1023 Op. cit., p. 15.

1024 C. G. Jung, Despre arhetip cu o specială considerare a conceptului de anima, în Opere complete, vol. I, p. 72.

1025 Mitul eternei reîntoarceri, cit., p. 35.

1026 Pentru analiza noţiunii de arhetip la Eliade vezi şi Natale Spineto, „The notion of archetype in Eliade’s writings“, Religion, nr. 38, 2008, pp. 366-374. Analizând diferitele sensuri ale arhetipului, Spineto afirmă: „It is possible to identify a third concept of archetype in Eliade’s works: the archetype as a structural and structuring element of the religious fact. It swings between two poles: it seems to have, on one side, a methodological function being an auxiliary concept that accounts for the similarities among several religious forms; on the other side, it seems to be an effective structure of reality. The implications of such a notion of archetype have been noticed, for example, by Ernesto de Martino, who pointed out that in Eliade’s works ‘every distinction between science and science’s object of study; between religious historiography and religious vision of the world, is lost’. But, if, according to this third meaning, archetype is no longer a useful word to describe the religious reality of ‘archaic’ civilizations and becomes the very structure of the phenomena, as well as the conceptual net with which we apprehend it, the ‘Platonic structure’ of the ‘archaic ontology’ expressed by the archetypes becomes a ‘Platonic’ structure of a tout-court reality. This explains why Eliade’s work has been referred to as ‘Platonic’ by many critics. The employment of the archetypes has been seen as a reference to a metaphysical quality with which all religious phenomena are tinged. This interpretation is the result of overlapping the first (descriptive) concept of archetype with the third (rather methodological), while a solution for the problem with Eliade’s Platonism could be, precisely, to make a rigorous distinction between the two concepts, so as to avoid the projection of the ‘Platonic’ nature of one of them onto the other. If understood in this sense, the archetype would not necessarily be based on a metaphysical foundation. But then, the problem remains to justify the notion of archetype on a theoretical level; an answer could be provided with reference to the concept of morphology. The notion of ‘morphology’ is linked to Goethe’s works. Goethe has used it in his writings in order to explain his method of study of the science of nature. Eliade is acquainted with the works of the German thinker, and in three cases he explicitly links Goethe’s position with his own. On a visit to the public gardens at Palermo, on April 5th 1951, Eliade recalls Goethe’s quest for the original plant, the Urpflanze. He says: ‘Seldom in the history of science has it been more difficult to recognize the importance of a method [.] But when the history of the idea of morphology as Goethe understood it shall be written, it will be seen how fecund it has been, not only in the natural sciences but also in the classification, analysis, and interpretation of creations of the spirit’. “

1027 Tratat de istorie a religiilor, ed. cit., pp. 27-28.

1028 Apud Natale Spineto, op.cit., p. 211.

1029 Imagini si simboluri, ed. cit., p. 149.

1030 Imagini şi simboluri, cit., pp.43-44.

1031 Ibid., p. 42.

1032 Vezi aici, pentru teorii alternative ale mitului, Ernst Cassirer, Filozofia formelor simbolice. Gândirea mitică, vol. 2, Paralela 45, 2008 şi Claude Lévi-Strauss, Antropologia structurală, Editura politică, Buc., 1978 (Paris, 1958), pp. 197-290; Idem, Gândirea Sălbatică, Editura Ştiinţifică, Buc., 1970 (Paris, 1962); Idem, Myth and Meaning, Foreword by Wendy Doniger, Schocken Books, New York, 1995; Idem, Mythologiques I – Le cru et le cuit, Librairie Plon, Paris, 1964; trad. rom., Mitologice I, Crud şi gătit, traducere şi prefaţă de Ion Pânzaru, Editura Babel, Buc., 1995. Legat de Lévi-Strauss Eliade scrie în Nostalgia originilor, cap. „Prolegomene la dualismul religios“, paragraful „Istoricism şi reducţionism“: „Lévi-Strauss utilizează acelaşi model ligvistic în analiza pe care o face mitului. După el, „scopul mitic este să furnizeze un model logic pentru rezolvarea unei contadicţii“. În plus, „gândirea mitică purcede de la o prise de conscience a anumitor contradicţii şi tinde la medierea lor treptată“. Pe scurt, pentru structuralişti polarităţile, opoziţiile şi antagonismele nu au o origine socială şi nici nu trebuie explicate