In dream imagery, architects assume the mantle of Creator in that they are perceived as the mysterious agents who craft the structural framework of the universe (though, I wonder, who represents the architect archetype in the dreams of architects?). The presence of "architect" is a modern archetypal association; in previous times, this role was given over to the blacksmiths, the industrial machinists, the alchemists, and the navigators.

Although, in ancient Babylon and Egypt, the king was the architect. It is interesting to note that our modern architects do not have the same wherewithal as had their historical antecedents. Could any modern architect build the pyramids with the same degree of precision? Even with their modern tools?

This leads us to question how far we have fallen from the archetypal definition. If the knowledge available to such a being is finite, has the proliferation of agents and representatives caused the sum total of architectural knowledge to be split? Not to promulgate a rage against builders, because this could be said of any body of knowledge in the modern era, but have we truly gotten smarter with more minds working on any given problem?

Such a question, though, is a terrible generalization and distracts from the true question of archetypes and their impact upon the dreaming mind.

Freud wanted to believe that everything we imagined was simply the expression of repressed desires, that dreams were nothing more than the febrile fantasies of our internal, unrestrained hunger. In our dreams, there is only savagery and the anarchistic need to consume. René Girard argued that this bestial hunger could never be truly removed from any society, and that a ritualistic outburst of violence was necessary to maintain the "sanity" of any societal organization. We needed to bleed off the energy of our dreams, if you will.

But such an argument implies the lack of a decent architecture within our psyches, the lack of a Creative presence. We have no way to focus—to build pyramids—because we don't know how.

Such an argument seems to suggest a lack of belief in God. Or rather, a lack of belief in "belief" because isn't that what architects do? They believe a structure can be built. They believe that something that has never been done before can be done.