Vol XVII. No. 22
Once upon a time in the West, the focal figure of all mythology and worship was the bountiful goddess Earth. She reigned supreme as the mother and nourisher of life and as the receiver of the dead for rebirth. As Joseph Campbell here elucidates, she was more than a symbol of fertility; she was “a metaphysical symbol: the arch personification of the power of Space, Time, and Matter, within whose bound all beings arise and die.”
How, when, and why did this change? Campbell shows how “the mythologies of the goddess mother were radically transformed, reinterpreted, and in large measure even suppressed by those suddenly intrusive patriarchal warrior tribesmen whose traditions have come down to us chiefly in the Old and New Testaments and in the myths of Greece.”
He goes on to describe the mythological underpinnings of Western religions — Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Zoroastrianism — and their historical influence on one another. No one who cares about history, mythology, religion, or past or current events in Western civilization can do without this venerable yet perennially fresh analysis.
From Joseph Campbell's Original Prologue to the Series (1959-69)
The comparative study of the mythologies of the world compels us to view the cultural history of mankind as a unit; for we find that such themes as fire, theft, deluge, land of the dead, virgin birth and resurrected hero have a worldwide distribution.... these themes also appear in religious contexts, where they are accepted not only as factually true but even as revelations of the verities to which the whole culture is a living witness...
Every people has received its own seal and sign of supernatural designation... and yet an honest comparison immediately reveals that all have been built from one fund of mythological motifs...revered by every people on earth...
No one, as far as I know, has yet tried to compose into a single picture the new perspectives that have opened in the fields of comparative symbolism, religion, mythology, and philosophy by the scholarship of recent years...
I attempt in the following pages the first steps of a natural history of the gods and heroes, such as in its final form should include in its purview all divine beings - as zoology includes all animals and botany all plants... for as in the visible world of the vegetable and animal kingdoms, so also in the visionary world of the gods: there has been a history, an evolution, a series of mutations, governed by laws; and to show forth such laws is the proper aim of science.
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Author's Bio:
Joseph Campbell was interested in mythology since his childhood in New York, when he read books about American Indians, frequently visited the American Museum of Natural History, and was fascinated by the museum's collection of totem poles. He earned his B.A. and M.A. degrees at Columbia in 1925 and 1927 and went on to study medieval French and Sanskrit at the universities of Paris and Munich. After a period in California, where he encountered John Steinbeck and the biologist Ed Ricketts, he taught at the Canterbury School, then, in 1934, joined the literature department at Sarah Lawrence College, a post he retained for many years. During the 1940s and '50s, he helped Swami Nikhilananda to translate the Upanishads and The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna. The many books by Professor Campbell include The Hero with a Thousand Faces, Myths to Live By, The Flight of the Wild Gander, and The Mythic Image. He edited The Portable Arabian Nights, The Portable Jung, and other works. He died in 1987.
- This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
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My Thoughts:
Over the years, I have been a strong promoter of books written by Joseph Campbell. For example, last July I shared information on one other book in this series of four, namely Primitive Mythology -
I continue to receive review copies from the publisher, New World Library, and want to share as many of them with you as I can.
This book focuses on the development of mythology in the West, and it suggests how a mythological transition occurred from a focus on the feminine to the masculine.
Exposure to what is promoted in this volume of the series offers an important shift in emphasise - both good and bad.
Campbell stated: "The main result (of writing this book, for me) has been a confirmation of a thought I have long and faithfully entertained: of the unity of man, not only in its biology, but also in its spiritual history, which has everywhere unfolded in the manner of a single symphony ... irresistibly advancing in some kind of might climax, out of which the next great movement will emerge."
All the books in this series are updates of the original four volumes, and the last one in this series will appear in 2024.
Taking all four volumes into consideration at that time will be much anticipated. Still, the first three in the series provide a wealth of learning from Joseph Campbell who died 35 years ago.
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MASKS OF GOD SERIES (published to date)
Primitive Mythology https://tinyurl.com/22kb9tp3
Oriental Mythology https://tinyurl.com/bdf3kvav
Occidental Mythology https://tinyurl.com/acs23f7t
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Buy the Occidental book from Amazon.ca:
Buy it from New World Library
- Rumi
- Frances Ellen Watkins Harper
- Matthew Scully
- Barbara Brown Taylor
Young people say, “What can one person do? What is the sense of our small effort?” They cannot see that we can only lay one brick at a time, take one step at a time; we can be responsible only for the one action of the present moment.
- Dorothy Day
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If God’s peace is in our hearts, we carry it with us, and it can be given to those around us, not by our own will or virtue, but by the Holy Spirit working through us. We cannot give what we do not have, but if the Spirit blows through the dark clouds and enters our hearts, we can be used as vehicles of peace, and our own peace will be thereby deepened. The more peace we give away, the more we have.
- Madeleine L'Engle
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How few things there are which can be proved! Proofs only convince the mind. Who has ever been able to prove that tomorrow will come, and that we shall die? And what could be more generally believed?…In short, we must rely on faith when the mind has once perceived where truth lies, in order to quench our thirst and color our minds with a faith that eludes us at every moment of the day.
- Blaise Pascal
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There is no way to peace along the way of safety. For peace must be dared, it is itself the great venture and can never be safe. Peace is the opposite of security. To demand guarantees is to want to protect oneself. Peace means giving oneself completely to God’s commandment, wanting no security, but in faith and obedience laying the destiny of the nations in the hand of Almighty God, not trying to direct it for selfish purposes. Battles are won, not with weapons, but with God. They are won where the way leads to the cross.
- Dietrich Bonhoeffer
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There is no scarcity. There is no shortage. No lack of love, of compassion, of joy in the world. There is enough. There is more than enough. Only fear and greed make us think otherwise. No one need starve. There is enough land and enough food. No one need die of thirst. There is enough water. No one need live without mercy. There is no end to grace. And we are all instruments of grace. The more we give it, the more we share it, the more we use it, the more God makes. There is no scarcity of love. There is plenty. And always more.
- Rosemarie Freeney Harding
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The path of an honest fighter is a difficult one. And when the fighter grows cool in the evening of his life this is still no excuse to retire into games and amusement. Whoever remains faithful to his decision will realize that his whole life is a struggle. Such a person does not fall into the temptation of proudly telling others of what he has done with his life. Nor will he talk about the “great decisions” he has made. He knows full well that at decisive moments you have to renew your resolve again and again and that this alone makes good the decision and the decision good.
- Soren Kierkegaard
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What is joy but that tiny flickering flame that lights up the human soul? It’s something so inexplicable, so hard to describe – yet, as they say, we know it when we see it. Sometimes it appears on the face of a child when she watches a butterfly land on a daisy. Or it sits somewhere deep in our bones when the cries of a long-awaited new babe bring us to tears after a strenuous labor. It’s a funny thing, joy. If we savor it and let ourselves truly feel it we might imagine that nothing could ever be as intensely present, but the fact is, the door of joy opens both ways. When we let the joy in we are hardly aware we have also entered a doorway that leads to the deepest pain one can know when that joy is taken away.
- Stephanie Bennett
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