In the first temptation, the Lord of Lust displayed his three beautiful daughters before the Buddha. Their names were Desire, Fulfillment, and Regrets—Future, Present, and Past. But the Buddha, who had already disengaged himself from attachment to his sensual character, was not moved.
Then the Lord of Lust turned himself into the Lord of Death and flung at the Buddha all the weapons of an army of monsters. But the Buddha had found in himself that still point within, which is of eternity, untouched by time. So again, he was not moved, and the weapons flung at him turned into flowers of worship.
Finally the Lord of Lust and Death transformed himself into the Lord of Social Duty and argued, “Young man, haven’t you read the morning papers? Don’t you know what there is to be done today?” The Buddha responded by simply touching the earth with the tips of the fingers of his right hand. Then the voice of the goddess mother of the universe was heard, like thunder rolling on the horizon, saying, “This, my beloved son, has already so given of himself to the world that there is no one here to be ordered about. Give up this nonsense.” Whereupon the elephant on which the Lord of Social Duty was riding bowed in worship of the Buddha, and the entire company of the Antagonist dissolved like a dream. That night, the Buddha achieved illumination, and for the next fifty years remained in the world as teacher of the way to the extinction of the bondages of egoism.
Now, those first two temptations—of desire and of fear—are the same that Adam and Eve are shown to have experienced in the extraordinary painting by Titian (now in the Prado), conceived when he was ninety-four years old. The tree is, of course, the mythological world axis, at the point where time and eternity, movement and rest, are at one, and around which all things revolve. It is here represented only in its temporal aspect, as the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, profit and loss, desire and fear. At the right is Eve, who sees the tempter in the form of a child, offering the apple, and she is moved by desire. Adam, however, from the opposite point of view, sees the serpent-legs of the ambiguous tempter and is touched with fear. Desire and fear: these are the two emotions by which all life in the world is governed. Desire is the bait, death is the hook.
Adam and Eve were moved; the Buddha was not. Eve and Adam brought forth life and were cursed of God; the Buddha taught release from life’s fear.
MOYERS: And yet with the child—with life—come danger, fear, suffering?
CAMPBELL: Here I am now, in my eighties, and I’m writing a work that is to be of several volumes. I want very much to live until I finish this work. I want that child. So that puts me in fear of death. If I had no desire to complete that book, I wouldn’t mind dying. Now, both the Buddha and Christ found salvation beyond death, and returned from the wilderness to choose and instruct disciples, who then brought their message to the world.
The messages of the great teachers—Moses, the Buddha, Christ, Mohammed—differ greatly. But their visionary journeys are much the same. At the time of his election, Mohammed was an illiterate camel-caravan master. But every day he would leave his home in Mecca and go out to a mountain cave to meditate. One day a voice called to him, “Write!” and he listened, and we have the Koran. It’s an old, old story.
MOYERS: In each case receivers of the boon have done some rather grotesque things with their interpretation of the hero’s message.
CAMPBELL: There are some teachers who decide they won’t teach at all because of what society will do with what they’ve found.
MOYERS: What if the hero returns from his ordeal, and the world doesn’t want what he brings back?
CAMPBELL: That, of course, is a normal experience. It isn’t always so much that the world doesn’t want the gift, but that it doesn’t know how to receive it and how to institutionalize it—
MOYERS: —how to keep it, how to renew it.
CAMPBELL: Yes, how to help keep it going.
MOYERS: I’ve always liked that image of life being breathed back into the dry bones, back into the ruins and the relics.
CAMPBELL: There is a kind of secondary hero to revitalize the tradition. This hero reinterprets the tradition and makes it valid as a living experience today instead of a lot of outdated clichés. This has to be done with all traditions.
In the first temptation, the Lord of Lust displayed his three beautiful daughters before the Buddha. Their names were Desire, Fulfillment, and Regrets—Future, Present, and Past. But the Buddha, who had already disengaged himself from attachment to his sensual character, was not moved.
Then the Lord of Lust turned himself into the Lord of Death and flung at the Buddha all the weapons of an army of monsters. But the Buddha had found in himself that still point within, which is of eternity, untouched by time. So again, he was not moved, and the weapons flung at him turned into flowers of worship.
Finally the Lord of Lust and Death transformed himself into the Lord of Social Duty and argued, “Young man, haven’t you read the morning papers? Don’t you know what there is to be done today?” The Buddha responded by simply touching the earth with the tips of the fingers of his right hand. Then the voice of the goddess mother of the universe was heard, like thunder rolling on the horizon, saying, “This, my beloved son, has already so given of himself to the world that there is no one here to be ordered about. Give up this nonsense.” Whereupon the elephant on which the Lord of Social Duty was riding bowed in worship of the Buddha, and the entire company of the Antagonist dissolved like a dream. That night, the Buddha achieved illumination, and for the next fifty years remained in the world as teacher of the way to the extinction of the bondages of egoism.
Now, those first two temptations—of desire and of fear—are the same that Adam and Eve are shown to have experienced in the extraordinary painting by Titian (now in the Prado), conceived when he was ninety-four years old. The tree is, of course, the mythological world axis, at the point where time and eternity, movement and rest, are at one, and around which all things revolve. It is here represented only in its temporal aspect, as the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, profit and loss, desire and fear. At the right is Eve, who sees the tempter in the form of a child, offering the apple, and she is moved by desire. Adam, however, from the opposite point of view, sees the serpent-legs of the ambiguous tempter and is touched with fear. Desire and fear: these are the two emotions by which all life in the world is governed. Desire is the bait, death is the hook.
Adam and Eve were moved; the Buddha was not. Eve and Adam brought forth life and were cursed of God; the Buddha taught release from life’s fear.
MOYERS: And yet with the child—with life—come danger, fear, suffering?
CAMPBELL: Here I am now, in my eighties, and I’m writing a work that is to be of several volumes. I want very much to live until I finish this work. I want that child. So that puts me in fear of death. If I had no desire to complete that book, I wouldn’t mind dying. Now, both the Buddha and Christ found salvation beyond death, and returned from the wilderness to choose and instruct disciples, who then brought their message to the world.
The messages of the great teachers—Moses, the Buddha, Christ, Mohammed—differ greatly. But their visionary journeys are much the same. At the time of his election, Mohammed was an illiterate camel-caravan master. But every day he would leave his home in Mecca and go out to a mountain cave to meditate. One day a voice called to him, “Write!” and he listened, and we have the Koran. It’s an old, old story.
MOYERS: In each case receivers of the boon have done some rather grotesque things with their interpretation of the hero’s message.
CAMPBELL: There are some teachers who decide they won’t teach at all because of what society will do with what they’ve found.
MOYERS: What if the hero returns from his ordeal, and the world doesn’t want what he brings back?
CAMPBELL: That, of course, is a normal experience. It isn’t always so much that the world doesn’t want the gift, but that it doesn’t know how to receive it and how to institutionalize it—
MOYERS: —how to keep it, how to renew it.
CAMPBELL: Yes, how to help keep it going.
MOYERS: I’ve always liked that image of life being breathed back into the dry bones, back into the ruins and the relics.
CAMPBELL: There is a kind of secondary hero to revitalize the tradition. This hero reinterprets the tradition and makes it valid as a living experience today instead of a lot of outdated clichés. This has to be done with all traditions.