Up: [[Symbols]] Created: 2025-01-22 Updated: 2025-03-21 Caves and caverns have the same meaning symbolically. A cavern is underground and bigger than a cave. Psychologically, entering a cave is about enclosure, containment, introversion, hibernation, incubation. Passing through a cave represents a change of state. In every culture, caves have been linked to the idea of earth being the Great Mother. Caves are associated with both death (tomb) and birth or rebirth (womb). Both are considered aspects of the [[Symbolic Feminine]]. Because caves are usually found in the sides of mountains, the two landforms are commonly associated. Mountains are [[Symbolic Masculine]]. ### Cultural Understandings of Caves - part of the creation myths of Pueblo, Hopi and Zuni tribes — born in the bowels of the earth, climbed up to daylight emerging through a cave - Ancients and medieval poets saw the entrance to Hades/Hell as a plummeting cave. The German word for cave is Höhle, related to Holle, Hell. - Revered as the birthplace of gods and heroes, but also the dwellings of the spirits of the dead - Because it’s dark and has a terrifying ‘abyss’ quality to it, caves were also seen as the home of serpents, and monsters that guard the entrance. - Mohammed heard voice of Allah reverberating in a cavern - Orthodox Christian icons show Jesus is born not in a stable, but in a cave with the Star of Bethelem beaming into the opening. New god sheltered in secret interior of mother earth. A cave was also Christ’s his resting place after the Crucifixion and before his descent into Hell, in preparation for ascension to Heaven - Celts saw caves as one way of entering the [[Otherworld]] - In folklore, the cave of Aladdin was the place to go for wish-fulfillment - Plato described caves as something to ascend from. He said uneducated people behaved as if they were chained in a cave, the chains forged by their childhoods, so all they could see were the images flickering on the wall in front of them. The only way to escape that was through meditation and ascension to the seat of the intellect in order to contemplate *the real world of ideas*. - Porphyry (234-305 A.D.), Neoplatonist philosopher, scholar, writer said before there were temples, all religious rites took place in caves. This makes sense because of the belief that symbolic death has to precede rebirth and illumination. The Sanskrit word for temple meant womb. The Sumerian word for the underworld, the sacred cave, and the womb was ‘matu’ from the universal root word for ‘mother.’ and the oracular shrine in Greece named Delphi meant ‘womb.’ We still today imitate the womb as rebirth into a new life in baptisms and some initiations. - Further support for caves as sacred religious sites is offered by the cave decorations that date back between 10,000 and 30,000 years. As Richard Leakey said, it would have been such a dangerous and frightening pilgrimage to get to the caves that it’s *unlikely they made this hazardous journey just to exercise their artistic skills*. - See also [[Incubation Caves]].