The decisive question for man is: Is he related to something infinite or not? That is the telling question of his life. Carl Jung The history of religions reaches down and makes contact with that which is essentially human: the relation of man to the sacred. The history of religions can play an extremely important…
The work of Mircea Eliade brought shamamism into consciousness in the 20th century. This is some of the material from Shamanism: Archaic Techniques of Ecstasy(1964): . The writer who approaches shamanism as a psychologist will be led to regard it as primarily the manifestation of a psyche in crisis or even in retrogression; he will…
Of course, if there is a world tree, there has to be a world serpent… What’s a tree without a snake?…. In Norse mythology, Jörmungandr is the Midgard Serpent that surrounds the world: when he lets go of his tail, the world will end. . Previous posts have talked about Snake symbolism and the Uroboros:…
The last post featured Yggdrasil, the World Tree from Norse Mythology. The idea of a World Tree is found in most cultures and mythology: this seems like a good time in the series to present some images related to the World Tree: (Click on the image to go to the source of the image)
From Northern Antiquities, an English translation of the Prose Edda from 1847. Painted by an Oluf Olufsen Bagge The last posts have been about symbols and stories of climbing into the heavens… This is a theme found in all cultures… In Norse Mythology, Yggdrasil is the immense ash tree that stands at the center of…
(excerpt) After they had lived like this for a few years, it happened one day that a Prince was riding through the wood and passed by the tower. As he drew near it he heard someone singing so sweetly that he stood still spell-bound, and listened. It was Rapunzel in her loneliness trying to while…
The beanstalk grew up quite close past Jack’s window, so all he had to do was to open it and give a jump onto the beanstalk which ran up just like a big ladder. So Jack climbed, and he climbed, and he climbed, and he climbed, and he climbed, and he climbed, and he climbed…
The last two posts have spotlighted the archetypal symbolism of Jacob’s dream; here are more images: Jacob’s Ladder Via Latina Catecombs 4th Century Engraving 1720 Lika Tov SHALOM OF SAFED (1887-1980) Jacob’s Ladder III – Kathleen Anderson – 1995
In reviewing art and dreams from the Bible, the dream of Jacob’s Ladder is overwhelmingly the most popular subject. I find this dream (and the paintings) to be quite archetypal, to be illustrative of what dreams (at their best)can be about — the ladder to the Self.