Essays on a Science of Mythology: The Myth of the Divine Child and the Mysteries of Eleusis (Bollingen Series, 22)

293 Pages·1969·9.79 MB·English

by  C. G. Jung

THE BOLLINGEN SERIES XXII
l. HeadofaBow-stretchingEros
ESSAYS
ON A
SCIENCE OF MYTHOLOGY
THE MYTH OF THE DIVINE CHILD
AND THE MYSTERIES OF ELEUSIS
BY C. G.JUNG AND C. KERENYI
TRANSLATED BY R.F. C.HULL
BOLLINGEN SERIES XXII
PANTHEON BOOKS
CONTENTS
PltOLEGOMENA, by C. Ken§nyi
I. Tr-IE PRIl\'1ORDIAL CHILDINPRIMonDIALTIMES,
by C. Kel'blyi 33
1. Child-Gods 35
2. TheOrphanChild 38
3. A VogulGod 42
4· Kullervo 47
5. Narayana 55
6. Apollo 63
7- Hermes 70
8. Zeus 80
....,c). Dionysus 90
II. A. THEPSYCHOLOGYOFTHECHILD-ARCHETYPEi~)
by C.G.lung 95
Introduction 97
1. The Archetype as aCondition of the Past 109
.....2. The Function oftheArchetype 112
..,.3. TheFuturityoftheArchetype 115
-..4. Unity andPIUl'ality ofthe Child-Motif II6
5. Child-Godand Child-Hero 117
E. THESPECIALPHENOMENOLOGYOFTIlE
CHILD-ARCHETYPE 119
I: TheAbandonmentofthe Child 119
2. TheInvincibilityofthe Child 123
3. TheHermaphroditismofthe Child 128
4. TheChildasBeginninganc!End 133
Conclusion 135
\'m_./
KOllE, by C. Kerellyi 139
I. Anadyomenc 142
2. TheParadoxoftheMythologicalIdea 145
3. Maiden-Goddesses 148
4- Hecate 152
5. Demeter 158
6. Persephone 167
7. IndonesianKoxeFigures 179
I:l. The Korc inEleusis 188
9. TheElcusinianParadox 209
IV. Tm:PSYCIIOLOGICALASPECTS OFTHEKouJ',
by C.G.]ung 215
EPILEGOMENA: The MiracleofEleusis, by C. Kere'/lyi 247
INDEX OF AUTHORS 283
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
I. HeadofaBow-stretchingEros
CopyfromthetimeofHadrianofanoriginalpresumably
by Lysippus. Berlin, private owncrship
2. WingedEros
Hellenistic (c. md century, D.C.). Munich, Muscum fur
Antike Kleinkunst. Photo KarlBauer
3. PuttawithDolphin
Roman.Naples, MuscoNazionale
4. ChildwithaLamp, wearingacucullus
Roman. Rome,MuscoNazionale
5. SleepingArnor
Bronze. Venetian, end of 15th century. Vienna, private
ownership
Illustrations 2, 3and 5are taken from the book by Glaser, Ein
hi17lmlischer Kindergarten, with the kind permission of F.
Bruckmann,Publishers,Munich.
PROLEGOMENA
I
BY C. KERENYI
1
W HAT is music? TVhat is poetry? "What is mythol
ogy? All questions which no opinion is pos
011
sible unless one already bas a real fee/iug for these
tbings. That is natural and obvious enough. Not so,
however, our feeling in the case of tbe last wl1Jzed.
Only the greatest creations of mythology prope1'
could hope to make clear to modern man tbat here
he is face to face with a phenomenon which "in
profundity,'permanence, and'universality is comparable
only with Nature herself."1f 'we 'want to promote "a
real lmo'Lvledge of mythology, we must not appeal at
the outset to theoretical comiderations and judge'ments
(not even to Schelling's, from wlJ01ll the quotation hi
praise of mythology comes). Neither sbould 'lve talk
overmuch of "sources." The 'Lvater must be fetched
and drunk fresh from the spring if it is to flo'LV througb
us and quicl(en our hidden mythological taleuts."·
But-here too there's many a slip bet'Lvecll the cup
and the lip. True mythology has become so completely
alien to us that} before tasting of it, 'we 'l.vould do 'l.pel!
to pa1tSe and consider-not only the uses aud dangers
of mythology (the psychologist and physicirm of the
mind will have something to say about this later on),
but also our possible attitude towards it. We have lost
our immediate ff!..eling to! the great realities oi'-J~'~
spirit-;-f1.nd to this 'world all true mythology belong:f.::.Jj
~lo~t it precisely became of our all-too-willing, hefpful,
and efficient science, It explained the drink in the cup
to us so -well that rz»e }.:.new all about it beforehand, far
betterthan tbe good old drinkers; and we were expected
to rest content rwith our }mowing better or even to rate
it higheT than unspoiled experience cmd enjoymen~. We
bave to asl.:. ourselves: is an immediate experience and
cnjoymeut of mythology still in any sense possible?
0
At all events we can no longer dispense with the
freedom from falsehood tbat true science confers upon
us. TVhat 'we demand besides'this freidom, or rather
demand back from science, is just this feeling of im
mediacy bet'L;e~;z ';;'rs;Tves and scientific subjects. Sci
ence herself must throw open the road to mythology
that sbe blocl.:.ed first with ber interpretations a71d then
'with her explanations-science always understood in
the broadest sense, in thls case theh~;'ic.~T~'ifd psy
c!JologTca[as ivelr"q~ the culturarand anthropologiqal
stltdy oJmyths. So, to define the attitude to mytholo&'y
for
fiossibTe "itstoday, we shall begin by recapitulating
'LL'hat 7.vas said in some detail in the first chapter of Die
antike Religion1 and toZtcbed on in the Foreword to the
earlier edition ofDas gottliche Kind in this regard. Tbe
question as to the origins of mythology in the sense
"TVbcre (lnd when did a great myth-creating culture
arisethatmay have influenced all later mythologieswitb
its products?" is not to be discussed here. We shall only
concern ourselves 'with the question: what has my
1Kerenyi. Die IIntike Religion: eine Grundlegung (Amsterdam, 1942).
2
tbology to do with origin or origi1ls?~ftnd here too only
in order to broaden that immediate' approach through
which the reader has to find his own way to mythology.
2
The word"myth" isaltogethertoo equivocal, blunted,
and bazy for our purpose; it does not give us as much
ofctstart as the expressions that combine the 'l.UOTi! I-1;U{fQ£
'with the 'l.vord MyELV, meaning "to put together/' "~'~y."
PJato, himself agreat "teller 01' 'lizyilJ-"s;" teaches usfrom
hl.I'-own experience sornething of th"e vitality and motil
ity of what the Greeks called !-,U&oAoyCa. This is em art
alongside emd included 7.vithin poetry (the t'U.w fields
overlap), an art with a special assumption as regards its
·$ubject-matter. A particular leind of material deteT1Jzines
the art of mythology, em immemorial and tra_ditioJ2al
body of material contained in tales about god}"'~7;dgod~
v -,-- ,,'_ .
lik.~~e~...,_ b_e"i''!f·"2g,s_,..,~,-~..h~e"'.r.......o..._~k,~",,,b.,a~~t,.tPl',e....s. "a·T~n--d.~j~o'u-rneys to the~ ~Un_~d_er-
world"':::"''lllytbologe7n'' is tbe bes'i-Greeli. word for tbe:m
-taTes alr'eady well kn0'7.vn but not una1llenable to fm
ther reshaping. Mythology is the movement of tbjs
material: it is sO'lrtetbingsolid andyet mobile, substantial
J}nd yet not static, qapable of transformation..
The comparison witb music-l sball often have to
recur to it in o1'derto bring out tbisaspect of'IIlytbology
-lies nearest to !Jand. Mytbology as art and -mytbology
as material,are fused in one and tbe same l}beno'lllCnOll~_
just a~ are the art.of the CO'lllpOrer and his material, the
world of sound. The musical work of art sbows 'us the
as
artist a shaper and at tbe seNne time the' 'l.vorld of
so'und as sbape'd. In cases ~vhere the mind of tbe shaper.
is 11o't in'tbe joreground, as in tbe"great mytbologies of
3
the India'llS, the Finns, (f7~d the Oceanic peoples, 'we can
speak with yet greater rigbt of such arelationship, that
is, of art that reveals itself in the shaping and of a
(I'll
7Jlaterial peculiar to it tbert sherpes itself in accordance
with its own laws, together constituting tbe indivisible
unity oj' one Clnd the same pbenomenon.
In mythology the shaping is pictorjgJ_A torrent of
mythological pictures streCi7iis outl Bitt tbe streaming is
at the same time an unfolding: beld fast as the mytbolo
p;ems {[re in the form of sacred traditions, tbey are still
in the '!latztre of 'IVories of art. Various developments tJf
the SCl1Jle grozmd-theme (fre possible side by side or in
succession, jllst Wee tbe variations on a musical theme.
For, althougb whett "streams out" always remains pic
torial in itself~, the comparison with music is still ap
plicable, certainly with definite works of music, i.e.
something objective, that hets become an object with a
voice of its own, that om does justice to not by inter
pretCition and explanation but above all by letting it
alone and allowing it to utter its own meaning. '..'
In atrue 11lythologem this meaning is not something
that could be expressed j'l;;J;as well and j'llst as fully in
a non-mytbological '1.vay. Mytbology is not simply a
mode 0f exp1~essip}!Jn whose stead another simpler and
more readily u1lderstandabie form might have been
cbosen, only not just then, wben it happened to be the
only possible and appropriate one., Like music, mythol·
ogy too can be more appropriate to tbe times or less.
There are times when the greatest "thoughts" could
only ha·ve been expressed in music. But in that case tbe
"greatest,,' precI'sJe y hat can be expressed"zn mUSIC
15 'W
Ilnd in no other way. So '1.vith mythology. Just as music
bas a'l'11eaning that is- satisfying in the sense that every
4