I was directed to Chief Seattle's speech by Joseph Campbell, one of the most interesting lecturers it has ever been my pleasure to hear and see and ponder.

I watched Mythos for the first time in a decade. It was a series of lectures presented by PBS and introduced by Susan Sarandan. The series was put together following Professor Campbell's death in 1987. The actual editing did not take place until 1999.

From Jane Goodall to James Joyce; from the Navaho Shamans to the King of all Shamans (El Papa); from cave paintings of Europe to the art of the Australian Aborigines; this presentation reminded me of why I majored in Anthropology at University.

And I find it degrading to call this Giant in human understanding a 'pop Anthropologist.'

Most of us have caught at least parts of Moyers' interview series with Campbell. The same topics and thoughts concerning Homo Sapiens are presented in Bill Moyers series but in a more informal manner whereby the great interviewer met the great lecturer. I loved the give and take in that series.

Joseph's lectures are just marvelous.

He has no notes, he has no TV monitoring device and he has no idiot cards.

It is like witnessing a stream of consciousness about consciousness.

He likes to use the old screen in front of the black board to present his pictures of art from all over the world along with some movie shorts demonstrating religious rites performed by tribes from all over the globe.

Lecturing is an art form in itself. And after 20 or 30 or fifty years of studying and teaching a lecturer does not need much in the way of notes and that brought back memories of college.

Joseph loves the intermittent shock; the comment that might wake up the slumbering student.

He shows a group of Goodall's male Chimps in their 'Men's Only Club' and then opines how sad he felt to recently find the Princeton's Men's Club filled with female professors. Hahahaaha

He loves to make generalizations (per his love of Freud and Jung) that on their face seem more than just disputable.

For instance he discusses the human persona (the Greek Mask if you will) and the difference in the 'use' of that persona by European tribes and Asian tribes.

In Asia, the human being becomes the persona. The mask may never be taken off because the wearer is the mask.

The European tribe member seeks 'individualism' and even though he or she has to wear the mask in order to survive, it is understood that the individual never becomes the mask.

That leads me to ponder the concept of fear. It would seem to me that there is less fear in becoming one's mask. This process would make it easier to see and understand one's place in the group as well as the world order.

To conceptually distance a part of oneself from that mask is a frightening concept indeed.

It would seem to me that if one had the mask of the doctor (with all the trimmings) confidence would increased as one 'became' the doctor's mask!

Generalization can be a scholastic sin if taken too far. There are plenty of folks in Europe and America who become their masks and in the freewheeling capitalistic Asia these days there are certainly millions who are attempting to create more and more distance between 'themselves' and their masks.

Getting back to Chief Seattle, I was so taken by his perspective that has become the Gaia Theory.

The view that the earth is a biological/sacred organism and we, humankind are part and parcel of that organism.

Campbell (as well as my old Anthro Professor) distinguishes this perspective from the perspective present in Genesis 1.

 

26 And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth.

 27 So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.

 28 And God blessed them, and God said unto them, Be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth, and subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon the earth.

 29 And God said, Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in the which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat.

Instead of being part and parcel of nature, of the natural flow of life, we instead find ourselves in dominion over that life.

Chief Seattle should be recognized as the religious leader and founder of the present day Green Party.

He spoke without animosity and for his love of this planet and his homeland.

You can catch Joseph Campbell's Mythos on the Netflix stream or other links I am sure.

Existentially, my favorite line had to do with his take on what I call temporary nihilism.

We all from time to time become despondent over our roles in this society; over our personae.

We wonder if there is any reality at all beneath our masks.

Joseph responds to this despondency thusly:

Every two weeks the lawn mower goes over the grass.

Why does not the grass just say:

OH, WHAT'S THE USE?

Previous attempt @

http://onceuponaparadigm.wordpress.com/