Usless Science Forum
The Psyche => Depth Psychology => Jungian Psychology => Topic started by: Matswin on March 11, 2011, 12:12:32 PM
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The Complementarian Self
Abstract: The self, representing the wholeness of the psyche, has in different guises functioned as a role model for the individual, throughout history. In the Christian era, the ideal of the spiritual individual who is morally perfect (Jesus Christ), through its very one-sidedness, created a reversal of its spirit into materialism. Psychologist Carl Jung, renounced the ideal of perfection and proposed an ideal of completeness. The consequences are no less deleterious. The traditional spiritual ideal must cofunction with a this-worldly (quaternarian) ideal of spirit, following the principle of complementarity as defined by physicists.
Keywords: self, psychic structure, complementarity, C.G. Jung, trinitarian, quaternity, transcendence, Christ.
Read the article here:
http://home7.swipnet.se/~w-73784/compself.htm
Mats Winther
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I think that I agree with your basic premise and I have some further musings to share...
For me I can see the dichotomy of the goals of completeness vs perfection. They are, I think, two sides of the same coin. They constellate different material in the unconscious. I think that the ascendancy and spirituality of the trinity reflects a process in time whereas the completeness approach to self knowledge has a more eternal association. When I think of Jung's dream of Uriah I see a dream character, Uriah, who is ascendant, but, in the due course of time, destined for a fall. And so I see in this a cyclical time pattern of the successive rise and fall, inflation and deflation of the ego. There is a progression here that is lacking in the Sultan who sits in balance presumably beyond the realm of time.
It may be that if you load the completeness and perfection ideas with eternity and time respectively, you can then elaborate the complimentarity of the two principles into a slightly more complex archetypal pairing that might lend itself to further comparison to physics in the form of the incompleteness theorem. And if you see how this correspondence extends the intuitive field of meaning then perhaps you can reverse the application and reveal how fundamental concepts in science are shaped by archetypal patterns themselves (in the mode of Jung and Pauli's collaboration on synchronicity). Oh, and there might be some connection from the incompleteness theorem to why Jung could not bow all the way...
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But Uriah was located beyond the temporal sphere, whereas Akbar was located in the middle of the clockwork. But intuitively I see your point, that Uriah is destined to return, similar to Quetzalcoatl or Christ, who will return in the Second Coming. I understand the trinitarian longing after transcendence, ascendancy as you call it, as an inner urge to transcend the worldly, in order to cleanse the self of all particulars. This notion did not appeal to Jung, whose notion of the spirit depended on experience. He rejected the view of Juan de la Cruz, namely that the soul shall be brought to stillness, in the dark night of the soul, to leave room for the infusion of God's spirit.
Speaking of Pauli, I remember that he discussed an image of the self that first appeared in dreams, which constituted a complicated clockwork that extended in an extra dimension. If anybody is acquainted with his writings on this three-dimensional self image, please recount it here. It could have something to do with a complementary self, as he was very much into complementarity.
Mats
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In the article I try to explain why the self ideals have been so different in
history, and why there is this strong tendency to imitate it (for instance, the
'imitatio Christi'). It has to do with the fact that eiter side in the
complementary model is a viable wholeness, in itself:
Jung followed the completeness ideal, and he liked to think of himself as a
modern Merlin. Krishnamurti (a very Christlike person, but nothing like the
historical Jesus) followed the transcendental ideal. Both individuals had a very
different view of things. Krishnamurti, refuted any psychological, inner,
evolution or "becoming", and said that any movement away from inner emptiness
is an escape. Despite their mutual irreconcilability, both perspectives carry a
great deal of truth, because it is the truth about the self. (Remember the
principle that either of the two sides in the complementary model is a
functioning wholeness, in itself, although it doesn't suffice to describe
reality.) Both persons, believing that they had found the right path to the
self, tried to realize the self, not knowing that the self is complementarian
(complementary).
What does this mean? It means that both persons, while they were right, they
were also utterly wrong, because their vision of the self does not include its
complementary. Krishnamurti manifested a Christlike ideal, while Jung, to a
degree, manifested a modern Merlin. While they both represented a vision of the
self that is a wholeness in itself, it fails to epitomize the whole truth about
the self. To the extent that they identified with the self, they also estranged
themselves from its complementary opposite. To manifest the self is to become
alienated from the self. Jung observed that the saintly practice of 'imitatio
Christi' alienated religious devotees from the self of completeness. History is
replete with tragic victims of 'imitatio Christi'. On the other hand, the
'imitatio Merlini' among modern paganists, would alienate the subject from the
self of transcendence, the consequences of which I discussed above. The
conclusion is that it is a mistake to throw out the complementary opposite,
because it inevitably leads to identification with the self. However, this topic
is very paradoxical. I don't claim to have wholly understood it.
http://home7.swipnet.se/~w-73784/compself.htm
Mats Winther
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I have now expanded on Pauli's vision of the world-clock, which Jung analyses, and added a new chapter. Please read and comment.
http://home7.swipnet.se/~w-73784/compself.htm
Mats
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Modern physics has certainly taught us the notion that it may simply be the case that phenomenon cannot be reduced to a single rational expression but may consist of two complimentary but rationally irreconcilable expressions or descriptions. In fact, having had this possibility held up to those who have taken the time to understand the complementarity principle will now have a new intuitive idea to apply to other realms as you have done here with Jung's and Pauli's numerology of the Self.
My take is this, that if you see this sort of thinking as highly intuitive and then consider, "How is it that intuition is perceiving similar patterns in very different subject matter?" you get to asking questions about how the brain works and how the brain makes the world even when the brain is perceiving the world. So when you looked at Pauli's dream that Jung analyzed and brought up the problem of 3 and 4, I thought immediately of a theory I sketched out just recent on this site here:
http://uselessscience.com/forum/index.php?topic=638.msg2330#msg2330
What this does is to bring up a possible neural grounding for why 4 is often a way to describe a whole. It potentially provides the ground upon which 4 is to be declared as an archetypal pattern; that is, because it is a re-usable pattern that the conscious function of intuition "can apply" in coordination with the neural architecture underlying color differentiation (at a certain level). By reducing the archetypal pattern to a brain architecture/functional specification you get the following:
1. An explanation for why 4 as a numerical archetype of wholeness seems like a consistent (true) perception that is not simply subjective wish fulfillment
2. A perspective from which to establish the validity and limitations of such a view on the archetype
3. A perspective from which to reconsider the validity and limitations of the physics theories that also partakes of the archetypal quality of 4 as whole
Now if intuition can apply a pattern of 3 as whole in a similar fashion then you can establish the two systems as complimentary if you establish that each one is equally valid yet differently constructed by the funciton of intuition. If you rationally trace out each theory they may easily conflict because they are, after all, based on the irrational perception of intuition, and like sensation, the perception functions of consciousness are not concerned with establishing a system of interconnected truths so much as they are concerned with establishing so called facts of perception.
So if my theory or another like it is true of the archetype of 4 as whole, then there is established a physical, inhereted ground for the archetype that is as dynamic as its various conscious images have shown. This lends validity to the idea of archetypes scientifically. At the same time, any scientific theory that happens to posit a four-fold system suddenly comes under suspicious because we can also see how the function of intuition as a brain architecture/function plays a role in creating or prefering this configuration. To my mind, then, we have complimentarity between an objective role of 4 as archetypal pattern of the psyche and a subjective role of 4 as whole in casting our scientific and other perspectives on wholes in terms of 4. The subject/object view is, perhaps, the highest order complimentarity and it saturates so-called objective science when that science applies intuitive, abstractions to nature. I think this is what Pauli was arguing in his portion of the book he wrote with Jung on synchronicity.
So with this you can deconstruct such scientific ideas of the "four forces of nature" because you can start with a simple skepticism. Are there really four forces? Well, as soon as you look at the nitty-gritty, or what I would call a sensation-type attitude, you see that there are really five forces but two were "united" a relatively long time ago. The more you look the more you can deconstruct the relevance of the archetypal pattern of 4 as whole as either coincidence or "subjective" influence of the intuitive function. This brings in the complimentarity of intuition and sensation which may see the same phenomenon but produce very different perceptions from it; both equally valid (true) yet different.
Of course, then you also have the cultural overlay which amplifies the archetypal and also gives images and ideas energy by virtue of their historical existence. Jung can then find support for his archetypes (or consistent intuitions) by examining archetypal images from different cultures from different times. What he is "really" doing, as an Intuitive Thinker, is to delineate universal ways in which the brain works to perceive "unconscious patterns" through the function of intuition.
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Your argument builds on the notion that we are archetypally predisposed for seeing things, for instance, in terms of trinitarian or quaternarian wholenesses. But is this enough to explain why people devote their whole lives to the trinitarian spirit, by becoming Buddhist monks, etc.? Does a perception of reality in what regards the wholeness of life, motivate a person so strongly? I would argue that such a thinking is lopsided toward consciousness, because it only predicts that our predispositions of perception will determine our cognition in certain ways. But an analysis on Jungian lines would put more emphasis on the unconscious, namely that we are affected by "thoughts and feelings" developed through the millennia in the unconscious. Therefore I would tend to see the complementarian self as constitutional, that is, the "completeness-self" and the "oneness-self" are both constitutional. It would better explain why people can passionately devote their whole lives to such ideals, as they are driven by an age-old unconscious force. However, it is possible that I overestimate the constitutional factor, and that we are, in fact, a more "sociological" species than Jungians generally believe.
Mats Winther
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I have now enhanced the article as I believe it has great relevance to alchemy. The hermaphrodite in alchemy is reinterpreted in terms of the "complementarian self". It differs from Jung's understanding of the end goal of alchemy as the realization of the conjunct conscious and unconscious — the integrated self. Instead the hermaphrodite, or the 'lapis philosophorum', is the result of a largely autonomous process that occurs relatively independent of the ego. If this is correct, the ego need not undergo the radical transformations that Jung portrays, involving a psychological crisis, or severe depression. The renovated self, as such, as the wonder-working 'lapis', will influence the ego, as an after-effect. This reinterpretation, however, does not refute Jung's view of alchemy, but it affects the most important aspects, namely how to view the relation with the unconscious, and the way in which the spiritual journey is accomplished.
The added alchemical section is here:
http://home7.swipnet.se/~w-73784/compself.htm#rebis
Mats Winther
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Your argument builds on the notion that we are archetypally predisposed for seeing things, for instance, in terms of trinitarian or quaternarian wholenesses. But is this enough to explain why people devote their whole lives to the trinitarian spirit, by becoming Buddhist monks, etc.? Does a perception of reality in what regards the wholeness of life, motivate a person so strongly? I would argue that such a thinking is lopsided toward consciousness, because it only predicts that our predispositions of perception will determine our cognition in certain ways. But an analysis on Jungian lines would put more emphasis on the unconscious, namely that we are affected by "thoughts and feelings" developed through the millennia in the unconscious. Therefore I would tend to see the complementarian self as constitutional, that is, the "completeness-self" and the "oneness-self" are both constitutional. It would better explain why people can passionately devote their whole lives to such ideals, as they are driven by an age-old unconscious force. However, it is possible that I overestimate the constitutional factor, and that we are, in fact, a more "sociological" species than Jungians generally believe.
Mats Winther
Archetypes help to allow unconscious contents come into consciousness. So if one has a need to relate to a whole which, like God, one cannot face directly but only through an intermediary due to its vastness, power, etc..., then the archetype can allow lidibo to flow (through consciousness) by virtue of the fact that it provides a "handle" on the whole. Re-presenting a whole in terms of a finite number of varied parts might be what allows consciousness to handle the whole (through differentiation). The handle allows the lidibo to be manipulable or potentially so, so that the ego can "handle" it.
The original source of the libido as I see it is the body and the collective. Both of these "sources" are of the unconscious as they are housed outside the conscious system, which is itself is, presumably, housed in the neural behavior of the brain. The bodily instincts as they impact the nervous system and the outer demands of society that require individual needs to be met on collective terms are themselves autonomous energy systems. These autonomous energy systems guide and drive the individual even as the individual attempts to resist or engage these energies and it is these energy systems which have been developed through the millenia, not anything in the neural firings of an individual's brain. Therefore, one may assume that some great portion of what is referred to as the collective unconscious actually is "housed" in these realms.
So I might actually agree (although in a different context) that the passion (aka "libido") is best seen as coming from the unconscious, but for that passion to be at all available to consciousness, it must be made palatable/digestible/relatable to consciousness. Archetypes of the collective unconscious arise when the conscious system cannot resolve a path to a need. A conflict results in either one's relationship to society (persona) or to one's inner world (animi). The perceptive function of intuition may generate, along with the differentiated knowledge of the sensation function, images which are of typical patterns that, in and of themselves, are the hallmark of intuition. I think Jung has spoken along these lines at times regarding intuition as a function which perceives the unconscious (from Wikipedia's Intuition (knowledge) page)...
In Carl Jung's theory of the ego, described in 1921 in Psychological Types, intuition was an "irrational function", opposed most directly by sensation, and opposed less strongly by the "rational functions" of thinking and feeling. Jung defined intuition as "perception via the unconscious": using sense-perception only as a starting point, to bring forth ideas, images, possibilities, ways out of a blocked situation, by a process that is mostly unconscious.
So to summarize, the individual, in order to be inspired (energized), must successfully relate to the energies available in the psychic realm. These energies are sourced in the unconscious, but to be made available/useful/enjoyable by the individual the ego must be able to handle those energies and to do so requires, at the least, a symbolic relationship to those originally unconscious energies. The symbol bridges the conscious to the unconscious. A comparative analysis of symbols reveals common patterns across time and culture. My idea is that these common patterns are the specific structures that the conscious function of intuition "uses" (as part of its objective character) to produce contents of consciousness. These patterns are what Jung has come to call the archetypes. My belief is that it is the very framework of the sensation function's sculpting of the cerebral cortex that is also the palette from which intuition works. By re-mapping the sensation function's own cortical maps, intuition is able to create perceptions that have the qualities of sensation but imply "truths" that are not about sensory stimulation but about ways to order what is otherwise beyond the scope for consciousness to handle. This is akin to how deeply embedded in our human language is metaphor.
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However, it is possible that I overestimate the constitutional factor, and that we are, in fact, a more "sociological" species than Jungians generally believe.
What I continue to find is that Jung's most profound ideas are few but too many to easily juggle in the mind all at once. I too tend to ignore the social realm vs the inner realm at times or vice versa. It is just hard to keep a good balance of all of these ideas, yet they all have something to contribute to most discussions of things psychological. By having these kinds of discussions with others who have a good grasp of the concepts (such as yourself) I learn to "juggle" better with Jungian ideas. So thanks for the back and forth so far!
I think that Jung himself in his various writings swerved and swayed tending to leave things out in one essay but to address them adequately in another essay...as if he could never quite get all his own concepts all together in a room at one time. Perhaps he needed to update his glossary in the back of Psychological Types more often!
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Hi Mats,
I've spent a great deal of time studying and thinking about the Rosarium, and although it is nearly pointless to suggest that there are "correct" or perhaps even "superior" interpretations of its symbolic emblem sequence, I think there is some value in sharing a few of my thoughts (some of which differ from yours and also from Jung's). Although Jung's scholarly knowledge of alchemy was very robust (far surpassing my own, for instance), I think he made some important interpretive errors in his efforts to psychologize alchemy. I would locate the crux of this problem with Jung's individuation model. I agree with Jung that there is a deep parallel between his individuation model and the alchemical opus. But what Jung didn't seem to fully grasp (perhaps because he wanted to see alchemy as unconscious projection or not consciously realized) is that the the richest and most complex renderings of the magnum opus (as in the Rosarium sequence) are more sophisticated and complete than his individuation model. Perhaps extensively so. Therefore, when Jung psychologizes alchemy, he only grasps as much as his own individuation model allows him to. He does not, for instance, base or even revise his individuation model on the alchemical opus. He sees the parallel and assumes that individuation is the "archetype" with alchemy a pre-psychological manifestation of it (an archetypal image of the individuation process).
Most Jungians (oddly enough) don't read alchemical texts; they just take Jung's writings (and the writings of von Franz, Edinger, and others) on faith. As nearly impenetrable as some of these writings are, this is a regrettable error. And it is odd because Jungians have traditionally been inclined to investigate other original texts that meant a lot to Jung . . . say, the I Ching or numerous cultural myths and folktales or other occult and mystical texts (Gnostic gospels, Kabbalism, etc.). I never bothered to read alchemical texts until I rejoined my Jungian roots about five or six years ago. Getting alchemy from the horse's mouth can allow us to form a somewhat different picture than Jung did. In any case, I believe you were at one point involved in Adam McLean's alchemy group, so I suppose I'm preaching to the choir.
One of the greatest and most costly errors in Jung's psychologization of the magnum opus is the conflation between "chaos" or massa confusa or (psychologically) "undifferentiated consciousness" and the alchemical prima materia and Nigredo. In most of Jung's renderings, the alchemical process begins with "undifferentiated" prima materia or may even begin in a "Nigredo" of depression, anxiety, and confused collapse of the ego. But it is much more traditional in actual alchemical writing to locate the Nigredo after the Solutio/Coniunctio. The Coniunctio is the process by which the prima materia is derived, and this prima materia is a "black, blacker than black". Prima materia/Nigredo is not some common depression or mental breakdown that Jung's patients might have experienced before they came to him for analysis. Rather, it is the first manifestation of the Lapis (the black stage of the black, white, red progression). Therefore, the derivation of the prima materia is a Great Work in itself.
What we see here is an error of psychologization on Jung's part. His familiarity with depression and ego-dissolution seemed to eclipse his ability to read the actual alchemical texts that portray the derivation of the prima materia as perhaps the single most important (and most difficult) task of the opus. If the prima materia is not properly derived, the opus (what is in the vessel) must be scrapped, and the alchemist must start from the very beginning. A couple years back I started a topic in this forum that establishes this argument: The Alchemical Nigredo (http://uselessscience.com/forum/index.php?topic=268.0).
Another component of this psychologization error of Jung's is the conflation of the Coniunctio with a transcendent "hieros gamos". But in alchemy proper, Coniunctio is death and utter destruction that derives the blackness of the prima materia. In Jungian thought, Coniunctio and the later stages representing the white and red stones or elixirs (depicted by the hermaphrodites in the Rosarium sequence, emblems 10 and 17) are muddled together (and all because of Jung's exaltation of the hieros gamos, perhaps assisted by his post-heart attack vision of the marriage of Tifereth with Malchuth).
I see in Jung's psychologization a kind of unresolved inflation that ultimately undoes the kind of mystical work alchemy attempts to describe. Jung was quite aware of this inflation, but had a very inadequate (and "un-Jungian") approach to dealing with it (an approach he unfortunately prescribe for everyone). He felt that inflation had to be "heroically" beaten back and down by the strong ego. The "weak" ego, would fall into inflation and suffer its delusions. He himself practiced what he preached, I believe (especially after reading the Red Book), but this practice led to a kind of dissociation which prevented Jung from understanding the alchemical opus in its entirety and ultimately stunted, even invalidated his individuation model (even as the data he constructed his model from were all quite valid and patterned or interrelated as he generally intuited). I believe this inflation has persisted in the Jungian model of individuation and the Jungian approach to the psyche. I see it as part of a "Jungian disease" or cultural complex. One aspect of this complex in the Jungian usage of alchemy is the tendency to equate the alchemical opus with a form of spiritual attainment or enlightenment. That is, to place romantic and transcendent goals of ego "deification" upon alchemical symbols and stages.
But wherever there is inflation in Jungian thought and behavior, we can reliably predict that a "heroic" compensation will also be hunkered down battling it. In this case, where transcendent, inflated goals are associated with alchemical stages, there is always the declaration that these attainments are either impossible or purely figurative. The inflation is defused in this way, or at least that's the intention. But I think what is really happening is that the unprocessed inflation is preventing the (individuation) process from progressing, and this observed lack of progression is rationalized in Jungian thought by making these stages "unattainable" or purely symbolic. The underlying problem is the Jungian notion of the Self as a unification of ego and unconscious, as a kind of Christ figure or godman. Where Jung wrote of the Self in this manner, the Self fails to be a true Other to the ego. The ego thus "attains" a kind of "Selfhood". But of course, wherever Jung begins to paint such a picture, he quickly counters with a defusing of the manifesting inflation. But at least Jung struggled mightily with this. Most Jungians take this sort of thing on faith, and never face the inflation of the Jungian disease at all.
But instead of a "state of egoic being or attainment", I think the rather grand hermaphrodite emblems in the Rosarium sequence (10 and 17) can be seen less inflatedly as complex attitudes toward the Self-as-Other and even toward Otherness in general. One of the problems in Jung's psychologization is the association of alchemical Gold with "consciousness", a thing which Jung placed enormous value on. But I would argue that the Gold in alchemy represents not "consciousness", but valuation. That is, the assignment of value to something not-I. That assignment requires consciousness, yes, but valuation is not equivalent to consciousness. If we shunt our Jungianism aside a bit and try to see the magnum opus of alchemy as a complex process of valuation rather than "consciousness-raising" or enlightenment, we can depotentiate the inflation of the Jungian disease much more sustainably. The symbolic process of transmuting base metals into gold (or more accurately, Philosophical Gold) through the use of a "Projection" of the Philosopher's Stone is a process of assigning value to what has "fallen" or appears base. This "fallen" thing is most commonly associated with Earth, matter or "Body" in alchemy. Alchemy is a process of re-valuating Earth/matter/Body (or in slightly more modern terminology, instinct). The art that perfects nature is the valuative art, and the creation of the Philosopher's Stone is the creation of the valuative attitude, which is eternally self-sustaining once established (i.e., it's like "riding a bike", becomes a kind of "muscle memory").
In Rosarium emblem 17, "The Demonstration of Perfection" (where in alchemy-speak, "perfection" is what the Art does to redeem and celebrate Nature and is equivalent to what I mean by valuation) displays the core components of the valuating attitude (or Philosopher's Stone capable of transmuting base metals into Philosophical Gold). As the concluding emblem from the "second opus" of the Rosarium sequence (the final three are, I feel, best understood as the sustainable attitudes needed to do the Work, but not part of the sequential process, per se), this emblem portrays the Red Stone/Elixir and must be contrasted with emblem 10, which depicts the White Stone/Elixir, in order for us to adequately understand its symbolism and why the alchemists saw this as a later stage of the Work. Below on the left is emblem 10; on the right is emblem 17. I will only go into what I feel are the most important differentiations instead of doing a complete analysis.
(http://www.alchemywebsite.com/virtual_museum/Images/RS10.jpg) (http://www.alchemywebsite.com/virtual_museum/Images/RS17.jpg)
Areas of similarity:
Winged Hermaphrodite
Cup of three serpents on left/one "un-cupped" serpent on right
Tree on left/lower ground
Bird on right/higher ground
Standing on pedestal
Areas of contrast:
Kind of Wings: The "first opus" concludes with angel or dove wings, denoting a "spiritual" movement, or a movement driven by and ultimately exalting "spirit". The "second opus" concludes with dragon or bat wings, denoting a chthonic movement, or a movement driven by and ultimately exalting "instinct" or "Nature".
Nature of Pedestal: complimenting the progression from "spirit" to "instinct" (or more precisely, the relocation of "spirit" or intelligent agency from the spiritual or divine to to earthly or Nature, sometimes described as the reinfusing of extracted spirit into Nature/matter), is the change in pedestal. The crescent moon pedestal in emblem 10 floats off the ground. The three-headed serpent in emblem 17 is the ground (is not only "earthly" and grounded, but is a part of the Earth mound itself). The self-devouring chthonic trinity in emblem 17 can be interpreted in numerous ways. One way that I find most useful and appropriate would be seeing this symbol as a symbol of sustainability. It eats itself but also regenerates itself. It's cyclical, self-sustaining Nature, a soil that devours the life it gave birth to, only to give birth and consume again and again. The alchemist at this stage founds his or her attitude on this chthonic, instinctual energy of the body/Earth. The alchemist of emblem 10 founds him or herself upon the transcendent, spiritual valuation of "Luna", the daughter of the Philosophers, an extraction of spirit from "base" matter.
Jung wrote an interesting essay ("On the Nature of the Psyche," CW 8 ) dealing with the relationship of spirit and instinct that gets at this very issue, but ultimately fails to fully understand that spirit is not an opposite polarity from instinct, but actually a more "anthropomorphic" or egoic interpretation of valuated instinct. It is easier for us to value the complexity and agency of instinct when we call it spirit or God than it is when we locate that instinct in the earthly or animal. But in order to valuate the Other (i.e., the Self-as-Other), we must continue to make essential differentiations between self and Other, between ego and Self. The instinctual aspect of the Self is not "spiritual" or "intelligent" in the way we think a mind can be. Instead of anthropomorphic intelligence, there is complexity, a natural condition from which intelligence can emerge (as in humans). To know the Self objectively (a thing conditioned by the drive to valuate the Self) is to see through "spirit", which is tainted with ego and therefore not entirely Other.
Clothing: The naked lunar hermaphrodite has been stripped bare of previous egoic associations and assumptions. Spirit extracted from matter is divested of its previous material clothing. But in emblem 17, the hermaphrodite is clothed in the colors of the Work (red and white). Naked, "sublimed" spirit is re-infused into a new material gown.
Kind of Fruit on the "Tree": The moon and sun trees bear 13 fruits each (as 1+3, where the singular fruit sits atop two columns of six fruits each). This can be seen as the "fertility" of the work, perhaps the products of the valuative act of "projection". What grows is what we valuate, and the alchemist of the White Stone valuates the Other as spirit, while the alchemist of the Red Stone valuates the Other as more "instinctual" (where the sun fruit is associated with the purified Philosophical Sulfur, associated with agency or volition; perfected, this would equate to something like natural self-organization or "energy" or libido/life force . . . which is not seen as wholly spiritual, but also as natural). The Red Tincture (which we can see as the blood dripping from the serpents' bites and also from the pelican's breast) is the Sulfuric coloration of "spiritual libido" with natural/earthly drive and organization.
At least as important as what is growing on these trees is their relative location to the birds on the right. As the birds on the right are elevated over the trees on the left, we could interpret this to mean that the bird symbols are meant to be exalted more or given a greater importance or valuation in the complex attitude being represented.
Kind of Bird: The crow or raven in emblem 10 is a symbol of the Raven's Head or Nigredo, the blackened prima materia that is the first manifestation of the Stone. So even as the White/Lunar stone has derived its color through the Albedo process, what is exalted in this attitude is the Blackening, the derivation of the prima materia, the essential accomplishment on which the entire opus is founded.
The pelican in emblem 17 is feeding its nestlings with blood from its own breast. It is a kind of Christ-like self-sacrifice, but also a motherly act. What we valuate, we feed with blood from our own breast. This may have a sacrificial quality to it, but the act is ultimately self-sustaining (and we can see the parallelism between this image and the three-headed, self-devouring earth serpent. The pelican here (also a symbol for the alchemical vessel) bases its reciprocating, sustainable valuation on the natural process of cyclical, dynamic life force that drives all life in Nature. But whereas the sustainable natural life force drives and founds the overall attitude (under the feet of the hermaphrodite), in the exalted form of the pelican, it is practiced consciously toward others. The valuator "contains" the other in a vessel of dynamic valuation, enables the other to grow and become.
The form of conscious valuation in emblem 10 is that which distills everything to its essence (prima materia) so that it can begin to "be born". So, it is as if, in emblem 10, I am seeing "you" as one who can be born. I'm allowing you to "be" what you can be. But in emblem 17, I am nurturing and feeding "you" with my valuation. And that nurturing feeds the body/instinct as well as the spirit.
Addition of Lion in #17: The lion in emblem 17 is the major incongruity. The lion is often a symbol of animal/instinctual life force in alchemy, but it is a life force that can devour or dissolve. Therefore, it is also associated with the acid that dissolves metal into prima materia. That dissolution not only breaks down, but it binds together in solutio that which has been differentiated. So the "instinct" behind the lion is sexual in a way. Dissolution is desirous, erotic union. As the lion is lying down and placed behind the hermaphrodite, we can assume that the erotic/dissolving animal drive that originally catalyzed the process is now "behind" it. In a sense, the "ferocity" of the lion has been subdued or depotentiated, but it may be more accurate to say that it has become effectively utilized and organized in the complex system of the attitude emblem 17 depicts. Everything in the pantheon of images we see in emblem 17 acts as an organ in the dynamic, self-sustaining system of the valuative attitude.
I have now enhanced the article as I believe it has great relevance to alchemy. The hermaphrodite in alchemy is reinterpreted in terms of the "complementarian self". It differs from Jung's understanding of the end goal of alchemy as the realization of the conjunct conscious and unconscious — the integrated self. Instead the hermaphrodite, or the 'lapis philosophorum', is the result of a largely autonomous process that occurs relatively independent of the ego. If this is correct, the ego need not undergo the radical transformations that Jung portrays, involving a psychological crisis, or severe depression. The renovated self, as such, as the wonder-working 'lapis', will influence the ego, as an after-effect. This reinterpretation, however, does not refute Jung's view of alchemy, but it affects the most important aspects, namely how to view the relation with the unconscious, and the way in which the spiritual journey is accomplished.
I'm not sure I can agree with you that the alchemical Philosopher's Stone is "a largely autonomous process that occurs relatively independent of the ego". There is a powerful autonomous element to the process (the "Nature" that alchemy meant to "perfect"), but seen psychologically, it is the ego, I think, that is being reorganized . . . not as, but by the Work itself. That is, the ego is not the product of the Work, not equivalent to the hermaphrodite or Stone, but the ego is utterly transformed by its participation in the Work. Additionally, the ego does not intentionally and willfully "perfect nature" or consciously dictate the process of transformation within the vessel, but through its participation in the Work, the ego accesses or is "tinctured with" the valuative attitude. Something does come into consciousness . . . even though the bulk of the participation in the process involves (symbolically) keeping a steady heat burning beneath the vessel. More importantly, I don't think this development of the valuative attitude can occur without conscious effort or some kind of discipline. It isn't like a typical dream that we can have an forget about at not real loss to our well-being . . . or some other autonomous bodily process . . . digestion, heartbeat, etc..
This Work may not be entirely chosen, but it must consciously be accepted. And success with it is rare and difficult. Happy accidents are not enough, because the Work requires massive devotion. Alchemical "vessel tending" is, I think, called a Great Work for a very good reason. It is equivalent to birthing and raising a child successfully ("well-enough") or creating a work of art that serves as a kind of conduit through which the artists Self is conveyed. Like Walt Whitman's Leaves of Grass or Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man (to name a couple American Great Works that seem to qualify).
If we take away the "radical transformation of the ego", we are essentially removing the aspect of archetypal initiation, that is, the "mysticism" that underlies both alchemy and Jung's individuation model. I have to admit that this is the aspect that interests me the most.
Best regards,
Matt
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I have now enhanced the article as I believe it has great relevance to alchemy. The hermaphrodite in alchemy is reinterpreted in terms of the "complementarian self". It differs from Jung's understanding of the end goal of alchemy as the realization of the conjunct conscious and unconscious — the integrated self. Instead the hermaphrodite, or the 'lapis philosophorum', is the result of a largely autonomous process that occurs relatively independent of the ego. If this is correct, the ego need not undergo the radical transformations that Jung portrays, involving a psychological crisis, or severe depression. The renovated self, as such, as the wonder-working 'lapis', will influence the ego, as an after-effect. This reinterpretation, however, does not refute Jung's view of alchemy, but it affects the most important aspects, namely how to view the relation with the unconscious, and the way in which the spiritual journey is accomplished.
The added alchemical section is here:
http://home7.swipnet.se/~w-73784/compself.htm#rebis
Mats Winther
So are you saying that the conscious involvement of the individual is as a by-stander and that the individual cannot impact the development of their own psychology?
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Matt, (true to your habit you write half a book). I concur partly with your critique of Jung's understanding of alchemy. Certainly, there is an inflational component in Jung's version, how he sees the conjunction as the united conscious and unconscious. It requires that the ego is dissolved in the unconscious, to unite with the Self, a demand that very few people are psychologically capable of, or are prepared to go through. In that case alchemy is for a tiny little élite only. How many Jungians have lived through such an extreme crisis at the very border of schizophrenia? This is ultra-elitism, the alchemist as daredevil, who recklessly dives into the unconscious to do battle with the dragon. I don't think this is the proper view of alchemy.
In my reading, however, the alchemical gold, the achieved coniunctio in the form of the hermaphrodite or the lapis, represents the reformed Self, as such. It is the wonder-working Stone that can heal the soul, the body and the world. Thus the ego is indirectly affected by the transformed Self, that has emerged in the unconscious thanks to a process of Nature, with a helping hand from the Art.
Sealchan, in a sense the artifex is an "active bystander", who provides the right conditions for the Stone to grow out of Nature, by itself. Salomon Trismosin (Splendor Solis) says in the Introduction and in the First Treatise:
"[Quicksilver] is a material common to all metals; but it should be known that the first thing in nature is the material gathered together out of the four elements through Nature's own knowledge and capacity. The philosophers call this Material Mercury or Quicksilver. It is not a common mercury: through the operation of Nature it achieves a perfected form, that of gold, silver, or of both metals. There is no need to tell of it here: the natural teachers describe it very clearly and adequately in their books. On this the whole art of the Stone of the Wise is based and grounded, for it has its inception in Nature, and from it follows a natural conclusion in the proper form, through proper natural means [...]
For this one must decoct and putrefy it after the manner and secrets of the Art, so that by art one affords assistance to Nature. It then decocts and putrefies by itself until time gives it proper form. Art is nothing but an instrument and preparer of the materials - those which Nature fits for such a work - together with the suitable vessels and measuring of the operation, with judicious intelligence. For as the Art does not presume to create gold and silver from scratch, so it cannot give things their first beginning. Thus one also does not need the art of Nature's own secret to possess the minerals, since they have their first beginning in the earth [...]
Through the secrets of the Art they can be made rapidly and manifested complete, born from temporal matter through Nature. Nature serves Art, and then again Art serves Nature with a timely instrument and a certain operation.
I think it is obvious from the above that the process is highly autonomous (it "decocts and putrefies by itself"), but that it must constantly be nourished with the fiery element, because the salamander thrives on fire. I don't mean to say that the artifex leaves the decoction alone and goes away to see to his other interests. He is always present, but in a more passive way than how Jung portrays it. I think the artifex' attitude is more like that of the Christian mystic. Piety plays a big role, I believe. It is this attitude which provides the fiery element, symbolic of the energy that goes back into the unconscious. To this is added meditations in some form.
Mats Winther
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Sealchan, in a sense the artifex is an "active bystander", who provides the right conditions for the Stone to grow out of Nature, by itself. Salomon Trismosin (Splendor Solis) says in the Introduction and in the First Treatise:
I think I can appreciate this...I have been doing some writing and reflecting and remembering and have found that for me, when I used to visit the Pacific Coast as a child and a younger man I would spend hours digging in the sand where a coastal stream would spill out onto the shore. I think I found something spiritual in this work and I likened the flow of libido to the flow of the streams water. However, the conscious attitude was towards guiding that stream the stream would usually defy it to some extent if not completely undo the will of the "stream-worker". In a lot of ways you have to know how the stream flows over rock and sand and choose carefully where you dig and where you move the rocks...then the stream does the rest of the work for you.
I'm sure there are many other analogies that involve the conscious will listening to the world and recognizing that the consciousness is really a small part, but if it chooses at just the right moment and in the right way, great changes can take place. Or a small act can later have a great impact over time so long as that act/choice is committed to.
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Matt, (true to your habit you write half a book).
Mats, it's partly habit and partly that I do have an unwritten book on this subject. It's hard to condense a thesis like this. Anything involving alchemy is not going to be simple, but I'm especially interested in the relationship Jung and Jungianism have with alchemy. Jung is the great promoter and modernizer of alchemy, yet at the same time has contributed most to solidifying some important and rather large misunderstandings.
As I feel is often the case with Jung, intuitively, he sniffed out the important pillars of alchemy (where it was relevant to psychology and especially to the archetype of individuation or mysticism). But intellectually or in his psychologizing interpretations, me made some errors. These errors seem at first "academic", but although they are small in size, they occur in linchpin areas and have systemic repercussions.
I think that understanding and figuring out how to remedy these errors in the Jungian psychologization of alchemy is perhaps the most direct pathway to a rather alchemical rejuvenation of Jungian thought, an "elixir" for the Jungian disease.
And I don't mean to fault Jung too heavily. Actually, I think as a pioneer (essentially THE pioneer) in the modern psychologization of alchemy, Jung accomplished a great deal and understood alchemy profoundly and deeply. The real problem is that Jungians following Jung have been extremely thickheaded and disciple-ish. They have neither expanded nor corrected Jung's vision of alchemy. Von Franz deserves a great deal of credit for the time and energy she devoted to alchemy, but she would never be able to seriously deviate from or question the master. She was true blue, especially to the more mystical, late Jung. An excellent "soldier" perhaps, but a bit narrowminded (in retrospect, this is especially evident). Edinger, in his own way, is even worse. He had a slightly different approach but remained a true believer. At least von Franz was working with Jung directly on alchemy as a kind of "co-pioneer" and has an excuse for sticking with Jung's program. Edinger, despite also having a good mind, fails to think independently. I find his alchemical writing the most disappointing, because I feel he of all people should have known better (as he devoted so much study to alchemy without having to answer directly to Jung).
There has been a massive failure of imagination in Jungian thought where alchemy is concerned. Nowhere else have Jungians remained so blindly slavish to the master. And I suspect this is so, because Jungians still don't really understand that or how Jung's individuation model is flawed. They don't realize the difference between individuation and initiation or a true mysticism. And so there is no criteria available to reevaluate Jung's individuation model.
I concur partly with your critique of Jung's understanding of alchemy. Certainly, there is an inflational component in Jung's version, how he sees the conjunction as the united conscious and unconscious. It requires that the ego is dissolved in the unconscious, to unite with the Self, a demand that very few people are psychologically capable of, or are prepared to go through. In that case alchemy is for a tiny little élite only. How many Jungians have lived through such an extreme crisis at the very border of schizophrenia? This is ultra-elitism, the alchemist as daredevil, who recklessly dives into the unconscious to do battle with the dragon. I don't think this is the proper view of alchemy.
I don't know. I don't think alchemy is just some belief system for the masses, a la Christianity. It is a genuine mysticism, and its roots stretch back to common ground with shamanism (see Mircea Eliade's The Forge and the Crucible: The Origins and Structure of Alchemy. I suspect that the alchemical opus is originally derived from the archetype of shamanic initiation. One thing common to all forms of mysticism and to initiation in general is the dissolution/dismemberment/devouring of the ego. I don't think this aspect of mysticism can or should be disposed of. In fact, one of the greatest flaws in Jung's individuation model is that he does not call for a true dissolution of the ego. Instead, he recommends the maintenance of a strong ego, an ego that takes up a position against the "chaotic and devouring unconscious". This is the form of ego he demonstrates (true to his claim) in the Red Book.
Jung wanted his ego to be touched and somewhat affected by the "unconscious", but not destroyed or dissolved. He feared the ego-loss of madness that he saw in the schizophrenic patients he tended to at the Burghölzli. Always the doctor (whose identity is opposed to that of the patient), Jung devoted himself to resisting madness. Yes, he feared the Red Book would make him look mad in the eyes of some of his more critical colleagues (and he may have been right about their potential interpretation), but the Red Book does not read like the rantings of an insane person. Jung as protagonist is always the outsider, always wrestling with and often condemning the autonomous Otherness he encounters in his visions. The Red Book is the work of an experimental rationalist, not a genuine mystic. And I think it is all the more valuable to psychology and especially to Jungianism because of this . . . although only if it can be recognized as such.
I think you are conflating archetypal themes when you say "This is ultra-elitism, the alchemist as daredevil, who recklessly dives into the unconscious to do battle with the dragon". The mystical or shamanic hero is not the same as the dragon-slaying solar hero of proto-modern patriarchal civilizations. The shamanic form of heroism is found more in the capacity for ego dissolution and reconstitution, a giving over of ego to (as in your Splendor Solis quote) "Nature". "Nature rejoices with Nature; Nature conquers Nature; Nature restrains Nature". NOT "ego or will conquers nature". Dragon slayers don't rely on Nature to slay dragons. They slay by will and by might. The saying of pseudo Democritus is a statement of nature's dynamic, self-organizing complexity from before there was a complex dynamic systems language. It has nothing to do with human heroism or alchemical daredevilism.
Perhaps the kind of alchemist you are describing is the Faustian variety. Jung, of course, also took issue with that kind of reckless and power-mad "heroism" (although he was also fascinated by it, and I would argue also a bit possessed). I think Jung's personal quest for selfhood involved a lifelong struggle with his inner Faust or his inner Nietzsche/Zarathustra. He saw the dangers and evils of this figure, but the transcendent solar "mana" tempted him. His vision of heroism was colored by this personal struggle, and I don't think he ever managed to differentiate the conquering egoic hero from the shamanic or ego-dissolving hero.
My point is that I don't think ego-dissolution is something one can choose or embrace willfully and with intentional "daring". Dissolution is always thrust upon the ego by some Other, by some devouring force like the alchemical Green Lion. No one can master it. It dissolves all Gold. There is a difference between reckless adventuring and vocation or Calling. Calling begins in dissolution that is not chosen, in disease, in undesired passage into death. Spiritual adventure is a hunt for glory, a desire to see the ego triumph over its supposed opposite, something wild and brimming with unbridled appetites.
So, I agree with your criticism of that attitude, but I think you cast your net too wide and fail to make an important distinction that is actually quite evident in the archetypal literature and data of mysticism, religion, and heroic narratives. It is not "elitism" to survive dissolution . . . and one does not survive by will (as Jung seemed to prescribe and attempt to demonstrate). It is by Nature that one survives. Survival of initiation's devouring or dismemberment is a mystery, even to the survivor him or herself. There is no trick to it, no skill, no heroic might. If there is anything at all beyond "grace", it is faith and a willingness to surrender and self-sacrifice for the sake of an Other.
In my reading, however, the alchemical gold, the achieved coniunctio in the form of the hermaphrodite or the lapis, represents the reformed Self, as such. It is the wonder-working Stone that can heal the soul, the body and the world. Thus the ego is indirectly affected by the transformed Self, that has emerged in the unconscious thanks to a process of Nature, with a helping hand from the Art.
It's a pretty complicated issue. Some of the blending of themes in your brief description here may add to the complication. I prefer to make certain distinctions to help a psychological language form around this. For instance, Coniunctio is not equivalent to the hermaphrodite that represents the Stone. Coniunctio is the final point of the Solutio at which separate "essences" are merged into one singular substance, a prima materia that is utterly black. That is, where no sign of light or life or consciousness is present. "Solar will" is destroyed, essentially canceled out by complete merger with "Lunar will". Two agencies: one that represents egoic selfhood's drive to promote and sustain itself, and one that represents the Otherness constellated by the singular drive of egoic selfhood. All of the ego's drive has been redirected at the representative of the Other (typically the animi). Instead of self-sustenance, there is Other-valuation. And the fulfillment of that redirected drive is death or depotentiation. Coniunctio. Which is also a conception. Something is being quietly gestated and will later be born: the filius philosophorum.
Another distinction I would prefer to make is between Gold (even the Philosophical Gold) and the lapis. The lapis is what the alchemical opus seeks to create . . . and then this lapis is what transmutes base metals into Philosophical Gold. It valuates. Valuation is a subjective act, a conscious assignment. Value is not inherent as a property of a thing, it is always relative to a subject. This is why I equate the Philosopher's Stone with the valuating attitude and not with some kind of reconstituted Self. The Self is always there, but before the dissolution, the ego cannot really approach it or valuate it or recognize it as a distinct Other. The alchemical Work enables the ego to develop a valuative attitude toward the Self and to begin languaging the Self or finding egoic terms that enable the Self to be manifest or understood.
Languaging doesn't significantly change the Self (which is "Body", Nature, instinct), but it can radically restructure the ego, which is essentially a language construction. The Self in my thinking is not a "union between conscious and unconscious", nor is it a product of the Coniunctio, nor Philosophical Gold, nor the Philosopher's Stone. I think alchemy is a process that reorganizes the ego's approach to the Self. The Self is something that needs to be valuated like any autonomous Other. The alchemical Work is a work on Nature or on Body/Matter that means to redeem this Matter (which had fallen onto the dung heap due to Platonic Christianity's attitude toward instinct, matter and the body). The "perfection" of Nature is not literally a "spiritualization of Nature" or any kind of restructuring of Nature. Rather, it is the valuation of Nature, the addition of the conscious, human, valuating attitude to the understanding of Nature . . . not through some kind of conquering and demeaning "rationalism", but through a deep and celebratory recognition that to truly understand Nature in the most sophisticated way is to see it as "intelligent", complex, alive, essential, something that must be sustained and protected.
Notably, this is the very same attitude that comes out of tribal shamanism. We live in and as a part of complex natural systems. And we have the power to damage them, but also the power to sustain them. Consciousness does not make us the enemies of Nature, but its wards and its custodians. The "Art" of this stewardship is more than some casual helping hand in a process that can go on well enough without us. To develop the valuating or Self-facilitating attitude takes more than casual and fleeting interest. It is a devotional and self-sacrificial process. It is more difficult to develop this valuating attitude than it is to conquer nature of construct a transcendent spirit. The facilitation of the Self requires that we know with great precision the difference between ego and Self, and that requires a dissolution of the ego, which teaches the individual the arbitrariness of the ego relative to the objectivity of the Self.
I agree in part that the alchemical process (or its psychological equivalent) is highly autonomous, but the tending of the vessel in which the Work is transforming as Nature dictates is no small or casual act, but a monumental and absolute sacrifice and devotion. As analysts well know, containment or mothering or functional mirroring is the true art of analysis. It's not dictating or giving assignments. The metaphor of containment is nowhere better expressed than in the symbolism of the alchemical vessel and the prescribed alchemical attitude toward the tending of that vessel. What seems relatively simple (Child's Play and Women's Work) is actually something that can only be derived from the convoluted process that alchemy describes. It may seem insubstantial, because it is less an act than an attitude, but the development of that vessel-tending, valuative attitude is extremely difficult and utterly demanding.
It's the downplaying of this attitude that I object to and which doesn't at all accord with my own experience.
Best,
Matt
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Matt, your notion of ego-dissolution proper (as against Jung's "inadequate" version) is, I contend, a projection of the reduction of the ego according to the ascetic (trinitarian) paradigm, on lines of mystic traditions. Jung objected to this view, and said that it is certainly proper that the libido turns inwards, away from the world, but the ego must be prepared to confront the unconscious archetypes (that are to be ignored according to ascetic mysticism). It would have a strong dissolving effect on the ego, were this to happen. Luckily, it doesn't happen with the healthy psyche.
One should not work to dissolve the ego. Had it been possible, I would not recommend it. The ego can only be reduced according to asceticism, the practice of self-denial and renunciation of worldly pleasure. It may require withdrawal from the material world to a life of meditation, as in the practice of Yoga.
I agree so far with you, that Jung is tendentious in his interpretation of alchemy. Comparatively, Murray Stein says that Answer to Job is also "tendentious". Jung accommodates the divine drama wholly within the psychological realm. Of course, this is psychologization par excellence, but Jung would probably only retort like he used to, namely that metaphysics and religious truths don't belong in his line of research. But as he gobbles up a large portion of the heavenly drama, his interpretation becomes a target for charges of psychologization anyway. Stein says:
"...The psyche replaces heaven and hell and all such metaphysical beings as gods and goddesses, angels and devils, as the field in which the essential conflicts rage and must be won or lost or worked through. And with this comes the ethical responsibility for ordinary mortals to take on the burden of 'incarnation'. Incarnation for modern men and women means entering actively and consciously into the battle of the opposites (good vs. evil; masculine vs. feminine), submitting to the suffering of this cross, and enduring this agony until a unio oppositorum is constellated in their individual souls. Each person is called upon to incarnate God, which means to bear the opposites inherent in God's nature." (http://www.guildofpastoralpsychology.org.uk/Media/LS285.pdf (http://www.guildofpastoralpsychology.org.uk/Media/LS285.pdf))
So Jung is very much an advocate of "ego-dissolution". However, you may be right in your assertion that this is not ego-dissolution proper, but this is simply because it is not a workable solution. Jung really portrays the path of the hero, and makes it the ideal of individuation, i.e., to throw yourself into the battle of gods and dragons. But the hero is an archetype. It is not a model of the ego. Jung realized this himself, when he was close to shooting himself (as related in his dream about the murder of Siegfried). But it was if he never really abandoned the hero as ego model. Perhaps the only way is ego-reduction. Jung says in Ps. and Alchemy:
"...This, in the alchemical allegory, is expressed by the King's cry for help from the depths of his unconscious, dissociated state. The conscious mind should respond to this call: one should operari regi, render service to the King, for this would be not only wisdom but salvation as well. Yet this brings with it the necessity of a descent into the dark world of the unconscious, the ritual (), the perilous adventure of the night sea journey, whose end and aim is the restoration of life, resurrection, and the triumph over death." (p.329)
In the Splendor Solis, The Third Parable, the King is drowning in the sea and he calls out for help. However, the text does not relate that an heroic individual dives into the sea to help him. Instead, when the morning comes the King wondrously resurrects by himself. The Splendor Solis goes on to describe how the body of a man with a golden head is laid waste, in order that he "might possess abundant life" (The Sixth Parable). In the Seventh Parable an old man becomes young again by having himself cut up and boiled. Obviously, to save the King is to let him go under and be thoroughly destroyed, in order for him to resurrect, thus acquiring new strength and vigour. The decapitated King is not the ego, it is the self, which Jung is well aware of.
Jung cannot substantiate the heroic interpretation of alchemy, as the rescue operation nowhere take place. To hasten the King's demise is the proper thing to do. This will eventually "rescue" him. Jung interprets alchemy according to the notion of "confrontation with the unconscious", but the dying and resurrecting King is not the ego. It is the self.
I concur with your appreciation of Jung's work, but one must be aware of its tendentious nature. Arguably, he so strongly wanted to accommodate both theology and alchemy within his psychological paradigm of "direct confrontation and integration" that he tends to overlook the empirical facts. Those alchemical texts which I know don't seem to say these things. They speak another language, of assisting the processes of Nature:
"...by art one affords assistance to Nature. It then decocts and putrefies by itself until time gives it its proper form. Art is nothing but an instrument and preparer of the materials - those which Nature fits for such a work - together with the suitable vessels and measuring of the operation, with judicious intelligence." (Splendor Solis: The First Treatise)
This doesn't seem very heroic to me, more of a silent work performed in solitude. Perhaps you are correct in your assessment that Jungians tend to be dogmatic. Richard Noll is perhaps correct in saying that it has cultic dimensions. Or maybe they are just unthinking. Hillman could be right in his assessment that Jungians aren't, as a rule, very clever. I have asked some Jungians to link to my homepage, but as I direct slight criticism against the Jungian paradigm, they won't afford me with a link.
The problem is that we get a warped view of the spiritual path. The way of the cloistered complentative is no alternative to most people. Instead the "alchemical" spiritual way can provide an answer. But if it becomes psychologized and misinterpreted it obviously has very damaging consequences. This issue is not merely a dispute over the misinterpretation of alchemy, it concerns the immensely important issue of how to find our way on the spiritual path.
Mats Winther
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I have yet to reach an initial satisfying understanding of alchemical symbolism as it relates to archetypal stuff...but my initial "posture" on it is that alchemical symbolism is simply the set of archetypal images pertaining to psychological processes that are self-conscious. In dreams I have seen how natural materials have been converted into articial ("man-made") products like timber into lumber or raw ingredients into prepared foods. In alchemy everything that is created is through some process that is partly conscious. The substance is symbolic of the idea of consciousness or the ego as a psychic substance that is worked on metaphorically. In a physical sense, however, there is no such thing as an substance with awareness. Consciousness, in my view, is a very complex emergent quality of the physical universe, which, like language, has a complex source in physical substructures, but exists in what has been called the noosphere and not the biosphere or the geosphere, etc...
The ego is often batted around as a psychic entity but it is definied somewhat circularly as a complex attached to our consciousness. My own view is that the ego is a "center" of psychic organization and therefore identifies itself as an order over a range of psychic behavior. This order seems to be at odds with other "orders". The psyche uses people to represent these various orders, presumably. I imagine that when the ego begins to run out of room and finds that there is little new territory to conquer that is not already owned then it is forced to reconfigure itself. This is necessarily a self-conscious process since the ego has to question itself. Alternately, I think that the ego, whatever it is, constellates the shadow, the anima and the Self, whatever they are (or alternately, some sort of basic neural infrastructure causes ego, shadow, animi, Self to mutually constellate each other). At some point, the ego can no longer afford to assume it is alone and it must begin to negotiate with these other personalities which are actually created by the ego, but in a way that does not grant the ego a sense of control or ownership. At some point the ego must begin to encounter this mystery of the other as itself and go through the various processes of transformation of which alchemical symbolism refers to.
Its analogous, I suppose, to solving a Rubik's cube. Sometimes psychic development is like getting that first side of the cube all one color. This mainly involves making moves that do not greatly disturb your previous work. Your first side of the cube, in a roughly linear way, becomes more and more solved until it is complete. Sometimes psychic development means you have to reconfigure your world or who you think you are and reassess your goals. In this case, once you progress past the first side of the cube you find more and more that to make progress you must disassemble what you have already accomplished in order to get more of the cube aligned. Once you establish the various methods you have to trust them because it looks like most of the time the cube is getting more disordered than it is getting ordered.
I think alchemy is about those last moves you make to solve the Rubik's cube and this requires developing methods and implementing them long term even though in the short term they appear to do more harm than good.
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The self-conscious ego is a late development in the psyche, so it is logical to think that the more archaic aspects of the psyche constellate the ego, and not the other way round. Since we are very much enveloped in the ego and its doings, alchemy probably compensates this, to focus on another centre of the psyche, namely the self. The self is archaic, which is why it is symbolized by a snake, the uroboros, or the serpens mercurialis. The alchemical operations are performed on the self, and they occur semi-autonomously. This is my view. The ego has developed so strongly in the latest millennium so it threatens to separate from the soil of the unconscious. Like Saint-Exupéry's Little Prince, the rootless ego goes to live on the little asteroid B-612. That's why it's necessary for the ego to take root in the unconscious soil, as it threatens to lose contact with both instinct and archetypal meaning. Jung says that modern people are more and more suffering from instinctual atrophy.
Mats Winther
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Mats, I certainly agree with almost all of what you write (Reply #15 on: March 30, 2011). And if I previously gave a different impression, it was not my intention to. I do concur with your characterization of the alchemical Work as one in which the Art acts primarily to contain and support a process driven and organized by Nature. The quote you supply from Splendor Solis states it a bit softly for my tastes, but generally I agree*.
* Actually, in checking up on this quote, I noticed that the context gives more credit to Art than what the quote decontextualized seems to. For instance (from http://www.rexresearch.com/splsol/trismosin.htm):
The Philosopher’s Stone is produced by means of the Greening and Growing Nature. [. . .] Wherefore when the Green is reduced to its former nature whereby things sprout and come forth in ordained time, it must be decocted and putrefied in the way of our secret art. That by Art may be aided, what nature decocts and putrefies, until she gives it, in due time, the proper form, and our Art but adapts and prepares the matter as becomes Nature, for such work, and such work provides also, with premeditated Wisdom, a suitable vessel.
For Art does not undertake to produce Gold and Silver, anew, as it cannot endow matter with its first origin, nor is it necessary to search our Art in places and caverns of the earth, another way to work and with different intention from Nature, therefore does Art also use different tools and instruments.
For that reason can Art produce extraordinary things out of the aforesaid natural beginnings such as Nature of herself would never be able to create. For unaided Nature does not produce things whereby imperfect metals can in a moment be made perfect, but by the secrets of Our Art this can be done.
Here Nature serves Art with Matter, and Art serves Nature with suitable instruments and method convenient for nature to produce such new forms; and although the before mentioned Stone can only be brought to its proper form by Art, yet the form is from Nature. For the form of every thing be it living, growing, or metallic comes into existence by virtue of the interior force in matter --- except the human soul.
But it must be borne in mind that the essential form cannot originate in matter unless it is by the effect of an accidental form, not by virtue of that form, but by virtue of another real substance, which is the Fire or some other accidental active heat. (from The First Treatise, Splendor Solis)
[...]
From the aforesaid it will be seen that he who will proceed properly in this Art, shall according to all Philosophers, begin where nature has left off, and shall take that Sulphur and Mercury which nature has collected in its purest form, in which took place the immediate action, which otherwise cannot be accomplished by anybody without art. (Second Treatise, Splendor Solis)
Probably one of the complications of my languaging is that I do not do away with the use of the term hero as a positive or useful figure/attitude. In this choice, I decisively deviate from Jungian conventions. As I mentioned in my last post (and have written extensively on throughout this site), I prefer to make a differentiation in my analysis of the data that contribute to the construction of a hero archetype. I see the genuine hero as rooted in the shaman (and not as a conqueror or a spiritually mighty being) and as a psychopomp of sorts who is devoted to facilitating and valuating the Self-as-Other. This hero can negotiate and communicate with the Self without distinct antagonism. This kind of hero respects the Otherness of the Self and knows how to cater to it, feed it, sacrifice to it, assist it. Although rooted in shamanic mythology (as all heroism is), the valuating hero is the hero we see most commonly in fairytales. It can be either male or female. It never slays or conquers, but wins the respect and aid of the Self (usually depicted in animal forms or as half-animal enchanted beings) by demonstrating a valuative rather than devaluing or antagonistic attitude toward the Self figures in the story. This valuating hero is often a Holy Fool or simpleton (or is taken as one by his/her more cynical brothers or sisters or community). S/he may defeat a Demonic figure, but never by direct force. Rather, the valuative hero defeats the Demon by enabling or tricking the Demon into turning its aggressive rage against itself.
These are nearly universal elements of the valuative, fairytale hero that as far as I have seen have gone unanalyzed by Jungian writers.
Also related to the shamanic/valuating hero is the alchemical "hero" who is capable of tending to the Work in the vessel that Nature is guiding. In relation to the Splendor Solis quote ("That by Art may be aided, what nature decocts and putrefies, until she gives it, in due time, the proper form, and our Art but adapts and prepares the matter as becomes Nature, for such work, and such work provides also, with premeditated Wisdom, a suitable vessel" [in the translation I found online]) you wrote: "This doesn't seem very heroic to me, more of a silent work performed in solitude." But here I do disagree with you. This is precisely what I mean by "heroic" in the valuating sense. And again, I give as an example of how truly difficult and "heroic" this kind of tending is, the role of the analyst in the analytic session. The kind of containment and steady heat that the good analyst supplies as well as the constant and diligent vessel-tending is not just something that anyone can do (and many analysts struggle to do this well). There is a reason that analysts train hard for many years to receive their certifications. And even certified analysts struggle mightily with the inner conflict between a valuative love for the patient being treated and a dogmatic adherence to the methodology and modes of diagnosis learned in analytical training. Dogma wins more than love, because it takes a (valuating) heroic attitude to be able to put aside theoretical dogmas and react directly to the patient's "soul" . . . a relationship that takes place in an imperfect and volatile space, an experimental space of trial and error, sacrifice and repentance. Such a space (whether in analysis or in alchemical symbolism) is not regulated and directed but contained.
The space of theory, on the other hand, is clean and perfect. Theory always "understands" and forcefully orders everything. But in practice, something far beyond book learning is required. The Art of psychotherapy like the Art of alchemy requires both knowledge and creative spontaneity. That's why no two analyses and no two alchemical texts are alike, no two processes or "recipes" are ever the same. Each alchemist and each analyst (and individuant) must recreate the opus anew.
The form of hero archetype that Jung is more concerned with and Jungians have focused more directly on is what I would call the "conquering hero". This hero is always male, and he is found in epics and myths that are meant to describe the ego ideals and identity constructions of a civilization (specifically a patriarchal civilization). This is also the hero of tragedy, because the conquering hero is inevitably undone by his fatal flaw. The fairytale hero lives "happily ever after" in union with his or her partner (animi), but the tragic/epic/conquering hero is finally defeated (usually by a lowly shadow figure or else by the hero's own hubris or recklessness). Many of the solar heroes are tragic/conquering heroes. Their lives consist of a rise and a fall. They might endure a kind of night-sea journey, but they cannot consistently do so. Contrast this with the shaman whose role is to continuously descend and return in order to commune with the dead/ancestors/gods/lost souls. The shaman may have to use trickery or bartering/sacrifice to procure either favors from the dead or to retrieve the lost soul of a tribe mate. But the shaman never conquers the dead, never assaults them. The shaman is no Heracles bursting into Hades and subduing Cerberus.
That kind of willful conquering hero is, I would argue, a patriarchal egoic fantasy, a compensation for a feeling of impotence.
One should not work to dissolve the ego. Had it been possible, I would not recommend it. The ego can only be reduced according to asceticism, the practice of self-denial and renunciation of worldly pleasure. It may require withdrawal from the material world to a life of meditation, as in the practice of Yoga.
I agree that attempts to dissolve the ego by force of will are ineffective and tend to result in pathology. True ego-dissolution is thrust upon us most of the time, typically when some event or accumulation of events swells up and topples the (usually fairly frail and poorly constructed) ego we have been trying to live by. [In tribal cultures, initiation rituals conducted by the tribal elders are an important contradiction to this paradigm; although, of course, the initiates who are traumatized and ritually wounded in these initiations do not choose and are conventionally overwhelmed and terrified by the Otherness of their initiators.] There is a natural movement toward ego-dissolution in the psyche ("nature decocts and putrefies"), I think, that especially begins to emerge during adolescence. This may be triggered by chemical/biological changes in the brain and body. But it is also facilitated by the increasing problem presented the growing adolescent of his or her infantile ego construction. The infantile or pre-adolescent ego is constructed as a strategic adaptation to an environment in which the parents provide for and protect the child. The parents are the primary vessel of containment, even if that vessel is poorly tended and dysfunctional. Ideally (and probably unconsciously), an image of the Self-as-Parent develops, but the relationship of the ego with that figuration of the Self is no longer fully functional come adolescence. A new relationship with the Self must be developed. Instead of parent, the Self must become partner. And building a vessel of containment for the ego should really become the individual's own creative project (although, for various reasons, in modern culture, this often gets postponed until later in life and may never fully occur at all).
But I see the dissolution and dismemberment symbolism in alchemy as parallel (and likely a direct descendant) of the same symbolism in shamanic initiation. The alteration of the "body" in shamanic initiation from a normal/"base"/human body to a spiritual/magical body (often by the symbolic introduction of iron, which was once more precious than gold and was found only "fallen from the heavens" in meteorites) also serves as a parallel with/precedent for alchemy. The alchemists recognized and sought to facilitate the dissolution/dismemberment (even if "Nature" drove the process).
In shamanic initiation, the initiate is often called by sickness ("initiation illness") and dissolution/dismemberment dreams. Where that is recognized by the tribe, the initiate would also be ceremonially trained by the tribe's elder shamans. Initiation illness (like any illness) involves a dissolution of the ego. And all other mysticisms from the ancient Egyptian to the Elusinean Mysteries to original Christian baptism (of adult initiates) depict and require some kind of ego dissolution. Alchemy carries this dissolution symbolism into chemical/metallurgic metaphors.
Alchemy and all other mysticisms act as containers for natural ego-dissolution processes. The alchemical symbol of the vessel makes this especially clear. If the dissolution process can be properly contained and adequately focused on (the steady, mild heat the artifex is to diligently maintain), destruction can be transformed into a new and improved creation.
Intentional dissolutions of the ego with the hope of tempting transcendent transformations are tricky. Yoga and various forms of meditation attempt this "lowering of mental threshold", but there is more to an alchemical or mystical work than "ego-reduction". I doubt any mystical work of transformation can occur without genuine initiation and more radical dissolution. And we can't willingly destroy ourselves to this degree. Something Other and greater must dissolve the initiate's ego. To "conquer oneself" is Demonic and only serves to delusionally repress the shadow. There is an important difference between initiation and "self-mastery". Initiation destroys or greatly depotentiates that part of oneself that seeks and can achieve "self-mastery".
No one can know how to "dissolve" until one is dissolved. We have no innate knowledge of how ego is constructed and play no real conscious role in its construction. It seems to us a true and solid thing until it is dismembered. And once it is, we are given the chance to observe and analyze it, to learn what arbitrary stuff we are made of and how carelessly and pointlessly we were composed. The successful initiate acquires this experiential knowledge by refusing to enlist the Demon to cram the crumbling ego back together. Instead, a different principle of ego organization is sought. Dynamic "Nature" (the Self) seems to have been responsible for destroying the fragile ego that socialization built . . . so perhaps it "knows" something. Nature is always building and destroying, and so long as one gives up the fantasy of a static, permanent, and willfully determined selfhood, the ego-dissolved individual can attempt to harness ego construction to this natural rhythm.
The principle of ego-organization, then, is located outside the egoic. It is Other. One consents to be self-organized by that which influences or happens to one. That is a major part of taoism (another mystical and alchemical tradition) and the wei wu wei (doing without doing) principle it advocates. Nature and "fate" (unfolding time and action/occurence) combine to assemble and constantly revise identity. The mystically initiated individual may, after processing the event of initiation, be able to dissolve and recompose the ego somewhat and with intention (albeit not direction). That is the shaman's craft, for instance. But the object of this reiteration of the initiation event in miniature is not to achieve transcendence or self-betterment or attain spiritual power or glory. Dissolution is utilized to join with and valuate otherness. This was always its deeper meaning. What is soft and pliable or fluid can remain itself while conforming the the shape of what it touches. That fluidity (like Luna/Quicksilver/anima) can become a vessel or womb for otherness, helping to contain and gestate it. In other words, such fluidity allows one to find greater meaning and potential in otherness. It does not necessarily "enable" otherness to be "itself" free from any difference or influence, but like the alchemical Work, it puts a steady low heat beneath the other while also offering a sturdy vessel to hold and acknowledge any volatility (that is bound to come from any true "moment of meeting").
And this alchemical containment is no spiritual feat of an ascetic swami or some "ascended master". Rather, it is merely valuation and facilitation. It's love. And there is no self-denial to this love. There is a profound presence of selfhood to it. It penetrates and is penetrated, and the relational mode of that selfhood is not Demonic or self-protective.
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Jung cannot substantiate the heroic interpretation of alchemy, as the rescue operation nowhere take place. To hasten the King's demise is the proper thing to do. This will eventually "rescue" him. Jung interprets alchemy according to the notion of "confrontation with the unconscious", but the dying and resurrecting King is not the ego. It is the self.
I think psychologizing the Old (or the New) King of alchemy is difficult. It doesn't map perfectly to either Self or ego, yet touches on both. Maybe the Old King is a construction of the old ego as well as its relationship to the old figuration of Self. I don't think the Self really changes substantially. Yes, it is complex, dynamic, and living . . . and so it is always changed. But it is the Self because it is always what it is no matter how it changes. Nature is always Nature no matter how it changes, even as it dies and is "reborn", it is Nature. Nature is that which is always dying and being reborn, always reorganizing. It think the Self appears to change depending on what it relates to (or what and how the ego relates to it). So, really it is the ego's perception and relationship to the Self that changes. I would even say (and have said) that the egoic thing that changes is the languaging of the Self. Ego is constructed by language. At first it is languaged to us, and eventually (and to varying degrees by individual) this languaging proves to be inadequate to express the Self/Other that we also are. A new language is needed in which to be and become, a personal, "mythic" and living language. In my own theoretical vocabulary, I call that "Logos". Alchemy is a Logos or a Logos tradition, but an individual developing a Logos must personalize it, must co-create it along with the Self (Nature). The Art (as in the alchemical Work) is a personal languaging endeavor . . . and I think alchemy's best symbol for this is the filius philosophorum, Son of the Philosophers. We co-create Logos like birthing and raising a child.
There is also a sense in which the Work redeems "God" or the Self. But I think Jung was very much aware of that and in fact used this as a cornerstone in his own psycho-theological fantasies. Where the ego is transformed, the Self is redeemed and rejuvenated . . . because ego is the medium between Self and environment. Ego can be a disease that strangulates the Self (more precisely, the Demon-possessed or -oppressed ego can be a disease). The Old King of alchemy is characterized by his sickness and by his capacity to "pollute" and "poison". The foul sulfurous odor is often referenced in alchemical texts and associated with the Old King's poisonousness or disease.
According to Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sulphur#Antiquity), sulfur was being extracted from pyrite (fool's gold) from the 3rd century by the Chinese . . . and when sulfur is heated enough, it melts into a blood red liquid (a la the famous "Red Tincture" of alchemy). It all makes an interesting allegory for the Old King who has "within it" a New King or non-intuitive inner form (yellow solid that melts into red liquid).
(http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a0/Burning-sulfur.png)
molten sulfur above; burning sulfur below.
My personal experience (as an artist and writer who had a long devotional period of writing about Old King figures and aspects) is that we might do work which seems to be directed at transforming an Old King (as a version of the Self), but this work indirectly functions to reconstruct the ego as a languaged object that relates to the Self. My book of poems What the Road Can Afford (http://barbarity.blogspot.com/2005/08/what-road-can-afford.html) goes about dismembering, cooking, and dissolving divine and quasi-divine Old King figures with an "alchemical heat". I saw theses Old Kings as related to the vision of the writer/artist that I was struggling not to be: a kind of Old Testament Creator-God. I recognized that this creation power was illusory and "poisonous" and that I was infected with it. So I went about "alchemically punishing" this aspect of the God and myself. I poured acid all over it and turned on the heat, but made sure to contain this all in the vessel of the poems (and the book as a whole).
Through the process of writing this book (over about seven years), I gradually became a knowing co-creator who could step aside from my "creative power" and its delusional poisons and facilitate something Other . . . the Self, that is. But I never really imagined that I was changing God or the Self. This was always metaphorical. I think I was trying to figure out how to contain, facilitate, or "alchemically perfect" the Self/Nature with my Art . . . not to create something perfect and golden or to be able to sip an Elixir that cured my suffering. But to find a way to love and commune with this Other (that is also "me") . . . and not just that Self-as-Other, but also others in general. The work of art was a process of developing a functional and valuating relationality.
The alchemical aspects of my poems were largely unknown to me while I wrote them. I had had some contact with alchemy through Jung, and it "inspired me" in many ways, but I had no conscious understanding of the alchemical process and therefore no ability to insert it into my poems as some kind of device or reference. It's really quite astonishing (to me, at least) how deeply alchemical my book ended up being. All Nature . . . where Art provided merely heat and containment.
The problem is that we get a warped view of the spiritual path. The way of the cloistered complentative is no alternative to most people. Instead the "alchemical" spiritual way can provide an answer. But if it becomes psychologized and misinterpreted it obviously has very damaging consequences. This issue is not merely a dispute over the misinterpretation of alchemy, it concerns the immensely important issue of how to find our way on the spiritual path.
I would agree that alchemy presents a very useful (and still very relevant) metaphor for leading the "symbolic life". But it also presents (at least) two major complications. First, it is so densely symbolic and convoluted that one has to have that kind of mad hermetical obsession to be able to sort it out (a sorting out that requires a good deal of projection and reverie, as well). There is not enough consistency in different renderings of the alchemical opus for most people to find a solid ground for interpretation in alchemy. This alone creates many intellectual (and spiritual) dangers. For instance, although I am very grateful to Adam McLean for his important online contributions to alchemy studies, sometimes his approach is too dogmatic for me. He criticizes Jung's interpretations of alchemy, and he does so on many valid grounds. But ultimately he faults Jung for psychologizing, and this I have to take issue with. Here, I think Jung understood what the alchemists were up to better than McLean or someone taking a more "scholarly" (or equally, a more "spiritual") approach.
What I mean is that there is no absolutely consistent tradition in alchemy that a "great scholar" can suss out, extract and lay before a reader's feet. There are many, many variations in alchemical thought, many different ways of saying the same things . . . and the alchemical writers made no real attempt to "get together" and make sure they were consistent or "on message". Jung does stray from some of the most traditional elements of the opus (e.g., conflating prima materia with pre-Work [and practically pre-ego] chaos, Nigredo with depression and "unconsciousness", and Coniunctio with transcendent hieros gamos). And this straying works to the detriment of Jung's psychologization. Here, he should have listened more willingly to the alchemists instead of leaping at what he thought were modern, psychological parallels.
But in trying to psychologize alchemy, Jung was also staying true to the spirit of alchemy, which essentially holds that there is no real "alchemical scholarship". That is, alchemy can only be understood experimentally and creatively. It is an Art, not an artifact. One must live the Work in order to study it . . . and no two people will live this Work in precisely the same way. One may learn a bit from one previous alchemist and another bit from another alchemist, but this cannot merely be taken as is and reused (where texts like Splendor Solis and Rosarium Philosophorum collect classical alchemical quotations together, these collections read more like inspirational mantras or koans than coherent philosophical arguments). Every opus is original. Only the general structural dynamics are consistent (i.e., not the order of stages or processes but the most general structures like solve et coagula and the Black, White, Red sequence). That the derivation of the Philosopher's Stone tends to read like a recipe (if only a very muddled one) is a deceptive temptation, a wish that cannot be fulfilled. To imagine that the opus is a recipe and not a labor is to go chasing madly after eternally elusive gold and thinking the material wealth of fantasy is the real valuation that awaits the successful "adept".
I contend that Jung practiced alchemy (in his alchemical writings). He was not a scholar of alchemy, but an alchemical experimentalist, an artifex . . . because he was a psychologizer. All alchemists were psychologizers (and neither scholars, per se, or spiritualists). This is something McLean doesn't seem to recognize or give Jung credit for. Although Jung at times over-asserted the "unconsciousness" of the alchemists, I think he was largely right about the projection of archetypal psychodynamics into the chemicals and metals. One can project like this without being truly unconscious, though. Projection can be a devotional or spiritual act (i.e. a "reverie"). And when Jung wrote his alchemical books later in his life, he was also swept up in reverie or in a kind of mystical participation with his subject matter. For this reason, Jung's alchemical writings should not be read as "alchemy scholarship". They are, in fact, alchemy experiments . . . opera.
Regrettably (especially for Jungians), Jung's alchemical opera represent devoted but ultimately (although not utterly) failed experiments. They do not generate functional Philosopher's Stones. But since alchemy (like science) benefits from failed experiments, this is not really a flaw. The problem is that Jungians want to see these works of Jung as Philosopher's Stones, and this makes for bad faith. Jungians become pseudo-alchemists, frauds, charlatans, or "charcoal burners" who deal in fool's gold. Many Jungian problems derive from not taking Jung and his thought scientifically. He is taken religiously, and so must be either right or wrong, a true or false prophet. If he were taken scientifically, we could actually learn from his experimental "failures". These failures would enrich us and allow analytical psychology to keep progressing. But instead, Jungians have typically chosen to blindly defend Jung's experimental ideas as "true prophecy" . . . which is one of the reasons that analytical psychology has been deteriorating and moving toward assimilation into psychoanalysis (where Jung is a "false prophet") on one hand and New Agism (where you can be a "true prophet") on the other.
I do not object to the psychologization of alchemy. In fact, I feel this is the only honest and non-delusional way to pursue an alchemical project today. We cannot find the Stone in old alchemical texts; we must make our own Stone. So only a modern language will suffice. The archetypal "gods" and structures (i.e., Nature) still live in psyche, even as they can no longer be found in chemicals. Equally, although these "divine" principles and intelligences do not really exist in matter (as we now understand matter), principles of complex, dynamic organization still do. The time for the alchemical imagination is still ripe, perhaps riper than it was since before the Enlightenment and the rise of sciences like modern chemistry as a form of materialistic rationalism.
But the second major complication for the modern use of alchemy is a matter of something we are not really all that ready to deal with, I think. The scientific study of nature now allows us to imagine and language complexity (which is the root to a valuation of matter akin to that in the alchemical project). But our human spiritualities are still quite archaic. I don't think we have yet found a truly modern form of spirituality. Jung's psychology points in a viable direction, but ultimately comes up short, especially in Jungianism (post-Jung) where Jung's ground-breaking spiritual psychologization has regressed to more conventional spiritualism and supernaturalism.
One of the causes (although I don't find it a suitable "excuse") of this spiritualistic regression in Jungianism is no doubt Jung's own regression late in life (especially after his heart attack) to a more conventionally spiritual position. It wasn't an absolute regression, but it was a slip backward into less-modern and more romantic thinking. Jung no doubt felt he deserved this comfort and had earned it after years of psychological devotion to the spiritual. Regrettably, it jackets the unique spiritual-scientific amalgam of Jungian thought into a more run of the mill occult spiritualism. As a psychologizer, Jung was truly modern and pioneering. As a spiritualist, he was merely a romantic, an anti-modernist. I think the quasi-scientific psychologizing trend in Jung's thought was his most profound contribution. But Jungianism has fallen away from Jung's more truly alchemical experimentalism and phenomenology in favor of more dogmatic and spiritualistic beliefs.
But this is what most Jungians today prefer (where "one's bliss" is followed instead of truth, belief eclipses knowledge). Jungianism after Jung has failed to be truly experimental and (as Jung recommended) experiential. In today's Jungianism "experience" is confused with belief and the "active imagination" that swirls around that belief. Believing is not doing . . . and this is another way in which the meanings of alchemy are lost on modern Jungians. Alchemy is not a religion, though. It is not meant to be believed in. It's a creative, experimental endeavor. It is not a truth to uncover but a mode of doing. Alchemy is similar to storytelling in the oral tradition. Each new teller reconstructs the stories they hear and inherit, revising them both on the basis of what they like most and also by what their audiences like the most. Alchemy shows the same kind of variations that folktales show. The written texts preserved are like specific renderings of the alchemical tale, but the "tradition" of alchemy is not really in these written texts. The tradition of alchemy is unwritten and dynamic (or at least it was while alchemy was still being orally and physically passed along).
What I mean to get at with this second major complication in the modernization of alchemy is that alchemy is not really "spiritual" as we typically understand that term. Yes, alchemy is a mysticism, and mysticism is the archetype that also underlies spirituality. But alchemy is decidedly anti-spiritual. It's emphasis is on Nature or Matter, and its approach is proto-scientific and experimental (rather than faith-based and dogmatic). Spiritualities tend to be passed on as dogmas. They give specific disciplines to follow and ideas to believe in. As you yourself note, alchemy doesn't demand the ascetic, spiritualistic attitude from its practitioners. Nature conducts the Work, and the artifex contains and facilitates Nature. We are accustomed to spiritualities that egoically oppose Nature (as instinct or body) and seek to transcend it. Alchemy seeks to valuate the very thing other spiritualities try to transcend.
So, with no gods, no dogmas, and a generally devaluing and dissolving attitude toward the super-egoic will, alchemy becomes a very enigmatic and unusual "spirituality". I think that in order for a modern individual to live a spirituality that is genuinely alchemical, a very scientific attitude toward spirituality is required. Alchemy, despite its arcane symbols, is compatible with rationalism and materialism (so long as it is psychologized rather than literalized). It asks the artifex to observe with scientific rigor what is going on "inside the vessel". The alchemical "spiritualist" has the mindset of a lab technician more so than an ascetic or someone bent on disciplined self-betterment. Even "finding God" or deriving some sort of healing Elixir is not really the true goal of alchemy. That's only the superficial goal, and a deceptive one at that. The true goal is valuation, and what is valuated is not the I, but something Other that has been and tends to become de-valued. The Stone is found in the dung heap.
In conventional spirituality, God or the object of praise and worship is the thing with the ultimate value, and this value is taken for granted. God is considered to be self-valuating, and the believer is supposed to bask in this, receive grace and warmth from it. S/he never has to be responsible for valuating, though. At the same time, it is equally taken for granted that what is devalued is not God, not sacred. worth ignoring. In alchemy, it's radically different. God has fallen or is sick, and not belief but Art or Work valuates and redeems God (as Nature or by connecting God/spirit to Nature). In fact, the "redemption of the Other" is no one time shot in alchemy. Alchemical valuation is to be constantly practiced. The individual becomes responsible for the maintenance of valuation. Alchemy essentially acknowledges that the human relationship with the divine is one governed by a kind of valuative entropy, where God (or the relationship with God) is that which is constantly falling out of valuation or into darkness and chaos and distant Otherness. Humanity is charged with keeping God in the world, with the sanctification of matter and life.
We see a similar attitude in some tribal cultures, especially Native American ones. The sanctity of the world is dependent on the valuation given it by the tribe. Without that valuation, the sun doesn't rise. Death and chaos consume everything. In fact, in tribal cultures that employ shamans, these shamans are specifically responsible for maintaining and facilitating the valuative connection between the individual members and the "sacred world". Shamans were necessary, because individuals continuously fell out of union with the sacred world. Their souls got sick or lost. Souls (as the connection between the human and the Natural/Divine) are always slipping away. They are mercurial things.
Alchemy is a post-tribal method of shamanic "soul retrieval". Like shamanism, alchemy restores soul (to Nature) by storying its retrieval. Shamanic trance rituals are highly dependent on the singing or storytelling of the shaman, who utilizes archetypal heroic (i.e., valuative) motifs to depict the rescue and return of the soul. The alchemical opus is a kind of shamanic story. By restoring the individual's lost soul, the shaman brings divine life back into the tribe. More psychologically, the shaman helps the tribe remain a functional symbol of the Self and its organizing principle. Individuals who suffer "soul loss" are like the devalued pieces of the Self system that must be restored to dynamic health so that the whole system can functional properly.
The alchemical opus depicts the same shamanic process in chemical metaphors. Divine Nature is treated and healed. "The Philosopher’s Stone is produced by means of the Greening and Growing Nature" (Splendor Solis). The Art kills and restores Nature.
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Matt, alchemical texts are very much in the trinitarian spiritual tradition. Jean Albert Belin says: "For the reasons above alleged one has need in the practice of the assistance of the most high: but heaven gives no help to the man who is its enemy: one must have a pure and holy heart, divested from the desires of the world, and vowed entirely to God." (The Adventures of an Unknown Philosopher)
In order to be able to find the arcanum, one must have a clean heart, much like the ideal of the Christian mystics. A life that involves suffering and loneliness is clearly favourable to the goal. An extraverted life is out of the question. This implies a sacrifice of the wishes of the ego. So it is an ego-sacrifice in a sense, but not ego-dissolution.
I think the notion of differentiating the hero archetype along your lines is a good idea. But can the hero at all be viewed as as a model of the ego, and his journey a model of the individuation process? M-L von Franz says in 'The Interpretation of Fairy Tales' that "In many so-called Jungian attempts at interpretation, one can see a regression to a very personalistic approach. The interpreters judge the hero or heroine to be a normal human ego and his misfortunes to be an image of his neurosis." (p.viii) She explains that the heroes really are abstractions. Their fates are expressions of the difficulties and dangers given to us by nature.
When the ego archetype is finally integrated with consciousness, it actually implies its death (what I discuss in The Real Meaning of the Motif of the Dying God (http://home7.swipnet.se/~w-73784/archetypes.htm)). This is how archetypes experience it when they pass over to the "other side". So, no matter what type of hero, death is its fate. Hence it cannot work as a model of the ego as we certainly don't want to go that far in our identification. This means that the hero identification must be overcome at some stage. Identification can fulfil a function, but not with the adult person who is a spiritual seeker.
So is the shamanic initiation, and the shamanic journey to the Otherworld and back, examples of the ego's journey in individuation? My argument is that it is not. The shaman does not represent the ego, but he represents an archetype. He becomes a god when he goes into trance. Likewise, primitive people in the Amazon, and elsewhere, portray the different totem archetypes to whom they belong. They dress themselves in attires that represent the god. The Australian aborigines all belong to the totem of some forefather spirit, which is a form of creator god. These are gods, and sometimes, during festivities, they imitate this god, but then they return to their normal ego. They allow themselves to be affected by the archetype, but they don't go farther than that. This is an ideal relation with the self, I suppose, to invigorate the self during festivities.
I think that the shaman's journey is predicated on the totemistic rituals of the primitives, and it serves to invigorate the relation with the self, by the impersonation of the self. I don't know if Joseph Henderson (Thresholds of Initiation), and Joseph Campbell, view this as a blueprint for the ego's journey in the individuation process. If they do, then they, to a degree, commit the error that von Franz points out, above. But I can't say that I have analysed Henderson and Campbell, thoroughly.
Mats Winther
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Matt, alchemical texts are very much in the trinitarian spiritual tradition. Jean Albert Belin says: "For the reasons above alleged one has need in the practice of the assistance of the most high: but heaven gives no help to the man who is its enemy: one must have a pure and holy heart, divested from the desires of the world, and vowed entirely to God." (The Adventures of an Unknown Philosopher)
Mats, I don't disagree . . . but all life at the time wherever Christendom extended was "trinitarian" (at least on the surface). Christianity was the canvas on which all thought was painted. At a more subtle level, though, the alchemical devotion to Nature ran against the Platonic/Neoplatonic trend of Christian thought. Not as an intended opposition or apostasy, but as a contrary sense of valuation. The incorporation of Christian motifs and symbols in alchemical emblems and texts may have required a bit of "convolution", but there is no overt sign I am aware of that alchemists challenged or even questioned conventional Christian mythology/theology.
Also, I think every work undertaken with devotion and integrity tends to breed a slightly ascetic or hermetic attitude. Alchemy, like both spirituality and science, requires a kind of introversion, a valuation of inner or microscopic work. Still, I mean to differentiate the "hermetic" attitude from the truly ascetic. The former may very well be spiritual, but it is focused on an object or other that it means to study, know, or reconstruct. Ego in this hermetic attitude is not the primary focus, but may end up being indirectly depotentiated because the hermetic focus is so distinctly on the object/other.
With the ascetic attitude, ego (or an enshadowed ego symbol) is a main focus and is seen as objectionable and dangerous or illusory. Commonly, the ascetic directs some form of abuse at the body (as ego-surrogate or -symbol). The idea is that if the body can be starved, beaten, neglected, etc., it can be overcome. This generally meant that "instinct" (in the more archaic appetitive sense) could be overcome. This instinct was imagined as a parasite or possessing demon, an other and intruder in the supposedly "pure" and holy human spirit/mind. The ascetic seeks to conquer this other and thereby exalt spirit.
I would argue that this spirit-centric orientation is ultimately impossible and even pathological . . . as the history of Christian mysticism would seem to especially illuminate (e.g., anything from self-flagellation (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flagellant) to pillar sitting (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stylites) to the construction of Inquisitional torture devices and the Malleus Maleficarum (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malleus_Maleficarum)). That is, whether one is starving oneself, whipping oneself or promoting or performing the starving and whipping of others in the name of a spiritual cause, hostility against the other (which the body often qualifies as, especially where Platonic heritage remains) drives the ideology. Underlying asceticism is the idea that the shadow can be conquered and removed. But this is a delusion, and what radical asceticism accomplishes is merely the dissociation of the shadow, which then appears "outside" and as a tempting or assaulting, often demonic, other. The ascetic defines him or herself by engaging in holy war with this demonic other, spending an entire life barely beating it back (or continuously failing to).
I don't think that is the attitude behind alchemy at all. But, as I tend to see (along with Eliade) alchemy and shamanism deriving from a shared root, it must be acknowledged that shamanic initiation typically involved a period of extreme asceticism, self-denial, and self-torture. Yet, I would argue that the purpose of this ascetic initiation period was not the same as that in many Christian mysticisms (where the eternal . . . and unwinnable . . . "battle with the devil" was the purpose and obsession of an entire life). In ascetic Christian mysticisms of the Dark Age and medieval period, the body/devil/instinct/appetites were a continuous threat that had to be "heroically" fended off and fortified against. The spirit-ego was the ruthless defender of the person against itself (in dissociated form). But in shamanic initiation, the ascetic period (a kind of 40 days and 40 nights in the wilderness), was an ego-dissolving finite episode where the old "ego" was dismembered and a new source of selfhood and purpose was discovered. The shamanic initiate passes through the threshold of initiation merely by surviving . . . not by conquering. What survives these intense and terrible initiations is the eternal thing, the new center of selfhood (the Self).
From my more psychological and modern perspective, I would see the radical ascetic as a Demonically-possessed "egotist" hell-bent on eradicating "Otherness" from the personality. The initiate (who may also be hermetic) is a non-egotist. That is, the ego is not the center of his or her personality, and Otherness is not Demonically defended against, but communed with. Only the Demon (or the Demon-possessed ego) is afraid of and in conflict with Otherness.
In order to be able to find the arcanum, one must have a clean heart, much like the ideal of the Christian mystics. A life that involves suffering and loneliness is clearly favourable to the goal. An extraverted life is out of the question. This implies a sacrifice of the wishes of the ego. So it is an ego-sacrifice in a sense, but not ego-dissolution.
I think the life of suffering and loneliness is not so much chosen as accepted or tolerated (as the lesser of evils). There is no need to deprive oneself. If one seeks to valuate the devalued Other or to question one's tribal affiliations, loneliness and suffering are inevitable social "punishments".
As far as ego-sacrifice vs. ego-dissolution vs. ego-reduction, etc., I think our disagreements are largely semantic. There is something about the way you personally define ego-dissolution that doesn't sit well with you . . . but I'm not sure the term has the same connotations for me. At the same time, asceticism obviously doesn't have a very positive connotation for me, whereas ego-dissolution is not associated with any negative judgments. The reason I like the term dissolution is that it has a specific history in alchemy. In shamanism, dismemberment is essentially the same thing, although the connotation is a bit bloodier and more destructive (to my mind). One can be dissolved somewhat or even substantially and still survive, still be what one is. But that which is dismembered is killed. Therefore, in my opinion, dismemberment is a much more figurative and symbolic term than dissolution (which still has validity as a modern psychological term).
Considering your background in alchemy, I assume that you do not object to dissolution as a psychic process, but you feel that what is dissolved in alchemy is simply not representative of the ego . . . that the dissolved body/matter is better understood as the Self. The reason I do not see it/psychologize it this way is that the thing I define as the Self is not really soluble. It is a principle of psychic organization akin to the self-organization of complex dynamic systems. A principle of organization can't be dissolved or broken down and reformulated . . . only a specific state of organization can be dissolved. The Self principle of organization is dynamic and is constantly moving to break down non-adaptive states of organization (or dysfunctional aspects of these states). I see the parallel in the Nature of the alchemists. The Art seeks not to reorganize or replace the ways of Nature, but to facilitate or "perfect" the Natural dynamic of organization. It isn't the construction of a new order out of natural stuff, but a redemption of Nature by freeing Nature's native dynamic or principle of organization from that which bogged it down.
I think the notion of differentiating the hero archetype along your lines is a good idea. But can the hero at all be viewed as as a model of the ego, and his journey a model of the individuation process? M-L von Franz says in 'The Interpretation of Fairy Tales' that "In many so-called Jungian attempts at interpretation, one can see a regression to a very personalistic approach. The interpreters judge the hero or heroine to be a normal human ego and his misfortunes to be an image of his neurosis." (p.viii) She explains that the heroes really are abstractions. Their fates are expressions of the difficulties and dangers given to us by nature.
I like that von Franz makes this differentiation. It demonstrates an awareness of the hero archetype that is often lacking, especially in "post-Jungian" thought. I also like that von Franz felt fairytales were more purely "archetypal" than myths and epics . . . and I believe she remains one of the very few Jungians who clearly voiced this opinion (with which I agree). But at the same time, von Franz's jab at "so-called Jungian attempts at interpretation [that are a] regression to a personalistic approach" needs to be properly contextualized. This comment is directed at the London/developmental school of Jungianism that Michael Fordham was the ideological progenitor of. I don't think she meant to utterly dissociate the hero from all that is egoic. She was engaged in a bitter war with "apostate" Jungians who were being drawn back into psychoanalytic thinking (especially the ideas of Klein, Bion, and Winnicott). She not only criticized the London Jungians but also the Zurich Jungians who were somewhat sympathetic to the London Jungians. I understand and sympathize with her concern that psychoanalytic concepts of ego and small-s self do not fully comprehend Jung's more archetypal "depth" perspective.
In psychoanalysis and more psychoanalytic Jungianism, the hero is pathologized and interpreted from an "infantocentric" perspective. Although this could be seen as a continuation of classical Jungian negativity toward the hero, it also devalues the archetypal structures and dynamics behind individuation, mysticism, and spiritual experience (as if they were nothing but remnants of some kind of neurotic Oedipal conflict) . . . and those are things von Franz believed in and valued. But we should keep in mind that the way the ego is understood in classical Jungianism is quite different than the way it is understood in psychoanalysis (in classical Jungianism, the ego is the center of consciousness, while in psychoanalysis the ego is a kind of overwhelmed hostage trapped in a battle between the id and the superego). I agree with von Franz that it is essential in the interpretation of fairytales to understand that the heroes of the stories are not representative of some kind of neurotic "adult infant". And even if von Franz was a bit of a Jungian fundamentalist (or perhaps the most fundamentalist of any Jungian), I think she had every right to be outraged by the assimilation of some Jungian thought into psychoanalysis, which Jung had adamantly differentiated his thinking from. That assimilation can legitimately be seen as a regression. And although I have tried to investigate this very subject, I have yet to find any clear analyses by Jungians of this odd, seemingly regressive move. That is, the shift is acknowledged, but not analyzed or seen in a psychological manner . . . which I find inadequate and suspicious.
But the relationship of the ego with the hero is, in my opinion, more complex than von Franz suggests (or was perhaps aware of). Even the classical Jungian position doesn't comprehend this relationship adequately, nor does it manage to disentangle its vision of the hero from its own psychological baggage (i.e., the inheritance of Jung's "conquering hero complex").
In my own thinking, the hero is not a model for the ego, per se. But the hero is a mode or attitude that can be brought into consciousness and that naturally gravitates toward consciousness. The ego, though, can never become the hero, nor would any such attempt be psychologically functional. In many fairytales the hero is clearly differentiable from the ego characters. The most common construction of this is where there are three brothers or three sisters, and the youngest one is the "special" one, the hero. The other siblings represent more conventional (defensively self-interested) ego attitude. But it is a fascinating feature of many dreams (usually those of individuals who are progressively engaged in an individuation event) that the dream ego can at times be very close to the hero archetype. So there is a strong set of data that suggests an ego/hero parallel.
But in the waking ego, the heroic (when active at all) is merely one of many attitudes or "splinter psyches". It is not a personality unto itself and cannot (I would argue) become a predominate or ruling attitude in the ego. There is something innately "anti-egoic" about the hero, despite its ego-compatibility. I think this is because the ego is meant to operate as a medium between Self and environment (where our environment is largely cultural). The ego cannot afford to be strictly heroic (in the valuative sense I have been advocating), because it must also enable the lasting survival of the Self, much of which depends on the survival and functionality of the ego. Sometimes restraint and defense is needed, because some others and otherness are hostile and dangerous. The heroic attitude is very fluid and not terribly self-concerned. It would do what is "right" (especially by the other) even at the expense of its own well-being . . . and often enough, that is not a worthwhile trade-off. Therefore the ego has to step in and say, "No, I can't be heroic today." Of course, more commonly, we are telling ourselves that valuative heroism is impossible when in fact it is entirely possible, but merely difficult and involving some kind of sacrifice.
We also live in a culture in which the hero is placed on a pedestal, perhaps as a superhero from a work of fantasy or a "Christ". The Christian imagination especially (and historically) has robbed humanity of its right to heroism (by making the hero a god or Christ). But people exercise the heroic attitude and do heroic things all the time. We often miss this, though, because we have been told that heroism is grand and rare or even miraculous.
This fantastic aggrandizement of the hero also derives from the conflation of the conquering hero with the valuative hero in the myths and epics of patriarchal culture. We are socialized to imagine that the hero is (or deserves to be) "high status" and powerful, accomplishing great things by might, wit, and almost supernatural skill. We never imagine that heroism is often socially invisible, subtle, and even fairly unconscious. Only grand "heroism" makes the media.
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Matt, I don't think there is any implication behind the use of Self with capital S, is it? Jung himself uses 'self' with small s.
My "complementarian self" notion implies that the self as an abstract "principle of organization" isn't good enough. It must be complemented with a notion of the self as a living entity. If that's the case then alchemical transformations can, after all, take place in the self. Life is malleable and "biological", always growing and changing. The living self is the complement of the Platonic notion of the self as a ready-made Form, what I term the trinitarian self. Thus, the hero, as an image of the self, is an abstraction, but also an autonomous person, a divinity, as it were.
Concerning your earlier message, about the regression in Jung to a more pagan standpoint. It is probably this which gave rise to Hillman's unrestrained form of paganism (see my Critique of Archetypal Psychology (http://home7.swipnet.se/~w-73784/hillmcrit.htm)). I believe your critical observations are correct. Perhaps the regression had to do with the fact that Jung's heroic confrontation with the unconscious proved untenable. Jungian followers did not see this happening, i.e., the encounter with anima, the wise old man, etc., followed by the dissolution and transformation of the ego.
A regress seemed to have occurred, and the spirit flowed back into the world, at a point when Jungians should have gone further, to definitively withdraw the spirit from matter. I suppose, it is at this point that Jung begins to think in terms of the World Soul, and when he becomes conscious of an identity with the pagan saviour, Merlin. Maybe many a Jungian felt uncomfortable with this development and turned to slightly more psychoanalytic thoughtways.
In alchemy (Splendor Solis, and elsewhere) the Mercurius Rex is drowning in the sea and is calling out for help. A rationalistic and scientific person finds it hard to admit that he is obsessed with an unconscious projection, and that he is really on the search after the lost spirit in matter, although he doesn't know it. That's the underlying reason why he is obsessed with the world, whether it's scientific experiments, political welfare projects, economical success, etc. Only when he realizes this can he stop the vain search and achieve enlightenment.
So the spirit remains projected onto matter, but it seems Jung never took the step to complete the withdrawal of the spirit from matter. Instead, he understands the call for help from the alchemical Rex as the demand on the ego to operari regi, render service to the King. It is "the necessity of a descent into the dark world of the unconscious" (Ps. and Alchemy, p.329). But this is not an immediate answer to the problem of the withdrawal of spirit from matter, in order to rescue the King from drowning. Here is where the ascetic attitude can make sense, after all. I suggest that the path of the Christian mystic is practicable in this context. But Jung rejected the school of negative mysticism out of hand. I am convinced that the withdrawal of the projection on matter cannot be achieved in connection with a self ideal that builds on completeness. The self of oneness, perfection, and transcendency, must be allowed to play a role, after all.
Your argument may be correct, that the ascetic obsession is in many cases pathological. But my argument is that the trintarian path is tenable, after all, provided that the personality has reached a certain level of maturity and insight, when it is ready for this final step. Jung and von Franz have contributed immensely to the withdrawal of projections, but it is as if Jung was unwilling to draw the logical conclusion from this, and take the final step. Instead he allowed libido to flow back into matter. This is mirrored in the weird off-shoots in post-Jungian psychology, on phenomenological lines, revolving around the Anima Mundi. The gnostics wanted to free her from her imprisonment in the mundane sphere. But the post-Jungians are anti-gnostics in the sense that they promote the worship of her. This is an expression of the pagan spirit and New Age. Against this, I would want to focus on the paradigmatic aspect of gnosis, to once and for all take the final step of redeeming the spirit, and conclusively withdraw our projections on matter, thus relieving us of the expansive heroic attitude that causes devastation to this earth, damages our societies, and drives people out of their minds in their pursuit of illusory goals.
Mats Winther
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In Jung's vision of 1944 (MDR, p.289ff) he had the experience that everything worldly was sloughed away. He had the feeling of extreme poverty, but at the same time of great fullness. There was no longer anything he wanted or desired, which sounds very much like the ascetic ideal.
Jung's thinking centers around the transformation of the ego, and consciousness as a whole, in concert with the unconscious. But according to the trinitarian spiritual tradition it is the self which is central, it is this very inner spirit which undergoes transformations. "I live yet not I, Christ liveth my life." Goldsmith says, "the activity of the Spirit comes alive in us, and It takes over: we are no longer good and we are no longer bad; we are no longer sick, but neither are we well. We are at a stage which transcends the pairs of opposites."(Art of Meditation, p.8)
Arguably, Jung's vision compensated his heroic psychology of unconscious integration. After all, to have "everything worldly sloughed away" is fully compliant with the ascetic ideal. The little man in the temple above earth was meditating Jung, and that's the only reason why Jung existed. The ego and its doings are very secondary compared with the self. It is the self that undergoes transformations. Actually, it is the self who is living Jung's life, on lines of St Paul.
I suggest that Jung defended against the transcendental spiritual notion by moving in the other direction, after his convalescence. He moved, as it were, in the direction of the chtonic spirit to escape the demands of the uranic spirit. The reason behind the event when he broke his foot, and the subsequent heart attack, he believed, must depend on his unwillingness to realize his life's myth, to carry the role of the pagan saviour. Drawing on the Merlin myth, he figured himself as a this-worldly saviour figure. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe this to be historically correct(?).
This might explain his expression, late in life, of having "failed": "I have failed in my foremost task – to open people’s eyes to the fact that man has a soul, there is a buried treasure in the field, and that our religion and philosophy are in a lamentable state." Evidently, Jung really expected to turn the whole world around. He wanted the ego, and the conscious collective, to transform. It is our consciousness of the world that must change, people must open their eye to the this-worldly spirit. However, the other version of the spiritual path is neglected. To give up one's own life to the spirit within, to devote oneself to the transformations of the self rather than collective consciousness and the ego, is out of the question.
I maintain that Jung's vision in 1944 compensated his focus on the transformation of consciousness by the integration of the unconscious. But the vision caused him to strengthen his defence against the transcendental spirit by going further in the other direction. He took the full step and accepted the pagan paradigm with its ambivalent deity. This is rather typical isn't it? If you can't go along with the self, then you must go in the other direction. Have I got this right?
Mats Winther
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Certain page notes seem to generate emoticons. It should be "page 8".
/Mats
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I have now expanded my article about "The Complementarian Self" with a
chapter Complementarity in Christology. The notion of the two-unity
of the self can be expressed in different ways. It is interesting to
see what alternative models of two-unity there existed in early
Christianity, regarding the nature of Christ, such as 'miaphysitism',
Nestorianism, etc. It turns out that they correspond to today's
different psychological versions of the self. I argue that the
complementarian self is essentially the same as the 'hypostatic union'
of the two natures of Christ.
Please read:
http://home7.swipnet.se/~w-73784/compself.htm#Christology
Mats Winther
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In Critique of Synchronicity (here (http://home7.swipnet.se/~w-73784/synchronicity.htm)) I discuss the complementarian self further and direct critique against the Jungian unitarian self.
Mats