The Wisdom of the Serpent: The Myths of Death, Rebirth, and Resurrection.

by Joseph Lewis Henderson, Maud Oakes

Overview

The tribal initiation of the shaman, the archetype of the serpent, exemplifies the death of the self and a rebirth into transcendent life. This book traces the images of spiritual initiation in religious rituals and myths of resurrection, poems and epics, cycles of nature, and art and dreaming. It dramatizes the metamorphosis from a common experience of death's inevitability into a transcendent freedom beyond individual limitations.


"This is a classic work in analytical psychology that offers crucial insights on the meaning of death symbolism (and its inevitably accompanying rebirth and resurrection symbolism) as part of the great theme of initiation, of which [Henderson] is the world's foremost psychological interpreter. This material is really the next step after the hero myth that Joseph Campbell has made so popular, and provides an understanding of how not to use the hero myth in an inflated way as a psychology of mastery, but as an attainment progressively to be died beyond. [Henderson] is helped by the presence of Maud Oakes, who is a trained anthropologist with exquisite taste in her choice of mythic materials and respect for their original contexts."--John Beebe

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780691216171
Publisher:	Princeton University Press
Publication date:	07/21/2020
Series:	Mythos: The Princeton/Bollingen Series in World Mythology , #532
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	320
File size:	51 MB
Note:	This product may take a few minutes to download.

Table of Contents

	List of Plates	xi
	List of Line Drawings	xv
	Acknowledgments	xvii
	Introduction
I.	The Fear of Death	3
II.	Death and Rebirth as Cosmic Pattern: The Dance of Shiva	8
III.	Death and Rebirth as Cycles of Nature: The Descent of Inanna	15
IV.	Personal Encounter: The Wisdom of the Serpent	32
V.	Initiation as a Spiritual Education	41
VI.	Initiation as Psychic Liberation: The Magic Flight	60
VII.	Resurrection and Rebirth in the Process of Individuation	66
	Myths of Death, Rebirth, and Resurrection
	Death and Rebirth as Cosmic Pattern	77
	Introduction
	The Dance of Shiva (Hindu 1500 B.C.-1000 B.C.)	78
	Death and Rebirth of the Universe (Hindu)	83
	The Parade of Ants (Hindu)	84
	The Five Suns (Aztec)	88
	The Ragnarok (Icelandic, 13th Century)	90
	The Voluntary Death (Hindu)	94
	Death of the Skeleton Mower (Egyptian)	97
	Death and Rebirth as Cycles of Nature	99
	Introduction
	Inanna's Descent to the Nether World (Sumerian)	100
	The Death and Rebirth of Horus (Egyptian)	107
	The New Year's Festival (Babylonian)	111
	The Tomb of Eye (Egyptian)	114
	Attis (Greek)	116
	Adonis (Greek)	118
	Persephone (Greek)	119
	Lemminkainen, His Destruction and His Restoration to Life (Finnish)	121
	The Retirement and Emergence of the Sun Goddess (Japanese)	127
	Tezcatlipoca's Feast (Aztec)	129
	The Girl Who Was Sacrificed by Her Kin (African)	133
	The Three Snake-Leaves (European)	135
	Initiation as a Spiritual Education	139
	Introduction
	The Malekulan Journey of the Dead (Melanesian)	140
	The Quest of Gilgamesh (Akkadian)	143
	The Hymn of the Robe of Glory (Syrian)	153

Editorial Reviews

The series makes available in paperback many influential studies on world mythology. This is a reprint of the 1963 (Braziller) work in analytical psychology which goes beyond the hero myth popularized by Joseph Campbell. Annotation c. Book News, Inc., Portland, OR (booknews.com)

Booknews