42 quotes
Our sense of justice depends on our sense of time. Justice is a phenomenon only of consciousness, because time spread out in a spatial succession is its very essence.
The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind (1976)
The importance of writing in the breakdown of the bicameral voices is tremendously important. What had to be spoken is now silent and carved upon a stone to be taken in visually.
The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind (1976)
Paradise Lost, A further observation could be made upon the story of the Fall and how it is possible to look upon it as a myth of the breakdown of the bicameral mind.
The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind (1976)
The mind is still haunted with its old unconscious ways; it broods on lost authorities; and the yearning, the deep and hollowing yearning for divine volition and service is with us still.
The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind (1976)
The changes in the Catholic Church since Vatican II can certainly be scanned in terms of this long retreat from the sacred which has followed the inception of consciousness into the human species.
The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind (1976)
The bicameral mind with its controlling gods was evolved as a final stage of the evolution of language. And in this development lies the origin of civilization.
The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind (1976)
"What is the meaning of life?" This question has no answer except in the history of how it came to be asked. There is no answer because words have meaning, not life or persons or the universe itself.
The divine kingdom to be regained is psychological not physical. It is metaphorical not literal. It is "within" not in extenso.
The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind (1976)
Consciousness is a much smaller part of our mental life than we are conscious of, because we cannot be conscious of what we are not conscious of.
The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind (1976)
The king dead is a living god.
The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind (1976)
I am emphasizing individuals set apartfrom others as ill, because, according to our theory, we could say that before the second millennium B.C., everyone was schizophrenic.
The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind (1976)
It is by metaphor that language grows.
The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind (1976)
The Trojan War was directed by hallucinations. And the soldiers who were so directed were not at all like us. They were noble automatons who knew not what they did.
The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind (1976)
It is something of a lovely surprise that the irregular conjugation of our most nondescript verb is thus a record of a time when man had no independent word for 'existence' and could only say that something 'grows' or that it “breathes.”
The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind (1976)
I shall state my thesis plain. The first poets were gods. Poetry began with the bicameral mind.
The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind (1976)
This breakdown in the bicameral mind in what is called the Intermediate Period is reminiscent at least of those periodic breakdowns of Mayan civilizations when all authority suddenly collapsed, and the population melted back into tribal living in the jungles.
The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind (1976)
Reading in the third millennium B.C. may therefore have been a matter of hearing the cuneiform, that is, hallucinating the speech from looking at its picture symbols, rather than visual reading of syllables in our sense.
The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind (1976)
For if consciousness is based on language, then it follows that it is of much more recent origin than has been heretofore supposed. Consciousness come after language! The implications of such a position are extremely serious.
The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind (1976)
If we would understand the Scientific Revolution correctly, we should always remember that its most powerful impetus was the unremitting search for hidden divinity. As such, it is a direct descendant of the breakdown of the bicameral mind.
The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind (1976)
The central assertion of this view, I repeat, is that each new stage of words literally created new perceptions and attentions, and such new perceptions and attentions resulted in important cultural changes which are reflected in the archaeological record.
The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind (1976)