Episode One - The Phantom Menace
Star Wars as Personal Mythology
Once again, an installment of the Star Wars series has become a
movie event of galactic proportions. The spiritual underpinnings of the
story have been widely recognized as a clear part of its enormous appeal.
There has been much discussion on the mythic dimensions of the film. Now
that the commotion has settled down, perhaps it is a good time to reflect
on the implications of the tale for those interested in the life of the
soul.
Early in the film, an imposing spacecraft is speeding through
the darkness between planets. There is a crisis, and two Jedi Knights are
on their way to help. The call to adventure is similar in all these movies
because it matches experiences that are known to the audience. The events
that cause us to develop strengths often begin as bad news. Something calls
us to solve a problem, or survive an ordeal, and through this difficult
process, we find that we are capable of more than we thought.
Like other fans, I have been eagerly looking forward to another
visit to the amazing universe of the Star Wars adventures. As a writer on
archetypal themes, I was recently invited to Harvard to lecture on the
mythic elements in Star Wars. It is not difficult to read the episodes as
wisdom tales. The key insights into the meaning of human experience are
clearly present. The mythic imagination is essentially a template that can
be endlessly re-worked. If we look at the films through a symbolic lens,
the life-lessons are abundant.
Given the advantage of advance access to The Phantom Menace, I
have had some time to think about the psychological themes of the story.
Even in the starting points of the film, there are universal questions.
What is the long-term effect of slavery - be it literal or figurative? What
is the long-term effect of fear on one's character and choices?
The key characters this time out include young Anakin
Skywalker, who we know will eventually become Darth Vader (as well as Luke
Skywalker's father). Jedi Master Qui-Gon Jinn, played by Liam Neeson is the
commanding presence of the film. His youthful apprentice is Obi-Won Kenobi,
not yet a full Jedi Knight. Queen Amidala is the teenage ruler of a planet
under siege by the Trade Federation. One of the gratifying aspects of
Episode One is the important role played by strong female characters.
As before, the force is a central element in the adventure. In
a recent issue of Time Magazine, Bill Moyers and George Lucas discussed my
ideas about the meaning of the force. Beyond the honor of being quoted in
such a conversation, I am reminded that the idea of the force is what makes
the Star Wars films more than well-done science fiction. This mysterious
energy is the key to the transcendent magic of the stories.
The Jedi describe the force as an energy field that sustains
all living things. An individual may sense the force as intuition, or
something spiritual. It is something beyond individual skill or wisdom.
Whether I say I trust my inner voice or use more traditional language, like
trusting the Holy Spirit, somehow I am listening for something beyond my
own calculations. I'm trying to tune into a larger field of energy and
knowledge. When a Jedi advises the hero to trust the force, he is saying
that we must not put all our trust in what we can know clearly. There are
mysteries and powers that are larger than our knowing and seeing.
The Jedi are the high priests of the force as well as the noble
knights of the time. The Jedi began in still earlier times as a theological
and philosophical study group. Only after long consideration of the force
did they take up the idea of fighting for high principles and causes.
When we become attuned to values and energies beyond our
immediate practical concerns, the effect on our lives may be enormous.
Listening to the voices from deep within can change everything. Quiet
pursuits like poetry and meditation can lead to daring action once you find
a calling, or become aware of the needs of others. You might not think
teaching is much of a life, until you see the face of a child excited about
learning something marvelous. Allowing ourselves to be led by emotion and
our deepest values can take us into surprising directions.
In The Phantom Menace, the threat of war has grown out of
economic issues. This seems like an eternal motivation for conflict. In the
present era, many standing armies are poised to go to battle over economic
matters. The U.S. seems particularly willing to mobilize in regions that
hold global oil reserves. Throughout history, trade issues with enormous
financial implications can grow into deadly conflict.
The heroic man or woman in an initiatory adventure is a regular
person. The story begins as a mundane situation. A boy is trying to win a
race. Starting in familiar circumstances lets the audience know that
extraordinary things can happen in ordinary lives. Tragedy often sets the
larger story in motion. This is the summons, the call to the quest. In The
Phantom Menace, it is a threat to the Queen's planet.
The event that sets a fictional quest in motion is similar to
what might happen to us. It is something that draws us into the engagement.
In our life stories it might be the death of a parent, a divorce, a
devastating illness, or a financial disaster. From there we can either
collapse and give up on life, or we can rise to the occasion.
In the mythic moment, the individual's issues become enmeshed
with larger problems. The Jedi get involved as Ambassadors. Along the way,
Qui-Gon discovers the gifted boy Anakin. The boy meets Queen Amidala and
learns he is not the only one with challenges, society is in trouble --
there are problems larger than his own. His personal circumstances and
larger causes become intertwined as he goes to the threshold of adventure.
His connection with Jedi teachers Qui-Gon Jinn and Obi-Wan Kenobi
represents contact with the higher self or inner master. The hero meets
these key allies at the threshold moment. It is the jumping off point
beyond which there is no return.
The hero might come to the adventure with many motivations.
These might include trying to resolve some family difficulty. Anakin and
his mother are slaves. Universal issues of personal freedom and dignity are
represented in this detail. We can take the family angle literally in terms
of personal drama, or see it symbolically. The image of the family can
represent how our lives intertwine with others in all sorts of situations.
Family dramas in dreams can reveal how various aspects of our inner lives
get along with each other. Notions about family can be about how the past
still influences us. Freud showed how the lives of people that came before
us ripple down through our present-day emotional reactions to others.
The traveler may be seeking a transcendent experience. Usually
the initiate is also looking for some undiscovered aspect of himself or
herself. There is some wound that requires healing. Anakin Skywalker is
moving toward several goals simultaneously. At some point, allies appear.
This will include someone like Qui-Gon with extraordinary life experience.
The guide has skills, secret lore, and wisdom necessary for the success of
the journey.
There is a strong team effort in The Phantom Menace. A solitary
warrior does not accomplish the solution. The initiatory quest is never a
solo journey. The adventure is always collective effort, contrary to some
immature fantasies of personal glory. Part of the lesson is to remember we
are not alone. It isn't an individual's skill or strength by itself, that
will resolve the situation. It is guides, allies, and animals that provide
help at every turn. Even the comic Jar Jar Binks makes a crucial
contribution. The seeker discovers that no single person can do the quest.
Others provide assistance all the way through and back. There is much in
these stories about humbling our arrogance.
This story shows how the call to service is not always
welcomed. Not everyone on the team is eager for the adventure. The
reluctant hero is an old theme. Some part of each of us is not pleased to
face danger. It is not the presence of fear that is the problem, but how we
handle it. Denial of fear is the worst, because then it lurks beyond our
attention, often getting projected onto others.
The mentors can take many forms; an old teacher, a wise
enchantress, a mysterious old magician, such as the strange creature Yoda.
The wise one gives the hero something that is necessary for the quest. In
The Phantom Menace we meet the council of the Jedi Masters. The high lodge
of keepers of the wisdom is an ancient mythological motif. They may play
some role in the possibility of initiation in the mysteries.
Gaining power is a challenging process involving proving good
character. The rashness of youth must be tempered. The parallels in
ordinary life may be as mundane as gaining the approval of a driving
examiner to get a driver's license. It could be completing arduous training
to become a Marine. It might be as grand as completing extensive education
to become ordained into a priesthood, certified as a teacher, or licensed
as a professional. It could be gaining high office. If the position is in
public life, the initiation may even involve an inauguration ceremony.
In this story, Anakin Skywalker comes through when things get
tough. In the model of the heroic adventure, not all of the allies turn out
to be loyal. There are betrayals and disappointments. Allies sometimes die
early in the story. The quest is a long voyage with many lessons before the
hero reaches the goal.
Queen Amidala and the Jedi Knights are the central aristocratic
figures in a tale with many royal characters. The fascination with the
realm of lords and ladies is a staple in science fiction and fantasy. It
does not necessarily mean that the audience longs to live under the rule of
Kings or Queens. The symbolism may be deeper still. It could be a yearning
for the larger meanings of all those grand roles. Such titles included
devotion to great causes. These were lives with meaning and dedication to
service. The psychological significance might be that we long for our inner
nobility. The qualities of character and purpose associated with such
positions may be what is missing in an overly egalitarian and endlessly
practical age. Seeking one's truly noble qualities is a worthy endeavor.
At some point in our quests, we all reach bottom. This is the
dark night of the soul when all seems lost. It may last years. It is the
crisis of faith in the seeker's life. This is like a baptism from hell. If
we survive this ultimate ordeal, we will likely be able to face anything
else fate throws in our faces. We can gain a depth of character by having
seen the worst. It may involve personal failure or painful losses. It is
tempting to wish the horrible things had not happened. That would miss the
lesson. This is the most valuable part of the journey.
We can see in a well-told story such as this, how important it
is to forge alliances with others. We can also look at the characters in a
story as the various energies within ourselves. After all, we each have
many personalities, and these various aspects of ourselves have to learn to
get along if we are to accomplish anything. These competing interests tug
and pull us in different directions. To be brave, or afraid, or loving, are
all features of a single individual's psychology. The story shows how to
accomplish a working integration of an inner life. The tasks of learning to
relate well with others and developing a well-balanced inner world are two
sides of the same coin.
Initiatory adventures often include a great confrontation
between good and evil. The task that is larger than we are, the fears
greater than we have ever experienced. We each discover that we can survive
ordeals we did not think we could endure. If we remember the lessons up to
this point, we have discovered how to work with our allies. We have learned
how to master the many conflicting elements within ourselves. Most
important, we know we must trust the force. We have found how to stay in
the flow of some wisdom larger than ourselves.
At some point, the individual's actions must become
synchronized with universal forces. This shift eases life's basic
loneliness. You are enmeshed in a larger purpose. You are meant to be in a
certain place and fill a particular role. You are being yourself, truly and
entirely for the first time. You have energies that you never knew about
before.
Joseph Campbell described what happens if you followed your
bliss, accepted your calling. Doors will open where you did not know there
were doors. Help would come when you did not even know you needed help.
Things are possible that would not have been possible for anyone else or
would have been impossible for you in the past.
Because the Star Wars stories are set in another time, on
fictional planets, we are able to get beyond the naturalism of most movies.
Joseph Campbell felt that naturalism was the death of art. If the stories
and characters are too realistic, it is more difficult to see the metaphors
that carry the deeper messages of the story. When a story takes place in
outer space, the audience knows that they are watching a work of the
imagination. That is a key reason that the Star Wars series has been taken
as conveying wisdom to a degree that is unusual for a Hollywood movie.
Campbell felt that Lucas had clearly understood his books and
had rendered the key metaphors in contemporary terms. The central modern
issue is whether we are going to let the machine control us. Campbell's
notion of the machine includes the corporate state. Once can gain a measure
of power by becoming machine-like. This is the great temptation that is so
hard to resist. To be fully human, we must not spend all of our energies
becoming part of the larger machine. The alternative is to listen to the
still small voice within.
Our core choices and values have to come from inside. Then,
ultimately, it all turns around, and one must find a place in the world. A
mythic story shows how we must find our own footing as individuals, and
also how we can return from separation to make a contribution. If the story
only showed how to rebel against conventionality, it would leave us as
hermits or lost souls. The greater challenge is to rejoin the community,
but on our own terms.
In Phantom Menace, we are aware that the boy, Anakin Skywalker,
will someday become the evil Darth Vader. This explores another universal
theme. The seeker will have to face the dark side within. Some part of the
hero is in the villain. The initiate is fighting some aspect of family
heritage within himself or herself. This shows us the limits of dualistic
thinking. We learn to get past imagining the hero is good and the other is
evil. Resolution will require warring factions within the individual to
pull together.
Some have noticed that the Star Wars episodes are similar to
each other. Yet, George Lucas is not making the same movie over and over
again. He is aware that one must go through many initiatory cycles to claim
the many lessons. Each time out, the initiate is able to accomplish
something new that seemed impossible. Each effort is successful because it
is in the service of a calling. When one is motivated by higher causes, you
can sometimes do amazing things.
After each lesson, the seeker then returns with significant new
psychological integration. To accomplish the many stages of claiming our
gifts, several elements are required -- we must gain access to the
attributes of both genders, find a way to be aligned with the forces of
nature, and develop connections with the best of allies. The companions are
seekers themselves, in later cycles of the life-long quest. In a grand
story such as this one, we see several generations in their various stages
of enlightenment.
The releases of this series of films also now spans
generations. Many who saw the first Star Wars movie as a teenager will now
be bringing their own children to see Episode One. Each member of the
audience faces challenges and lessons appropriate to his or her age group.
There is a character on the screen at the right stage in the long unfolding
story for each person to follow.
At the end of each initiatory adventure, there is a big
celebration. The many different characters present symbolize different
stages of life. At the same time they can represent the various aspects of
an individual who is growing more fully aware of the many energies within.
Part of what Lucas does so well is to tell a story that operates on many
levels simultaneously.
The traveler comes back home with something to show for all the
effort. This prize is sometimes called the boon, elixir, or blessing. It
can be new wisdom, or a skill. Often it is an insight of great value to the
historical moment. The challenge then is to pass it around. The boon does
not belong to the adventurer alone. It is for everyone.
The seeker returns to an honored place in the community.
Ultimately, being true to oneself includes being useful to others. The
sense of fulfillment is extraordinary at that point. There is a clear sense
of identity and role. Such a life moves with amazing energy. The force is
then truly with us.
|
|
|
|