The concept of the ‘mythological event’ occupies a structurally central position within the depth-psychology corpus, where it designates not merely a narrative episode but an occurrence understood to possess ontological and psychological reality beyond ordinary historical fact. Eliade establishes the foundational formulation: the mythological event is one that can be ritually reactualized, collapsing the distance between primordial time and the present moment, as when the Babylonian combat of Marduk and Tiamat is mimed anew each New Year. For Campbell, the mythological event functions as an archetype projected onto the plane of temporal existence, conferring sacred meaning upon biological and social facts — the kill, the initiation, the cosmogonic act. Giegerich offers a corrective, arguing that modernity has severed access to the mythological mode of being-in-the-world wherein events could be intrinsically meaningful without being ‘turned into experiences’ by a subjective ego. Campbell’s gloss on the Garden of Eden as ‘a sheer mythological event’ subsequently interpreted as historical illuminates the persistent hermeneutical tension between literal and symbolic registers. Neumann approaches mythological events as projections of transpersonal collective-unconscious dynamics, while Vernant situates them within the ritual-dramatic matrix of royal festivals. The corpus thus holds in productive tension two major positions: the phenomenological-religious (Eliade) and the depth-psychological (Jung, Neumann), with Giegerich pressing toward a logical-ontological reconsideration of what it means for myth to ‘happen’ at all.
The mythical event became present once again. ‘May he continue to conquer Tiamat and shorten his days!’ the priest cried.
Eliade argues that ritual re-enactment does not merely commemorate but genuinely reactualizes the mythological event, dissolving the boundary between primordial and present time.
, The Sacred and the Profane: The Nature of Religion, 1957thesis
Think what happens in Christianity about the event in the Garden. That is a sheer mythological event but it is also interpreted as an historical event.
Campbell identifies the Garden of Eden episode as paradigmatically a mythological event, arguing that Christianity’s error lies in conflating this symbolic register with literal historicity.
, Thou Art That: Transforming Religious Metaphor, 2001thesis
The very point of the mythological mode of being-in-the-world is that events did not have to be turned into experiences by
Giegerich argues that mythological events possess intrinsic meaningfulness as facts in themselves, requiring no subjective ego to transform them into ‘experiences’ — a capacity modern consciousness has lost.
, The Soul’s Logical Life Towards a Rigorous Notion of, 2020thesis
all life on earth is to be recognized as a projection on the plane of temporal event of forms, objects, and personalities forever present in the permanent no-where, no-when, of the mythological age
Campbell proposes that the mythological event exists in a timeless dimension, and terrestrial happenings are comprehensible only as projections of that eternal mythological reality.
, Primitive Mythology (The Masks of God, Volume I), 1959supporting
the mythological first killing that was perpetrated on the holy moon-being or the repetition of that killing in the cult — whether in the village ceremonials or in the actions of the headhunt
Campbell, following Jensen, demonstrates how a primordial mythological event — the first sacred killing — is perpetually re-enacted in ritual, giving all subsequent violence its cosmological sanction.
, Primitive Mythology (The Masks of God, Volume I), 1959supporting
The myth, being a projection of the transpersonal collective unconscious, depicts transpersonal events,
Neumann locates mythological events within the transpersonal collective unconscious, distinguishing them categorically from personalistic occurrences and grounding them in archetypal psychology.
, The Origins and History of Consciousness (Princeton, 2019supporting
the myth remains very close to the ritual drama that it illustrates, the model for which is found in the royal festival of the new year, in the month of Nisan, in Babylon.
Vernant situates mythological events within their ritual-dramatic matrix, showing how the Zeus-Typhon combat recapitulates the Babylonian cosmogonic pattern of royal renewal.
, Myth and Thought Among the Greeks, 1983supporting
the man of archaic cultures tolerates ‘history’ with difficulty and attempts periodically to abolish it
Eliade argues that archaic humanity resists profane historical time precisely because it lacks the ontological density of the mythological event, which alone constitutes genuine reality.
, The Myth of the Eternal Return: Cosmos and History, 1954supporting
The nature and creation myths of the first stage, which led in the hero myth to the battle of the natures, culminate in the triumphal myth of transformation, of which it is written: ‘Nature rules over nature.’
Neumann charts the sequential logic of mythological events — from creation through heroic combat to transformation — as stages in the development of consciousness.
, The Origins and History of Consciousness (Princeton, 2019supporting
salvation is the result of a single, unrepeatable event, namely the crucifixion and death of Jesus in fleshly form. Versus this view, the Gnostics adhere to a concept of salvation or liberation which appears as a repeatable event in the present
Hoeller contrasts the orthodox Christian fixing of salvation in a singular historical event with the Gnostic understanding of the mythological event as an iterative, experiential process.
, The Gnostic Jung and the Seven Sermons to the Dead, 1982supporting
the genesis themes remain integrated with a vast royal epic that depicts the clash of successive generations of gods and various sacred powers for dominion over the world.
Vernant shows how mythological events in eastern and Greek theogonies are structurally subordinated to royal ritual, functioning as the narrative articulation of cosmological and political order.
, The Origins of Greek Thought, 1982supporting
It will have a mythological streak which one is apt to interpret as ‘originality’ or, in more pronounced cases, as mere whimsicality, since its archaic character is not immediately apparent
Jung notes that ideas shaped by archaic mythological motifs carry an unconscious power of conviction deriving from the eternal validity of the underlying archetype rather than from empirical evidence.
, Psychological Types, 1921aside
the basic structure or archetypal elements of a myth are built into a formal expression, which links it up with the cultural collective consciousness of the nation in which it originated
Von Franz distinguishes myth from fairy tale by noting that mythological events are embedded in specific cultural-historical consciousness, giving them formal elaboration and national specificity.
, The Interpretation of Fairy Tales, 1970aside