Rating: 
Summary: Timely
Review: Joseph Campbell is always a miracle. Even though this volume is very small, the ideas in it (as always) are huge. One of the things you should know about Campbell is that you can spend an hour comteplating the implications of just one paragraph. There's a rythm to reading his work; read a page or two, put book down to say "Whoa!," pick up book and start again.
Joseph Campbell challenges us to get unstuck from our metaphors to see the truth they contain and express. After 9/11, this is more important than ever. During his life, Mr. Campbell described the misinterpretation of "The Promised Land" as one of the great tragedies of our time. It is read by people "who are stuck to their metaphor and don't realize its reference." If you want to know what that means, buy the book.
Rating:
Summary: Blends mythology with religion
Review: Joseph Campbell's Thou Art That blends mythology with religion in its discussion of the transformation of religious metaphor. Read this as a long essay or extended lecture: the author blends autobiography and reflection with explorations of common Judeo-Christian symbolism in light of world religions and spirituality.
Rating: 
Summary: Thou Art What Connects Us All
Review: Joseph Campbell, the foremost authority on mythology, shows us that symbolism is the key to understanding and experiencing religious mystery. Along the way he criticizes the clergy for not enlightening followers to this fact, and more significantly he shares his own interpretation of many Judeo-Christian symbols. I especially enjoyed the last chapter titled "Question Period." It is a collection of Campbell's responses to various questions taken after many of his lectures over the years. He seems to shine in this type of forum and demonstrates a depth of knowledge and a clarity that sometimes gets buried in the preceding chapters. The Appendix is a reprint of "Earthrise - The Dawning of a New Spiritual Awareness," which was a Campbell interview that appeared Easter 1979 in the New York Times Magazine. Chapter notes, a bibliography, and an index are also included in this wonderful little book.
Rating:
Summary: An eye-opening book
Review: Like Donald Wayne Mitchell, I need to preface this review with a disclaimer: I am a non-practicing Jew, so it is clear that the paths to enlightenment offered by scriptural, faith-based religions clearly have not given me the sense of connecting to the transcendent that I would like. I very respectful grant Mr. Mitchell's central thesis concerning Thou Art That--that a person of faith in the literal truth of the Old and/or New Testaments might find this book dissatisfying--I must disagree with a number of his points. Mr. Campbell's central argument is NOT, as Mr. Mitchell would have it, that there is 'artistic license' taken in the Bible. There have been enough of those books around--no one needed to look to Joseph Campbell for that. Rather, Campbell says that the symbols of the scriptures have been MISREAD by professional interlocutors as literal fact, as historical accounts rather than spiritual metaphors. The question isn't whether Noah really sailed the ark onto Mt. Ararat or Christ really lived the life described (so inconsistantly) in the Gospels. The question is what spiritual and psychological truths do these stories tell us about the journey we all take through our own lives.
I walked away from reading this book over the weekend with more respect for the tradition that bore me, if not necessarilly for the people who taught me the signs and symbols of that tradition. Even books of the Scripture that I've always really detested--the Book of Joshua, with all its blood, or the Book of Numbers with its interminable laws--appear to me in a very different light after reading this wonderful work.
(Having said all that, I did find the third chapter--on "Our Notions of God"--to be a bit choppy and confusing. Did anyone else experience this? Had I simply drunk to much coffee that day?)
Rating: 
Summary: A Rip-off of Hot To Dot. Dot. Dot. Dot. With The Soul
Review: The title of this book bears a strong resemblance to the recently published book, How To Dot. Dot. Dot. Dot. With The Soul. The title of the book and the approach of the editor use the unique language of the above book to delve into religion and spirituality and myth making. I would suggest that readers review the above book and compare the similarities. J. Hansen
New York, New York
Rating:
Summary: Knowledgeable, but bad hermeneutics, and no exegesis of text
Review: This book is a collection of unpublished works compiled by the Joseph Campbell Foundation after his death, and represents most of Campbell's ideas on the Judeo-Christian mythological worldview. I have some familiarity with Joseph Campbell's books, and have studied the Hero's Journey and watched the Power of Myth series. I was pleasantly surprised to see Campbell's distinction between eastern and western mythological views more developed, as he explained the differences in how symbols are interpreted and applied in eastern and western cultures, though he still does not touch the *differences* in the relationship of good and evil in Western vs. Eastern mythologies. Campbell is a master of myths, and has put a lot of time and research into his ideas, and for this he deserves a lot of respect. Because of his knowledge of various source material, students who are unfamiliar with the Bible may not detect problems with his interpretations. But fallacies arise because he narrowly views the Christian tradition thru the lens of Catholicism, which I believe misrepresents the Bible. For example, Campbell accuses Christianity of teaching that a relationship with God comes thru the "Institution." Again, that may be what is taught in Catholicism, but not according to many other denominations. In Thou Art That, Campbell frequently accuses the "Church" of over-emphasizing rituals and symbols, and interpreting the Bible very literally. But, Christians will dismiss that by pointing out that there are many churches out there who delve into the deeply spiritual meanings of the Bible. And many Protestant churches already reject the ritualism and pagan traditions that the Roman church had introduced. Campbell uses questionable doctrines that are unique to the Roman Catholic tradition to show how they come from eastern mythologies, but these teachings themselves are not to be found anywhere in the Bible! For example, the teaching that the Virgin Mary ascended to heaven, among other things, is not found in the Bible. You cannot use non-Biblical sources to prove that the Bible says something that it doesn't. (Whew) But, he constantly pulls from non-Biblical sources to say that they are a part of the Judeo-Christian tradition. Campbell frequently quotes from the Gospel of Thomas as if it is a part of the Christian "mythological view" even though most Christian churches reject it as being false and uninspired. Campbell makes some good points in looking at the spiritual meaning of religious texts. But, principles of hermeneutics tells us that the "spiritual interpretation" of something should at least be compatible with the literal interpretation and not say opposite things, otherwise the "spiritual" interpretation may be a misunderstanding. Campbell's spiritual interpretation of Genesis conflicts with the moral of the literal story. Campbell says that God wanted Adam and Eve to sin, but if you read the Bible literally, God did *not* want Adam and Eve to sin. Campbell says that as a result of the Fall, Adam and Eve became more in tune with God/nature, but according to the literal story of the Fall, they fell out of harmony with God and nature. Thus, his spiritual interpretation says the *exact opposite* of the literal interpretation. Campbell is right in that one tree in the Garden of Eden represents Unity while the other tree represents Duality. Then Campbell theorizes that they are the same tree. But, this contradicts the point of the two trees to begin with. They both represent two different worldviews: the Tree of Life represents the worldview of harmony thru Good (no Evil), while the Tree of Knowledge represents the worldview of harmony thru mingling Good and Evil. It is not Good versus Evil, but rather Good versus Good AND Evil-- that is Unity versus Duality. This would be consistent with lessons from the literal story. But Campbell thinks that in the "spiritual" context, they are really the same tree, essentially interpreting both of them only as Duality, and thus contradicting the meaning derived from the literal interpretation of the story. In general, Campbell tries to say that an underlying theme in mythology is that harmony is obtained thru going beyond opposites. On the other hand, anybody who reads the Bible in a straight-forward way will see the theme is consistently that harmony is obtained not thru "going beyond" good and evil, but rather thru the *separation* of good and evil--this is the underlying theme in the Judeo-Christian tradition and it stands in stark contrast to the worldview that Campbell attempts to interpret out of the Bible.
Rating:
Summary: A pleasant taste of metaphor study.
Review: This is a wonderful taste of the large, unpublished work of Campbell yet to be shared. I would recommend this book to those who want a good introduction to Campbell's work. Hopefully it will inspire them to read more about mythology and deepen their knowledge. This book is concerned mainly with mythos (meaning) versus logos (symbol) and how many people get caught up in symbols, thus missing the meaning (the mistake most fundamentalists are trapped in). As always with Campbell, his explanations are so eloquent and educated that one cannot help but want more. The only complaint I have about this book is its size--only 100 pages of Campbell's writing (mostly from lectures and notes). It certainly could have been expanded to twice that with very little effort. However, for those used to Campbell's written work, they will be pleasantly surprised how different his lecturing is.
One mistake the editor, and many a reviewer, make is to try and say that Campbell focuses on the Judeo-Christian aspect of symbol abuse. If one were to read all of Campbell's work, they would find this to be quite wrong. Campbell is not so shallow. His concern is mythology, all of it, world-round. In fact, the majority of his work focuses on primitive mythology. He certainly spoke and expounded on the Judeo-Christian aspect much in his lecturing, but this is mostly because that is what his audience was interested in, especially the new-agers who desperately clung to Campbell in the last decades of his life.
But I encourage those interested to dig deeper than this book into Campbell's work where can be found a rich, scholarly depth and breadth of mythos/logos study.
Rating:
Summary: This would have been Campbell's next book
Review: This volume is the next natural subject in the Joseph Campbell library. If you go back through his previous books, audio tapes, and video programs, you can pick out the themes that are displayed so righteously in this little volume. Kennedy did an outstanding job editing the talks, brief essays, interview, and discussions into a seamless thesis that begins and ends with the same statement evident throughout: The western problem is the misreading of religious metaphor as historical fact rather than connotative of a mystery that transcends human thought completely. Bravo to the Joseph Campbell Foundation for crystallizing a lifetime of brilliant thought and scholarly analysis into a truly life-affirming philosophy by a wonderful and engaging teacher.
Rating:
Summary: This would have been Campbell's next book
Review: This volume is the next natural subject in the Joseph Campbell library. If you go back through his previous books, audio tapes, and video programs, you can pick out the themes that are displayed so righteously in this little volume. Kennedy did an outstanding job editing the talks, brief essays, interview, and discussions into a seamless thesis that begins and ends with the same statement evident throughout: The western problem is the misreading of religious metaphor as historical fact rather than connotative of a mystery that transcends human thought completely. Bravo to the Joseph Campbell Foundation for crystallizing a lifetime of brilliant thought and scholarly analysis into a truly life-affirming philosophy by a wonderful and engaging teacher.
Rating:
Summary: No Horizons In Space
Review: THOU ART THAT is the first volume in THE COLLECTED WORKS OF JOSEPH CAMPBELL which contains materials gathered from previously uncollected essays, letters, diaries, articles and lectures. As such it presents a broad sampling of Campbell's work on mythology and the Western religions. Campbell believes that the stories in the Bible should be read metaphorically. By interpreting events historically institutional religions create a problem. When people realize that the events probably did not take place, then the power of the message is diminished. Examples of such events are the Fall of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden and the Exodus from Egypt. A fairly thorough discussion is introduced in Chapter VI of Judo-Christian symbols such as the Virgin Birth, Judas and the Flight into Egypt. Here we see why Campbell is so much admired for the breadth of his knowledge of mythology and his ability to bring this learning to bear on Jewish and Christian origins. In one of the more interesting parts of the book Campbell describes the basic differences between the world religions of creed which are Buddhism, Christianity and Islam and the leading ethnic religions of birth which are Hinduism, Judaism and Shintoism. Often Campbell points out that our ideas of the universe are being reordered by our experience in space. There are no horizons in space causing many people to retreat into fundamentalism. For a small book THOU ART THAT is filled with much food for thought. I highly recommend it and am looking forward to reading future volumes in this series.
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