The Essence of Panic: Mythology, Philosophy, and the Numinous within It

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“The soul seems surrounded by the most terrible darkness and feels trapped in agonizing despair. In this darkness, it sees no possibility of salvation and falls into a panic that no words can describe.”

– The mystic Teresa of Ávila

As the mystic Teresa of Ávila says: There is no language that can describe such an experience. One finds oneself in a disturbing state of consciousness. The usual functions of the personality break down. One is hardly able to function in the world, as all energy and attention are almost entirely absorbed by this experience and the struggle against panic. The world narrows, thoughts whirl, and beyond that, it feels as if you are distancing yourself from your own body and surroundings, as if everything around you has become a distant, alien landscape, and you are observing yourself from afar.

In this article, we take a journey to broaden our perspective on fear and panic attacks. First, we look at the origins of panic, which go back to antiquity, and then we examine the theological and philosophical views on fear and panic. Contrary to the widespread clinical view today, we do not focus on the physical and psychological symptoms of panic. Instead, we take a few steps back to get a broader picture that better accounts for both phenomenology and ontology. This is not about ranking one perspective as superior to another, but rather about getting a larger picture that includes the more difficult-to-describe aspects of panic. To do this, words alone are not enough. Therefore, we need ideas that can amplify the experience. Rather than impoverishing the experience by trying to understand it purely rationally, we want to preserve a vibrant fullness. In this way, the experience of panic can be more deeply empathized with and recognized for what it is – an inner, intense experience that expands our reality.

Fear & Anxiety

Before we delve deeper into the structure of panic, let’s first consider what gives rise to panic.

Two terms that are often used interchangeably, but there is an essential difference that Paul Tillich makes clear. Paul Tillich (1886-1965) was a renowned German-American theologian and philosopher whose work profoundly influenced modern theology and existentialist philosophy. In one of his widely known books, The Courage to Be, he explores the essential meaning of both terms.

In brief: Fear has an object, and anxiety does not. Fear can be faced, understood, analyzed, fought, and conquered. We fear specific things in life. We fear certain animals, flying, public speaking, diseases, or the person who follows us one night. But at the core of fear is anxiety. It is the element that connects all types of fear. It is argued that anxiety is a part of being. The origin of anxiety arises from the awareness of finitude, of non-being. Thus, fear can be seen as a projection of anxiety. Fear is the symptom, and the cause is anxiety. Since anxiety is a part of our human consciousness, it cannot be fought. We cannot eradicate, destroy, or deny it. Those who encounter it “are helplessly exposed to it, insofar as it is pure anxiety.”

Through fear, the projection of anxiety, the idea of finitude is amplified and brought closer to the person. Anxiety may not have been conscious before, but through fear, we become aware of finitude. These projections may sometimes correspond to reality, such as when the person walking behind us on a lonely road at night is actually following us with destructive intentions. But other times, it may just be the existential anxiety of non-being that appears in our consciousness through fear.

Three Forms of Anxiety

Non-being is not only equated with death but also encompasses other forms of threat. This differentiation helps us understand how the awareness of nothingness threatens being and how this anxiety appears in our lives.

In his book, Paul Tillich distinguishes three forms of anxiety that are expressed through non-being. On the ontic level, we fear fate and death; on the spiritual level, we experience the fear of emptiness and meaninglessness; and in the moral realm, we meet the judge of damnation and guilt.

The Fear of Fate and Death

This anxiety is an inevitable part of every being. We cannot protect ourselves from death, just as we cannot protect ourselves from fate. Hence, this anxiety is called ontic. Both are higher forces that have their say in our lives and leave their marks. Attempting to eliminate them with arguments fails. We could argue that there is life after death, but this does not make the anxiety disappear. For the end of our biological being is a fact, and everyone is aware of it. Fates can befall us at any time, which makes the fear of fate so strong. We cannot calculate it. Fate could be lurking around every corner and end our present existence.

The Fear of Emptiness and Meaninglessness

A life that is meant for us but not lived is the emptiness and meaninglessness that Paul Tillich speaks of here. Attempts to avoid this spiritual anxiety can be seen in fanatical conviction, which gives the person a sense of purpose in life. The fanatical person did not find their conviction through natural development, but the person was driven to it by anxiety. When their values are criticized, the person will go on the defensive, for the insight into the actual emptiness or meaninglessness would bring forth this anxiety. Having an answer to the meaning of life does not necessarily mean knowing the words but living something that gives one authentic fullness in life.

The Fear of Guilt and Damnation

At some point, we are asked what we have made of ourselves. Paul Tillich writes at this point: “The one who asks is the judge, and that is himself, he who stands against himself at the same time.” From this question arises the fear of guilt and damnation. With our creative power, we bear the responsibility to make of ourselves what we should be. With the freedom that comes with this power, it also happens that we miss our calling, that we may not live according to the demands of our inner life, but rather according to the expectations from the outside or choose another path out of comfort.

Ontic anxiety manifests in the omnipresent threat to being by the inevitable end of life and the unpredictable intervention of fate, through which non-being is experienced as an inescapable reality. Similarly, the fear of emptiness and meaninglessness and the fear of guilt and damnation reflect the threat to being by non-being, pointing to the absence of meaning and the possible failure of one’s existence.

The Encounter with Nothingness

Thus, the encounter with bare anxiety (whatever it may be) is the encounter with nothingness. Nothingness has no structure, no support, no points of orientation, so we have no choice but to get lost in it. This is exactly what happens when panic seizes the soul; a part of us gets lost in it, we seem to have no control over what is happening, something greater takes over our autonomy. Anyone who has experienced a panic attack knows that there is little that can be done to escape it; it almost seems as if every attempt strengthens it.

According to Paul Tillich, unlike fear, anxiety cannot disappear. Anxiety is a present reality. Medications do not make anxiety disappear; they only alleviate the symptoms. Even therapy does not make anxiety disappear; at best, it teaches us acceptance. This is one of the central arguments in the book The Courage to Be: “Existential anxiety has an ontological character and cannot be eliminated, but must be taken into the courage to be.” Courage to be, for existential anxiety is a part of our being.

When we experience panic, we may also experience fear, but it is certainly the encounter with anxiety itself. Not just any kind of encounter, but one that makes us tremble and freeze, bringing the potential reality of non-being so close that we can almost taste it. A comparable experience, which brings us both into depth and into the radical revelation of the soul. It is a revelation of a numinous experience, something that lies beyond the profane of the day. The numinous, a term coined by the theologian Rudolf Otto, defines a special kind of sacred - today we might say spiritual - experience that can be both terrifying and alluring. This numinous experience opens the doors to a realm that is rather hidden in everyday life.

Sensitivity and Anxiety

Depression, post-traumatic stress, and phobias can be precursors to panic, but they do not necessarily have to be. Paul Tillich describes that there are people who are simply more sensitive. Their skin is thinner; they feel more, and thus not much stands between them and bare anxiety. Non-being is factually always present, and the sensitive person is more aware of this than the mass person.

Marie-Louise von Franz was a Swiss psychologist and a close collaborator of Carl Gustav Jung. She is known for her work in the field of Jungian psychology and her analyses of fairy tales and alchemy. In one of her lectures, she tells the story of a Frenchman and an Englishman who sat together in a trench during World War I. “The Frenchman nervously smoked one cigarette after another and paced up and down, while the Englishman sat calmly and then mockingly asked the Frenchman: ‘Are you afraid? Are you nervous?’ And the Frenchman said: ‘If you were as afraid as I am, you would have run away long ago.’” There are people who are so thick-skinned that they do not feel anxiety when they encounter it through a barbaric threat like war. However, this says nothing about their courage. The sensitive person must muster much more courage to endure situations of threat.

Therefore, panic for some people is not the result of personal history, but they are closer to existential anxiety.

Paul Tillich also mentions that these people have greater creative capacities. They are more connected to non-being and thus connected to the realm where everything is one. The vacuum from which every idea, every person, every creation springs.

Pan and Panic

In antiquity, panic attacks were often regarded as supernatural or even divine phenomena. Thus, in ancient Greece, the god Pan, from whom the word panic is derived, was believed to intervene in the person’s being. Understanding the etymological origin will help us better understand why panic is not just a pathological phenomenon but also a human experience through which something profound is experienced and thus has a value that should be highlighted.

In the book Pan and Natural Anxiety - On the Necessity of Nightmares for the Soul, James Hillman picks up on an article by Donald Brinkmann and says: “Brinkmann has already pointed out the failure of all theories of panic that attempt to treat it sociologically, psychologically, or historically and not in its own terms. The correct terms, Brinkmann says, are ‘mythological.’”

It is not uncommon for a psychological phenomenon to be named after a god or figure from Greek mythology. Just to name a few: Oedipus complex, panic disorder, narcissistic personality disorder, Adonis complex, nymphomania, and any kind of phobias refer to the god Phobos, or manic behavior refers to the spirits of Mania, who personify madness, insanity, and raging ecstasy. Even though these myths are no longer conscious in our society, they still govern. Whether we believe in them or not. They are part of nature. They are a force that determines our actions.

As Brinkmann says, attempts to describe panic exclusively in terms of symptomatology fail because we do not do justice to its phenomenology, the actual experience. Therefore, it is helpful to engage with the Greek mythologies surrounding the god Pan.

Pan is depicted as a creature with horns, hooves, a hairy body, and a panpipe, similar to how we have imagined the devil since Christianity. However, this depiction arises from a conflict between Christianity and the polytheistic culture of the ancient Greek empire, which I will not go into further here to stay on topic.

However, it is important to mention that he is not pure evil (as we usually imagine the devil), but he encompasses a wide spectrum of generative, sustaining, and destructive aspects. On a fundamental level, Pan is seen as the god of nature. This includes areas of instincts and fertility. But Pan is often also associated with masturbation, panic, excessive indulgence, nightmares, and even rape.

Pan’s habitat is nature in Arcadia, which is both a physical and psychological place. In the Orphic hymns to Pan, it is reported that the god of instincts is found in the caves of Arcadia. Thus, in the area that creates an access to both the upper and lower worlds. The upper, our world, the world of order and life, and the underworld, the obscure realms.

Pan’s Habitat in Our Psyche

Such a place also exists in our psyche. This is the area where psyche and body collide, the inner and outer world. Instincts find their place there, as they are half-conscious and half-unconscious. So, we also see the connection between instinct, Pan, and psyche here.

If we were to place ourselves in this area, we would have one foot in the conscious and the other in the unconscious. We stand at the edge of both worlds, the underworld, the world of the dead, and the world of the living. On one side, we look into the darkness, and on the other side, we see the light. This is the place of Pan and thus of panic. In panic, we feel our heart racing, cold and dry hands, feet, dizziness, nausea, and at the same time, it feels as if we are standing beside ourselves; we and the world appear strange to us.

When we panic, we break through the layers of our daily perception and gain access to deeper layers of our being. These layers not only contain non-being but also forces that are generative, destructive, and often hidden in our own nature.

In harmony with this, James Hillman continues in his commentary on Brinkmann’s work: “Brinkmann has already pointed out the failure of all theories of panic that attempt to treat it sociologically, psychologically, or historically and not in its own terms. The correct terms, Brinkmann says, are mythological. Then panic is no longer seen as a physiological defense mechanism or an inadequate reaction or an abaissement du niveau mental (lowering of the mental level), but as the right response to the numinous.”

One of the central arguments is that panic is not simply a pathological or irrational reaction, but rather a natural human response to the numinous – an encounter with something that goes beyond our profane everyday life and existence.

Panic can affect people with relevant histories or even people with a certain sensitivity to the existential anxieties of being.

When we experience panic, even if it has a fearsome object, we are not just reacting to that object but confronting the essence of our existence – the conflict between being and non-being. In this light, panic is not a failure or a sign of weakness, but a legitimate and meaningful encounter with the numinous.

James Hillman’s insights deepen this understanding by emphasizing the mythological nature of panic and its connection to the god Pan. Pan, as a representation of nature and instincts, embodies the intersection between the conscious and unconscious, the known and unknown. In moments of panic, we are thrown into this in-between area, experience a profound disruption of our normal perception, and gain access to deeper layers of our psyche.

Perhaps we do not do justice to panic if we only refer to its obvious symptoms and try to treat them. Perhaps there is a value in this experience, a wisdom that we can bring forth from the deep layers. Something that helps us deepen our lives and thus give panic a meaning instead of just wanting to fight and eliminate it.