The Warrior
- First attested
- 1990Formalized as one of the four foundational mature masculine archetypes by Robert Moore and Douglas Gillette in 'King, Warrior, Magician, Lover' (1990).
Moore and Gillette's Warrior is the mature archetype of aggressive, disciplined action for a greater cause.
The Warrior is the second of four archetypes of the mature masculine in Robert Moore and Douglas Gillette's King, Warrior, Magician, Lover (1990), a book of the mythopoetic men's movement. The authors call it a primarily masculine energy form, noting feminine Warrior myths, and say it grows out of the boyhood Hero and is paired with the Lover in one of two dialectical oppositions. They draw on the Egyptian expulsion of the Hyksos, the Indian kshatriya, Thermopylae, the samurai and Native American warriors. They say the scheme builds on Jung's archetypal Self and goes beyond it; the Jungian scholar Darrell Dobson says Moore advanced archetypal theory with its two-poled shadow.
Light
Moore and Gillette describe the Warrior in his fullness as aggressive in the sense of taking the offensive, alert, clear-thinking and trained, able to endure pain, and loyal to a cause beyond himself. He acts with some emotional detachment and, they say, destroys only what needs destroying, so that something newer and more alive can appear.
Shadow
Moore and Gillette give the Warrior two shadow poles: the Sadist, whose cruelty is cold or passionate and who despises the weak, and the Masochist, who projects his Warrior energy onto others, feels powerless and lets himself be pushed around. A man in the Masochist pole, they say, may take abuse for too long and then erupt as the Sadist.