The many examples of the journey to the underworld (Ishtar, Odysseus, Plato’s Er) exhibit certain structural parallels to this model of ascent. The cosmic traveler is shown the workings of the world beyond death and returns to report his or her findings. One could then argue that the journey (even though a journey “down”) functions to lend authority to the report. But there is one crucial difference. When one is taken to the highest heaven in texts of this type, one enters where no mortal belongs, whereas a journey to the underworld is the very opposite—as the place where all humans are
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