David Miller — invariably David L. Miller, professor of religion at Syracuse University — occupies a distinct and irreplaceable position within the depth-psychology corpus as the theologian who most rigorously articulated what James Hillman’s archetypal psychology demanded of religious thought: a thoroughgoing polytheism. His 1974 monograph The New Polytheism: Rebirth of the Gods and Goddesses, republished in 1981 with a prefatory letter by Henry Corbin and an appendix by Hillman himself, stands as the locus classicus for the argument that the Western imagination’s drift toward monotheistic unity is psychologically impoverishing and that a return to the multiplicity of the gods constitutes not regression but recovery. Miller works at the intersection of classical mythology, process theology, and Jungian amplification, drawing on Rilke, Aristotle, and the pre-Socratics to show that polytheism is a metaphysical rather than merely cultic category. His earlier essay ‘Achelous and the Butterfly’ (1973) extends this project into the surprising domain of humor and psyche, linking the humor archetype to classical mythological figures and demonstrating the range of Miller’s archetypal method. Within the intellectual community gathered around Hillman — including Stanley Hopper, Murray Stein, and Edward Casey — Miller functions as a theological peer whose work consistently challenged psychology to take the gods seriously as psychological realities rather than mere symbols.
THE NEW POLYTHEISM REBIRTH OF THE GODS AND GODDESSES by DAVID L. MILLER prefatory letter by HENRY CORBIN appendix by JAMES HILLMAN
This is Miller’s defining work, situating his polytheistic theology within a collaborative framework with Corbin and Hillman that established the theological foundations of archetypal psychology.
, The New Polytheism: Rebirth of the Gods and Goddesses, 1974thesis
ACHELOUS AND THE BUTTERFLY: TOWARD AN ARCHETYPAL PSYCHOLOGY OF HUMOR DAVID L. MILLER
Miller’s 1973 essay proposes an archetypal psychology of humor grounded in classical mythology, demonstrating his method of amplifying psychological phenomena through mythic figures.
, Achelous and the Butterfly: Toward an Archetypal Psychology of Humor, 1973thesis
Psyché as butterfly is the form of being at home in the interplay of the airs or ethers… Achelous… as the river of rivers… is the form of being at home in the interplay of moistures (humors).
Miller argues that both Psyche and Achelous are mythic figures embodying the elemental conditions for humor, grounding the humor archetype in ancient cosmological imagery.
, Achelous and the Butterfly: Toward an Archetypal Psychology of Humor, 1973thesis
the smile of Miller’s clown and the laughter of Nietzsche’s Zarathustra may be metaphors of certain archetypal forms, imaginal patterns, rather than only overt behaviors.
Miller contends that humor must be understood through archetypal amplification rather than taken at face value as mere behavioral expression.
, Achelous and the Butterfly: Toward an Archetypal Psychology of Humor, 1973thesis
Pneuma could never do the imagination’s realistic job, as psyché did. For pneuma leads too quickly to the non-imaginative and rationalistic nous.
Miller distinguishes psyche from pneuma to argue for the primacy of imagination over rationalism in understanding soul, a cornerstone of his archetypal approach.
, Achelous and the Butterfly: Toward an Archetypal Psychology of Humor, 1973supporting
You could not discover the limits of psyché, even if you traveled every road to do so; such is the depth (bathos) of its meaning (logos).
Miller invokes Heraclitus to anchor his concept of psyche in the pre-Socratic tradition, establishing the depth and inexhaustibility of soul as foundational to archetypal inquiry.
, Achelous and the Butterfly: Toward an Archetypal Psychology of Humor, 1973supporting
David L. Miller, Gods and Games: Toward a Theology of Play (New York: Harper and Row, 1973), pp. 164-169.
Miller’s earlier work Gods and Games is cited here as a precursor to his polytheistic theology, showing the continuity between his theology of play and the New Polytheism project.
, The New Polytheism: Rebirth of the Gods and Goddesses, 1974supporting
David Miller and Stanley Hopper from Syracuse; the poet Charles Boer from Connecticut; Paul Kugler, Tom Kapacinskas, Robbie Bosnak, Thomas Moore, Murray Stein
Russell documents Miller’s participation in the foundational Dallas gathering of the archetypal psychology circle, identifying him as a key intellectual figure alongside Hillman.
, Life and Ideas of James Hillman, 2023supporting
See David L. Miller, ‘Orestes — Myth and Dream as Catharsis,’ in Joseph Campbell, ed., Myths, Dreams, Religion (New York: E. P. Dutton, 1970), pp. 26-47.
An early Miller essay on Orestes, myth, and dream in Campbell’s edited volume demonstrates his longstanding engagement with myth as a psychological and cathartic phenomenon.
, The New Polytheism: Rebirth of the Gods and Goddesses, 1974supporting
Miller, David L. Hells and Holy Ghosts: A Theopoetics of Christian Belief. Nashville: Abingdon Press, 1989.
Hillman’s bibliography in The Soul’s Code cites Miller’s theopoetics work, confirming Miller’s sustained presence as a theological reference within the Hillmanian corpus.
, The Soul’s Code: In Search of Character and Calling, 1996supporting
Hillman, Kerényi, Miller, Stein, and others, to discern and describe the epiphanies of the gods in the contemporary psyche
A Spring Publications catalogue listing names Miller alongside Hillman and Kerényi in the Facing the Gods volume, positioning him within the core editorial circle of archetypal depth psychology.
, The New Polytheism: Rebirth of the Gods and Goddesses, 1974aside