The Power of Myth
The Hero Myth
Joseph Campbell: The Power of Myth
Prometheus
The myth of Prometheus
The Hero: those who act on the behalf
Give life to something, some idea bigger
The Myth of Prometheus
Zeus gives the task of creating humans to Prometheus and his brother Epimetheus. Epimetheus, whose name means “afterthought,” grants the animal kingdom all the joys of creation—fur, wings, shells, and so on—until there seems to be nothing left for man. He appeals to Prometheus for help.
Prometheus takes over and devises a way to make mankind superior to the animals. First, he gives mankind an upright shape like that of the gods. Then, he travels to the sun, where he lights a torch and brings fire down to the earth. Zeus resents the great advantages that Prometheus has given man, but he cannot undo the gifts. He punishes Prometheus by binding him to a rock and condemning him to a life of “no rest, no sleep, no moment’s respite.”
The Myth of Prometheus
Zeus once received a prophecy that a son of his would one day overthrow him—and that only Prometheus would know that son’s name. Despite threats, Prometheus does not cave in to Zeus’s pressure, instead choosing to endure an eagle’s feasting on his flesh and liver every day.
As further revenge against Prometheus and the powers he has given man, Zeus creates a woman named Pandora. Zeus gives her a box and forbids her from opening it. He sends her down to earth, where her insatiable curiosity leads her to open the lid. Out fly plagues, sorrow, mischief, and all other misfortunes that can plague mankind. Horrified, Pandora attempts to shut the lid of the box, but it is too late. The only good element to fly out of the box is hope.
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A Hero’s Actions
Physical heroic deeds – soldiers in battle
Spiritual heroic deeds – a seeker of truth who then shares it with others
Sacrifices life
The Heroic Cycle
The hero leaves “home”
A pilgrimage
A journey
Returns to disseminate truth to others
The heroic cycle reflected in various initiation rites culturally – rites of passage, puberty
Graduations – something dies, a former self as undergraduate, is then reborn – to matriculate, to give birth to a new life.
We are all heroes
Mythologist Joseph Campbell cites Otto Rank – psychoanalyst – colleague and friend of Freud: “Everyone is a hero in birth.”
Birth a process of huge transformation – both physical and psychological
Born in water, amniotic fluid and emerges as an air breathing mammal
Unconscious vs conscious
The hero can sometimes be not of his or her own choice – accidental – the hero is thrust into the heroic cycle; thrown into a situations which call upon him or her to be heroic. He / she may be ready but did not anticipate the event. Men/ women drafted into the army during war.
Versus more conscious actions of the hero: In The Iliad and the Odyssey: a son is called upon the gods to find his father who is lost and can’t find his way home.
The Quest
The quest of the hero is essential / universal, according to Campbell in all cultures.
The hero leaves the world as he / she knows it,
goes into a depth [ocean: Jonah and the whale] –
or into a distance, or height
to find what is missing in the consciousness of the hero inherited from his / her former world,
makes a decision to stay and leave the former world
or to return home while holding on to what has been learned.
Examples
Moses climbs the mountain to receive the Ten Commandments.
Christ goes into the desert to find God, tempted by he devil, but overcomes him.
Buddha goes on a spiritual pilgrimage, tempted three times – lust, fear, social duty
All a spiritual journey in which there is a new consciousness learned to pass on to the world.
The Hero’s Message
Rejected at first possibly
All preach the same in the myth
“You must lose yourself’ – the ego – give yourself over to a greater force
To be a hero you must die into a new life
Beyond the self there is a deeper and more universal meaning; you must release the ego to find it
The World of the Modern Hero
T.S. Elliot – The Wasteland
Modern life devoid of spiritual life
No mythology
Alienation from essential life experiences
Inauthenticity – no “aura” – Walter Benjamin
Life is mechanistic, formulaic, progress is the machine – The Enlightenment – reason / science, technology have gone wrong and become instrumental and used for not original meanings / purposes.
The essential energy of life that connected man and science is gone.
