Healing Pandora The Restoration of Hope and Abundance

by Thomas, Gail; Sardello, Robert

• ISBN13: 9781556438394
• ISBN10: 1556438397
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2009-09-29
• Publisher: North Atlantic Books

Summary

The story of Pandora is one of the most resonant in Greek mythology. AsHealing Pandorashows, it's also one of the most relevant. Psychologist Gail Thomas has used Pandora in her practice for two decades, often with profound results. Cast in popular accounts as the evil bringer of doom to humanity in divine retaliation for Prometheus stealing fire, Pandora, in Thomas' view, is a much more complex character, with enormous healing powers as well as her better-known destructive capacity. In this revelatory book, Thomas shows Pandora's true nature as the dark but all-giving feminine, the archetypal vessel of culture and city with the power to heal our culture. Pandora's task is to help us transform our overwhelmingly material civilization into a culture of undivided participation and engagement. Part one discusses Pandora's multifaceted persona as both beautiful evil and divine benefactress. Here Thomas contextualizes Pandora in the cycle of myth and archetype. In part two, the author proposes a series of healing rituals"Healing Our Fear of Sacrifice," "Healing Our Dis-Ease," "Healing the Control of Patriarchy," and othersinspired by Pandora. Both practical guide and inspiring study,Healing Pandoraargues persuasively for manifesting our inner work concretely on the cultural, not just personal, level.

Author Biography

Gail Thomas, PhD, is an archetypal psychologist and cultural activist, cofounder of the Dallas Institute, and director of its Center for the City. She is co-editor of several books, including Images of the Untouched: Virginity in Psyche, Myth, and Community. A longtime organizer for urban renewal and green design, she lives in Dallas.

Table of Contents

Foreword	p. xi
preface: a cultural Myth	p. xxi
Introduction: pandora as soul: the making of culture	p. xxiii
Pandora: Her Myths And Her Making
Pandora: Divine Benefactress or the Beautiful Evil?	p. 3
First Fruits	p. 3
What Is the Image of Western Culture?	p. 4
A Primordially Feminine Culture as a Permanent Realm of the Psyche	p. 5
Hesiod's Version: The Price for Fire, an Evil Thing	p. 7
With the Beautiful Maid Comes the Curse of Man	p. 8
Hesiod: Bachelor Farmer	p. 11
"She Is After Your Barn!"	p. 12
The Five Ages of the World	p. 14
Her Thought Caused Sorrow and Mischief to Men	p. 14
First Get a House, a Woman, and an Ox for the Plow	p. 16
Womb Envy: The Origin of Trade	p. 17
Prometheus:The Formation of a New Order	p. 23
The Great Ruse	p. 23
But He Took the Gift	p. 26
The Gift and Gift Giving	p. 30
The Making of Pandora	p. 35
A Mixture of Earth and Water	p. 36
Athena's Gift: The Web of Contradiction	p. 37
Aphrodite's Gift: Cruel Longing and Cares That Weary the Limbs	p. 39
Hermes's Gift: A Shameless Mind and a Deceitful Nature	p. 40
Mortal Beauty: A Divine Mirroring	p. 42
A God Dwells within Her Name	p. 44
The Mystery of Winged Things	p. 45
The All-Giving Instinct: The Origin of Evil	p. 46
Pandora as Earth Goddess	p. 49
The First Focus of Worship	p. 50
Rituals to the Gods	p. 51
Pandora: The Chthonic Realm	p. 53
The Eleusinian Mysteries	p. 54
Pandora and the Underworld	p. 59
Hammers and Mallets Await Her	p. 59
A Love God Hovers over Her Head	p. 59
Pandora and Hermes Psychopompos: The Release of Souls	p. 64
Contents of Pandora's Box: Souls or Bacilli?	p. 65
The Vessel	p. 71
The Vessel as Female Body	p. 72
The Vessel as Soul	p. 73
The Vessel as Culture	p. 73
Pandora's Box	p. 74
All the Goods There Are	p. 75
Looking for the Origin of Evil	p. 78
The Computerized Box	p. 81
The City: The Ultimate Vessel	p. 89
The City as Pandora	p. 89
Pandora: Foundation for the City	p. 91
The Founding of the City: Honoring the Dead	p. 92
Rome	p. 95
History of Pandora's Connection with the City	p. 97
Paris	p. 100
the Making of Culture
Psychological Wordplay: Myth or Fact?	p. 111
Healing Our Fear of Sacrifice: Lilith	p. 117
Images of Sacrifice	p. 117
Forever Separated from the Gods	p. 119
Lilith	p. 119
The Zohar: In the Beginning	p. 120
The Shekinah in Exile	p. 124
Making Holy	p. 125
Healed Feminine Consciousness	p. 127
Healing the Fear of Not Knowing: Medusa	p. 129
Medusa	p. 130
Healing the Denial of Death: Demeter and Persephone	p. 135
Death as Essence	p. 136
The Dead as Ground of the Living	p. 137
Demeter	p. 137
The Place of Not Knowing	p. 138
Creativity and Renewal of Life	p. 139
Pluto the Rich	p. 140
Healing the Control of Patriarchy: Clytemnestra	p. 145
What Does Clytemnestra See?	p. 150
Birth, Death, and Renewal	p. 151
A Pandora Consciousness	p. 154
Healing Our "Dis-ease": Bulimia	p. 157
Cultural Bulimia	p. 161
Conclusion	p. 171
Notes	p. 175
Index	p. 185
Acknowledgments	p. 195
About The Author	p. 197
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