Critique of Individuation





“Seagulls at the beach”. Alexander Camaro (1951).

Abstract: Individuation as the process of psychological maturation is connected with the way of the spirit, the same as the ‘narrow path’. Social and worldly adaptation as a central aspect of individuation is overvalued. According to psychology, symbolic transformation of unconscious images fulfills a therapeutic function. This view is criticized as a way of upholding the stagnant ego, which should really undergo authentic transformation. The notion of ego abandonment in spiritual tradition must be taken seriously. Central to psychology is the integration of the unconscious. But equally important is the opposite process of ‘complementation’. Consciousness is not only synthetic, it has also a ‘sympathetic’ function. Consciousness can give life back to the unconscious and not only empty it of its goods. To this end, a creative form of contemplation is recommended, in the manner of painting or writing. The destruction of the stagnant state of personality, and the riddance of aspects of personality, are part and parcel of individuation. Today, adaptation and assimilation are overvalued whereas negation is undervalued. The Self in Jungian psychology is a towering ideal, a conglomerate of contradictory aspects of personality. At a point in time, the spiritual seeker must abandon the ideal of completeness and begin to negate his profane obsessions, which are nothing but meaningless games of life. At this juncture, the passionate game of creativity is ushered in.



Keywords: critique of Jungian psychology, integration, complementation, negation, destruction, spiritual path, art, individuation, apotheosis, alchemy, Gnosticism, Holy Grail, C. G. Jung, Emanuel Swedenborg, Poul Bjerre.

Introduction

The towering ideal of Self

spirit —

Marie-Louise von Franz

Time is a child — playing like a child — playing a board game — the kingdom of the child. This is Telesphoros, who roams through the dark regions of this cosmos and glows like a star out of the depths. He points the way to the gates of the sun and to the land of dreams.

illusions —

Maya —

The giant and the two skyscrapers

A giant, several hundred meters high, was attacking a skyscraper, but he lets the other skyscraper be. Debris was falling all around me, and people fell to the ground and died. I took a long roundabout route, outside the view of the giant. During the journey I fell blind during a time, but finally managed to enter the safe skyscraper. From the bottom floor window in the safe skyscraper I could see that the giant wore washed-out blue jeans.

The complementarian Self

It seems that life has a “game-playing” foundation. The most pronounced characteristic of human nature is a fondness for the manifold games of life. Historian Johan Huizinga (1971) goes as far as naming our species ‘homo ludens’. Human activities, in the form of professions and careers, are qualitatively different in that some are, in the short perspective, more beneficial to society but not necessarily to nature. Yet, there’s no essential difference between the careers of sports, scientific research, film stardom, politics, etc., because they have the same “game-playing” foundation. The share market is a kind of game, and so is the whole competitive market system. Whatever we do, we are merely partaking in a meaningless game, spurred by unthinking forces of instinct. Like energetic hamsters we are running around on the game board of life. While swimming with the tide, life’s forces shuffle us around. It’s an apt picture of professional and matrimonial life. In our careers and achievements we are unthinkingly devoted to playing life’s game. Although it captivates and engages us to a remarkable degree, the perpetual game-playing must be regarded an essentially purposeless activity. It gives birth to the idea that we should step out of the hamster wheel and stand apart from the onrush of life. Of course, this is nothing new. The achievement of worldly transcendence is central to the spiritual traditions of the world.Arthur Schopenhauer argues that humanity is driven by a dissatisfied Will, continually seeking satisfaction. Human desire and all human action is futile, illogical, and directionless. To Schopenhauer, the Will is a malignant power that arises from insentient nature and imprisons us in the hamster cage of life. His answer is that we must escape the Will by standing apart from life. It is achieved by way of methods of transcendence, such as asceticism and chastity. But since Schopenhauer lacked a positive notion ofas a complement to the negative compulsion of the Will, it took the reverse expression in an hedonistic life-style among his followers. Since life is essentially without purpose, we could just as well enjoy ourselves while remaining on this earth.Carl Jung, being averse to asceticism and chastity, took Schopenhauer’s insensate Will and turned it into the positive force of individuation. From a standpoint of worldly abstinence, it is as if Jung endorses the “hamster wheel of life”. Yet, since his consciousness is modelled on the ambivalent Self, he is also capable of seeing life’s failure as the inception of individuation in the way it promotes self-knowledge. He expands life’s game by inventing the individuative journey as the successive integration ofby way of the method of activeConcepts of individuation and the realization of theas they go inwards and outwards at the same time, are contradictory and unclear, and many can’t seem to make heads or tails of them.Thus, Jung has revamped the spiritual path as the journey of individuation. On the one hand, there is a focus on psychic integration. On the other hand, it remains essential to partake in earthly existence to the full, because the goal of integration is the acquirement of the complete humanity of the Self. The traditional notion of worldly transcendence is reinterpreted as a temporary period of introversion, involving a confrontation with the archetypal domain. However, in the following I shall argue that it risks becoming yet another game-playing activity.The Self is defined as a teleological goal. The telos of the Self implies that the ego is pulled towards the Self whose gravity is always increasing during individuation. The Self is viewed as a paradoxical and multifarious wholeness, harbouring many conflicting opposites. Arguably, since individuation as a concept elevates the multifarious wholeness of Self as an ideal for the ego, self-absorption could be the consequence. Rather than depending on the telos of the Self, I suggest that individuation depends on spiritual ambition, which is essentially different than secular fulfillment. Notions of worldly transcendence, deriving from time-honoured religious tradition, are as valid as ever before. For this reason, it is necessary to disentangle the non-secular path from the notion of individuation and introduce a notion of spiritual individuation.The Self is a towering ideal, representing the integration of conscious and unconscious, mundane and extramundane. Arguably, the notion of Self is overbearing, as it represents the ideal to encompass both social existence and the unconscious psyche in yet more intense and also broader relationships (cf. Jung, 1977, para. 758). In theory, demands are put on the individual that require an inordinate power of personality. However, we cannot possibly be well-adapted individuals in society, having recourse to a full-fledged family and social life as well as a thoroughgoing relation to thenot at the same time, at least. Jung’s ideal of Self is associated with “completeness” and he argues strongly for it, repudiating the ideal of “perfection” (cf. Jung, 1979, pp. 68-70). It amounts to “lifting up one’s cross”, carrying it along in life. He says that “[only] the ‘complete’ person knows how unbearable man is to himself” (Jung, 1977b, pars. 1095f). The conclusion is that huge and contradictory demands are put on the individuant.The majority of people are occupied with the problem of how to amuse themselves this very day, or how to promote their own social or economical status. Yet some people have another drive.(1915-1998) holds that the spiritual drive is even stronger than the sexual. Such a devotional drive, corroborated by the tremendous prominence of esoteric and ascetic tradition, would seem to make the telos of the Self redundant. Why some people have more of it than others is another question. It’s evident that suffering plays a prominent role. Has anyone, who hasn’t been sick or deprived in some sense, ever succeeded on the godly path? It’s evident that the earthly allure has a harmful influence on spiritual development, which explains the enormous focus on poverty and suffering in religious tradition. We have a tendency to become overly absorbed in secular matters, with the consequence that the faint and godly energies vanish from sight. The sense of mystery is easily lost.Individuation is something quite different than self-fulfillment and self-realization, which is the subject of many a book. Whereas earthbound success is like being transported on the diverse currents of life, especially as formulated by societal life, spiritual individuation depends on another kind of drivenness. I think of individuation as a pious devotedness that has its source in the unconscious, which means that it is independent of religious doctrine. Yet, Jung’s version of individuation is to play the game to the full, both in its inner and outer respect. He inscribed the following verse in Greek on a stone, and it’s also how he ends his autobiography:Thus, the Self is portrayed as a gamester who points the direction to daylight existence and the moonlit realm, simultaneously. Telesphoros means ‘fulfillment-bearer’. Theas archetypal personification of the unconscious, plays an important part in psychic life. Yet, it is also the fabricator ofthe veil ofwhich might explain why Jung always looked upon the anima with suspicion, since he had in a sense fallen for her deception. She creates the illusions which keep us bound to the games of life. For example, the game of chess is subjected to an anima projection, which serves to enslave the chess player to the game (to his own contentment). The anima is projected on the psychological theoretical edifice, too, providing us with an eminent hamster cage. We are being deluded; but this is how life is. It is not really evil, but it’s a functional and probably necessary phase.Individuation, understood as emancipative achievement, or worldly transcendence in religious language, is brutal and nothing must stand in its way. This seems to be the message of the unconscious. The following dream of a middle-aged man is thematic.The “spiritual” skyscraper was undergoing construction, and it was determined to overcome the doomed skyscraper. The skyscraper being demolished represents earthbound and ambivalent life whereas the other one represents inner life. Meaningless mundane obsessions and preconceptions fall to the ground and die. The giant presumably represents the towering force of individuation, which cannot be stopped. The first skyscraper is like an illusory and grand “hamster cage”, in which the ego scurries around on the many floors and joyfully tries out the different hamster wheels. The gist of my argument is that individuation, from the beginning, seems to continue independently alongside the construction of an illusory anima life, yet in the form of a second skyscraper undergoing construction. The upshot is that transcendental individuation is to be taken very seriously, because it has its roots in powerful insensate nature. It is so central that nothing else counts. It is a giant that crushes to smithereens the painstakingly constructed skyscraper of consciousness.According to the view here proposed, individuation runs invisibly in the background, as it were, in parallel with Schopenhauer’s formative Will. But when the adaptational function of the latter has served its purpose it becomes only an impediment, and the structure must be dismantled. Thus, the spiritual pilgrim must stand apart from illusory life, in the way of Schopenhauer. The difference is that the individuant now has recourse to the completed second skyscraper, namely that of individuation proper. Personality needn’t be ambivalent anymore. Thus, there seems to be two complementarian aspects of Self and two parallel paths of individuation, one illusory and one true, the first of which must be terminated. On the other hand, the problem with the Jungian edifice is that it’s conglomerative, something which leads to deleterious consequences. For Jung, there is only one skyscraper and there is only one Self. Taking part in purposeless life while performing inner work constitutes a conjugate, since it gives expression to completeness and the conglomerative Self. However, there are really two skyscrapers, the first of which must be razed to the ground because it has turned evil, although it wasn’t from the beginning.Joseph L. Henderson takes the view that individuation is predicated on the shamanic journey. He adds to the picture the “Ultimate God Image” as a complement to Jung’s view of Self, namely the “Primal God Image”, portrayed as an “ambivalent monster” (cf. Henderson, 2005, p. 226). The shamanic journey takes place as a circular movement between these two poles:

Poul Bjerre

Negation and destruction

During transpersonal states of consciousness the ego is not abandoned, nor completely transcended; rather, the spiritual practitioner realizes that the ego lacks concrete existence. It is not the ego that disappears; rather the belief in the ego’s solidity, the identification with the ego’s representations, is abandoned in the realization of egolessness during states of ordinary waking consciousness. (Schlamm, 2010)

The theory of unconscious compensation

The stagnant ego castle

by —

M-L von Franz

Individuation as a parallel spiritual path

Neoplatonism —

I was overlooking town from a ridge and observed the nearby ongoing construction of two skyscrapers, which both had begun at ground level below the ridge, perhaps a hundred meters below. But suddenly the leading construction collapsed. I looked down and saw many dead people. My friend, standing beside me, hadn’t seen anything of this. It would mean that I had experienced a vision of the future. It is relevant that both constructions begin far below the conscious level.

Death and rebirth

transfiguration —

Symbolization and amplification

M-L von Franz

nature —

[psychologically] this means that the transformation has to be described or felt as happening to the ‘other’ […] This can hardly be accidental, for the great psychic danger which is always connected with individuation, or the development of the self, lies in the identification of ego-consciousness with the self. (CW 9:1, p. 145)

Image) —

The resurrection body

M-L von Franz

Osiris —

Hermes Trismegistus —

And yet that light or ‘filius philosophorum’ was openly named the greatest and most victorious of all lights, and set alongside Christ as the Saviour and Preserver of the world! Whereas in Christ God himself became man, the filius philosophorum was extracted from matter by human art, and by means of the opus, made into a new light-bringer. In the former case the miracle of man’s salvation is accomplished by God; in the latter, the salvation or transfiguration of the universe is brought about by the mind of man — “Deo concedente,” as the authors never fail to add. Man takes the place of the Creator. (Jung, 1983, p. 127)

Therapeutic ritual

M-L von Franz

At a sunny day I was making an excursion into a beautiful area for open-air activities. However, I immediately chose to climb a big mountain from where I had a good view. But I couldn’t find a way down, so I had to go back. It was then that I found out that it was fake. It was made of some plastic that had been masked with a cloth which made it look very natural. I knocked on it and it sounded plastic and hollow. I slid down the mountain at good speed, sitting on my back. It impressed an old gentleman passer-by. From below, it was impossible to see that it was a fake mountain. I ventured out in the natural surroundings and was slightly surprised to see that many people were living here in big apartment buildings. There were small industries, too. It looked like a very harmonious area, close to nature. I wended my way into the attractive surroundings.

Hegelian collective individuation

body —

integration —

Here, the transcendental movement means to transcend the earthbound in its guise as the “Primal God Image”. However, it does not signify a polarization of secular and non-secular in the metaphysical sense. In the above dream, the giant is destroying the very same “ambivalent monster” as carrier of our conceptual objects of worship. It is a terrestrial God Image, a pagan image of idolatry. Striving after transcendence serves the purpose of emancipation, to free personality from the idolatrous aspects of consciousness. When the conscious ego-structure has played out its role it goes the way of all flesh. Personality is relieved of everything that it believes in, which has kept personality and its creativity captive. What remains is the heavenly blue yet chthonic spirit, the indwelling spirit, whose name is Mercurius. It’s no longer a hypostatized object of worship, but a spirit of creativity rooted in insensate nature, which allows personality to relate to existence in a profound sense. When we think that we are being worldly-minded and relational, we in fact miss the essence of reality. Sometimes it seems we are only rushing by in a hurry. As extraverts use to say at a ripe age: “Oops! Was that Life that just sped past me?”In Henderson’s diagram, I think that the downward movement means a return to the Primal God Image in its guise as the Earth Mother, which here takes the meaning of bodily death. The upward movement of detachment would signify ‘the assimilation of the alchemical Mercurius as the spirit of individuation’, leading to a creativity that is unpretentious and rooted in the insensate mind. The Mercurius, as the heretic god of medieval alchemy, seems to represent the force of love as present in the lives of people, whereas the Christ is the hypostatization of love as transcendental object of worship. The Mercurius is merely another name for the Christchild. I hold that it symbolizes the primus motor of individuation, as the force that invokes and sustains the path of individuation in the lives of people, and which always attempts to break the gridlock.Such a development necessitates that the world of the “ambivalent monster” is thoroughly abandoned. Nevertheless, the Primal God Image remains a necessary phase of individuation. We cannot start out without a platform of concepts and beliefs, serving the constructive purpose of strengthening our consciousness. Although psychology provides us with a good conceptual platform, later in life it may inhibit the powers of emancipation. Thus, in the ongoing race of construction, the first skyscraper takes the lead, as a necessary factor of personality growth, but the second skyscraper is destined to overcome it. As the latter reaches a certain elevation, it is time for the giant to step in and demolish the earthly skyscraper. It is earthly in the sense that it keeps us bound to the Primal God Image, that is, the Jungian earthbound ideal of Self and concomitant idolatrous concepts of consciousness. Instead of giving them metaphysical status, almost as objects of worship, we must instead realize that it’s “grey theory”. As such, it is of the good, until the time arrives to loosen the mooring.The Primal Self Image is an ‘ambivalent monster’. Should the individuant remain stuck in its claws, he may not emancipate personality and truly participate in life. As a consequence, life rushes by without him taking root in existence. It is paradoxical in the sense that “grey theory” isn’t really invalid. It just isn’t useful anymore, but has become an enemy of individuation. Thus, Henderson’s diagram seems to point at a radical transformation of personality, since it portrays our psychology as harbouring two competing selves, the primary of which must be abandoned. I discuss this notion in my article ‘The Complementarian Self’ (Winther, 2011, here ). Although the second skyscraper has long undergone construction, supported by an ambivalent consciousness, it is now time to remove its competitor, because egoic consciousness impedes its completion, a circumstance that leads to stagnation.The theme of coercion in terms of life’s obligations and necessities versus the liberation of the life spirit was central to Poul Bjerre (1876–1964). Bjerre’s notion of death and stagnation, to be overcome by an effort of renewal, remains central in human psychology, although its misinterpretation in Freudian theory as the “death drive”, has rendered it a resting-place on the churchyard of psychoanalysis. He belonged to the first psychoanalysts; but in 1913 he chose to break away from the Freudians. Regrettably, few of his books have been translated to English. His philosophical book “Death and renewal” (his intellectual legacy) is much different from his pragmatic explications of clinical psychology, which revolve around the same theme, namely how the coercive forces of life give rise to mechanization and psychological death. The life-draining force of stagnation must repeatedly be overcome by a psychic renewal. Should one get stuck, it may give rise to obsessive-compulsive afflictions or neurosis.Freud took Bjerre’s notion of the death-renewal cycle and reinterpreted it in terms of the death drive versus the eros drive. Probably he thought that he had thereby foiled Bjerre’s competing school of psychosynthesis, but he had also made nonsense of the notions and made them indefensible in biological terms. It seems to me that Bjerre’s views could inform modern psychology, especially since his successful therapeutic approach is bolstered by modern developments in therapy. In Bjerre the individuative demand is toned down. Instead, it is regarded an autonomous function of the psyche, searching to acquire harmony and wholeness, building on experiential contents and future possibilities. It is our natural biology, which serves to further the chances of good health and survival. Thus, the dream function attempts to overcome stagnation and to further growth to new possibilities of life. It always revolves around the dichotomy of stagnation and renewal. Yet people tend to get stuck in the transitional phases, which could result in neurosis.Thus, his view of psychological growth is different than the Jungian view. The latter is teleological in that individuation strives to realize the goal of an ideal Self, formally indistinguishable from the God image. The Christ as a symbol of the Self is in itself a dichotomy, incorporating the little suffering man and his opposite in the form of the all-powerful Christ Pantocrator. Nevertheless, the Christ isn’t complete enough, according to Jung. The Self is an ambitious goal of personality, which implies both secular fulfillment and deiform elevation. One might question why evolution should have endowed us with such a individuative drive. Biologically, it is hard to explain. But Jung has absorbed Gnostic and Neoplatonic religious ideals and reformulated them in earthbound terms.In his book “Drömmarnas naturliga system” (Natural system of dreams) Bjerre, among other things, gives a few examples of the monogamous-polygamous conflict. He exemplifies with dreams of patients in where the monogamous and matrimonial solution is sought by the dream function. This, of course, gives the lie to the Freudian instinctual and polyamorous wishes. The question is why the unconscious mind should side with monogamy. The answer is that it searches to achieve harmony and to avoid inner conflict. After all, there is nothing as disruptive and splitting as polyamorous adventures, when one’s feelings become divided. The social consequences are damaging, especially in Bjerre’s own time. Bjerre has termed this natural tendency ‘assimilation’. It searches to assimilate the different aspects of the individual, including the forgotten events that carry exuberance of life, in order to create a harmonious whole, so that the individual may have recourse to his/her full vigour and feeling for life. Thus, growth of personality and individuation occurs as a corollary of the natural tendency of stagnation (such as a stagnated marriage) and the natural tendency to overcome stagnation, achieving a renewal of life. Arguably, individuation can do without the teleological goal of attaining the Self in all its humanity and divinity, on lines of the mystical ideal.In terms of Bjerre, the forces of stagnation depend on a mechanization of life typically brought about by a fixation on tenets of consciousness. Arguably, the way in which Jungian psychology depends on a rather overbearing metaphysical edifice, it might have psychological stagnation as a consequence. If individuation is regarded as the telos of the magnificent Self rather than a pragmatical attitude of emancipation of life’s energies, in whatever form, then it represents a hypostatization of spiritual emancipation, as in the world religions. If the tenet of individuation is worshipped rather than lived, then psychology has acquired religious overtones.Bjerre exemplifies with a young Christian man whose highest ideal was to evangelize among “the Negroes”, but he was waiting for a calling from God. He had been brought to a neurotic standstill, working with office duties that were below his intellectual level (cf. Bjerre, 1933). Bjerre sent him on his way, despite the fact that he despised the notion of Christian evangelization. He reasoned that this man might in the future come to his senses, but only provided that the deadlock is broken. One must “strive after an emancipative development”, no matter what form it takes. It is a highly pragmatical attitude, similar to how a sapling must for a time grow in the “wrong” direction in order to reach the light. On account of his pragmatism, analysis didn’t continue over many sessions, but was continued in correspondence. To get the juices flowing is central. But how would a modern analyst have treated this patient? Arguably, he would have been subjected, directly or indirectly, to the many metaphysical tenets of psychology, in an attempt to “win him over”. Let life have its way, instead.Thus, individuation isn’t entirely predetermined according to psychological law. By example, if painting geometrical abstract art is the way that the dream function suggests, then it’s the right way, because it releases libido, stimulating a movement out of stagnation. It doesn’t matter that it gives the lie to the Jungian symbolic process. Although the unconscious psyche has an innate structure, individuation cannot be pinned down. Anything goes, as long as we make headway. The giant in the skyscraper dream held a huge broken off portion of the building and shook the many conscious preconceptions out of it, with the consequence that they fell to the ground and died. Examples of such are preconceptions along lines of psychological telos and the technique of making headway on the path of individuation.To be undivided means to have recourse to our full resources, which promotes health, both psychological and bodily. The psyche strives autonomously to heal us in this sense. But it’s not that simple. After having attained a stage of stability and relative wholeness, we will soon find the forces of routinization and stagnation taking over. So it goes with everything; religions, marriages, social networks, and especially the individuated person. According to Bjerre, this is the birthplace of neurosis, which gives rise to dividedness. The psyche wants to overcome stagnation, and it starts to break up the lifeless wholeness. Thus, the psyche works both ways: there is a dynamic interplay of the forces of death and renewal. Wholeness eventually leads to death, which must be overcome.When people become stuck in the transitional phase, it has neurotic consequences. People often dream of having a complete row of teeth, but then they start to drop out. This is a typical “negation dream”, which means that the wholeness achieved is negated and that which has become rooted in the flesh must be removed. New teeth will grow out instead. In the aforementioned dream, the first skyscraper is like a row of teeth that must drop out. It’s a wholeness become stagnant that must be destroyed. The reason why it takes this monumental archetypal expression is because stoical and long-suffering consciousness needs to be convinced, in a brutish way, that the present situation can’t be right. It is a very common problem, having to do with the centrality of ‘faith’ and ‘faithfulness’ in our culture.For Jung, there is only an archetypal impetus toward wholeness. He turns a blind eye to the motif of destruction, which could be denoted the Hegelian fallacy. In fact, the destructive force is part and parcel of individuation. Any wholeness, regardless of its richness, is a cocoon that must sooner or later crack open and give birth to something new. Stagnation, and possibly neurosis, occurs when we remain stuck in the cocoon. It gathers mould instead of breaking up. His notion of Self as unitarian, means that it envelopes both ego and non-ego. The ambivalent ego is modelled after this criterion.Thus, the Jungian notion of Self it violated when ambivalent wholeness is being negated. But this is the way of mystical tradition; the ideal of “self-abandonment to divine providence”. At some stage, self-abandonment becomes necessary, at least to a moderate degree, otherwise it leads to death and stagnation. The notion of ego abandonment, in Eastern philosophical terms, is misinterpreted by Jung. From a psychological point of view, transcendence mustn’t be understood as a metaphysical and religious concept. Rather, it means transcending the ego in its present constitution. In his critique of yoga and Eastern spiritual discipline, Jung interprets ego transcendence as the catastrophic abandonment of the conscious function. Against this critique, Leon Schlamm says:Jung’s ardent defence of the egoic structure is misguided, because its consciousness is not the same as its structure. As he formulates it himself, the ego is merely the centre of consciousness. The ego cannot enhance its light endlessly, incorporating yet more realizations of the unconscious. There’s a limitation to the elevation of the first skyscraper because stagnation ensues and there’s ‘negation’ piling up in the unconscious. (However, according to Bjerre, when religious tradition elevates ‘negation’ to doctrinal status, the devotees tend to get stuck in that phase instead.)Dreams on the theme of negation are difficult to understand from the Jungian perspective of compensation. “What does this dream compensate?” Thus, it is taken for granted that there’s something wrong with the conscious standpoint, but it isn’t necessarily so. In fact, we must sometimes search to overcome a wholeness that is become complacent and listless. The only thing that counts is that life is flowing. People who are overly fond of alcohol and merry festivity tend to dream that they meet an alcoholic bum on the street. Understood in terms of compensation, i.e., as a way of contrasting consciousness, it would mean that the dreamers’s qualms about his alcohol consumption is exaggerated, as there are people worse off. Or if it’s understood in archetypal terms as the shadow, then it would signify his innate nature, which he can only keep on a tight rein but not get rid of.In terms of Bjerre, such dreams are really ‘objectifications’, which serve to put the alcoholic and festive aspect of personality on the outside, as non-ego. It is not ‘me’ but another person. It has an immediate benevolent effect, because the dreamer begins to loosen his attachment to this particular aspect of personality. Should he dream that the alcoholic bum goes to Japan, then it’s termed ‘distancing’. Should he die, then it’s negation proper, i.e. like losing a tooth. The fact that therapists have to struggle with the notion of compensation as only tool is unsatisfactory. The Jungian theory of dream interpretation is rather simplistic. What’s worse, the therapist might apply the method of ‘amplification’ and associate the drunken bum with mythological themes, such as Bacchus the wine god, or whatever. It leads away from the concrete dream material in the same manner as Freudian free associations. The method is worthwhile provided that the archetypal theme can be connected to personal material. Yet, dreams seldom focus on the archetypal aspect. They generally refer to personal life and not to the life of our species.Dreams often serve to strengthen the conscious standpoint. It gives the lie to the notion of compensation as the master key of dreams. It has to do with the fact that consciousness is conflicted. Although personality has already made up its mind in a sense, for various reasons it remains stuck. For instance, it could be due to insecurity or inertia. It could be the question of a bad personal relation that needs to be terminated. In such cases dreams can tell the person what he or she already knows, in the so called outline dreams (‘gestaltning’). The way in which dreams outline the situation and certifies that the conscious view is right, is a valuable function. It makes the ego strengthen its resolve, enabling it to see things more clearly. Consciousness is often only ‘almost’ certain, but the fog will soon be lifting as rational understanding is supported by feeling. Personality is freed of the remaining illusions.The ego needs support from the unconscious, and not only opposition and correction in the form of compensations. Often the dream function supports the wholeness achieved by an endowment of feeling, perhaps with a religious overtone. The conclusion is that the dream function is generally synthetic and not generally compensative, since it strives to alleviate the conflicts of personality and to enliven consciousness. When lust for life peters out, and the present situation is insupportable, the Self will attempt to break up the stagnant wholeness in order to invoke a new development, which has long been in the making as a parallel building project.The theory around individuation and the dream function is rather abstruse and the theoretical blueprint is insufficient. The Self isn’t working single-mindedly towards wholeness. Wholeness must be destroyed, if it is become like an oxygen-depleted pool, void of life. Should the ego lead life in a beautiful castle yet with boredom approaching, then it’s time to leave the castle for a hut in the wood, among the wild animals, if this is what it takes to keep libido flowing. This is the way of Prince Siddhartha Gautama and many other an ego-transcending ascetical sage.Jung, however, takes offense at the idea. I suppose, his own ego castle remained animate and alive not the least thanks to his many followers and the circus that surrounded him. One cannot expect the great sage to abandon his own edifice. He only continued building on it, never questioning any part of it. Some of his premises are wrong, however. That’s probably why his dreams emphasized the transcendental element. When he is levitating in space above India (in whose philosophy he rejects the element of self-abandonment) he meets a meditating Hindu sitting silently in lotus posture. He was about to enter his temple when he was called back to life (Jung, 1989, pp. 289-94). In the dream about kneeling before the highest presence (ibid. pp. 217-20), he enters a circular room with two persons of eminence, the worldly-minded Akbar and the heavenly-minded general Uriah (who had been murderedguess who?), to whom he bows down in deference. Arguably, Jung’s ego is comparable to the ambivalent King David, who conspired to kill general Uriah (2 Samuel 11:15).The spirit is, prima facie, the greatest passion of humanity, arguably stronger than sexuality. From a traditional point of view, individuation is the purpose of life, and it is not merely “a prescribed path”. In the early 1980s,withdrew from teaching at the Zurich Institute on the grounds that not enough attention was being paid to individuation as an unconscious process (cf. Kirsch, 2000, p. 26). Should individuation come to a halt, then personality is spiritually dead. It seems that we can detect that people are dead in the way they are lacking in “love” as a foundational passion for existence. Lacking a sense of mystery, they have no longing for the mercurial spirit that is flowing like a silvery stream beyond the veil of existence. Neville Symington (1993) says that, with such people, the “life-giver” in the unconscious is become extinguished. It is an overly simplistic notion, but it seems to accord with Poul Bjerre’s idea of “Death and Renewal” as central theme of individuation. They are stuck and cannot invoke renewal, and thus they are virtually dead. He exemplifies with people who remain virtually dead throughout life, and seem to have invoked it as a solution.There is indeed a process of individuation, although not necessarily as Jung envisaged it. I think of the notion as a process taking place in the background, as in the building project of the ‘second skyscraper’. It is a spiritual project running autonomously or semi-autonomously, to which consciousness adds its support by way of interim measures of assistance. To accomplish this, it is necessary to dampen the conscious light. The ambivalent ego is capable of this. It is also how the alchemists described the process of circular distillation. Jung, however, understands the alchemical process in the usual terms of conscious-unconscious integration, which is questionable.If the construction of the first skyscraper depends on ‘integration’ so the second skyscraper must depend on another process. Obviously, the latter, during which time it is constructed, is not being assimilated as a psychic content. It must refer to some other process. As a suitable modern psychological term, I have suggested ‘complementation’. It is the semi-autonomous process, mentioned above, during which time something is brewing and taking shape in the unconscious. I hypothesize that it underlies true individuation as opposed to the chimerical and ambivalent anima life. It coincides in some measure with esoteric teachings of olden times. Still, we must have recourse to a psychological understanding, to which religious notions are inadequate.For the psychological process to function harmoniously when primary wholeness (Henderson’s ‘Primary God Image’) is abandoned, there must already be an alternative wholeness that may serve as ideal at the point when the stagnant state is broken, otherwise a change cannot go smoothly. Psychology’s focus on integration, however, means that the negation of assimilated content is out of the question. Jung never discarded anything. Instead, any inconsistent notion is complemented with its opposite, having the effect that both opposites are absorbed by consciousness. Although he had a beef with Christianity, he never abandoned the Christian standpoint. He only complemented it with its opposite in the form of paganproblem solved!The notion that individuation can mean destruction, in the sense of breaking out of an old shell, conflicts with the view of the psyche as a teleological system that is seeking integration. Since the telos of the Self is wholeness, it cannot possibly work toward the destruction of wholeness. Nevertheless, his youthful vision of God destroying the Basel Cathedral had a profound effect on him (Jung, 1989, pp. 36-39). To understand the Basel Cathedral as the burden imposed on us by our Christian heritage isn’t exactly wrong; but it really signifies the destructive capacity of the Self to obliterate the “stagnant wholeness”. Thus, it serves as a symbol of the ‘first skyscraper’. The vision really points to the future into which he projects a renewal of the Self, wholly in line with the ideal of ego abandonment. This is a youthful dream of the man with the previous discussed skyscraper dream.According to this model, individuation continues more or less autonomously in parallel with ordinary life, ready to take full charge of life when time is ripe. It is the notion of a spiritual path that moves ahead, independently of societal success, while the individual is leading an earthly existence. It would mean that the process is self-sufficient, since it is unconnected with the integrative work. The latter only fulfills a function up to a degree, sufficient for adaptation to life and the assimilation of one’s own psychological shortcomings. But at a point in time, the continued assimilation of content and the expansion into secular and social life will bring no benefits. It will only bring about stagnation, which to Bjerre is the root cause of neurosis. Thus, we must question psychology’s overarching ideal of an unending progression of psychic integration. At some point, we must abandon integration and wholly focus on complementation, which requires a toning down of consciousness.Jung discusses rebirth symbolism in his paper ‘Concerning Rebirth’ (Jung, 1980b). He adopts the view that ‘natural transformation’ (individuation) accords with a psychological view of rebirth whereas other forms, such as ‘magical procedures’ are historical and sometimes imitative variants. He claims that “all ideas of rebirth” are founded on the natural transformation of personality (cf. p. 130). Thus, he manages to shoehorn all rebirth symbolism into the integrative paradigm. Jung interprets the death experience as the withdrawal from social life by resort to the introverted standpoint, and exemplifies with an old man taking his abode in a cave as a refuge from the noise of the villages, where he is to be incubated and renewed. Inside the cave an encounter with the archetypal universe occurs, which will lead to the assimilation of archetypal content.Thus, death and rebirth are invariably regarded as transformation symbols. Transformation does not denote a particular moment ofit’s a process that serves to approximate the Self by means of integration. But it’s a goal that can never be fully attained, although the transformation process strives to approximate ego and Self to one another. The Self, which functions as an “invisible guru” or “personal guide”, may be “just as one-sided in one way as the ego is in another. And yet the confrontation of the two may give rise to truth and meaning” (p. 131). It is this newly acquired truth and meaning that constitutes rebirth. He interprets alchemical texts to the effect that it is “not a personal transformation, but the transformation of what is mortal in me into what is immortal” (p. 134).The rebirth experience leads to a relative change of personality, but it’s not the question of transfiguration. In fact, “[the] repristination of the original state is tantamount to attaining once more the freshness of youth” (p. 136). So it is predominantly an invigorating experience. Thus, it seems that Jung’s notion of rebirth is not, after all, that much different from the religious rituals of rebirth, which served to revitalize the initiand through the invocation of archetypal truths. The Self symbolically undergoes a complete transfiguration, as in the metamorphosis of the fish into the Khidr (an incarnation of Allah in human form). Yet, the ego must refrain from identifying with the process. Allegedly, it is an archetypal symbol of transformation that is not applicable in real life. Were personality to undergo a corresponding transfiguration it is tantamount to an “identification of ego-consciousness with the self [that] produces an inflation which threatens consciousness with dissolution” (p. 145).Paradoxically, then, the Self is not viewed as an ideal and a role model for the ego, but as an Other, a “personal guide” with whom one relates in an attempt to restore harmony. In this interpretation, the Self is, after all, not a self-ideal, but is more like a personality who is to be confronted in order to achieve a more balanced standpoint on part of the ego. This is paradoxical, because the Self in Jungian psychology represents also the ideal of completeness and wholeness.The paradox shows that something isn’t right. If the Self portrays itself as undergoing a thorough transfiguration, it ought to symbolize the future prospects of personality, although it is indeed possible to downgrade it to a therapeutic ritual enactment. Nonetheless, the deity really urges us to follow his calling and not only to ritualize his message. Jesus said, “Destroy this temple, and I will raise it again in three days” (John 2:19). He is to undergo a complete destruction whereupon he will arise from the dead. He also said, “Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me” (Matt. 16:24). Thus, the disciple is expected to undergo a complete transfiguration, too. Jesus was transfigured and not merely “therapeutically invigorated”. Normally, the tone of voice is sufficient to identify a person, but Jesus’s disciples didn’t recognize him although they kept company on the road to Emmaus (Luke 24). The meaning of this symbol is evident: he had undergone a complete transfiguration. It was not the question of creating a clone.The conclusion is that death and rebirth takes a purely symbolic and archetypal meaning, having essentially the same therapeutic aim as religious ritual. The main difference is that the process is now better understood by recourse to modern psychological terms. However, this may damage the healing effect, since consciousness has a way of devitalizing the symbol. The archetype cannot tolerate the stark light of consciousness, but tends to dwindle to a mundane dimension. The concept of death and renewal is subjected to ‘symbolization’ in Jung. It never occurs to him that it could mean the actual dethronement, partly or wholly, of the extant personality, including its beliefs and fixations. He rejects the notion of transfiguration proper, since the ego shall not be cast off as an old shell, but must continue the work of integration. Symbolization and mythologization may have the effect that a factual and realistic interpretation is foiled.Amplification is a way of interpreting mythological images in terms of other mythological images. Amplification, correctly used, allows us to better understand the language of dreams. Our unconscious employs ideation and emotion in a mythological way, and thus we may be informed by historical mythology. If the diverse themes of a dream are archetypal, that is, if they conform with characteristic mythological motifs, then amplification is worthwhile. But the archetypes are merely the stage actors of dreams, whereas the overall meaning of the dream typically boils down to personal difficulties and how to make progress in life. The archetypal themes are employed by the dream function to conduct a stage play that will, in the end, boil down to small-scale personal realizations.This is also true about the impersonal form of archetypal realization. When the gods land in reality they become mundane beings, as exemplified by the pine tree, the narcissus flower, and the poor carpenter’s son. In fact, the dream function will often make use of everyday language and compose a play with words, which is not at all archetypal but more in the way of rebuses. We must first and foremost search to associate the dream content with personal life and old memories rather than with mythological motifs, which risk leading us astray.criticizes the unrestrained use of amplification, in the manner of Julius Schwabe and sometimes also Mircea Eliade. “If you start with the world tree, you can easily prove that every mythological motif leads to the world tree in the end” (von Franz, 1996, pp. 9-15). Thus, it is essential that interpretation is rooted in personal emotion and feeling, otherwise understanding will fly off on a tangent. Symbols mustn’t be treated impersonally, as if they were an end in themselves.This makes me think that also the symbol of ‘death and renewal’ must mean something personal. It’s not merely a symbolic spectacle arranged by the Self wherein only the Self shall undergo transfiguration, in order to promote secondary therapeutic effects in the ego. In fact, a numinous archetype will become manifest in small-scale form in personal life and invoke a radical change of personality. The intellectual person may “transmutate” into an artistic and feeling-oriented individual, in close proximity to insentientthe realm of the spirit. Although personality undergoes transfiguration it does not mean that it is being dissolved in unconsciousness. In fact, there is already an auxiliary ego, a higher personality, in the making. It is like changing ships on the high sea, or moving from one skyscraper to the next. Yet, Jung downplays the theme of death and resurrection as mere therapeutic self-analysis. For him, it is necessary that the egoic structure remains intact. He says thatHowever, a notion of Self undergoing development isn’t easy to reconcile with the notion of the Self as telos. Jungian theory has no notion of a collateral and autonomous individuation process, pertaining to an auxiliary Self image (Henderson’s Ultimate Godthere is only a singular individuation process that depends on a continual assimilation of personality. Thus, destruction and negation can’t be regarded natural aspects of individuation. I conjecture that this is wrong. Interestingly, Sabina Spielrein, a patient and collaborator of Jung’s, wrote an article named ‘Destruction as the Cause of Coming Into Being’, where she argues that “no change can take place without the destruction of the former condition” (JAP 39 (2), 1994). However, she reasons in obsolete Freudian terms of a destructive drive and a drive for coming into being.In Alchemy (1980),investigates the central theme of alchemy, namely the fabrication of the ‘resurrection body’ (glorified body) by means of the alchemical procedure of circular distillation. She connects it with the resurrection of the Osiris in Egyptian religion. Osiris is imprisoned in the coffin, similar to how the Mercurius is imprisoned in the alchemical Vas Hermeticum. The alchemists believed that they were able to accelerate the processes of nature with the aim of creating a new vehicle for the soul, which is the glorified resurrection body of Christian theology. According to Christian belief, it is the bodily form that we shall assume at the end of the world. It also denotes the body of Christ after his resurrection.The alchemists believed that they needn’t wait for the end of the world, but that they could cultivate the resurrection “body” by alchemical means, which will grant the artifex eternal longevity. In this faith, they effectively aimed to reproduce the procedures of the ancient Egyptian priests, whose duty it was to provide the Pharaoh with a resurrection body, that is, to transmutate him intothe immortal one. Whereas it is unlikely that European alchemists had much knowledge about Egyptian religious chemistry, European alchemy has its roots in Egyptian alchemy and the traditions ofa holy teacher identified with the Egyptian god Thoth, who knew the magic of resurrection.The physical mummy is equated with the Osiris, and it must be preserved as the carrier of the soul. A person who had gone through the rituals of resurrection “would be able, as the papyri texts say, to appear in any shape any day. That meant the dead could leave the coffin chamber; they could leave the tomb of the pyramid and walk about in the daylight and could change shape. They could appear as a crocodile and lie about in the sun by the Nile, or they could fly about as an ibis” (von Franz, 1980, p. 236).According to this belief, the old body shall be cast off as an old shell and the soul shall continue to live in a new body. Since the egoic framework in psychology cannot be discarded but only complemented with yet more psychic content, it’s not worthwhile to interpret this symbol in traditional psychological terms. Of course, von Franz realizes this, and that’s why she gravitates toward a religious interpretation, on lines of the ancient Egyptians, i.e. that it signifies the “incorruptible essence in man which would survive death”. The Self contains the “divine nucleus in man which is immortal”. She says that “[it] is an experience of something immortal lasting beyond physical death. You know that in parapsychological reports this is also sometimes mentioned as a typical quality of the soul of a dying person” (ibid.).Von Franz’s parapsychological interpretation is, of course, accompanied by a traditional symbolical understanding, but it is evident that theory is inadequate to interpret the central alchemical mystery, since there is no way that it allows for the destruction of the old form of earthly personality. In fact, the symbol of the resurrection body means that our personality is to be totally renovated. Self No. 1 is abandoned for Self No. 2, capable of living in unison with earthly reality. No. 2, has acquired earthly transcendence and is truly experiencing life‘s presence. He may take to flight with the ibises, or lie about with the crocodiles, because the Kingdom is present in every direction. Personality No. 2 will slowly take shape under the auspices of personality No. 1, who has decided to contribute to its growth in the unconscious vessel. The resurrection body has many names: filius philosophorum, filius regis, infans solaris, Adam Kadmon, among others. Jung says about him:Note that he takes the view that it concerns the “transfiguration of the universe” whereas it is really about the apotheosis of the artifex. He then goes on to explain that it forebodes the rise of science, which would change the world and let man take the place of God. But this has nothing to do with it. He makes again the reductionistic interpretation that many have done before him. He understands it as changes going on in the collective unconscious, which will impact the collective ways of mankind. Thus, the transformations of the Self are relevant to the ego only in a limited sense, and the latter should refrain from identifying with them. His understanding again focuses on integration, now ready to produce the scientific mindset. This runs counter to the view of the alchemists who saw it as a way of personal salvation. Gerhard Dorn, Jung’s favourite philosopher, worked to achieve the ‘unio corporalis’, which represents the unification of the ‘unio mentalis’ with the previously mortified body. The work of self-redemption runs like a red thread throughout the history of alchemy, even from its beginnings in the 1st millennium B.C. The “body” shall undergo transmutation, but it is not about the salvation of the world. (The Christ has taken care of that.) It really means that the artifex searches to acquire the glorified body in advance and in this manner to redeem himself.Jesus isn’t lying when he presents the mystery of resurrection as something that is open for everyone, and not only relevant for the Pharaoh of Egypt. Nor does it refer to a life in the hereafter, because people can possess life “here and now” as well as in eternity, for they have “passed from death to life” (John). “You won’t be able to say, ‘Here it is!’ or ‘It’s over there!’ For the kingdom of God is already among you” (Luke 17). When Jesus rises from the dead, he is transformed and may take up his place at the right hand of the Father. It means that he is back in the paradisal Eden, together with God. “When you come to know yourselves, then you will become known, and you will realize that it is you who are the sons of the living father” (Thomas 3). Thus, we can all take seats at the right hand of the Father, provided that we are capable of abandoning our personality No. 1, which has served its purpose insofar as it has provided us with a worldly-minded and realistic attitude. Although it has been of help in the adaptation to harsh reality, it also constitutes a prison for the soul.In Jung’s terms, this is an archetypal symbol that cannot take effect in the ego, but must only be applied ritually, however in the modern way of active imagination. Instead of partaking in institutionalized ritual, the mind can forge imitative fantasies of its own, an activity which is believed to have a similar therapeutic effect as religious ritual.tries to remedy Jung’s symbolistic reductionism by recourse to parapsychology whereas James Hillman regresses to the neurotic solution of extraverted romanticism. It is time to realize how conservative Jung is about the life of the soul and how he notoriously applies symbolistic reductionism and the paradigm of integration to reduce mystical transcendence to therapeutic exercise. People always think about Jung as the liberator of the soul, although he is something of an archconservative stick-in-the-mud. He is equally conservative about the “terrifying” reality of the archetypes as Freud about sexuality.When the spiritual mystery finally lands in reality, it does not mean that one has acquired the ability to walk through walls, like the Osiris. It would mean that worldly-minded and ambivalent personality has been cast off, allowing room for the divinely inspired person whose heart is open to the Kingdom of God, which has always been nigh. The personality No. 1 is only provisional. I dreamt about this very theme recently.This is an apt example of how the dream function supports the already accepted standpoint rather than compensating it. The fake mountain is provisional personality No. 1, which is abandoned with great ease. The “heavenly kingdom” which I venture into is a very normal and civilized world, and not a fairytale paradise with supernatural creatures. It is an ‘outline dream’, which strengthens the resolve to abandon the plastic mountain. Although the mountain was a nice and cleanly place with a good overview, life there has been unconnected with reality in the profound sense. There is no need for the intervention of a giant that crushes the first skyscraper, because I’ve already made up my mind. That’s why the process is portrayed as so much easier. The manner in which I slide down the mountain (when the old man commended my bravado) portrays the process as “child’s play”, which is a well-known saying in alchemy: the ‘ludus puerorum’. The rest is easy. Just let nature take over, and don’t hold fast to anything. Jung finds no explanation for this idea. He thinks it is euphemistic (cf. Jung, 1980, p. 199).On Jung’s view, this is the plastic ego mountain on which one must settle permanently and resort to therapeutic measures to make life bearable. But the abandonment of the plastic mountain is the objective of the alchemical opus and the goal of Jesus’s rebirth mystery. It’s no wonder that the filius philosophorum is so long in the making, because the artifex must, in a manner of saying, learn to play the celestial violin. Jung’s understanding of the alchemical and Christian mystery leaves something to wish for. It is reductionistic, in a sense. In his otherwise erudite and rewarding works he manages to shoehorn his notion of individuation, as consecutive phases of integration, into the concepts of spiritual tradition, such as yoga. As a consequence it comes to be regarded as a therapeutic measure for the stagnant ego, rather than a means of transformation proper. A misinterpretation of mystical tradition, such as alchemy, is not to be taken lightly because it devaluates the precious symbols and it leads the seeker astray.I highlighted the way in which Jung interprets the filius philosophorum as the harbinger of science. He is thinking especially about Jungian psychology. He saw alchemy as proto-psychology, i.e., he projected the tenets of his psychology on alchemy. Thus, the filius philosophorum represents not only material science but psychological science, especially. This newborn spirit is bound to redeem the world, by imbuing it in a new light, thus replacing the light of the Christ. This thinking is known as the Hegelian unfoldment of the World Spirit, which aspires to yet higher and higher levels of consciousness.Jung believed that the World Spirit is brewing in the unconscious, and that alchemy represents this very brewing process. Of course, the truth in the matter is that science ran apace when the straightjacket of theology was finally removed. Every historian of science knows this. Science has been there all the time, at least since the time of Aristotle. By example, scholars of medieval times believed that Adam’s atoms had propagated and are now continuing in our bodies. This served to explain the theological dogma of the propagation of original sin. We are of the same substance as Adam’sso they believed. Thus, the food we eat does not contribute to the building of our bodies. We are in fact only extracting the energy from the food. But when scholars no longer needed to heed to theological dogma, they began to think freely.The final blow to the Catholic church came with the theologically inexplicable Lisbon earthquake in 1755, after which the floodgate of science and rationality was released. Science and rationality had only been held back, because it had been there all the time. Thus, science did not jump out of the collective unconscious as if the scientific mindset hadn’t existed before. It is true that the expansion of consciousness depends on the unfolding of the unconscious, and that ideas are always brewing in the vessel. But the notion that alchemy and its symbols represents proto-science, serving to prepare us for the scientific and psychological mindset, doesn’t hold water. It is a Hegelian and unscientific fantasy; the belief that we are guided by an unconscious Will that continually unfolds in reality.As a matter of fact, alchemy already incorporated chemical science and alchemists were also making important discoveries. They had recourse to all the chemicals and equipment, still in use. But it was only at the point when mystical theology was stripped from it that chemistry began to unfold. Chemistry was already present, but clad in mystical language. Thus, alchemy represents the path of transcendence. Alchemical fantasy was a form of creativity, an art of imagination, that served to gather the celestial sparks in creation. Jung sees the Opus as constituting a heap of naive projections on matter, a project doomed to failure, since they could never manage to integrate their findings as psychological insight (perhaps with the exception of Dorneus, according to Jung).In fact, the alchemical Opus did not serve the end ofit was a form of complementation. Many an artist and musician is devoted to the same process. A modern painter adds chemical compounds, dissolved in linseed oil, to a canvas. The canvas serves the same purpose as the vessel in medieval alchemy. By example, have a look at this painting where Picasso has filled the “canvas egg” with the typically ignoble items in earth colours, characteristic of ‘prima materia’. In alchemy, the vessel is notoriously associated with the egg. It shall give birth to the ‘infans solaris’, the golden child.



“Still Life With Chair Caning”. Pablo Picasso.

(Wisdom) —

The soul-spark

Conscious expansion as evil

The God-man

Emptiness

philosophy —

ego —

This was my second visit to a kind of luxury old people’s home, open for visitors, which included an enclosed adventure park. The senior citizens, who were all more or less demented, had walked this path so often that they had dug a 6 inches trench into the lawn. In one section of the path one could risk the short climb up to a cliff with a beautiful view of the landscape. It was surprisingly high up, and from there I could see the glittering sea at a distance. However, the ground was unstable and I risked falling down. An old decrepit man walking passed me said that I must walk where he was going instead. However, I chose to climb down to a lower path that was stable, from where I could not see the landscape. Before this peak, however, was a cafeteria, where a bald and fairly short man in his thirties worked as a cashier. I noted that they vended miniature whisky bottles at 70 kr (7 pounds), which made me feel guilty, because I had at an earlier visit taken one of these without paying, thinking that they were gratis.

Therapeutic individuation

Like Jung said, the archetypal ‘inner man’ has to be nourished with healing myths if he is not to become dangerous or disturbed. Jung himself created a healing myth when he offered modern ‘disenchanted’ individuals a personal myth or a psychoutopian story of individuation which through the universal and archaic nature of archetypes connects them backwards with the ancient mythical world and forwards to the modern individualistic search for authenticity. Jungian individuation signifies something unattainable, something that, while glimmering on the psychic horizon, we can never really reach. It is a basic characteristic of utopianism that it empowers us to look for reality-transcending elements in the world while it eludes all attempts to actually establish utopia in the world. Individuation also entails the notion that it is much better to believe in untrue but positive fictions than to have a totally illusion-free conception of reality and of one’s life. The reason for this is that if you believe in something that may not be true but that may have beneficial consequences to your life, it may save you from mental suffering, such as depression […]

If we expect to be able to lead a good life and enjoy life even while we grow older and weaker, this hopeful expectation may become self-validating. And insofar as Jung succeeded in promoting his message that individuation is a real process, this message must have had a positive effect on people, regardless of the truth value of his doctrine […]

Jung’s individuation is a mythical story about the (archetypal) origins of things, but it is simultaneously a utopian story about attaining wholeness. He maintained that intrinsic to human nature is the tendency to mythologize, because myths protect us from symbolic impoverishment, which can lead to neuroses or even worse tragedies, as the current ‘cultural crisis’ in the West shows.

Occasionally Jung made frank statements about the mythic character of his psychological work, implying that his own psychology was a healing myth. In one of his seminars he once called individuation ‘our mythology’, and his friend E. A. Bennett relates that when the ageing Jung was asked about his own personal myth, he would answer without hesitation: ‘Well, the Collective Unconscious, of course’. And in his memoirs he wrote: To the intellect, all my mythologising is futile speculation. To the emotions, however, it is a healing and valid activity; it gives existence a glamour [Glanz] which we would not like to do without. Nor is there any good reason why we should. (Pietikäinen, 2007, pp. 126-27)

Self-abandonment

The hubris of consciousness

Ludus puerorum

however —

From the perspective of a psychologist, this meant that the world of the psyche and the world of “outer” reality were just different reflections of the unus mundus; thus, Jung describes the “inner planes” in terms which are a perfect illustration of the “psychologization of religion and sacralization of psychology” […] The only difference, I would add, is that Jung was not an occultist […] It is by building his psychology on a concept of science derived from Romantic Naturphilosophie (and opposed to modern “causality”) that Jung may have succeeded in finding a way to “up-date” traditional esotericism without disrupting its inner consistency. From the perspective of the historical study of esotericism, this makes him a unique figure. (Hanegraaff, 1996, pp. 504-5)

Two paths

conjugate —

vis-à-vis

[A] long-standing patient arrived for his appointment to find that Jung had gone sailing on Lake Zurich. In a towering rage the patient hired a boat, set off in pursuit and, once he caught up with him, used a loud-hailer to upbraid him… Jung then zigzaged away, with the patient in hot pursuit. When they again came within hailing distance, Jung cried out, ‘Go away — you bore me!’ (Pietikäinen, p. 125, loc.cit).

The problem of 3 and 4

process…”

paganism —

M-L von Franz:

I am in Sweden, where I come across an important letter. [It] says in the letter that with me there is something essentially different from C.G. Jung. The difference is that with me the number 206 has changed to 306, but not with Jung. I keep seeing 206 turn into 306. The letter is signed: ‘Aucker’. (Meier, 2001, p. 137)

Ascension of the spirit

grains —

The kingdom of the Father is like a woman carrying a jar full of meal. While she was walking on a distant road, the handle of the jar broke and the meal poured out behind her on the road. She was unaware, she had not noticed the misfortune. When she came to her house, she put the jar down and found it empty. (Thomas, 97)

Jesus said: “I am the light that is over all things. I am all: from me all came forth, and to me all attained. Split a piece of wood; I am there. Lift up the stone, and you will find me there.” (Thomas, 77)

Incarnation and apotheosis

vis-à-vis

The alchemists knew very well what science was, yet they insisted that they were devoted to an holy art form. They did indeed manage to gather the ‘scintillulae’ (Lat. little sparks) from matter. It is a remarkable success story that has prevailed throughout the Christian era and long before. Not many spiritual disciplines have been so fruitful, pervasive, and resilient. It depends on the fact that it did not only revolve around prescribed collective values, ideas and techniques. Jung did not only project his psychology on the alchemical art. He saw it in Gnosticism, too, despite the fact that it could not be understood in Jungian terms. He also projected psychological tenets on the book of Job. Eventually, he projected them on the universe as a whole, which is said to harbour the archetypes-as-such in a wholly transcendent realm, namely the unus mundus. In Answer to Job (1969), Jung portrays the divine drama with Jahve as client. Jahve undergoes psychoanalysis with Job as analyst, and a lot of transference and countertransference takes place.I believe it is a grave misinterpretation. The biblical Wisdom books (including Wisdom of Solomon) give expression to a longing after the SophiaSapientia Dei. According to Jung, this shows that Jahve longed to become conscious, because wisdom relates to consciousness. But Sophia really denotes the fallen heavenly being responsible for the orderliness of the world, whose ‘scintillae’ (divine sparks) the Gnostics and the alchemists endeavoured to gather for the subsequent transportation back to the celestial sphere. Thus, contrary to Jung’s belief, the salvation of Sophia signifies the opposite movement than the descending movement of incarnation.The scintillae of matter are the heavenly atoms that, when gathered, constitute and replenish the resurrection body. Eventually, the filius philosophorum shall rise from the receptacle. Thus, the alchemist redeems himself, but he also redeems God, who is longing after spiritual replenishment due to his great sacrifice. He is longing after Sophia. So the movement goes in the opposite direction than that of assimilation, which is why Jung could never arrive at a proper understanding of Gnosticism and alchemy. To him, the scintillae in matter represent archetypes that must be integrated. But it doesn’t make sense to interpret the divine restoration of the scintillae as conscious integration, for human consciousness cannot be equated with the heavenly abode where cosmos had its beginnings. In my article ‘Complementation in Psychology’ ( here ) I point out in what ways ‘Answer to Job’ is defective.The filius philosophorum represents the resurrection body. It shall serve as the new vehicle for personality, after Self No. 1 has been cast off. The Opus does not serve the Hegelian purpose of integrating God with terrestrial existence in yet more revelations of consciousness. In fact, it wins back to God that which has been lost to him due to his continual unfolding in the world. After having acquired the resurrection body, which is the heavenly person, the stark light of consciousness is dampened, and the disciple’s eyes are opened to heavenly things that were imperceptible before. The stark conscious light has hitherto blinded him to the faint spiritual energies. He will be able to discern the soul-sparks that permeate reality, and may continue to gather the heavenly food, a feat that could only be achieved with difficulty before.Arguably, it is not a sudden conversion of personality, but more of a slow descent to a true life, as opposed to the alienated existence upon the plastic mountain. By way of the artful gathering of the scintillae, the Christchild grows heavier all the time, as in the legend of Christopherus (cf. Wiki, Saint Christopher, here ). Thus, the conversion to a new person should probably be seen as a continual process, where the transfiguration to a new body serves as symbol for the moment when the decision is taken to abandon the earthbound ways, no longer to endorse the ways of the integrative paradigm and the diverse forms of personal advancement. It would correspond to the very moment when the Christopherus of legend places the Christchild on his shoulder and steps into the water. This is child’s play, “[for] my yoke is easy and my burden is light”, says the Christ (Matt. 11:30).The spiritual pilgrim may loosen the grip and slide down the plastic mountain, because he/she has learnt how to gather the celestial sparks by recourse to the art. After that moment, to slide down is a ‘ludus puerorum’. Thus, the abandonment of personality No. 1 is not a metaphysical event, but would represent the moment when the pilgrim makes up his mind. At this precious moment the transfiguration process catches up speed, and it cannot be stopped. It is like sliding down a mountain with the aid of the natural force of gravity. This is the correct interpretation of alchemy, which runs counter to Jung’s Hegelian reading, building on the paradigm of integration. The tribulation of Job, as well as the sacrificial work of the Gnostics and alchemists, really belong to the parallel paradigm of complementation.On a moonlit night we may see many things that we couldn’t see before, when we had recourse only to our analytical consciousness that separates all things. In the moonlight, things tend to meld together to reveal their sublime nature. Where we only saw distinct things before, they now meld with the surrounding to reveal the presence of an ethereal reality. It is the cooperation of the sun and the rain clouds that makes life possible. The unconscious is like a cloud that provides us with life-giving moisture, without which sentient life couldn‘t exist. The moist principle serves to dampen the conscious light to the furtherance of the sacred. It is divinely procreative while sustaining a standpoint of quiescence. But the unconscious is not a horn of plenty capable of providing for us perpetually. The principle of integration has yielded an unbalanced view of the psyche.Nor can we expect that God (or the World Spirit) will incessantly provide us with the boons of a continuous incarnation. The Gnostics saw the incarnation of Sophia as a monumental divestiture of celestial life, and it was incumbent upon mankind to settle the accounts. We must pay back what we owe the celestial Father by working for the salvation of Sophia, which is the spirit imprisoned in the world.Christian theology, as opposed to Gnostic theology, focuses on the boons of incarnation, an overly one-sided standpoint which is continued in psychology’s focus on integration. But the spirit has already given up its autonomy to an enormous degree and we cannot expect conscious expansion to continue interminably. Divine autonomy must be restored. The Hegelian project of Jung’s has run up against a brick wall on account of one-sidedness. That’s why his theory of the transcendent function doesn’t work. It is supposed to serve as a pipeline for the transportation of goods of the unconscious, but it cannot contribute more as it will ruin the balance. The moon sap, which in myth rains down on earth during the moon’s waning phases, is dwindling. Life cannot continue without it. What remains is a sun-scorched earth, where the ego abides upon the plastic mountain, entertaining its dried out archetypal concepts.There is in theory only a flux from the archetypal to the temporal sphere, but there is no notion of a flux in the opposite direction. Thus, Jungian psychology is very much a child of its times. What does it help to remain aware of the repression of the feminine in our culture when there is no means of remedying the problem, other than to proselytize and make more people aware of the fact? As a consequence, even more people will have been recruited to an inadequate standpoint. It is a way of pretence, an aloofness from reality, which only serves a personal therapeutic end, since it enables the person to sustain his faith and steadfastly remain in the foxhole. Yet it represents stagnation, an artificial life made permanent with the aid of a clever ploy of consciousness.Active imagination may serve as an artifice by which new tokens of worship are created, in lieu of the Christian. It is the fast-food variant of pagan worship, in a sense. But in that case it serves only a therapeutic purpose and leads nowhere. It is high time for Jungians to learn something from the Christian mystics, who Jung rejected off-hand. The nigredo of the alchemists, and the ‘dark night of the soul’ of the mystics, does not signify the encounter with archetypal content, with the ambitious goal of extorting even more treasures from the unconscious. In fact, the nigredo represents the abandonment of the “Happy Neurotic Island”, and the opening of our senses to the faint fragrance of the sacred, ever radiating from the Sophia of the Gnostics, or the Mercurius of the alchemists. The faint stars in the darkness will continue to multiply, leading to the albedo, which is the morning of a new life. It is a great moment when the grand building collapses, leaving only a naked island in its stead. Soon the rock will be covered with sparse and thin grasses. The return of life has begun, which is a precious moment. As Bjerre predicted, stagnation always ensues. There is only one way out of it, namely “death and renewal”.The manner in which the divine promotes new temporal life and how it offers itself up for us, is a mystery that is portrayed in the religions of the world, especially pagan religion. The gods sacrifice themselves for the benevolence of humanity, as in the Passion of Christ. The deities are culture heroes, which means that the hero archetype is involved. It is also the central theme of fairytales. Narcissus sacrifices himself, too. The god-man remains the pre-eminent symbol of the complementarity in our nature.The god-man of pagan religion poses a quandary to the theologians. According to some theologians (e.g. Bultmann, Barth, Kaufman) the “Christ event” is always ‘in potentia’, while it also manifests continually. In the beginning of the Christian era, it “spilled over” from myth into reality. The pagan myths confirm that the Christian myth is deeply rooted in human psychology, and that people had for centuries longed for the Christian revelation at the time of its advent. To the Celts and the Teutons, the story of the suffering king whose death brings blessing upon humanity, who hangs upon a tree penetrated by a spear, was nothing new. The druids used to lop a tree into T-shape form, as a symbol of the sacrificial king. The Graeco-Roman versions of Jesus, however, weren’t real enough. They had this fairytale character typical of Graeco-Roman religion. Greek culture had a penchant for the abstract, as typified by the Greek philosophers, including Plato. Jewish culture, however, was more oriented towards concrete realization, not to philosophize but to make things manifest.Quite possibly, the Australian aborigine story of the god-man is quite ancient. Who knows, it could be many thousand years old. The myth of “The Southern Cross” is about the first humans, two men and a woman, who ate only plants. One day during a famine, the woman and one of the men broke the rule of the sky king and killed a kangaroo rat. The other man would not eat but walked angrily away towards the sunset. He continued to walk until he fell down dead under a white gum tree. The death spirit Yowi appeared and put him in the hollow centre of the tree. A terrific burst of thunder was heard and the gum tree lifted from the earth towards the southern sky where it planted itself where the Southern Cross is now seen. The constellation looks like a Christian cross. It is the smallest yet one of the most distinctive of all the modern constellations. In the southern hemisphere, the Southern Cross is frequently used for navigation (cf. Langloh Parker, pp. 9f).Thus, to the aborigines, the cross is the symbol of the original man who is faithful to God, whereas the other two correspond to Adam and Eve who fell through sin. The god-man’s sacrifice follows upon the arrival of sin in the world. He is buried in the tree, whereas the Christ was fastened on the tree. Both symbols express the unity of the god-man with the cross.Among Indians of Central America there existed a god-man called the ‘bird-serpent’ (Quetzalcoatl, Kukulkan, Kukumatz) who, according to the Toltecs, preached flower-offerings instead of human offerings. Remarkably, in Toltec myth he appears as a white man with a beard. When the conquistadors arrived in the Aztec kingdom there were crosses erected to his honour. The vertical and horizontal axes of the cross would signify the heavenly and the earthly natures that are united in him. The fact that he is a bird as well as a serpent also points to his double-nature. Like Jesus he was chaste. In the manner of Jesus, he surrounded himself with the outcasts of society; humpbacks and harlots. According to the Aztecs, he was intoxicated by a witch, and as a consequence he lost his chastity. Having been stained by sin, his sacrifice must follow suit. According to one version he ascended to heaven by immolation in fire. In another version he sailed away over the sea. Before this, he made a vow to come back, defeat the forces of evil, and establish his kingdom.Interestingly, according to a heresy of medieval times, Jesus lost his chastity to Mary Magdalene, an idea which is featured in the film The Da Vinci Code (Tom Hanks, Audrey Tautou). Although the plot is very far-fetched, it is a heretical notion that seems to carry a great deal of archetypal power. It is connected with the myth of Jesus of Arcadia, who medieval heretics said was the real Jesus, whereas the Jewish Christ was an impostor. In Greek mythology the name Jesus appears in the forms Iasos, Iasios, Iasion, etc. Iasos and Iason are typical ancient Greek names. These are different variants of the same name, like John and Johnny. In Greek mythology appears a certain King Iasos of Arcadia. King Iasos (Iasios, Iasion), son of Lykurgos of Tegea, is remembered as the father of Atalanta, the Amazonian heroine and huntress (cf. Rose, 1964, p. 213). It appears that this figure is sometimes confused with Iasion, son of Zeus and the virgin Electra, daughter of kingIasion, the god-man, was elected by Zeus to convey the heavenly truth to humanity, as the director of the mysteries of Samothrake. As a consequence of losing his chastity, he was killed by Zeus himself. But Zeus took pity on his son and lifted him up to the Olymp.Iasion (Iasios) was an agricultural hero, the springtime consort of the goddess Demeter. He was seduced by Demeter and lay with her in a thrice-ploughed field, after having departed from the wedding celebrations of Kadmos and Harmonia. When Zeus learned of the affair, he was angered and struck Iasion down with a thunderbolt. He was afterwards placed among the stars in the constellation Gemini. As Iasion represented the mysteries of Demeter, he was perhaps equated with Attis, the dying and resurrecting consort of the Phrygian goddess Kybele. The myth gave rise to the medieval heresy of Jesus of Arcadia, or the Aryan Christ. The well-known dictum, ‘Et in Arcadia Ego’, in Poussin’s paintings, is believed to have something to do with this. The Knights Templar seem to have entertained such beliefs, too. Later, the Teutonic Knights continued the tradition. In modern times the racial ideologist Lanz von Liebenfels revived the idea of the Aryan Christ. (Richard Noll fastens this label on C.G. Jung.)It is possible to argue that the success of the Christian message in pagan culture was due to a long-standing preparatory stage during which they adhered to beliefs proximate to the Christian belief. I think of the god-man as an archetype that slowly matured and was ripe for general consciousness at the beginning of the Christian era. Remarkably, we can learn about Jesus Christ by studying myths from the other side of the world. These are more primitive Jesus-versions than the Jesus of Nazareth, but by comparing the respective myths we can see what they boil down to.The god-man tends to rise in every culture possessed by elitism and utopianism. The misfits and humpbacks, who are cast out of the perfect Aryan state, gather outside the city walls around the god-man Quetzalcoatl, who tells them that they will inherit the Kingdom. However, it is necessary to acknowledge the beautiful ‘diamond body’ of Utopia and the notion of ‘racial purity’. Otherwise we cannot understand that ‘upper class condescension’ which catches hold of people, time and again. If we keep repressing the archetype we will not benefit from the moral victory when Christ or Quetzalcoatl appears on the scene, gathers the cripples around himself and grants them the Kingdom, because this is how the good is extracted out of the evil, or the gold is obtained from the dragon.Surprisingly, the god-man appears also in Islam. Although Islamic theology expressly rules out the notion of a god-man, Islamic tradition has come up with the Khidr (‘The Green Man’). As the messenger of divine mercy, he bears a similarity to the Christ. The Khidr’s message functions as an antidote to Islamic uncharitable elitism and notions of world dominion. He represents the living spirit of wisdom and the guide of souls, who speaks to the heart of the individual. Although he is not quite as merciful in the Quran (sura 18), he functions as a psychopomp, guiding Moses to sacred knowledge.The term ‘Happy Neurotic Island’ was coined by Jung (vid. Jung, 1984). However, I submit that it denotes any state of stagnation. Thus, it makes no difference which “school” we belong to, whether it’s the Jungian, the Nietzschean, or the existentialist school ofit will lead to the same result of stagnation. When the notions are incorporated and we have learnt to play the game, there is no further progress. In the esoteric traditions of Buddhism, Christianity, and Hinduism, however, there is a way out, namely the path of self-abandonment.It is a notion that Jung strongly objects to. Instead, we are expected to prop up the ego by breathing life into beliefs that psychology has administered as medicine. Thus, an ego ideology takes shape that serves to sustain the stagnateda belief system that becomes institutionalized and exoteric and soon takes cultic expression. Although ego transcendence remains the central message of higher religion, in the exoteric practice it has become ritualized. Thus it fulfills the opposite function of transcendence, namely that of ego sustenance. So religion provides people with a Happy Neurotic Island. Yet, religion also has an underlying message that inspires the pilgrim toward the path of transcendence. But psychology has no notion of self-transcendence, that is, it doesn’t provide for the genuine non-secular longing of the soul. In this sense, trinitarian religion is superior to psychology as philosophy of life. Jungian psychology may become a trap. I exemplify with a recent dream of mine, which comments on the professional Jungian community, whose forum I visited for the second time. It is worthwhile to retell because dream imagery complements our abstract intellectual understanding.This ‘outline dream’ depicts psychology as an adventure park for slightly demented pensioners, a Happy Neurotic Island, as it were. The word whisky derives from Gaelic ‘uisce beatha’ meaning “water of life”. I had always thought that the archetypal water of life were gratis as deriving from the unconscious, but it costs money, that is, it is costly in terms of precious life that goes to waste as we walk the path and purchase these bottled up products. The process of assimilation is like stealing from the gods, in a sense, which explains the feeling of guilt. It represents the exchange of messages on intellectual and archetypal themes. The cashier, as the forum moderator, represents the spirit of Jung, in a sense. The heavily worn path I connect with a different type of path that Bjerre laid out in the park at his house at Vårstavi. He always laid out a new path after a while, and let the old path grow over, and then he enthusiastically showed his visitors his new layout. Of course, it was predicated on his idea of renewal.Evidently, the adventure park provides the pilgrim with a refreshing experience in the form of a drink of whisky and a beautiful overview of the landscape and the sea, if one dares to climb that high. It represents the intellectual realizations. But it will take you no higher than this (it was just a steep rock). Yet, it is emphasized that I must tone down the intellect, step down to a lower level, and abandon the splendid intellectual overview. Moreover, it is depicted as a repetitious experience that goes in a circle and really takes you nowhere. Individuation does not seem to imply progress. It fulfills a mere therapeutic purpose and functions as ego maintenance, although, judging from the dream, it is not without its dangers. After this dream, I finally made up my mind to leave the charade.“Emptiness” is central to Buddhism. All the phenomena as well as the concepts that we are attached to are really “empty”, which signifies an “emptiness of essence”. It doesn’t mean that the phenomena are non-existent, it only means that they are empty of life-giving nourishment, as it were. They are like flowers that lack nectar for the honey bee. It doesn’t mean that all of Jungian theory is false, only that the dried out concepts lack relevance for the emancipated personality. Theory is certainly full of meaning and value for the student and for the patient in therapy, but when he/she has passed that phase, its only function is to prop up the ego. It’s then time to realize that the concepts have been emptied of nectar, and it’s futile to hold to one’s egoic structure. Jung’s system, as well as any other philosophy of life, has then become a system for the maintenance of the stagnated ego.This has harmful consequences if there is in personality an urge towards self-transcendence. The person will remain on Happy Neurotic Island persuading himself that the present condition is fine. But, with at least some people, there will arrive compensatory messages in the form of dreams. Accordingly, they will dream about “death an renewal” and self-abandonment, just as Jung himself did, but cleverly misinterpreted. Intelligent people have this weakness. After all, they don’t need to really listen to the collected wisdom of mankind, because intellectual proficiency allows them to build their own edifice, and skillfully cram historical tradition into it, by way of clever misinterpretation. Jung, in fact, had no need to take religious teaching seriously, since he could get it from the inner guide, in the guise of Philemon, etc. Consequently, during his visit to India, he evaded the planned rendezvous with the great guru.The Christian transfiguration into the resurrection body, the alchemical creation of the filius philosophorum, and the conversion to buddhahood and bodhisattvahood in Buddhism, all represent the stage of self-transcendence: enlightenment (bodhi) — being (sattva). There is in psychology no theory around this central aspect of human psychology. It won’t suffice to say that the Buddha represents the Self. It’s evident that there is a gaping hole in theory, because self-transcendence is ruled out. The realizations and insights that take place when we learn psychology, and learn to analyze our dreams with its tools, represent a flux from the realm of potentiality to the temporal and a concomitant decrease of potential libido and autonomy.But there is no notion of a flux in the other direction, nor how to relate to the phenomenon of “emptiness”. Evidently, the individuant has made an achievement, but now he is unable to understand messages of dreams, which prompt for a movement in the other direction, because psychology provides no means of understanding the message. There is only a method of symbolization in terms of archetypes that relativizes the message and robs it of its personal and very specific significance. So this is why the traditional notion of individuation doesn’t hold water. Individuation cannot be equated with realization of the Self, defined as a confrontation with the archetypal domain in combination with social adaptation. With some people, i.e., the ones dissatisfied with earthly life, no matter how rich it is, it must lead to a stagnant condition.According to my argument, Jung’s individuation doesn’t denote “progress”. Rather, it revolves around ego maintenance. Jung says that individuation typically takes its beginning in the late thirties, after adaptation has been achieved and the latter half of life begins. It seems that individuation, in this form, serves merely to maintain what has been achieved. The break with Freud occurred at the psychoanalytic congress in 1913. (At the same occasion Bjerre and Maeder stood up and took exception to aspects of psychoanalysis, something which is seldom mentioned.) Jung was then around 38 years old, and from then on his life changed direction. His 41st year marks the inception of his crisis. He says that his later intellectual achievements derive wholly from his psychological experiences during this period. Of course, these experiences were strongly predicated on his earlier studies of mythology. From then on, he was devoted to maintenance work during the latter half of his life. Evidently, individuation does not imply endless progress. From a point in time, it fulfills a mere therapeutic purpose as ego preservation. Petteri Pietikäinen (2007) takes the view that Jungian individuation is therapeutic:It is that last part of Jung’s sentence that I take objection to. “Nor is there any good reason why we should [do without mythologizing]”. In fact, when one has ascended to the peak in the psychological amusement park, then nothing remains to be seen. From then on it fulfills a mere therapeutic function for maintaining the achievements of the ego. But one must cast off those achievements and attempt to transcend the ego, by leaving the therapeutic amusement park, or sliding down the plastic mountain. It does not mean that the psychological edifice is altogether faulty, it only means that it is “empty”.Psychology must be supplemented with a theory around self-abandonment (ego-abandonment), because it must needs stand on two legs. There is no reason why this couldn’t work, because higher religions stand on two legs, too. Christian mysticism, in terms of St John of the Cross, et al., argues for a personal union with God, the ‘unio mystica’, in defiance of the dogmas of Catholicism. People have no problems with the idea that there is an exoteric and an esoteric path, where the latter is relevant for the élite. This is so in Buddhism and Hinduism, too. After all, self-abandonment is psychology, too, and it mustn’t be neglected. The manner in which we settle upon the ego mountain seems to represent a phase of adaptation and stabilization of personality. But the egoic bias of theory imparts the belief that we also need recourse to the egoic edifice long after it has been established, although it seems that we can do without it. The “enlightenment-being” needn’t worry about fending away dragons with the sharp sword of consciousness, anymore.It seems that the unconscious, generally speaking, poses no danger after this stage. There’s no need for the therapeutic archetypal exercise of finding one’s own myth. This is because self-abandonment leads to the demise of the dictatorial and ravenous ego to the furtherance of the spiritual method. This is complementation, which, in terms of alchemy, takes place in the mild light of the moon. It would mean that the unconscious now upholds and sustains the reformed Self (the “resurrection body”), as a shift has occurred and consciousness is now in service of the unconscious. It is necessary to invent a new psychological term for “bodhisattvahood”; otherwise we have to make do with religious terms, which isn’t ideal.There is no need for self-maintenance on part of the ego. Personality in this state has been “purified” of mundanity, a common notion in mysticism that signifies the dismantling of the egoic structure, including all of its attachments and beliefs. Apophatic mystical tradition around the world; all of them emphasize the necessity of achieving “emptiness” and purity of mind. The alchemists, too, focused on the theme of self-abnegation, although such trinitarian notions never attracted the interest of Jung. It demonstrates that the psyche has a function which is not accounted for in theory, as Jung finds it inexplicable that the ego can be transcended. According to him, personality must stand its own ground, always be prepared to confront the archetypal psyche and take up fight with the dragon. But a more or less pure consciousness can be maintained without the dissociative consequence of unconscious submersion. This mysterious psychological state would correspond to a stage called the “embrace of God”, in Christian mystical discipline.The Book of Job illustrates in the prelude an ideal situation, in terms of the paradigm of integration. The heavenly realm had incarnated on earth and become manifest as Job’s and his family’s paradisal existence. It was in a sense the Kingdom of God on earth, centered upon material welfare and obedience to the law of the book. The consequence of this was that God as the living spirit had been confined to the shadows. He was remembered only in the book, which Job read intently. Job evidently thinks that he is righteous. It is a similar situation today, as consciousness has made an immense progress and acquired great powers that earlier belonged to the divine. Likewise, people remain equally politically correct in the manner they unthinkingly subscribe to the “good” principles.For i