The necromancer is the shadow side of the ascetic and represents the death instinct or thanatos principle of Freud. It is also the mother complex that we must confront and moving into the realm of the dead, the graveyard we come very close to the mother complex and constellate very strong feelings that try to overwhem us. The symbol of deference that is staged by the necromancer when he kneels down and bows his head is very interesting. A Christian version of this story might require a sacrificial act so this image would not make it into a more western story. We are reminded that the east does not believe in self-sacrifice so the ritual of kneeling and bowing is to be avoided. Yet the celebration comes from cutting off the head of the destroyer, defeating the mother complex and transforming the mother complex into the creative and ever-expanding mother archetype. It is the difference between drinking alcohol until unconscious and drinking herbal tea referring back to the fishing trip. It is using the fermentation of yeast in making bread vs making and drinking alcohol. It is transmuting mother nature into nurture rather than being destroyed by mother nature's byproducts. In fact a Christian version of the story is the story of Faust and requires a pact with the Devil. There is no good and evil in our Indian story just the visible and invisible worlds.
The necromancer is also the archetypal trickster setting us up for failure by telling us a lie. The king's response is to become the trickster himself and turn the tables on him. There is an internalization of the components of the story into the king. The king takes in the fruit that hides the gems for years. He takes in the corpse and his stories and teaching and finally he takes in the trickster and the trickster becomes part of him. He is now a complete person.
Saturday, July 31, 2010
Monday, July 26, 2010
The Corpse
What is this dead criminal we must carry on our back for an entire night? What is this graveyard in which we must find him? This is Dante's Inferno and Faust's romp with Mephostopheles. This is the time in our life when we must unearth the dead and decaying parts of ourselves so that we may come to terms with them. They hang about us like strange fruit from the tree of death rather than the tree of life and they offer as much surpise as the fruit which bore the gem.
Rose as an 85 year old patient who had cancer. She was a woman whose feeling function had been repressed and who appeared very critical and cranky. She hated her life in a nursing home and did not wish to die there. She would toss doctors and other staff out of her room if they did not listen to her instructions. Everyone was afraid to go into her room. She trusted me and togther we started to unearth the dead parts of her self. One such part involved her best friend when she was in high school. She told her best friend who she was going to ask to the prom. Rose always felt insecure about not having a boyfriend. She did not feel attractive and because her friends had boyfriends she felt she was missing out on life. Her girlfriend asked the boy out behind Rose's back and that betrayal destoyed their friendship but also caused Rose to mistrust her feeling function and relegated it to the baggage she carried with her the rest of her life. Her thinking function took over and she secretly vowed never to be betrayed again. In the course of our sessions her feeling function become activated again and this lost part of her emerged. In fact, this young person part of her seemed to dominate her life towards the end and instead of appearing the critical old woman she became full of life and open to those around her. In some ways I became the boyfriend she left behind and our final words to each other were a declaration of love. So Rose unearthed one of many corpses she needed to come to terms with in order to become a complete person just as the king must carry the corpse on this dark journey through the graveyard in order to fulfill his role as hero.
Why is this corpse a criminal? We banish these parts of ourselves to our unconscious as if to prison, as if they were criminals. Secondly it is the realm of criminality we must go to get them, that is outside the rules we normally follow in life. The criminal is banished from society and it is this place of banishment we must go to find them.
Rose as an 85 year old patient who had cancer. She was a woman whose feeling function had been repressed and who appeared very critical and cranky. She hated her life in a nursing home and did not wish to die there. She would toss doctors and other staff out of her room if they did not listen to her instructions. Everyone was afraid to go into her room. She trusted me and togther we started to unearth the dead parts of her self. One such part involved her best friend when she was in high school. She told her best friend who she was going to ask to the prom. Rose always felt insecure about not having a boyfriend. She did not feel attractive and because her friends had boyfriends she felt she was missing out on life. Her girlfriend asked the boy out behind Rose's back and that betrayal destoyed their friendship but also caused Rose to mistrust her feeling function and relegated it to the baggage she carried with her the rest of her life. Her thinking function took over and she secretly vowed never to be betrayed again. In the course of our sessions her feeling function become activated again and this lost part of her emerged. In fact, this young person part of her seemed to dominate her life towards the end and instead of appearing the critical old woman she became full of life and open to those around her. In some ways I became the boyfriend she left behind and our final words to each other were a declaration of love. So Rose unearthed one of many corpses she needed to come to terms with in order to become a complete person just as the king must carry the corpse on this dark journey through the graveyard in order to fulfill his role as hero.
Why is this corpse a criminal? We banish these parts of ourselves to our unconscious as if to prison, as if they were criminals. Secondly it is the realm of criminality we must go to get them, that is outside the rules we normally follow in life. The criminal is banished from society and it is this place of banishment we must go to find them.
Sunday, July 25, 2010
The King and the Corpse-The Monkey
The King represents that ego we know, the one that makes up our conscious attitude towards the world. This ego is in on autopilot mode that eventually becomes bored or unsettled. It takes the king ten years in the story to come to the realization that all the gifts he has been given by life he has thrown away not understanding their true value. Sometimes this can take a lot longer, maybe even 50 years. It is important to take note that it was the monkey that revealed to him the value in the fruit and the monkey resides in the female quarters. This is the unconscious parts of us, the lunar side, the realm of the feminine, the feeling function which most men repress most of their lives. Now the king's realization there is value here he had previously ignored seems an easy transition, perhaps because this is an Indian tale and Indians are much more in touch with their feeling function. In the west this would manifest as a complaint, depression, anxiety because the ego would resist such new knowledge. Or the person would act out in an affair or something that would force his stance with the world to change (once caught). The king feels indebted to the peasant who brought the fruit once he realized their value. This indebtedness we all experience when we come to the same realization often late in life that we have taken advantage of life all our lives and that it's real meaning was right in front of us. The peasant turns out to be something more than a peasant just as the fruit turned out to be something more than fruit. The peasant is actually a holy man, an ascetic, and the king offers the holy man a favor. The holy man requests the king as hero assist him in an enterpise of magic. The holy man's name is "Rich in Patience" which is quite befitting him. This is that part of us that intiates us into the realm of the imagination, the magical realm and he can wait many years before he is listened to.
The King and the Corpse
This very old story from India has not had the shake and bake handling of a jungian analyst as I can find and except for Heinrich Zimmer, an Indologist not an analyst, I can find no other attempt to interpret. It is a rather long story so I will leave out much in a synopsis. A king was quite content in his office and would meet daily with the people of the kingdom to give them access to him for a short time each day. A peasant shows up and begins offering him fruit everyday which the king politely accepts and then gives to his treasurer who tosses them through a window into a treasure room. This went on for ten years until one day the peasant gives the fruit to a monkey that escaped from the women's quarters in the castle. The monkey takes a bite and throws it down revealing a large gem in the center of the fruit. Now the king is interested and has the treasurer check on all the other fruit in the room only to find many gems with fruit in some state of decomposition, The king is intrigued with the peasant and the next day asks the peasant what he, the king, could do for him. The peasant tells him he could be a hero and directs him to a sorcerer. The necromancer tells the king he must go to the graveyard and cut a corpse down from the large tree on which the criminal was hanged. The king finds the corpse and cuts him down and carries him on his back to the sorcerer but on the way a voice from the corpse begins to tell the king a riddle and if the king knew the answer he must tell it or his head would explode in many pieces. The king asnwers the first riddle and the corpse flies back to the tree. The king trudges back to cut him down again and begins the trek back to the sorcerer but along the way the corpse tells him another riddle that the king, if he knows, must answer or else his head will explode in many pieces. The king answers the next riddle and the corpse flies back to the tree. This goes on all night with the king answering 24 riddles. Then the 25th riddle the king could not find an answer and with that the corpse is impressed and reveals to the king a secret. That when he brings the corpse back to the necromancer he will try to kill the king by instructing him to kneel down and lower his head so that the king can be given power over the world of souls and spirits but the necromancer will cut off the king's head instead and he will become the ruler over all the world visible and invisible so the corpse spirit told the king when the necromancer tells him to do this to ask the sorcerer to show the king how it is done and when the sorcerer bows his head the king would cut it off with the same sword and that is what is done. The corpse spirit in gratitude offers the king power over all the visible world and when he dies over the spirit world as well. The corpse spirit, in gratitude for the king completing the journey offers the king whatever his heart desires and the king simlpy asks that the 24 tales and his own story be handed down through the ages for all mankind and this is done.
Work this story around for a while and we will discuss next posting.
Work this story around for a while and we will discuss next posting.
Wednesday, July 14, 2010
Fishing/Breadmaking
There is a wonderful paradox in going on a fishing trip with a group of men. So much energy goes into fishing which is symbolic of delving into the unconconcious. Yet so much resistance to actually learning anything. The alcoholic drowning that takes place seems an attempt to shut feelings down suggesting that there is a tremendous amount of energy that is captured during sobriety that has no outlet. There is no learning that goes on when drinking suggesting the only learning can come from keeping the opposites in tension and not releasing the tension artifically through drinking. So the fishing for "unconscious material" is in the ritual of casting into the water but there is no preparation for the ritual so the ritual becomes meaningless.
There is also the risk of violence particularly as men drink. The violence is emotional rather than physical but can turn physical. This is all in the absence of the mother as if in protest to the mother. We act like dogs more domesticated at home and wild when our wives aren't around. There is the odor of destruction with all the drinking and smoking and farting as if the mortificatio is serving some purpose. Maybe there is a misguided attempt to move to a feeling level but there is no mechanism for it and alcohol interfers with this movement rather than facilitating it. Perhaps we feel dead in the day to day workings of our lives, our domestic lives and we need to smoke and drink and fart to know we are alive.
I found myself, in the middle of this testosterone bath baking bread for several hours as in a frenzy. There seems to be some compensation there. The bread making is both feminine in nature and alchemical. It is time contained. You cannot rush through the process and there are no shortcuts. Perhaps the shortcut in drinking alcohol brings us to bliss but not by way of meditation. The breadmaking is feminine also because it is maternal, it comes from the mother realm, the realm of feeding and nourishment. The bread expands as in pregnancy. In alchemy it is both the process of sublimatio (expansion of air and "rising") and coagulatio becuase it is very earthbound. Earthbound and airbound at the same time. paradoxical. Fishing is time bound and requires patience. No shortcuts there either. Have to put in the time. Cardplaying is very intellectual. So we have gone from drinking solutio to breadmaking coagulatio and sublimatio to cardplaying which is sublimatio and trickster energy. Where is the fire? Ah the fire was there in the pit and was very high and seemed to be required as part of the experience. We have all four elements: fire, water, earth and air.
There is also the risk of violence particularly as men drink. The violence is emotional rather than physical but can turn physical. This is all in the absence of the mother as if in protest to the mother. We act like dogs more domesticated at home and wild when our wives aren't around. There is the odor of destruction with all the drinking and smoking and farting as if the mortificatio is serving some purpose. Maybe there is a misguided attempt to move to a feeling level but there is no mechanism for it and alcohol interfers with this movement rather than facilitating it. Perhaps we feel dead in the day to day workings of our lives, our domestic lives and we need to smoke and drink and fart to know we are alive.
I found myself, in the middle of this testosterone bath baking bread for several hours as in a frenzy. There seems to be some compensation there. The bread making is both feminine in nature and alchemical. It is time contained. You cannot rush through the process and there are no shortcuts. Perhaps the shortcut in drinking alcohol brings us to bliss but not by way of meditation. The breadmaking is feminine also because it is maternal, it comes from the mother realm, the realm of feeding and nourishment. The bread expands as in pregnancy. In alchemy it is both the process of sublimatio (expansion of air and "rising") and coagulatio becuase it is very earthbound. Earthbound and airbound at the same time. paradoxical. Fishing is time bound and requires patience. No shortcuts there either. Have to put in the time. Cardplaying is very intellectual. So we have gone from drinking solutio to breadmaking coagulatio and sublimatio to cardplaying which is sublimatio and trickster energy. Where is the fire? Ah the fire was there in the pit and was very high and seemed to be required as part of the experience. We have all four elements: fire, water, earth and air.
Sunday, July 4, 2010
Infantilizing Lear
Act II, Scene IV is a remarkable turning point in Shakespeare's tragedy of King Lear. Having been disrespected by Goneril, Lear arrives at Gloucester's castle. There both Regan and Goneril work in a coordinated fashion to control and limit Lear. In his eyes he has given them everything, and they wish to return the favor by dismissing his retinue of soldiers and leaving him with nothing.
It is as though a small child is having his toys taken away by Mommy, or being told he need not order his own meal as a few scraps off of Mommy's plate will be enough. In this way, an amazing reversal takes place. Goneril and Regan are clearly the parents; Lear is the child.
But what kind of parents are they? They show little charm or compassion for the inconveniences involved in hosting Lear. Indeed, it seems as though they leap at the first opportunity to confine him, rob him of respect or dignity. They are frigid mothers, like smoothe, cold-blooded Medusas. If Lear is an infant in their eyes, he is one they are trying to abort.
Their role in the play seems to be to betray and destroy the literal father. Rising from the ashes of this destruction will be a truer, kinder better father (albeit briefly). But Goneril and Regan will not benefit from the transformation they help set in motion. Only Cordelia, who from the beginning seems to value the archetypal father more than the literal father, will get a glimpse of Lear the man.
Lear imagined his retirement as a comfortable nap in the laps of his grown adult daughters acting as mother figures. What he gets instead is a humbling confrontation with the true brutality of nature.
Like Hamlet, Lear's journey can be viewed as a passage out of the mother realm and into the realm of the archetypal father. In both stories, much has to be sacrificed in order to make the crossing. But both Hamlet and to a greater extent Lear face death as better men for having done so.
It is as though a small child is having his toys taken away by Mommy, or being told he need not order his own meal as a few scraps off of Mommy's plate will be enough. In this way, an amazing reversal takes place. Goneril and Regan are clearly the parents; Lear is the child.
But what kind of parents are they? They show little charm or compassion for the inconveniences involved in hosting Lear. Indeed, it seems as though they leap at the first opportunity to confine him, rob him of respect or dignity. They are frigid mothers, like smoothe, cold-blooded Medusas. If Lear is an infant in their eyes, he is one they are trying to abort.
Their role in the play seems to be to betray and destroy the literal father. Rising from the ashes of this destruction will be a truer, kinder better father (albeit briefly). But Goneril and Regan will not benefit from the transformation they help set in motion. Only Cordelia, who from the beginning seems to value the archetypal father more than the literal father, will get a glimpse of Lear the man.
Lear imagined his retirement as a comfortable nap in the laps of his grown adult daughters acting as mother figures. What he gets instead is a humbling confrontation with the true brutality of nature.
Like Hamlet, Lear's journey can be viewed as a passage out of the mother realm and into the realm of the archetypal father. In both stories, much has to be sacrificed in order to make the crossing. But both Hamlet and to a greater extent Lear face death as better men for having done so.
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