Phone: 44 191 222 7993 Address: International Centre for Music Studies SACS, Armstrong Bldg Newcastle University Newcastle upon Tyne NE1 7RU United Kingdom
The Katha Upanishad, one of the longest and most famous of the Upanishads, begins with an unexpec... more The Katha Upanishad, one of the longest and most famous of the Upanishads, begins with an unexpected fairy tale: the boy Nachiketas goes down to hell to ask Yama, god of the dead, to tell him the truth about death. Their negotiations ultimately force Yama to explain that the secret of death is the secret of life – leading into a vast and sophisticated disquisition on reincarnation, transcendence, and the meanings of life that are achieved only through acceptance of its mirror, death. A closer examination of this peculiar introduction shows that the fairy tale can be unpacked across several levels of symbolization into a field of understanding as broad as the body of this Upanishad, and beyond. Archetypal resonances of Yama, the first mortal to die who becomes lord of the dead, of the boy and his symbolic quest, and the details of their interaction can be viewed through Jung’s systematic analysis of death and rebirth. The intensity of religious, mythical and folkloric images associat...
The Katha Upanishad, one of the longest and most famous of the Upanishads, begins with an unexpec... more The Katha Upanishad, one of the longest and most famous of the Upanishads, begins with an unexpected fairy tale: the boy Nachiketas goes down to hell to ask Yama, god of the dead, to tell him the truth about death. Their negotiations ultimately force Yama to explain that the secret of death is the secret of life – leading into a vast and sophisticated disquisition on reincarnation, transcendence, and the meanings of life that are achieved only through acceptance of its mirror, death. A closer examination of this peculiar introduction shows that the fairy tale can be unpacked across several levels of symbolization into a field of understanding as broad as the body of this Upanishad, and beyond. Archetypal resonances of Yama, the first mortal to die who becomes lord of the dead, of the boy and his symbolic quest, and the details of their interaction can be viewed through Jung’s systematic analysis of death and rebirth. The intensity of religious, mythical and folkloric images associat...
Uploads
Papers by Paul Attinello