[Back to Nt. 4] Pfeiffer, pp. 221–222. Cf. Campbell, Occidental Mythology, pp. 510–512.
[Back to Nt. 5] Pfeiffer, op. cit, Volume II, "Sermons," p. 89.
[Back to Nt. 6] Cf. Garga Samhita, Canto I, part 3.
[Back to Nt. 7] Cf. The Maha-Bodhi, Journal of the Maha-Bodhi Society, vol. 44, (Calcutta, India: Maha-Bodhi Society of India, 1936), p. 238.
[Back to Nt. 8] Mark 10:8.
[Back to Nt. 9] Mahendra Nath Gupta, The Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna, translated by Swami Nikhilananda, (New York: Ramakrishna-Vivekananda Center, 1942, 1985), p. 384. Campbell participated in the creation of this translation.
[Back to Nt. 10] Bhāgavata Purāṇa, 10.29.
[Back to Nt. 11] Bernard of Clairvaux, Sermones in Canta Canticorum XX.6. Translation by Terence L. Connolly, S. J., Saint Bernard on the Love of God (New York: Spiritual Book Associates, 1936), p. 113.
[Back to Nt. 12] Galatians 5:17.
[Back to Nt. 13] Adolph von Harnack, History of Dogma, Vol. VI, Neu Buchanan, translator (New York: Dover Publications, 1961), pp. 59–67. Cf. Campbell, Creative Mythology, pp. 19–20.
[Back to Nt. 14] Campbell's translation of Meister Eckhart (anonymously), Theologia germanica, Ch. 38.
[Back to Nt. 15] Thomas 77.2–3.
[Back to Nt. 16] Plato, Timaeus, 37c–38c.
[Back to Nt. 17] William Blake, "Proverbs of Hell," The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, l. 10.
[Back to Nt. 18] Campbell's translation of Thomas Mann, "Goethe und Tolstoy," Gesammelte Werke: Reden und Aufsätze, volume I (Berlin: S. Fischer, 1960), p. 178.
[Back to Nt. 19] Campbell's translation of Gottfried von Strassberg, Tristan und Iseult, prolog, ll. 45–67.
[Back to Nt. 20] Matthew 5:43–45.
[Back to Nt. 21] Guiraut de Borneilh, "Tam cum los oills el cor...", from John Rutherford, The Troubadours: Their Loves and Their Lyrics (London: Smith and Elder, 1873; General Books, 2010), pp. 34–35.
[Back to Nt. 22] Gottfried, op. cit., ll. 12495–12502.
[Back to Nt. 23] William Blake, The Marriage of Heaven and Hell (1790–93). “A Memorable Fancy,” plate 14.
Nt. 24 Wolfram von Eschenbach, Parzival XV, l. 740, (Berlin and Leipzig: Karl Lachmann, 1926), pp. 348-349.
[Back to Nt. 25] There is an excellent translation: Helen M. Mustard and Charles E. Passage, Parzival: A Romance of the Middle Ages (New York: Vintage, 1961).
[Back to Nt. 26] I Corinthians 13:7.
[Back to Nt. 27] Matthew 7:1.
[Back to Nt. 28] Heraclitus of Ephesus, as quoted in Scholia Graeca in Homeri Iliadem, ad Λ 4.
[Back to Nt. 29] Nathaniel Hawthorne, “Fancy’s Show Box,” from Twice-Told Tales (New York: Modern Library, 2001), p. 173.
IX - Mythologies of War and Peace
[Back to Nt. 1] From a lecture (L184) with the same title.
[Back to Nt. 2] Oswald Spengler, The Hour of Decision, (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1934) p. 21.
[Back to Nt. 3] Spengler, op. cit, p. 199.
[Back to Nt. 4] Jeff King, Maud Oakes, and Joseph Campbell, Where the Two Came to Their Father: A Navaho War Ceremonial, Bollingen Series I, 2nd ed. (Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1969, 1991).
[Back to Nt. 5] Deuteronomy 7:1–6.
[Back to Nt. 6] Deuteronomy 20:10–18.
[Back to Nt. 7] Deuteronomy 6:10–12.
[Back to Nt. 8] Joshua 6:21, 24.
[Back to Nt. 9] Joshua 8:22, 25.
[Back to Nt. 10] Joshua 10:40.
[Back to Nt. 11] Judges 21.
[Back to Nt. 12] Judges 5.
[Back to Nt. 13] II Kings 22–23.
[Back to Nt. 14] II Kings 25.
[Back to Nt. 15] Isaiah 60:10–14.
[Back to Nt. 16] Campbell is here referring to the so-called "Six-Day War" in 1967, the year of this lecture.
[Back to Nt. 17] Koran 2:216.
[Back to Nt. 18] Koran 17:4–8.
[Back to Nt. 19] Isaiah 45:14–25.
[Back to Nt. 20] Isaiah 45:22.
[Back to Nt. 21] Isaiah 9:6–7.
[Back to Nt. 22] Daniel 7:13–27.
[Back to Nt. 23] Daniel 12:2.
[Back to Nt. 24] Josephus, De Bello Judaico, 1.4.1-6.
[Back to Nt. 25] Matthew 5:43–45.
[Back to Nt. 26] Ibid.
[Back to Nt. 27] Luke 14.
[Back to Nt. 28] Matthew 19:21.
[Back to Nt. 29] Luke 8:22.
[Back to Nt. 30] Thomas 1.113.
[Back to Nt. 31] Matthew 26:47–52.
[Back to Nt. 32] John 18:10.
[Back to Nt. 33] Lao-tse, Laozu’s Tao and Wu Wei, translated by Dwight Goddard. New York: Brentano's, 1919. Stanzas 30, 31.
[Back to Nt. 34] Sun Tzu, The Art of War, translated by Samuel B. Griffith. (New York: Oxford University Press, 1963), I.1–9.
[Back to Nt. 35] The Book of the Lord Shang: A Classic of the Chinese School of Law, translated by J. J. L. Duyvendak. (London: A. Probsthain, 1928), I.8 , 10–12.
[Back to Nt. 36] Goddard, op.cit.
[Back to Nt. 37] Bhagavad Gītā 2.27, 30, 23.
[Back to Nt. 38] Ibid. 2.31-32.
X - Schizophrenia—The Inward Journey
[Back to Nt. 1] From a lecture (L308) with the same title. It was released as pt. 2 of The Inward Journey: East and West, series I, vol. 2 of The Joseph Campbell Audio Collection.
[Back to Nt. 2] Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, Vol. 96, Article 3, pp. 853-876, January 27, 1962.
[Back to Nt. 3] Campbell, The Hero with a Thousand Faces, p. 23.
[Back to Nt. 4] The collaboration (L227–228) between Campbell and Dr. Perry, entitled "Psychosis and the Hero's Journey," took place at the Esalen Institute in 1968.
[Back to Nt. 5] Julian Silverman, “Shamans and Acute Schizophrenia,” American Anthropologist, Vol. 69, No. 1, February 1967.
[Back to Nt. 6] Cf. Campbell, Primitive Mythology, Chapters 6 and 8.
[Back to Nt. 7] Knud Rasmussen, Across Arctic America (New York and London: G. P. Putnam's Sons, 1927; University of Alaska, 1999), pp. 82-86; and H. Osterman, The Alaskan Eskimos, as Described in the Posthumous Notes of Dr. Knud Rasmussen. Report of the Fifth Thule Expedition 1921-24. Vol. X, No. 3 (Copenhagen: Nordisk Forlag, 1952), pp. 97-99.
[Back to Nt. 8] Bhagavad Gītā II:20.
[Back to Nt. 9] Bhagavad Gītā II:58.
[Back to Nt. 10] R. D. Laing, "A Ten-Day Voyage," The Politics of Experience (New York: Pantheon Books, 1967, 1983), ch. 7.
[Back to Nt. 11] Alfred Nutt, The Voyage of Bran, Son of Febal to the Land of the Living, Vol. II, translation by Kuno Meyer, (London: David Nott in the Strand, 1897; Cornell University Press, 2009), pp. 91–92.
[Back to Nt. 12] Translation by Arthur W. Ryder, The Panchatantra (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1925; Delhi, India: Jaico Publishing House, 2005), pp. 434-441.
[Back to Nt. 13] Jung, Psychiatric Studies, Collected Works, Vol. I (Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1957), pp. 3-92.
[Back to Nt. 14] Revelations 21:1–4, 22:1–2.
XI - The Moon Walk—The Outward Journey
[Back to Nt. 1] From a lecture (L306) with the same title.
[Back to Nt. 2] Dante Alighieri, The Divine Comedy: Paradiso, Canto II, ll. 1–15.
[Back to Nt. 3] Robinson Jeffers, "Roan Stallion," Roan Stallion, Tamar, and Other Poems , p. 20.
[Back to Nt. 4] John 12:24–25.
[Back to Nt. 5] John 15:4–5.
[Back to Nt. 6] Alan Watts, "Western Mythology: Its Dissolution and Transformation," in Joseph Campbell, ed., Myths, Dreams, and Religion (New York: E. P. Dutton and Co, 1970; New York: MJF Books, 2000), p. 20.
[Back to Nt. 7] Jeffers, loc. cit.
[Back to Nt. 8] Erwin Schrôdinger, My View of the World, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1964), p. 95.
Envoy - No More Horizons
[Back to Nt. 1] From a lecture (L332) with the same title. Two lectures on similar themes (L46
& L535) were combined and released as pt. 4 of The Mythology and the Individual, vol. 1 of The Joseph Campbell Audio Collection.
[Back to Nt. 2] Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass, Version of the First (1855) Edition, section 48, ll. 1262–1280, edited with an Introduction by Malcolm Cowley (New York: The Viking Press, 1961), pp. 82–83.
[Back to Nt. 3] Bṛhadāranyaka Upaniṣad 1.4.6–10, abridged.
[Back to Nt. 4] The Papyrus of Nebensi, British Museum #9,900, sheets 23, 24. From E. A. Wallis Budge, The Book of the Dead: The Chapters of the Coming by Day (London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trûbner and Co., 1896), pp. 112–113.
[Back to Nt. 5] Thomas, 99:28–30, 95:24–28.
[Back to Nt. 6] Whitman, op. cit., Section 52, ll. 1329–1330; p. 86.
[Back to Nt. 7] H. Heras, S.J, “The Problem of Ganapati,” Tamil Culture, Vol. III, No. 2 (Tuticorn, April 1954). For more on Campbell's meeting with Father Heras, cf. Campbell, Baksheesh and Brahman, p. 121.
[Back to Nt. 8] William Blake, loc. cit.
[Back to Nt. 9] Thomas Merton, "Symbolism: Communication or Communion?" in New Directions 20 (New York: New Directions, 1968), pp. 11–12.
[Back to Nt. 10] Ibid., pp. 1 and 2.
[Back to Nt. 11] Ibid., pp. 1 and 11.
[Back to Nt. 12] [In the original edition of this book, Campbell cited Grof's unpublished manuscript, Agony and Ecstasy in Psychiatric Treatment; this work was never published, but became the basis for five later volumes of Grof's work. Cf. Stanislas Grof, When the Impossible Happens: Adventures in Non-Ordinary Reality (Boulder, Colorado: Sounds True, 2006), p. 285.]
[Back to Nt. 13] Aldous Huxley, The Doors of Perception (New York: Harper & Row, 1954; ), p. 54.
[Back to Nt. 14] Grof, op. cit.
[Back to Nt. 15] Matthew 27:46.
[Back to Nt. 16] Ecclesiastes 1:2.
[Back to Nt. 17] Huxley, op. cit., pp. 22–24.
[Back to Nt. 18] Cf. Benjamin Jowett, translator, The Works of Plato, Vol. IV (New York: Cosimo Books, 2010), p. 377.
[Back to Nt. 19] Hermes Trismegistus (attributed), Le Livre des XXIV Philosophes, Françoise Hudry, ed., (Paris: Jérôme Millon, 1989), p. 152: Deus est sphaera infinita cuius centrum est ubique, circumferentia nusquam.
About Joseph Campbell
Over one hundred years ago, on March 26th in 1904, Joseph John Campbell was born in White Plains, NY. Joe, as he came to be known, was the first child of a middle-class, Roman Catholic couple, Charles and Josephine Campbell.
Joe's earliest years were largely unremarkable; but then, when he was seven years old, his father took him and his younger brother, Charlie, to see Buffalo Bill's Wild West show. The evening was a high-point in Joe's life; for, although the cowboys were clearly the show's stars, as Joe would later write, he "became fascinated, seized, obsessed, by the figure of a naked American Indian with his ear to the ground, a bow and arrow in his hand, and a look of special knowledge in his eyes.”
It was Arthur Schopenhauer, the philosopher whose writings would later greatly influence Campbell, who observed that
…the experiences and illuminations of childhood and early youth become in later life the types, standards and patterns of all subsequent knowledge and experience, or as it were, the categories according to which all later things are classified—not always consciously, however. And so it is that in our childhood years the foundation is laid of our later view of the world, and there with as well of its superficiality or depth: it will be in later years unfolded and fulfilled, not essentially changed.
And so it was with young Joseph Campbell. Even as he actively practiced (until well into his twenties) the faith of his forbears, he became consumed with Native American culture; and his worldview was arguably shaped by the dynamic tension between these two mythological perspectives. On the one hand, he was immersed in the rituals, symbols, and rich traditions of his Irish Catholic heritage; on the other, he was obsessed with primitive (or, as he later preferred, "primal") people's direct experience of what he came to describe as "the continuously created dynamic display of an absolutely transcendent, yet universally immanent, mysterium tremendum et fascinans, which is the ground at once of the whole spectacle and of oneself." (Historical Atlas of World Mythology, I.1, p. 8)
By the age of ten, Joe had read every book on American Indians in the children's section of his local library and was admitted to the adult stacks, where he eventually read the entire multi-volume Reports of the Bureau of American Ethnology. He worked on wampum belts, started his own "tribe" (named the "Lenni-Lenape" after the Delaware tribe who had originally inhabited the New York metropolitan area), and frequented the American Museum of Natural History, where he became fascinated with totem poles and masks, thus beginning a lifelong exploration of that museum's vast collection.
After spending much of his thirteenth year recuperating from a respiratory illness, Joe briefly attended Iona, a private school in Westchester NY, before his mother enrolled him at Canterbury, a Catholic residential school in New Milford CT. His high school years were rich and rewarding, though marked by a major tragedy: in 1919, the Campbell home was consumed by a fire that killed his grandmother and destroyed all of the family's possessions.
Joe graduated from Canterbury in 1921, and the following September, entered Dartmouth College; but he was soon disillusioned with the social scene and disappointed by a lack of academic rigor, so he transferred to Columbia University, where he excelled: while specializing in medieval literature, he played in a jazz band, and became a star runner. In 1924, while on a steamship journey to Europe with his family, Joe met and befriended Jiddu Krishnamurti, the young messiah-elect of the Theosophical Society, thus beginning a friendship that would be renewed intermittently over the next five years.
After earning a B.A. from Columbia (1925), and receiving an M.A. (1927) for his work in Arthurian Studies, Joe was awarded a Proudfit Traveling Fellowship to continue his studies at the University of Paris (1927-28). Then, after he had received and rejected an offer to teach at his high school alma mater, his Fellowship was renewed, and he traveled to Germany to resume his studies at the University of Munich (1928-29).
It was during this period in Europe that Joe was first exposed to those modernist masters—notably, the sculptor Antoine Bourdelle, Pablo Picasso and Paul Klee, James Joyce and Thomas Mann, Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung—whose art and insights would greatly influence his own work. These encounters would eventually lead him to theorize that all myths are the creative products of the human psyche, that artists are a culture's mythmakers, and that mythologies are creative manifestations of humankind's universal need to explain psychological, social, cosmological, and spiritual realities.
When Joe returned from Europe late in August of 1929, he was at a crossroad, unable to decide what to do with his life. With the onset of the Great Depression, he found himself with no hope of obtaining a teaching job; and so he spent most of the next two years reconnecting with his family, reading, renewing old acquaintances, and writing copious entries in his journal. Then, late in 1931, after exploring and rejecting the possibility of a doctoral program or teaching job at Columbia, he decided, like countless young men before and since, to "hit the road," to undertake a cross-country journey in which he hoped to experience "the soul of America" and, in the process, perhaps discover the purpose of his life. In January of 1932, when he was leaving Los Angeles, where he had been studying Russian in order to read War and Peace in the vernacular, he pondered his future in this journal entry:
I begin to think that I have a genius for working like an ox over totally irrelevant subjects. … I am filled with an excruciating sense of never having gotten anywhere—but when I sit down and try to discover where it is I want to get, I'm at a loss. … The thought of growing into a professor gives me the creeps. A lifetime to be spent trying to kid myself and my pupils into believing that the thing that we are looking for is in books! I don't know where it is—but I feel just now pretty sure that it isn't in books. — It i
sn't in travel. — It isn't in California. — It isn't in New York. … Where is it? And what is it, after all?
Thus one real result of my Los Angeles stay was the elimination of Anthropology from the running. I suddenly realized that all of my primitive and American Indian excitement might easily be incorporated in a literary career. — I am convinced now that no field but that of English literature would have permitted me the almost unlimited roaming about from this to that which I have been enjoying. A science would buckle me down—and would probably yield no more important fruit than literature may yield me! — If I want to justify my existence, and continue to be obsessed with the notion that I've got to do something for humanity — well, teaching ought to quell that obsession — and if I can ever get around to an intelligent view of matters, intelligent criticism of contemporary values ought to be useful to the world. This gets back again to Krishna's dictum: “ The best way to help mankind is through the perfection of yourself.”
His travels next carried him north to San Francisco, then back south to Pacific Grove, where he spent the better part of a year in the company of Carol and John Steinbeck and marine biologist Ed Ricketts. During this time, he wrestled with his writing, discovered the poems of Robinson Jeffers, first read Oswald Spengler's Decline of the West, and wrote to some seventy colleges and universities in an unsuccessful attempt to secure employment. Finally, he was offered a teaching position at the Canterbury School. He returned to the East Coast, where he endured an unhappy year as a Canterbury housemaster, the one bright moment being when he sold his first short story ("Strictly Platonic") to Liberty magazine. Then, in 1933, he moved to a cottage without running water on Maverick Road in Woodstock NY, where he spent a year reading and writing. In 1934, he was offered and accepted a position in the literature department at Sarah Lawrence College, a post he would retain for thirty-eight years.
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