Synopsis: Commander Chakotay is in a shuttlecraft performing a ritual to honor the anniversary of his father’s death when he is confronted by a young Kazon.
This episode can be seen as an illustration of what James Hillman would call the relationship between the archetypes of the Senex, the wise old man or the king, and the Puer, the eternal youth.
In “Initiations” Commander Chakotay has borrowed a shuttlecraft in order to perform a ritual to honor the anniversary of his father’s death, which he is doing when the vessel crosses into Kazon-Ogla space. In response, the leader of the Kazon-Ogla, Razik, sends a Kazon youth, Kar, to kill him in order to earn his Kazon-Ogla name. Instead, when fired upon Chakotay disables Kar’s ship and transports him to the shuttle to save his life. Then a larger Kazon-Ogla vessel appears and captures them both. Chakotay refuses to kill Kar so that he can die in honor, and eventually Kar kills, Razik, who has been both belittling Kar and ordering him to kill Chakotay. Kar then replaces him as Kazon-Ogla leader.
Hillman writes about the relationship between the archetypes of the Senex and Puer as being one that can be used to interpret all others, because it is a continuous cycle of change between two opposites, which occurs in many paired archetypes within our psyches. It envisions that the old king, or Senex, must die and that the Puer, or youth, will then take his place, in an ongoing enantiodromia, or running counter to. In this episode when Kar decides to kill Razik and claim his place instead of killing Chakotay, he struck a blow to the old system, and started his own reign, much as the Puer archetype in our psyche replaces the existing Senex.
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