Obligatory Chilean Miners Post

I was, of course, delighted by the rescue of the Chilean Miners yesterday. I was inspired by the way that different individuals, organisations and governments had focussed their talents, resources and determination in order to accomplish a moving humanitarian mission. It was great, a triumph of engineering and resolve over adversity.

I feel that I have to state this for the record because I might have appeared slightly curmudgeonly yesterday. Whilst I was glad of the rescue I didn't seem to feel quite so emotional as others, but anything less than full-heartedness seemed to be an inappropriate reaction. Partly, I have become cynically dubious of any event which seems to be so perfectly suited to 24-hour rolling news coverage, as this was. Partly, I was wary of the massed collective response: Twitter, Facebook, emails - not to mention Real Life People - everyone seemed to be overcome. I seemed only to be merely happy and this seemed to be deemed an insufficient response.

What was actually happening was a re-enactment of the most profound kind of human drama, perhaps the oldest story, redolent with primal imagery. Descent into and escape from an underworld is a cornerstone of many early myths, some of which date back to the earliest European societies whose rites of passage, like modern shamanic practices, achieved re-birth by ascending from the depths.

In 'A Short History of Myth', Karen Armstrong discusses the role of caves such as Altimira or Lascaux in Paleolithic spirituality.

These grottoes were probably the first temples or cathedrals. There has been a lengthy academic discussion of the meaning of these caves [...] but certainly they set the scene for a profound meeting between men and the godlike, archetypal animals that adorn the cavern walls and ceilings. Pilgrims had to crawl through dank and dangerous underground tunnels [...], burrowing ever more deeply into the heart of darkness until they finally came face to face with the painted beasts. 

Armstrong also emphasises the role such places played in initiation rites.

Initiation ceremonies were central to the religion of the ancient world [...]. Like the journey of the shaman, this is a process of death and rebirth: the boy has to die to childhood and enter the world of adult responsibilities. Initiates are buried in the ground, or in a tomb; they are told they are about to be devoured by a monster, or killed by a spirit. [...] The experience is so intense and traumatic that an initiate is changed forever.

The link with surviving shamanic practices provides this thought (here Armstrong includes a shaman's words quoted from 'The Power of Myth' (New York, 1988) by Joseph Campbell with Bill Moyers):

Like the dangerous expedition of the hunter, the shaman's quest is a confrontation with death. When he returns to his community his soul is still absent form his body.and has to be retrieved by colleagues who 'take hold of your head and blow about the sides of your face. This is how you manage to be alive again. Friends, if they don't do that to you, you die... you just die and you are dead.'

These brave men have descended into the utter darkness and confronted their mortality. They have passed through death and have risen, miraculously, from their underground tombs. But although reborn, they are not yet fully alive. As they return to the world, it is the job of their families and friends to hold them and to breathe life back into them. Their journey back from death has not yet ended.