Lecture I.1.1 - The Celebration of Life

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noman
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Post by noman »

I feel I know what the crucifixion of Christ represents. And I know what a pilgrimage to Mecca represents. The meaning of the ritual of the Burning Man Festival is officially and intentionally left undeclared.


Many years ago, I heard about the Burning Man Festival on NPR. It was described generally and then the ritual for which the Festival is named was described. The journalist said, ‘the wooden man represents…’ - but then didn’t finish the sentence. It was sort of a ‘who knows’ type of answer. Since then I’ve been thinking about what the Burning Man might represent.


But now I know, even if the organizers don’t or won’t admit it.


The most annoying thing to me about Hippyism or New Age or whatever you wish to call it that came out of the late sixties is the part of the philosophy that declares anything that is established, or large, or successful, or all three, is necessarily evil. And anything that is new and different and not established, is necessarily good. And that is the only criteria that was used. Nothing else mattered. But this is from a political point of view. I looked at the Burning Man and thought in terms of politics; that the burning man represents the establishment. But then I had to wonder what kind of world these people want. A world without clothes? A world where everyone uses psychedelics? A world where non-conformity is conformity?


No, no, no. I was looking at this all wrong. This is a religious festival. Not a political statement. And what is being celebrated is something ‘beyond good and evil’ as Nietzsche would put it. Much like celebrating Shiva as creator and destroyer of worlds. Or Purusha, in the creation story of the Rig Veda, as both the sacrificer and sacrificee who in this dual activity becomes our universe. A forest grows, declares LittleWing, “from a reality so different as seeds and destructive/lifegiving fire.”


In this sense, the burning man doesn’t represent anything specifically as orthodox or established – but rather orthodoxy itself. This is why the burning man is always the same; replica of a giant man and not the replica of a giant woman, a giant coyote, or a giant SUV, even though the rest of the creative effort will change from year to year. But the festival as a whole celebrates the entire circle of which LittleWing speaks, the ouroboros; both creation, the life of our existence, and its destruction and death. It says ‘yes’ to the cycle. Any value judgments beyond this are irrelevant.

You don’t need to send a memo out, but you could direct people to this website. 8)

- NoMan
Last edited by noman on Thu Mar 19, 2009 6:40 pm, edited 2 times in total.

bodhibliss
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Post by bodhibliss »

Hey There Noman,

I'm sorry - I see what you're getting at.

I like your interpretation of what the Burning Man represents - that the effigy itself actually represents orthodoxy. I only did a quick scan of your post while working on other projects, and first thought you were saying the burning is itself an orthodox act .

Your analysis is thoughtful and thorough - certainly as valid as any presented by those who have participated over the years - which range from the idea the Burning Man represents consumer culture, to the belief the figure is congruent with the wicker effigies burned in ancient Celtic rites that Sir James Frazer documents in the Golden Bough (the correspondence with wicker effigies first clearly noted by a participant at the 1988 event, though Larry David claims that was not what was in his mind when he created the event).

However the hippie connection is a bit of a stretch - calling someone a hippie at Burning Man might be considered fighting words. Burning Man organizers, and especially founder Larry David, scoff at the label (one supplied, no surprise, by the media), often going to great lengths to point out the many differences (many in the media assume a naked person covered with multi-colored polka dots at Burning Man must be a hippie; on the other hand, a naked person covered with multi-colored polka dots at the Khumba Mela in India - largest religious gathering in the world - is thought a Hindu, not a hippie, by the media - even if the same person).

And most Burning Man participants I've met look on hippies with disdain or as the butt of a joke - quite the opposite of Rainbow Gatherings, which, like the Khumba Mela, have elements in common with Burning Man - but Rainbow has its origin in hippie culture, not in the art world.

I have a different take on the ritual, but would agree that, best as I can tell, there is powerful religious aspect to Burning Man (which is first and foremost a gathering of artists).

The artists who attend bring gifts - creations and installations designed specifically for Burning Man, usually created or assembled on site. The overwhelming majority of those I know who attend (I have yet to go - can't get past the price tag, nor the fact it unfolds on the desert playa in the hottest part of the summer) have the same attitude as the Gyoto monks of Tibetan Buddhism (whom Campbell mentions in Power of Myth)

The Gyoto monks create elaborate, artistic images out of colored grains of sand - an intricate, colorful detailed mandala, often patterned on a Bodhisattva or other male figure. The creation of this figure is the focus of a multi-day event - at the end of which, the exquisite, often quite large figure is destroyed, swept away.

Similarly, all the elaborate artistic creations, which have always been the whole point of Burning Man - particular the large, elaborate effigy itself - are destroyed ... like the sand painting of the Gyoto monks, a unique creation existing but a moment in the field of temporality, then gone forever.

(You could claim a hippie connection here - in the late eighties the Grateful Dead spent vast sums with no return on their money to bring the Gyoto monks to the U.S., funding a multi-city tour, and paying for a documentary that filmed the creation and destruction of a mandala; the Dead and the Gyoto monks acknowledged a powerful resonance between their respective creative acts).

This motif rings true for me - as does your suggestion that the effigy represents the orthodox establishment, or the belief it is a re-emergence of an ancient pagan rite. It is all of these things and more - whatever the participants project into it.

The overarching theme, though, is that the effigy and the many many installations and objects at the event are works of art (and, indeed, most of the creators and performers at Burning Man are professional artists, not hippies).

Larry David and company aren't withholding the true, secret meaning of the burning effigy, any more than an artist is withholding the true, secret meaning of her or his work of art when someone asks what it means. As Joseph Campbell points out, that's an insult to an artist ("if he doesn't respect you, he'll tell you what it means").

Art, like life, doesn't have a meaning - it's something to be experienced, not defined. If one listens to a Brahms concerto and asks what it represents, or looks at Van Gogh's Starry Nights and asks what it represents, or witnesses the burning of the effigy and asks what it represents, one has, in Campbell's words, missed out on the experience.

Of course, it takes experiencing it to "get it" (much the way Campbell's early prejudices about hippie culture evaporated once he attended a Grateful Dead event and "got it").

I believe tickets to BM are on sale now ...

littlewing
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Post by littlewing »

As are tickets to the Grateful Dead Summer Tour :lol:

Thanks so much, noman, for this wonderful flash of recognition for Who the Burning Man is. Now you say it, how obvious! And of course, the artists lead the way (no wonder so many artists are attracted to this festival) as it is pointed out on this website how important artists are to leading us into a New Myth. The burning of all current orthodoxy.... I don't take this as orthodoxy, bad; heresy, good. I take it as we've surely outgrown our current flat earth orthodoxies. As Joe pointed out , we are in need of one that reflects a modern view of humans/earth/universe.

noman:
The most annoying thing to me about Hippyism or New Age or whatever you wish to call it that came out of the late sixties is the part of the philosophy that declares anything that is established, or large, or successful, or all three, is necessarily evil. And anything that is new and different and not established, is necessarily good.
I have sadness at the intensity of revulsion I feel this was written with. Yeah, we weren't going to listen to anyone over 30! Now at post 60, what a laugh/tear that gives me. This wasn't the cry of the movement, really. There were quite a few leaders over 30 within the multimovement we lump as hippies. The out-with-the-old and embrace-whatever's-new attitude was simply: Childish. What can one expect from a movement of 90% children? It was a heresy that enveloped a number of high ideal dreams; some worked and some didn't. But rather than defend it, I would ask compassion for the faults and failings of a large bunch of teenagers/twentysomethings. It is by our faults we are human... even lovable.

Among the life philosphies that touch my heart and guide my life is the wonderful and succinct philosophy of The Dead. The bandmembers pointed out after Jerry died that they are really The Band; we who love and follow this bit of happiness and philosophy around the nation dancing to it, are The Dead. And we are grateful.

lw

What do you want me to do, to do for you to see you through?
this is all a dream we dreamed one afternoon long ago.--Box of Rain by Robert Hunter

jonsjourney
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Post by jonsjourney »

The Gyoto monks create elaborate, artistic images out of colored grains of sand - an intricate, colorful detailed mandala, often patterned on a Bodhisattva or other male figure. The creation of this figure is the focus of a multi-day event - at the end of which, the exquisite, often quite large figure is destroyed, swept away.

Similarly, all the elaborate artistic creations, which have always been the whole point of Burning Man - particular the large, elaborate effigy itself - are destroyed ... like the sand painting of the Gyoto monks, a unique creation existing but a moment in the field of temporality, then gone forever. -BB
This got me to thinking about 'right way' vs 'wrong way' viewpoints. I wonder if the sand painting of a Buddhist Monk or Native American have equal value with a Picasso or a DaVinci.

I am not one to assign this type of 'value' judgment, but does our society do this? We build multi-million dollar museums to house the 'master works', no? I tend to like the idea of art as temporary...as serving a moment. As a musician who now only participates in 'jam sessions' that have no predetermined structure, I appreciate the emotion of the now. I don't think that art can really be defined, I just know what I respond to. But I had a discussion with a friend the other day about this...

Can we say that one bit of artistic expression has value over another? (Jackson Pollock vs Picasso) Does the master work have a greater 'value' in its preservation for the appreciation of future generations? Is it still relevant (like an old belief system)? Or is the pure expression of this transitory moment in time of 'greater value'? The lesson from the sand painting is impermanence. Life continues with or without our contribution to it, but we can participate in creation...with the understanding that, in the end, it is shadows and dust.
"He was a dreamer, a thinker, a speculative philosopher... or, as his wife would have it, an idiot." -Douglas Adams

Ercan Arisoy
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Post by Ercan Arisoy »

This got me to thinking about 'right way' vs 'wrong way' viewpoints. I wonder if the sand painting of a Buddhist Monk or Native American have equal value with a Picasso or a DaVinci.
Why not if they represent a truly elite experience?
If they're really more than part of a setting for a ritual?
In the West we also value the permanence of an artistic work.
Because we value time and history.

In Eastern thinking, people sometimes tend to ignore time and history in
Western sense because they relate them with even more pain.

But maybe Gyoto monk's an actor -not a painter?
Mandalas are swept away but the play (the ritual) persists?

Picasso's case is different.
I know people spending hours watching a painting.
If El Guernica's can still reflect cosmic energies that Picasso channeled
very long years ago, if his elite experience can be more or less
accurately transmitted to others, it should deserve being kept in a museum as a
tangible myth frozen in time as colors and shapes, ready to
generate again and again an elite experience that needn't to be
identical with the original experience of its painter.
Here we're not interested in what happened in Picasso's studio while
he made El Guernica.
What matters here is the painting/sculpture/visual art itself that became a medium
of its own reflecting certain cosmic energies in a particular way.

Leonardo Da Vinci (and Renaissance in general) was seeking a sacred geometry
in the sense the artists of Ancient Egypt would work or the way Rupert Sheldrake
discussed the form -as a means to better reflect certain type of energies (whatever it means; presently we don't have much alternative in English language to describe those things that are not matter and we tend to assume that they're energies as if anything that's not matter can be called an energy with no other specification). What they
did had a dimension of engineering as well. I believe that this is a typically
Western approach (equally seen in Buddhist architecture or sculpture of Southern
Asia so,I call it a Western approach only to make a distinction).

I think the idea of time, history and mystery are together in Western art.
To have a history is a painful experience but also implies a responsible attitude.
For instance, visiting Berliner Dom is an extremely painful experience.
From Paris to Rome, from Berlin to London, all capitals of Europe are full of this
sense of individuation.
Last edited by Ercan Arisoy on Fri Mar 20, 2009 5:08 pm, edited 20 times in total.

bodhibliss
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Post by bodhibliss »

On one hand, yes we value permanence

... but on the other hand, all works of art are impermanent - given enough time, all will be dust in the wind - a point Campbell makes about the Gyoto monks' mandalas ...

Ercan Arisoy
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Post by Ercan Arisoy »

bodhibliss wrote:On one hand, yes we value permanence

... but on the other hand, all works of art are impermanent - given enough time, all will be dust in the wind - a point Campbell makes about the Gyoto monks' mandalas ...
True, time's also very relative.
If only we could experience that 4th dimension :)
The light in me honors the light in you.
Last edited by Ercan Arisoy on Thu Mar 19, 2009 11:12 pm, edited 1 time in total.

noman
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Post by noman »

The most annoying thing to me about Hippyism or New Age or whatever you wish to call it that came out of the late sixties is the part of the philosophy that declares anything that is established, or large, or successful, or all three, is necessarily evil. And anything that is new and different and not established, is necessarily good.

- NoMan


* * * * * * *

I have sadness at the intensity of revulsion I feel this was written with. Yeah, we weren't going to listen to anyone over 30! Now at post 60, what a laugh/tear that gives me. This wasn't the cry of the movement, really. There were quite a few leaders over 30 within the multimovement we lump as hippies. The out-with-the-old and embrace-whatever's-new attitude was simply: Childish. What can one expect from a movement of 90% children? It was a heresy that enveloped a number of high ideal dreams; some worked and some didn't. But rather than defend it, I would ask compassion for the faults and failings of a large bunch of teenagers/twentysomethings. It is by our faults we are human... even lovable.

- Littlewing
No need to be sad LittleWing. [violins begin playing in the background] Perhaps a little revulsion is good for the soul. Perhaps it was good for the souls of the millions who embraced the counter-culture movement and hated the establishment. Perhaps it was good for the millions of people who responded with a backlash, hated the liberals, and worshiped Reagan, and later Rush Limbaugh. Perhaps a little revulsion was good for the soul of Joseph Campbell when he told Michael Toms in an interview, “I was terribly disgusted with the sixties. I was glad to get out. I never thought I’d be happy to retire from teaching but I didn’t like what was going on.”

I don’t need to go into what I’ve ranted and raved about before in this forum. But I don’t mind mentioning it because I believe it has everything to do with our mythology, the loss of mythology, Campbell’s ideas about how to deal it, and why he said that heresy is the life, and orthodoxy the death of a mythology.

It also has a great deal to do with Campbell’s theories of art and the creative life. Being ‘childish’ is what art is all about. But it’s a certain type of controlled childishness. I’ve always thought of the artist as a person who matures to become a child. The problem occurred in the sixties when childishness was applied to politics and art inseparably, and taken seriously by a great many people. This is why Campbell so vehemently preached against the didactic in art. Art, true art, does not take sides in a culture war. Nor should it matter in evaluating a work of art whether it came from a DWEM, an oriental, or someone from a terribly oppressed class.

I feel as though I know why Campbell showed up at a Grateful Dead concert and became associated with this part of our culture. In POM he talks about looking for and finding a Guru on his travels in India. The first question he asks the Guru is how is it possible to say ‘yes’ to all the things in life that are repulsive. The Guru replies, “For you and me, we must say ‘yes’.”

The ultimate goal of my enquiry into the culture wars is to say ‘yes’ to both sides. But, as is probably obvious, I’m a long, long way from beholding that Holy Grail. [violins stop]


- NoMan

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Post by Clemsy »

I feel as though I know why Campbell showed up at a Grateful Dead concert and became associated with this part of our culture. In POM he talks about looking for and finding a Guru on his travels in India. The first question he asks the Guru is how is it possible to say ‘yes’ to all the things in life that are repulsive. The Guru replies, “For you and me, we must say ‘yes’.”
Noman... no way I'm getting into this with you again, but if you're saying that Campbell's involvement with the Dead was because he was saying yes to something repulsive then, then, then...

....I have to say that may be the most absurd thing I ever read. I may never read anything more absurd.

I wonder if he also said yes in such a manner to pornography? Is that something to do on a Saturday night? Find something repulsive and acknowledge its reality in the world by taking a taste of it? Is that what Sri Krishna Menon meant?

Hmmm. Weekend's coming up. I don't know... may be a toss up between going on a good rape and pillage or getting addicted to heroin.

I know! I'll listen to Rush Limbaugh! I'll give him a call and ask him if he wants to hang out a pop a few oxycodones!

Nah. I'd rather poke myself in the eye with a rusty nail. That's less repulsive.

:roll:
Last edited by Clemsy on Thu Mar 19, 2009 10:35 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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noman
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Post by noman »

More on Burning Man
And most Burning Man participants I've met look on hippies with disdain or as the butt of a joke - quite the opposite of Rainbow Gatherings, which, like the Khumba Mela, have elements in common with Burning Man - but Rainbow has its origin in hippie culture, not in the art world.

- Bodhi
Yes, in the little web surf I did I could see that the organizers don’t appreciate the media/masses associating Burning Man with hippie culture. It’s not a retro-Woodstock. It’s not a replay of a hippy drug fest. Nor is it a political statement as far as I can tell. There are no statements declared on how to save the world.

On the other hand there is this continuum of the counter-culture that seems to radiate from the San Francisco Bay area. And I don’t quite know how to think of hippie culture as separate from the art world. True, not all artists are hippies. But I have trouble imagining a hippie that doesn’t think of his or her self as some kind of artist. But this question seems academic – at least to my interest in the BMF.

Campbell did say that art shouldn’t be questioned for meaning. For some reason that advice seems sound for certain types of art. You don’t have to ask what a piano concerto means. But then a great deal of Campbell’s work is about interpreting and explaining myths, rituals, and works of art. For example, in talking about the first chapter of Joyce’s Ulysses Campbell explains that the three eggs in the frying pan represent three divine substances, the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, the homoousia, in the Catholic trinity. In POM Campbell gives his interpretation of the meaning of the virgin birth motif that is found in so many mythologies. When talking about the artwork on the Petroasa bowl he explains that a pine cone represents the potential of a human spirit in the Elysian mystery cults.

Often, in a great work of art, such as a Shakespearian play, the artist leaves room for people to squabble over. This can help engage a person, draw them into the work - and also it provides humanity professors with something to do.

Of course, there is such thing as finding meaning or interpretation where there is none. This could be called the ‘Walrus is Paul’ fallacy for anyone about my age. I’ve been accused of the ‘Walrus if Paul’ fallacy before. Looking too hard, and being too confident in my interpretations.

But it’s all in fun.

- NoMan

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Post by jonsjourney »

I know! I'll listen to Rush Limbaugh! I'll give him a call and ask him if he wants to hang out a pop a few oxycodones!

Nah. I'd rather poke myself in the eye with a rusty nail. That's less repulsive.
Wasn't he the guy who said all drug offenders should be sent to prison? Nah...couldn't be.
"He was a dreamer, a thinker, a speculative philosopher... or, as his wife would have it, an idiot." -Douglas Adams

noman
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Post by noman »

LOL

I respect your opinion Clemsy. But it’s no more absurd then imagining a scholar in his 70s and 80s, after a lifetime of listening to Wagner, after a lifetime of reading Goethe and Joyce, after a lifetime of study, finding his joy with the sound of the Dead, his inspiration with the lyrics of the Dead, or his bliss in sharing chemically laced fruit with the Dead. There’s something absurd about that. And really quite funny.

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Post by bodhibliss »

Odd that you would suggest Campbell shared chemically laced fruit with the Dead, Noman. The falsity of that statement suggests either you are intentionally misrepresenting the truth (which I have trouble swallowing), or are so attached to stereotypes that you believe your projections regardless of reality (which would be difficult not to extrapolate out to other statements), or are making a very clumsy attempt at humor.

I prefer to believe it's the latter - but that's not clear from your context, and to leave that statement unchallenged might lead those visiting this site for the first time to believe it's true.

So, for the record, Joseph Campbell's only experience with mind-altering substances, apart from alcohol, occurred in his early teens, when illness forced him to miss most of the school year - at the worst of it, he was prescribed morphine.

I guess it is absurd imagining someone who has listened to Wagner and studied Goethe and Joyce finding joy in the sound and lyrics of the Dead - at least it is for those who project their own imagination onto what they believe the live Grateful Dead experience must have been like (usually informed by media representations and the fact that the Dead rarely sounded good in the recording studio)

... but for those who listen to Wagner and studied Goethe and Joyce and attended Dead shows, there's no surprise at all. (Heck, bassist Phil Lesh was trained as a classical musician; Jerry Garcia, drummer Mickey Hart, and Lesh were in particular influenced by Joyce; lyricist Robert Hunter immersed himself in translating Rilke and Goethe from the German.)

And then Joseph Campbell, who collaborated on a never finished opera with the avante-garde John Cage (even more "out there" than the Dead), was part of the Greenwich Village art scene for decades. Joe felt most comfortable around artists, considered artists his primary audience, and was an acknowledged authority on the subject.

By the time Campbell attended his first Grateful Dead event, he knew the boys well enough to know that they were passionate about their art, but I do think he was surprised at their mastery and the transcendent quality of their work. (I' have to admit he was there on one of their good nights - that was one of the nights I felt the vibrations ... though I probably was enjoying some chemically-laced fruit).

Campbell had a wider firsthand experience of art, whether painting, sculpture, writing, or performance, than anyone I've met (and I spend much time these days working with artists and musicians), so it's no surprise to me he not only enjoyed the experience, but remained enthusiastic about it.

I've recently heard bootleg recordings of Mickey Hart and Jerry Garcia performing before their panel discussion with Joe at the Palace of Fine Arts later the same year (with an incredible female vocalist); that performance - "The Holy Ghost Meets the African Queen" - moves between symphonic and shamanistic, with the same haunting, ethereal qualities as a Gregorian chant followed by the powerful rhythms one would expect at a primal initiation rite. I found myself taken in imagination to a Haiti voodoun ritual that melted into a high mass

... which is intense and powerful no matter who the performers.

If it had that effect on, me listening to a scratched cassette tape of indeterminate age years later (no chemically-laced fruit this time round), I can imagine the mythic imagery it evoked for Joe, sitting right there amid the musicians as they performed, immediately following Joe's lecture and right before they opened the floor to questions.

However, once we form an image in our heads, that's often all we expect to find - so never any need to look further.

Yes, Joe was repulsed by his image of the hippies in the sixties, and there were plenty of hooks (especially in the popular image) to catch those projections. Joseph Campbell was flawed like everyone else - but what impresses me is his willingness to face his own shortcomings, grow beyond his projections, especially those formed decades before.

I am reminded of one of Campbell's favorite tales that speaks to the roadblocks that get in the way of celebrating life. This is the Japanese version:
Two Zen monks, Tanzan and Ekido, traveling on pilgrimage, came to a muddy river crossing. There they saw a lovely young woman dressed in her kimono and finery, obviously not knowing how to cross the river without ruining her clothes.

Without further ado, Tanzan graciously picked her up, held her close to him, and carried her across the muddy river, placing her onto the dry ground. Then he and Ekido continued on their way. Hours later they found themselves at a lodging temple.

And here Ekido could no longer restrain himself and gushed forth his complaints: “Surely, it is against the rules what you did back there…. Touching a woman is simply not allowed…. How could you have done that? … And to have such close contact with her! … This is a violation of all monastic protocol…” Thus he went on with his verbiage. Tanzan listened patiently to the accusations.

Finally, during a pause, he said, “Look, I set that girl down back at the crossing. Are you still carrying her?”
Namaste,
bodhibliss

noman
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Post by noman »

Great Zen tale Bodhi,

It was a clumsy attempt at humor. I get used to the crowd here that knows me and assume they know when I’m not being literal. It’s worth pointing out that the jazz era that Campbell came of age in and participated in as a musician had a strong reputation of drugs, particularly marijuana and heroin. (see the Ken Burns documentary on Jazz) Also, I would suspect that Campbell had an interest in the ethnic music explorations of the Dead.

All in all I suspect ambivalence toward the hippie culture that so loved his work. His attitude, as I so often realize, is not unlike my own.

* * * * * * *

Littlewing,

That quote of yours I posted last was a very sweet thing to say. Thank you

From the Rig Veda here is one of the oldest prayers, and still one of the most popular prayers in use today:
Om Bhur Bhuvah Svah
Tat Savitur Varenyam
Bhargo Devasya Dhimahi
Dhiyo Yonah
Prachodayat


Throughout all realms of experience
‘That’ essential nature illuminating existence
is the adorable One.
May all beings perceive through
subtle and meditative intellect
the magnificent brilliance
of enlightened awareness.

- Gayatri Mantra (Rig Veda III, 62, 10)

aum shanti

- NoMan

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Post by Clemsy »

It’s worth pointing out that the jazz era that Campbell came of age in and participated in as a musician had a strong reputation of drugs, particularly marijuana and heroin.
Don't need Burn's doc. My Dad was a jazz musician. The tendency towards altered states of consciousness certainly wasn't invented by Tim Leary and is really a human, not counter-culture, topic.

Campbell was a man of his times and his reaction to the counter-culture was more the rule than the exception for his generation. Time allowed a more balanced perspective, and many, I think including Campbell, realized the impulse that gave rise to the 60's revolution was quite valid, even if aspects of it were naive to juvenile.

Indeed, what happened at that time was one large heresy: a mass rejection of orthodoxy at many levels.

Image

Would you have burned your draft card, noman? Or would you have gone to Vietnam? It was heresy to question the draft or the war.

Over a million Vietnamese died (genocide?). Fifty thousand Americans died then. Another fifty thousand vets, by one estimate, have committed suicide since then.

Yeah... when youth engage in revolution, they can go too far. That's the nature of youth. However, the impulse was justified.

Image

In POM, Campbell told Moyers in no uncertain terms that John Lennon, the poster child for counter-culture heresy and its excesses, was a Hero. Campbell's "attitude, as I so often realize, is not unlike my own. "

Image



8)
Give me stories before I go mad! ~Andreas

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