Reply To: Question about a passage from The Hero With a Thousand Faces
Great question!
I think you may be imposing too literal a Jungian perspective on what Campbell is saying here — I think he’s describing myths where the hero (whether it’s Jonah or Raven in the whale, or any number of other characters who end up transformed by the act of being “devoured”) have to embrace their own inner nature — or recognize their identity with the outer nature that is represented by the devourer — in order to become truly themselves. In that way, it seems to me, the act of devouring or of being devoured by the opposite is equally an act of integration.
Does that make sense?