![]() ![]() Their "Yo-ee-oh" chant, which uses the interval of the fifth and distinctively low pitches, is reminiscent of the ancient liturgical music favored by the Russian Orthodox church (Nathanson 1991). The Guards at the Witch's castle (the Winkies) are dressed in Russian-like costumes. The Wicked Witch of the West is a dark, controlling presence who seeks to dominate and control very much like Hitler. ![]() A movie is like a group dream, a conscious decision to suspend reality, alter our consciousness, and let the images play out in front of us (Nathanson 1991).īits of the collective consciousness of its time crept into the movie. Movies are like dream states in which archetypal images appear, Hollywood itself being the land of dreams. Thus the film did not come from any one person, but was truly a collective. The movie, released the same year as Gone with the Wind, was the product of five different directors and a myriad of studio writers, continually assigned and reassigned. It was from the collective unconscious, a bubbling cauldron of archetypal images, that The Wizard of Oz was birthed into existence in 1900 as a book and later reincarnated as a movie in 1939. Whether or not we are aware of it, we are all connected, we are all online. It is a psychic cyberspace, a place where every thought, feeling, and action of humanity is recorded. According to Jung, these symbols are an expression of the collective unconscious, a concept similar to the akashic records mentioned by ancient mystics. Carl Jung and later Joseph Campbell described how certain symbols and motifs appear in mythology, fairy tales, stories, and religions throughout the world. It is filled with symbols and metaphors, all pointing to other things. The Wizard of Oz is true on a noumenal level. This is the water, the essence of all things, the ground of all being, God, Allah, Jehovah, WaTonka, Brahman, Oz. Noumenal reality is the reality inaccessible to logic or the normal senses. Phenomenal reality is the reality of things seen: that which we are used to experiencing, the waves, bits of reality coming into temporary form. Thich Nhat Hanh (1999), the Buddhist mystic, describes two levels of reality that exist simultaneously. All are waves temporary forms of the same water. If you look deep enough, you see that there is no difference between reality and fantasy, between this and that, here and there, the idea and the thing. And then we wonder how a good and loving universe can allow car accidents to happen. We declare the stop sign to be holy and good while proceeding right through the intersection without stopping. One of the shortcomings of humankind in this past millennium is that we have attended to the sign, but not to what it is pointing to. Although Holy Books may not always contain facts, they contain symbols, metaphors, myths, and dreams, which are signs pointing to Truth. Indeed, there are many instances where a series of facts have led to the wrong truth simply because of which facts were attended to and which were ignored. Although facts may be true, they do not always lead to Truth. There is a difference, however, between truth and facts. The first thing to be said about The Wizard of Oz is that it is true, absolutely and completely, or as Munchkins would say, "Morally, ethically, spiritually, physically, positively, absolutely. ![]() Second, spirituality can also be seen in a sacred sense as the part of one's self that is connected to the universe, one's divine essence, or the perfume within the clay jar. It is the higher part of self, superego or superconsciousness. First, in a secular sense, it can be seen as an accumulation of one's higher values, virtues, and ideals. oh, Auntie Em, there's no place like home! Oh, but anyway, Toto, we're home-home! And this is my room-and you're all here-and I'm not going to leave here ever, ever again, because I love you all. A wave looking deeply into herself will see that she is made up of all other waves and will no longer feel she is cut off from everything around her. ![]() When we are mindful, fully living each moment of our daily lives, we may realize that everyone and everything around us is our home. Does a wave have a home? When a wave looks deeply into herself, she will realize the presence of all the other waves. "The Spirituality of Oz: The Meaning of the Movie." Quest 88.6 NOVEMBER-DECEMBER 2000): pg 212-217. Originally printed in the November-December 2000 issue of Quest magazine.Ĭitation: Johnson, Andrew. ![]()
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