-----Original Message-----
From:   Roberto Calvo Macias [SMTP:[email protected]]
Sent:   Wednesday, May 27, 1998 9:36 AM
To: [email protected]
Subject:        RV: The Catacombs, the Forests, Knowledge and Being.



-----Mensaje original-----
De:     Roberto Calvo Macias 
Enviado el:     miércoles 27 de mayo de 1998 13:59
Para:   '[email protected]'
Asunto: RE: The Catacombs, the Forests, Knowledge and Being.



-----Mensaje original-----
De:     Thomas Friese 
Enviado el:     miércoles 27 de mayo de 1998 9:18
Para:   '[email protected]'
Asunto: The Catacombs, the Forests, Knowledge and Being.

>  Auf die Rueckkehr titanischen Wessens in die Gestalt
>  des Arbeiters verweist der Zustrom plutonischer
>  Energie, die voresrtst eher gefuerchtet, ja negiert
>  wird als bherrscht. Das wird erst moeglich, wenn
>  sie sich personifiziert.

> So, was heißt plutonische Energie? It's a little obscure...

Dear John and Jungerites: Thanks for bringing up the plutonic energy question - 
you have accidentally given me the solution of a old mystery.

I explain: your reference reminded me of a related passage in Eumeswil that has 
until now always struck me oddly - I could not understand whether this was 
because I misunderstood Junger's terms and categories or because there was an 
error in the translation (where it's underlined)

        (Following on from a discussion of evolution, experiments and nature as 
an experiment:) 

        "As little can be expected from evolution as from any progress. The 
great change transcends not only the species but the entire bios. It is a 
crucial loss that mere fragments have come down to us from the most ancient 
documents. The difference between the forests and the catacombs seems to be 
that in the former one experiments at the Tree of Knowledge and in the later at 
the Tree of Life (I thought it would have been the reverse)
        Attila is familiar with the forests; he has lived there for a long time 
as at many outer limits. That is why I listen very attentively to his words and 
even more to his silences. Likewise, more is happening in the catacombs than 
the hoarding and administering of knowledge. It is the foundations of the 
species and not of consciousness that are being shaken. In the forest, a new 
Isis out to be engendered, and Prometheus liberated from the Caucasus by the 
subterranean."
                                                                                
                                        Page 341

There always seemed to be a paradox in these two consecutive paragraphs - is 
"knowledge" in the realm of the forests or the catacombs ... one experiments at 
the Tree of knowledge in the forest but hoards and administers knowledge in the 
catacombs. The paradox is reinforced by other circumstances in Eumeswil: Bruno, 
who is said to be oriented towards the Catacombs, certainly experiments with 
the Tree of Life, as did Attila in his laboratory periods.  Vigo, who is 
oriented towards the forests, definitely experiments with Knowledge, as does 
Manuel in his studies at the Luminar. Yet the Luminar itself is feed from the 
information hoarded by the subterranean in the catacombs. 

So, the forest group plays with the knowledge hoarded by the catacomb dwellers, 
and the catacomb group plays with Life, whose archetypal source will always be 
the forest. Attila in fact compares his laboratory grafting experiments to the 
weird hybridization that he later discovers in the post-catastrophe forest, 
where similar things seem to be happening naturally and with much less effort. 

A second passage partly explains the paradox and it relates to directly to your 
question by classifying the catacombs and their discoveries as plutonic.


        " Bruno is reticent with his allusions, but I suspect that he has lived 
in hollows made by plutonian and human efforts. They contain extensive gardens 
with a flora more splendid than that of the upper world. The constant warmth 
and the strange rays of light produce wonders. Botanists have released 
previously unknown forces of nature. I asked Bruno, "Doesn't that seem odd, 
since the biologists are on the side of the forests?"
        "Now you know that when Proserpine was picking flowers on a meadow, she 
was abducted by Pluto and carried off to the underworld."
        Of course; his answer pointed to times when luminaries of science fell 
into enemy hands, because of either cunning or force, and were ' turned 
around.' " 
Roberto Calvo:
Beatiful Thomas. That reminds me the marvelous Persefone_proserpine- Myhte. She 
was abducted by Pluto and carried off to the underworld. Then, her mother 
Demeter goes in her search. She goes to Eleusis: and that take us to the keys: 
drugs- wow! all is interlaced!. In Eleusis she was at first refused-"Dieu se 
retire", but after some maledictions people found the Mysterys- gods came 
again.Then she request to Zeus to take part for she. And Zeus and Pluto get an 
agree. Persefone keep living with Pluto in the underworld but came back every 
spring. Conclusion

[Thomas Friese]  Roberto,  I know the myth about the spring being a return of 
Persephone to her mother in the world of nature, but what of Junger's analogy - 
it is now not a cycle of one year in which she disappears and returns but a 
much longer one. Where are we in this cycle - in midwinter, or is the sap 
already awakening in the limbs, the roots warming up and beginning to feel 
themselves again, the first buds perhaps starting to emerge from the cool, 
concealing bark. But what is powerful about this myth is the fact that sooner 
or later Life always returns. (We might add, as do the gods....)   

About this I recomend you "Searching Persefone", and "Road to Eleusis", by 
RGordon Wasson, Albert Hofmann, Carl A. P. Ruck, Jonathan Ott and Robert 
Graves.                                                                         
                                    Page 361.

[Thomas Friese]  I've heard about the Eleusis - drug hypothesis but I am not 
convinced intuitively that there must have been drugs present. Have you read 
Junger's "Annaeherung" - I particularly remember the chapter which referred to 
Beaudelaire's artificial paradises. Modern man may need drugs to artificially 
reach these planes of experience but that doesn't mean the ancients also 
required such help. We should not judge past psycho-spiritual conditions by 
today's reality. Eliade makes the same point about modern shamanic use of drugs 
- modern shamans apparently believe that their ancestors were more powerful and 
did not require drugs. So for Eliade spiritual drug use is a degenerate 
condition.   

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