just as in

India certain raga (a specific musical scale subdivided much further than our Western scales) is

to be played at its prescribed time of day, there is a “feeling tone” in the modes. But music carries

more than collective or cultural meaning. Music as a tool in soul tending, and I contend that

Sappho was “self-medicating” her soul when she wrote her songs, has biological, psychological,

cultural, and personal components. It has the ability to affect brain functioning in areas involved

in processing emotion, motor coordination, sensory perception, and cognitve associations.

One of the most significant elements of music is its ability to bring about attunement to

objects vibrating at different rates, or alignment of periodicity. In acoustical physics this effect is

called entrainment. I best understand entrainment from the point of view of the music therapist,

where the term suggests the synchronization of rhythmic attunement so that a relationship is
created between the music therapist and the client that is positive, supportive, and which can

facilitate the psychological move that is sought. Entrainment can be seen as the process towards

“being on the same wavelength” with another. When a strong rhythm is heard the body responds

naturally, usually to join in movement with the rhythm, or the reaction of wanting to distance

oneself from a strong rhythmic stimulus that is felt as disruptive. When frequency entrainment is

achieved, the two vibrational rates are said to resonate. Resonate means to re-sound. When one

deeply resonates with something or someone there is an actual and spiritual union that exists by

way of the merging of vibrational waves of energy.

Before proceeding further it should be stated that music has the ability to affect our

brains, and this biological component ought to be reviewed with regard to the vibrational nature

of hearing and perception. The following is a summary of the process of perceiving music, which

can be found in most biology text books. Music enters the brain as sound waves or vibrational

energy via the ear. The outer ear collects these waves mainly in front of the person and focuses

them towards the ear drum. The ear drum responds to the magnified vibrational energy and sets

the ossicle, the bones of the middle ear, into motion which further amplify the sound energy

waves through the fluid of the inner ear. The transformation of wave energy into electrochemical

data is achieved by nerve impulses in the cochlea.

The electrochemical data of the music goes to the deep levels of the brain such as the

limbic system which deals with survival and emotional response, and the thalamus which is

responsible for the toe-tapping reaction to music’s rhythmic element. Dale Taylor in his book

Biomedical Foundations of Music as Therapy describes the journey of the auditory stimulus as

“automatic and involuntary until it reaches the cerebral cortex” (26). At that point the person then

becomes consciously aware of the music and its response in their emotions both associatively as
well as physiologically. Taylor offers the idea that because music affects human brain activity in

areas responsible for regulating physiological, as well as immunological functioning, music can

be applied therapeutically to achieve a balancing and healing effect upon the person (15-26).

Now that we can see how music can affect brain functioning we can look at the capacity

of music to bring about altered states of consciousness. One of the things that happens when a

person enters into trance, or similar altered state of consciousness, is a shift in one’s brain wave

frequency. Obviously a lullaby is designed to alter the brain waves from waking alertness to

sleep, but what are the stages of conscious awareness as related to brain wave frequency?

Typically when we are awake and alert our brain waves are mainly operating at the beta

level, which is the fastest frequency at which our brain waves usually operate. When we are in a

state of creative imagination (and often when musicians are playing intuitively, and we can bring

Sappho to mind here,) our brain waves are operating mainly at the alpha level, which Mark Rider

in his book The Rhythmic Language of Health and Disease describes as being about twice as

slow as the beta frequency. He goes on to state that the next level down in brain wave frequency

is the theta level, which is about twice as slow as the alpha level. When our predominate brain

wave frequency is theta, we may be in the trance state or deep meditative state. The slowest level

of brain wave frequency we typically experience is about twice as slow as the theta level, and is

called the delta level. The delta level predominates when we are in deep sleep (34-35). I think it

would not be easy to operate effectively in a fast changing Wall Street trading situation when you

are listening closely to Brahms’s Lullaby. These activities are at odds vibrationally.

Likewise, music has been used for its energizing as well as calming effects since religious

chants and lullabies were first sung. Music can be hypnotic. It can be arresting and soothing.

Chanting is common in many religious rituals, mystic traditions, and personal spiritual practices.
Chanting is a kind of singing, one that can induce altered states of consciousness. Enchantment is

a singing into and throughout. Chanting can be seen as a way to bring one into attunement with

inner and outer vibratory rates.

Music is also a known anodyne, an agent that serves to assuage or relieve pain and

discomfort. My dentist turns up the easy-going background music when I come in to his office

for dental work because he knows that when one actively engages in listening to music, one

registers pain less and there may be actually less pain receptors available,being engaged in

processing music. Music therapy has been used in hospital settings for decades, for intervention

in painful procedures like spinal taps, to pre-surgical preparation (and post-surgery recovery) to

maintain calm physiological levels of blood pressure and heart rate in patients. Music can be

cathartic, moving one from one state of being to another psychologically. One way of

experiencing this is when a piece of music has brought you to tears and you felt like you had a

“good cry.” There is movement in music.

Sappho’s more personal love poems are intimate in nature and allow her to create a third

from the tension of love and loss, and that third thing is her song. To me, this is the most

important therapeutic effect of music and poetry, and this is the offering to the gods, the soul

tending. Sappho is deeply connected to the goddess Aphrodite, her songs address and refer to the

goddess of love and also to her son Eros. As a poet-composer, to write a heartfelt love song is

cathartic. There is a negotiation of pain and endurance that is mediated by the process of song

writing in this context. That Sappho was admired in her time is noteworthy of any artist who

creates because he or she must.

Lyric poetry and music have inherent symbolic content in their structure as well as in

their feeling tone. A well composed lyric poem (and the piece of music for it) can be seen as
representing wholeness: its wholeness expressed in beginning, middle, and end; its ordering of

the Self seen in both the structural and emotive quality. In C.G. Jung’s writings, I found the use

of musical terms and qualities such as harmony, discord, balance, and movement. I believe he

used these terms to express the possibilities of relationship with the contents of the psyche. There

is a letter that Jung wrote in 1950 that seems to explain why he may have used musical terms.

Jung makes a direct comparison of such music to the archetype of the Self in his letter to Serge

Moreux regarding the relationship of music to the collective unconscious. Jung writes:

Music certainly has to do with the collective unconscious--as the drama does too: this is
evident in Wagner, for example. Music expresses, in some way, the movement of the
feelings (or emotional values) that cling to the unconscious processes. The nature of what
happens in the collective unconscious is archetypal, and archetypes always have a
numinous quality that expresses itself in emotional stress. Music expresses in sounds
what fantasies and visions express in visual images. I am not a musician and would not be
able to develop these ideas for you in detail. I can only draw your attention to the fact that
music represents the movement, development, and transformation of motifs of the
collective unconscious. In Wagner this is very clear and also in Beethoven, but one finds
equally in Bach’s “Kunst der Fuge.” The circular character of the unconscious processes
is expressed in the musical form; as for example in the sonata’s four movements, or the
perfect circular arrangement of the “Kunst der Fuge,” etc. I am with best regards, Yours
sincerely, C. G. Jung. (C. G. Jung Letters, vol I, 542)

A “transformation of motifs of the collective unconscious” is the desired end in song

writing to some extent, in that the creation of the lyric and music is born from the tension of

opposing forces. This may be what Jung calls the “transcendent function” in depth psychological

terms. For me, this is the soul tending inherent in the endeavors of lyric poetry for the writer, and

for reader and listener as well. At the very least, when I sing and play music, my own creations

and those of others, there are times when my longings and tensions are eased awhile.

For me, the creation of and experience of music and lyric poetry are personally

therapeutic. Sappho’s art form may have been so to her, and when I read her poems it sounds like

it to my mind’s ear. Just to have those interior experiences in the external world in a manageable
form (however truthfully inadequate) can sometimes be a relief in and of itself. The synergistic

third that is created from the fortunate combining of lyric and its music can be a healing

experience, as well as being a crafted work and a dynamic experience. Lyric poetry and its music

have the capacity to frame, express, and create relationship with the contents of the unconscious,

and a capacity that is built into the patterns of our biology and psyche.
 Appendix A

The following lyric poetry, set to a melody from the thirteenth century C.E. called O

Virgo Splendens (Anon.), and which dates between 1250-1320 C.E., was written by myself and

Ruth Barrett in 1981 and recorded in 1982 with melody and harmony plucked on the dulcimer,

and a contrapuntal part played on the bowed psaltry. This genre is typically sung by multiple

singers. The lyric is entitled: “Lovers of the Moon,” and we composed it as an Ode to Spring.

Lovers of the Moon

Words by Cynthia Smith and Ruth Barrett, © 1981, Aeolus Music, BMI

Come, Lovers of the Moon, from your cares retire.

Let the red heather and rose waken your desire.

The Earth awakes Her blossoms, branch and stone adorn Her bower.
Come lie within Her garden breathing deep the lavender flower.

Come, Lovers of the Moon, taste the dew of spring.

How sweet the nectar of love that joy and laughter bring.

Winter’s chill is passing, green leaves burst from every spray.

The Earth once more is stirring, kindling new the Ancient Flame.

Lunam amantes venite, desistite a curis.

Amor vester excitatory, ericis et rosis.

Transit frigus hiemalis, virgula virescens.

Terra mater movetur, ignem rursum accendens.

Come, Lovers of the Moon, from your cares retire.

Let the red heather and rose waken your desire.

Winter’s chill is passing, green leaves burst from every spray.

The Earth once more is stirring, kindling new the Ancient Flame.
 Appendix B

The following piece is a poem by Dale E. Foye written in 1999 called Eros. I set it to

original music in 2000. I would best classify the feeling tone of the music of this piece as

Phrygian. This song lyric uses the first person singular from the god Eros’ point of view.

Eros

Words by Dale E. Foye, © 1999

What does distance or age matter

In this simple affair of the heart.

The breeze that caresses your cheek today

Is untraceable, hidden in mystery.

That fragrant bouquet from a friend

Or lover, bares my presence to you.

That scent you breathe is my body,

Those soft petals my lips to yours.

What silken summer’s night has ever

Passed that I did not lie with you?

Your lover’s gliding fingers along

Lips and throat trace my signature.

Your whispered words of unguarded delight

Spring from my voice to your lover’s ears.

Those tears of joy and release that flow,

Pour forth from my eternal Heart.

So innocently you give yourself to me,

That Shame withdraws its poisoned arrows.

So completely do I give myself to you,

That all of your longings can ease awhile.
 Work Cited

Anderson, Warren D. Music and Musicians in Ancient Greece. Ithaca, NY: Cornell UP,
1997. 48.

Gardner, Kay. Souinding the Inner Landscape. Rockport, MA: Element Books, 1997. 96,
97, 132, 136.

Godwin, Joscelyn. The Harmony of the Spheres: A Sourcebook of the Pythagorean

Tradition in Music. Rochester, VT: Inner Traditions International,1993. 12-14.

Howatson, M. C. The Oxford Companion to Classical Literature. Oxford, NY: Oxford

UP, 1989. 336, 509.

Jung, Carl Gustav, C. G. Jung Letters. Trans. R. F. C. Hull. Vol. 1. Ed. Adler, Gerhard
and Aniela Jaffe. Princeton: Princeton UP, 1973. 542.

Rider, Mark. The Rhythmic Language of Health and Disease. Saint Louis: MMB Music,
Inc., 1997. 34,35.

Sappho, The Love Poems of Sappho, Trans. & Essay. Paul Roche. Amherst, NY: Prometheus
Books, 1998. 191.

Taylor, Dale. Biomedical Foundations of Music as Therapy. Saint Louis: MMB Music,
Inc., 1997. 15-26.
 Taurus Oedipus and the Riddling Sphinx: A New Interpretation

By John Knight Lundwall

Oedipus the King has been called the greatest masterpiece of Greek theater (Fagles 131)

and the most famous narrative in Western civilization (Edmunds and Dundes vii). Aristotle

asserts this play to be the most brilliant example of theatrical plot (Fagles 131), while Hegel and

Nietzsche declare Oedipus himself a symbol of towering human intellect--a man who cannot stop

until all riddles are solved (Edmunds 2).

The power in this Greek tragedy resides in its potent, fast-paced narrative. Oedipus is an

oracle-made wanderer who must solve a series of riddles, the first of which emanates from an

enigmatic, multi-formed creature named the Sphinx. Defeating this creature Oedipus becomes

king of Thebes, but his kingdom disintegrates under the shadow of plague, famine, sterility, and

death. Oedipus learns the only way to revoke this universal pestilence is to find the murderer of

the former king, Laius, and punish the criminal with either death or banishment. “I am the land’s

avenger by all rights, and Apollo’s champion too,” cries Oedipus (154-155). Thus, he who solved

the riddle of the Sphinx now seeks to solve the conundrums of the kingdom. Yet, the blind seer

Tiresias begs Oedipus to let some mysteries go unsolved: “How terrible–to see the truth when the

truth is only pain to him who sees!” (359-360). Oedipus is a man of bold action and tosses

Tiresias’s warnings aside. Unriddling is what Oedipus does best, and Oedipus unriddles a chain

of clues dangling downwards from Apollonian heights. In the end, Oedipus discovers the

terrifying truth: he is the murder of Laius, and Laius was his own father, and he has married and

bedded his own mother. Oedipus is the cause of the plague of Thebes!

Oedipus the King presents a compelling plot which has been analyzed for centuries.

Numerous critiques have been superimposed upon this tale, ranging from Victorian analysis
declaring the hubris of Oedipus brings about his own downfall, to Francis Fergusson’s

suggestion that the tragedy is an Athenian mystery play revealing “a solemn rite of sacrifice that

purges the community of its collective guilt by punishing a scapegoat...” (Fagles 134). Other

analysts have declared the play a tragedy of fate, juxtaposing the idea of free will against god-

ordained determinism. Josh Beer sees in Oedipus the King the political and social texture of

ancient Athens, from the struggle against Persia which put at stake the Athenian way of life (Beer

21-22), to the long oratories of the tragedian chorus reminiscent of “the political and forensic

speeches of its various assemblies and law courts...” (Beer 44). Robert Fagles, whose translation

I am using, also defines the play in its historic context, citing that fifth century Greece was a

culture on the cusp of change between the Oracle of Delphi and a new age of reason unattached

to archaic and prophetic models but having its own limitations: “The catastrophe of the tragic

hero thus becomes the catastrophe of fifth-century man; all his furious energy and intellectual

daring drive him on to this terrible discovery of his [own] fundamental ignorance...” (Falges

143).

Numerous critiques can be cited, but one revolutionary interpretation deserves

mentioning: Sigmund Freud’s psychological approach. According to Lowell Edmunds, Freud

presents a radical solution to the problem between legend and consciousness by “transposing the

legend...into the unconscious. Oedipus is no longer the hero of a legend but the name of a

complex” (Edmunds 3). Or, as Freud writes in Interpretation of Dreams: “[Oedipus’s] destiny

moves us only because it might have been ours–because the oracle laid the same curse upon us...

as upon him. It is the fate of all of us, perhaps, to direct our first sexual impulse towards our

mother and our first hatred and our first murderous wish against our father” (Fagles qtd. 132).
For Freud, this Oedipal Complex is the under-girth of his psychological theory, a theory which

brought a revolution of thought in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

Finally, it should be mentioned that not all critiques have been favorable to the play. The

well known Gilbert Murray of the myth-ritual school saw nothing but ambiguity in this tragedy:

“Even the good things that have to be done in order to make the plot work are done through mere

loss of temper. The spiritual tragedy is never faced or understood...” (Edmunds qtd. 2). And

Walter Benjamin sees Oedipus as a bungler. When faced with full realization of the truth,

Oedipus blinds himself with Jocasta’s brooches attempting a “flight from the realization” of who

and what he is (Edmunds 3). Humphrey Kitto turns his ire not to the Sophoclean tragedy itself,

but to all its interpreters: “Whatever Sophocles meant, he put his meaning into the play, and to

get it out again we must contemplate the play–all of it, in all its aspects...” (Kitto 138).

In truth, Kitto’s proposition of examining the play, each character, symbol, and line, for

what is in it and for what is not, is a tall order to fill; despite the scholars lining up to do so.

Scholarly argument will always declare that any one approach falls short of such a full analysis,

including Kitto’s. Nevertheless, in the numerous approaches to this play (literary, psychological,

historical, and so forth) there is not one approach I have found that inquires after its mythologic

basis. Sophocles did not invent the story of Oedipus; this tale was part of a mythos already hoary

with age by the time the Greeks invented dramatic tragedy.1 Of course, so little is known about

this oral myth as to not bother. However, I propose that Kitto has it partly right; there are vestiges

of the myth recorded in Sophocles’ play–pieces that stand out as luminous signals as bright as

1
Nearly all authors yet cited comment that the myth of Oedipus was existent for
centuries, perhaps longer, before Sophocles staged his play. Of the original myth little is known,
but Lowell Edmunds gives perhaps the best discourse of the historical fragments in his book
Oedipus, The Ancient Legend and Its Later Analogues, pp. 6-22.
Apollo’s crown. As each of these pieces are examined a matrix of connections emerge which pile

up beyond the coincidental realm. We find in Sophocles’ version of Oedipus, and particularly in

Sophocles’ version of Oedipus,2 hints of an ancient mythology of prime cosmological concern.

I therefore propose my own radical theory and new interpretation, which, as far as I am

aware, is original, but not without basis. To begin, let us pick up some of these luminous pieces.

I. The Oracle: Kill the Father and Marry the Mother. King Laius of Thebes, son of

Labdacus, marries Jocasta, daughter of Menoeceus. An oracle tells Laius that if he has a son, he

will be killed and replaced (in the marital bed) by him. Laius and Jocasta have a son named

Oedipus. To avoid the prophecy, Laius sends the infant to his death.

II. Binding the Feet on Mount Cithaeron. Laius orders a servant to kill the child. The

servant, a shepherd, binds the infant’s feet together and leaves him on Mount Cithaeron. Having

pity on the child, however, the servant saves Oedipus by delivering him to another shepherd, who

eventually gives him to his foster parents of Corinth.

III. Family Heritage: Etymology. Thomas Worthen notes the etymologies of Oedipus’s

family (Worthen 13). The name Oedipus means swollen foot. The name Laius means left-sided.

The name Labdacus means lame.

IV. The King’s Company. King Laius travels to Delphi. Laius travels with four

attendants, one called a herald (828-829). Laius also travels in a wagon or chariot.

2
Fragments of the Oedipus myth are found in the writings of Homer, Apollodorus, and
Diodorus Siculus. Also, images of the various versions of the myth have been found on kraters
unearthed in Greece. Additionally, other dramatic interpretations of the myth were written,
namely by Aeschylus, Euripides, and Seneca. Despite these latter renditions, Sophocles version
remained the “definitive account of the Oedipus’ story” (March 561).
 V. The Crossroads. King Laius comes upon a place called Phocis where two branching

roads meet, one from Daulia and the other from Delphi (808-809). At this crossroads Oedipus

slays Laius and all but one of his attendants; the herald escapes.

VI. The Sphinx. Oedipus then meets an enigmatic creature: part human (female head),

part eagle (with eagle wings) part lion (a lion body and legs), and part snake (a serpent tail). This

creature is called the Sphinx, and broods over Thebes with a riddle about time. Only after slaying

the Sphinx does Oedipus ascend to the throne.

VII. Decaying Thebes. Only after Oedipus has served as king over Thebes for a long

period of time, “the count of years would run you far back...” (627) does the kingdom fall into

ruin. The ruin is wholesale, as if it were an end of an era.

VIII. Death of Jocasta and Blinded Eyes. After all riddles are solved, and after Oedipus

discovers what and who he is, Jocasta hangs herself, her body “cradled high in a woven noose,

spinning, swinging back and forth” (1396-1397). Upon discovering her, Oedipus blinds his eyes

with her brooches (1402-1405).

It is interesting to note that Sophocles’ play begins at point VII on my list. That is, items I

through VI are all assumed events, occurrences that have already happened and are briefly

alluded to within the text of Sophocles’ play. Yet, these events are central to the unfolding of the

tragedy. Certainly the ancient Greeks watching this drama unfold were thoroughly familiar with

the myth of Oedipus, and thus with the mythic context which Sophocles assumed his audience

knew. Items I through VI therefore must represent a large body of the ancient myth, otherwise

Sophocles would have had to begin his tale far earlier in the mythic chronology and with much

more exposition.
 Whatever the truth is regarding the ancient myth the Greeks knew, one image of that

myth is certain–the Sphinx. Numerous portraits of the sphinx have been uncovered from

antiquity. Images found on ancient vases show Oedipus facing this highly unusual creature.

Further, statuary of the Sphinx has also been uncovered and reproduced. At least one history

book on ancient Greece states that Sphinxes guarded the entrance to the Temple of Demeter and

the Eleusian Mysteries (Petrie et. al. 2461-2496; see Appendix, figures 1-5). The Greek Sphinx

was not just a mythological story, but a prolific, ancient reality.

The prolific image of the Sphinx exists well beyond the shores of ancient Greece. In the

ruins of Persepolis, in ancient Persia, large bas-reliefs depict a tall, noble human figure thrusting

a dagger into a creature whose form curiously mimics the Greek Sphinx (see Appendix, figure 6).

This Persian Sphinx has a lion’s head and fore paws, eagle wings and talons, a scorpion tale, and

what some interpret as a bull’s body. Multiple interpretations have been given of this Persian

correspondence to the Greek creature, not to mention that a noble figure like Oedipus is slaying it

while holding it by a top handle which emerges from its skull. Ker Porter believes that the human

figure is Ormuzd (Ahura Mazda) who is fighting the powers of darkness represented by the

Sphinx (Plunket 65). Emmeline Plunket also observes that within Persepolis numerous bas-

reliefs are found of this bestiary type, always combining at least two forms of the four: lion,

eagle, bull, and scorpion (Plunket 64).

This bestiary image also finds a parallel in Hebrew myth. In the book of Ezekiel a

description of the cherubim reveals a near duplicate of the Greek and Persian types: “And I

looked, and, behold, a whirlwind came out of the north, a great cloud, and a fire infolding

itself.... Also out of the midst thereof came the likeness of four living creatures.... As for the

likeness of their faces, they four had the face of a man, and the face of a lion, on the right side:
and they four had the face of an ox on the left side; they four also had the face of an eagle”

(Ezekiel 1: 2-10; see Appendix figure 7). It is also interesting to note that the Hebrew cherubim

are represented as being in wheels within wheels (Ezekiel 1: 19-22), not unlike the implied wheel

of the turn handle on the Persian Sphinx or for that matter the turning wheels of the eagle wings

each type bears (eagles are known to wheel about in the sky).

Furthermore, the image of the sphinx finds parallels in the Mithraic mysteries (see

Appendix figure 7A) and in numerous other cultures. Christine Downing, when reviewing this

paper, stated that the sphinx image came very late in the myth of Oedipus, citing Kerenyi, who

thought the image was introduced perhaps no earlier than Aeschylus (6th century BCE). The

sphinx as a mythological type certainly existed well before the 6th century, and in fact Petrie and

Flinders suggest it originates in Egypt, in one form or another, as early as the fourth dynasty

(Petrie, et. al. Volume VI). Amazingly, the Neo-Platonist Proclus identifies the founder of all

Greek religion and ritual as Orpheus, a pan-Hellenic figure, who was imaged as “a God without a

body, with golden wings on his shoulder and having on his sides the heads of bulls, and on his

head a monstrous dragon” (qtd. in Mead 109). Later in this same passage Proclus identifies

Orpheus as “a dragon with the heads of a bull and lion and in the midst the face of God, with

wings on the shoulders” (qtd. in Mead 109). Furthermore, Proclus identifies Pan, the All-Father

of the Greeks in later times with the same imagery, and connects both the very ancient symbol of

the swastika and the Star of David to an iconography attached to sphinx symbolism (Mead 110).

While the sphinx type is very ancient, just exactly when the sphinx image entered the

myth of Oedipus is unknown. The sphinx clearly enters into the Greek tragedies (thus Kerenyi’s

dating) and in fact it is in these tragedies that the only verifiable dating of the sphinx connected

with Oedipus can be definitively made. Interestingly, the sphinx image seems connected to
mystery rites as the image is found in Greece most often at tombs (Petrie, et. al. Volume VI) and

are associated with the dead. This mystic rite association seems viable as Persopolis was a cult

center, the book of Ezekiel was considered to be highly liturgical and esoteric, and both Orpheus

and Mithras were mythic liturgical figures. If the sphinx image is introduced into Greece via the

mystery religions than the dating of the image probably goes back to the founding of Greece!

In any case, the exact dating of the sphinx image being introduced into the Oedipus myth

proper is irrelevant, for what is being analyzed is the Oedipus myth as verified by Sophocles.

Admittedly, this line of research must be expanded, for in fact it is in the image of the sphinx

which, in my analysis, provides the key to interpretation of the Oedipus myth.

The mythologic images embedded in the Greek Sphinx are not arbitrary or by artist

design, rather, they have their exact imagery and origins in the celestial zodiac, namely the

constellations Leo (the lion), Taurus (the bull), Aquarius (the human) and Scorpio (the snake,

scorpion, and/or eagle3). These four constellations represent an astronomical colure, for each

oppose each other on the zodiac table. Moreover, it is these four constellations in antiquity which

held the rising sun on the days of equinox and solstice. Ancient astronomers looked upon the

horizon at the exact point where the sun arose and saw the zodiac constellation still lingering in

pre-dawn light receiving that celestial orb. Roughly, between 4500 B.C.E. and 2400 B.C.E. the

sun rose on the morning of spring equinox in the constellation Taurus, on the morning of summer

solstice in Leo, on the morning of fall equinox in Scorpio, and on the morning of winter solstice

in Aquarius (see Appendix, figures 8-11).

3
Plunket asserts that the eagle imagery is due to the first magnitude star within Aquila,
and believes that it replaced the imagery of the human as Aquila is just above Aquarius (Plunket
66), while Swynburne believes that the eagle imagery is a replacement for Scorpio for roughly
the same reasons as Aquila resides in an arch in the sky between Aquarius and Scorpio.
 It has been a long time since the dust has been blown off the solar interpretation of myth.

In Frances Younghusband’s translation of C. Witt’s Classic Mythology, all the Greek deities are

divided by cosmological type (myths of the sun, moon, dawn, wind, etc.). Under Oedipus we

read, “Belongs to group of sun-myths. His story symbolizes the daily or yearly career of the

sun...” (Younghusband trans. xxiv). Witt descends from the F. Max Muller school, and Muller

himself writes “It is a thoroughly solar idea, for instance, that the offspring is destined to become

the murderer of his father or grandfather. This fate seems inevitable with every young sun or

coming day, whose very birth implies the death of the preceding day. Thus O[e]dipus is the

predestined murder of his father Lai[u]s...” (Muller 526).

The Sphinx as astronomical symbol clearly informs a celestial interpretation to the

Oedipus myth. Yet, Muller’s rendering of Oedipus is limited only to the daily rising of the sun;

Oedipus slays the previous dawn and presumably marries the mother as part of the daily

fertilization of the Earth. Muller ends his interpretation here. Curiously, Muller is silent with the

Oedipal etymologies. Etymology was one of Muller’s prime supports for his solar theory. Indeed,

many mythological deities show clear solar and lunar connections through their names. Yet point

III in my own analysis shows a curious etymological heritage passed down from father to son in

the Oedipus myth. I assert these etymologies are associated with a solar mythos, but well beyond

what Muller had in mind.

The name Oedipus means swollen foot. Oedipus is a wobbler; apparently, so is Laius and

Labdacus. If the Oedipus myth is about celestial mechanics dealing with the sun, then Oedipus’s

condition of wobbling-lameness is truly curious. Oedipus has his feet pinned upon a mountain

(point II). If we continue with celestial symbolism, in antiquity the mountain was always a

symbol of the axis-mundi–the center of the world around which all ages of humankind revolved
and the prototypical point of creation. Thus, the first dry land to appear (Genesis 1:9) is the

cosmic mountain; an image repeated in most mythologies where universal creation is forged

upon a rising mountain and where the mythic pantheon also resides (Olympus, Meru, Fiji,

Sumeru, and Kenya are all types of this universal, mountain myth). Particularly, the cosmic

mountain was the axis of the Earth, the pole upon which creation had been forged. While Mount

Cithaeron is not technically such a place, it is a mythologic type, a node upon which creation and

transformation occurs.4 The identity of Cithaeron as pole-axis is strengthened as Oedipus has his

feet pinned together upon this mount. Even as Oedipus is lamed and made to wobble upon a

swollen foot, so is the axis of the Earth a wobbling foot.

The Earth’s axis is tilted at a 23 degree angle. Due to the gravitational pull of the sun and

moon upon the Earth, and because the Earth is not a perfect spheroid, but has an equatorial bulge,

the Earth’s axis is pulled and shifted. Literally, the axis wobbles in a grand cosmic circle

completing one circuit approximately every 26,000 years. Because of this axial wobble, the pole

star shifts over time. The current pole star (North Star) is Polaris, but beta Ursae Minoris was

once the pole star, and before that it was alpha Draconis. The effect of this wobbling axis-pole is

precession of the equinoxes. In short, from the point of view of an observer on Earth, the sun

rises on the horizon into a known zodiac constellation. The four pillars of the year are the

equinoxes and solstices, and on the morning of these special days the sun rose into the four

zodiac signs which represented the “four corners of the Earth.” However, due to precession, these

zodiac signs slowly shift, moving one degree every 72 years. As each zodiac sign is 30 degrees, it

4
Mount Cithaeron in myth is not associated with a pole-axis proper, but, according to
Hesiod, was the locale of the Muses. With no small irony then, does Sir Francis Bacon connect
the muses with the Greek sphinx, declaring that the sphinx was a symbol of science who received
its mystic song from the muses (Pesic 32-33).
takes 2,160 years for an entire zodiac constellation to precess out of its position of holding the

rising sun.5 Again, from the point of view of an Earth-bound viewer, the four constellations

which hold the rising sun on the mornings of equinox and solstice slowly disappear below the

horizon, as a set of four new zodiac constellations take their place (see Appendix, figures 12-13).

Precession of the equinoxes was supposedly discovered by the Greek Hipparchus around

127 BCE. But as now a few scholars are reasoning, Hipparchus’s discovery must have been a re-

discovery of what “...had been known some thousand years previously, and that on [precession]

the Archaic Age based its long range computation of time” (De Santillana and Von Dechend 66).

Indeed, Girogio De Santillana, professor of the History of Science at M.I.T., writes in his ground

breaking analysis of ancient myth, Hamlet’s Mill, precession must have been known far back in

antiquity and vestiges of this knowledge is recorded in world myth:

The theory about “how the world began” seems to involve the breaking asunder of a
harmony, a kind of cosmogonic “original sin” whereby the circle of the ecliptic (with the
zodiac) was tilted up at an angle with respect to the equator, and the cycles of change
came into being.... As we follow the clues–stars, numbers, colors, plants, forms, verse,
music, structures–a huge framework of connections is revealed at many levels. One is
inside an echoing manifold where everything responds and everything has a place and a
time assigned to it.... To recapitulate for clarity, whatever is true myth has no historical
basis, however tempting the reduction, however massive and well armed the impact of a
good deal of modern criticism on that belief.... Myth is essentially cosmological. (De
Santillana and Von Dechend 5, 8, 50)

Santillana argues that the heart of mythic cosmology is precession. This argument is

picked up by Jane Sellers, who writes of ancient Egyptian myth, “I suggest that Orion’s

precessionally caused failure to appear in his place at his proper time gave rise to long centuries

5
The constellations of the zodiac have been assigned a 30 degree “house” from ancient
times. As there are 12 constellations this makes 360 degrees or a full circle around the Earth. In
reality, the zodiac constellations vary in size, Aires is less than 28 degrees while Pisces is greater
than 34.
of an oral tradition of Osiris’s death” (Sellers 3). Emmeline Plunket’s examination of ancient

calendar systems, many more sophisticated than our own, aligns with these conclusions. Plunket

believes, for example, the origin of the Akkadian calendar must date no later than 6000 B.C.E.

and was crafted by those who were aware of precession (Plunket 1-23).

Whatever the truth of these claims, the myth of Oedipus rises from centuries of

cosmological inattention as a prime candidate as a precessional myth. In points IV and V Laius

rides with four escorts (the four constellated corners of the Earth), one a herald (the heliacal star

of the vernal equinox constellation) where he arrives in a land named Phocis6 where two roads

meet (the celestial equator and the ecliptic)7. It is here, and only here, that Laius falls to his son,

or as Muller would say, where Laius is killed by his sun! Yet Muller does not understand the

implications of this cosmology. Laius is not killed by the rising of a new day, but by the rising of

a new precessional age. No amount of literary or psychological interpretation can trump the

profound and exact imagery just displayed before us by Sophocles. Kitto’s bequest that every

image and line be examined to see what the play has to say itself is sadly ironic, as the host of

critical interpretations of this play have entirely missed the celestial images in their stellar

context. To say that a king who is pulled by four attendants, one who heralds his coming, is just

coincidental to the relationship the sun has with its equinox and solstice attendants is one thing,

but when Laius is killed at a crossroads of light by his direct offspring along with his attendants,

6
The root pho means light, brilliance, and is found in phoenix, phosphorous, and photon.
7
Jocasta declares that Laius is killed “at a place where three roads meet” (790). But a few
lines later, in describing the place, Jocasta says “A place called Phocis, where two branching
roads... come together” (808-810). The third road is implied as the road Laius is on. The two
roads coming together therefore, in my interpretation, represent the celestial crossroads where the
ecliptic meets the celestial equator. The third road is the constellation which “holds” this point.
Out of curious coincidence, of course, lies the fact that only two constellations in the zodiac hold
the Milky Way–Taurus and Scorpio, and thus this third road is the most visible road in the sky.
leaving only the herald to escape, we cannot imagine a more exact explanation of a shifting of the

cosmic coordinates that occurs when the four zodiac constellations are slain at the crossroads of

the ecliptic and celestial equator due to the precession of the equinoxes. And just in case we miss

the obvious, the theme and imagery is all repeated again, as if to explain just exactly why

Oedipus is destined to slay his father and is himself destined to be banished from his own

kingdom.

It is no coincidence that after Oedipus slays his father he meets the enigmatic Sphinx. He

defeats this creature in a cosmic re-enactment of the killing he has just performed at the celestial

crossroads. How? By solving a riddle about time. And what greater riddle is there in the cosmic

clockwork than the revolution of spheres which created time itself, with its daily, monthly, and

yearly movements, all subsets to the greatest celestial cog of them all–precession! Neither is it a

coincidence that the image of the vernal constellation (the bull) is missing in the form of the

Sphinx. As noted, the Sphinx is made of four forms: human, lion, eagle, and serpent. In the

astronomical colure holding the equinoxes and solstices the important image of the bull which

marks the year and the cosmic age is nowhere to be found. How curious it is then, that when

Tiresias identifies Oedipus as the killer of Laius, “This day will bring your birth and your

destruction” (499), Oedipus flees into the palace. The dramatic stage is left empty, save for the

chorus, who interdicts with one of its longest orations. R. W. Burton observes:

The most remarkable feature in the first half of [this] ode is the gradual emergence of a
single concrete image. Suggested tentatively in the opening stanza with its impression of
flight swifter than storm-horses, of assault... by the fires of Apollo, of pursuit by the dread
6ZD,H, it acquires vivid form at 478 [544 in Fagles translation] in the phrase ` J"bD@H,
placed emphatically at the end of a clause and coming with all the force of a revelation of
identity, ecce ille taurus, ‘Look! There he goes, the bull!’ (Burton 150)
 Oedipus is the missing image on the Sphinx. Oedipus is the bull! Of course, Burton does

not have precession in mind, but the images pile up as Santillana suggests, in an “echoing

manifold where everything responds and everything has a place and a time assigned to it.” Truly

Tiresias’s prediction, “This day will bring your birth and your destruction” is supremely on

target; indeed, we could say Tiresias has scored a bull’s-eye.

Pardon the pun, but the bull’s eye is very important. Indeed, in the constellation Taurus is

the red star Aldebaran–the eye of the bull. Aldebaran is a first magnitude star that rose helically

on the morning of spring equinox (Sellers 14). For over two millennia astronomers would watch

for this star blinking on the horizon in the pre-dawn light. Over time, however, and due to

precession, the eye of the bull that had always been the “herald” for spring disappeared below the

horizon. The whole heavens had shifted. The bull’s eye had been blinded.

Thus we get to points VII and VIII. Decaying Thebes is an image of the end of a

precessional age, where the four constellations on the horizon are all descending into the

underworld--heaven is falling out of place. This imagery is climaxed at the end of Sophocles’

play, where Jocasta hangs herself “cradled high in a woven noose, spinning, swinging back and

forth” (1396-1397) and Oedipus blinds his eyes with her brooches (1402-1405). In this

cosmological interpretation Jocasta is an image of the Earth whose swinging back and forth is a

double image of Oedipus’s own wobble. She marries the father and the son not because of any

psychological complex, but because she is the persistent link in the turning heavens. Oedipus

blinds himself because, like his father before him, his age is ending, and Aldebaran, his eye, is no

longer the herald of spring8 (see Appendix, figures 14-16).

8
In another curious coincidence the theme of blinding the eye is paralleled in Homer’s
Odyssey, where Odysseus blinds the cyclopean eye of Polyphemus. This occurs in a mountain
cave. Oedipus’s swollen foot is replaced by a “lifted...olive pole...twirled...around as a man
 In ending, I should note two things. One, Sophocles, as author of Oedipus the King,

would not need to know anything about precession of the equinoxes. If Sophocles incorporated

the original myth (which was the original carrier of this celestial knowledge) into his own

dramatic play writing, which for all intents and purposes he did, expanding on themes and

characters as a playwright will, then his own corroboration in writing precession “into” his work

would be unnecessary. The myth would do this for him. Having said this, it is Sophocles version

of the Oedipus myth which holds the most straight-forward clues to such an astronomical

interpretation. Unfortunately, so little is known about Sophocles himself as to render what he

could have known as pure guess-work. Secondly, and finally, I am aware of a whole host of

objections which can be given to this interpretation of the Oedipus myth. Do we find all these

clues in other versions of the story? What other myths might corroborate a precessional

interpretation? How could precession have been discovered as early as is claimed? Why hasn’t

anyone else ever given this interpretation? And the list goes on and on. These objections are fair

and worthy, and I can only remind readers that they are the exact same objections which should

be prominent in the current theories of myth. What is accepted does not mean it is true.

Meanwhile, we mythologists have much work to do.

would drill the wood of a ship” (IX. 382-384). When Polyphemus is blinded Odysseus and his
men escape out of the cosmic mountain under the belly of sheep, just as Aires (the ram) replaced
the eye of Aldebaran in Taurus (the bull) due to precession.
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