The Red Book: Liber Novus, by C.G. Jung

That's French for "the ancient system," as in the ancient system of feudal privileges and the exercise of autocratic power over the peasants. The ancien regime never goes away, like vampires and dinosaur bones they are always hidden in the earth, exercising a mysterious influence. It is not paranoia to believe that the elites scheme against the common man. Inform yourself about their schemes here.

Re: The Red Book: Liber Novus, by C.G. Jung

Postby admin » Sun Dec 01, 2013 10:28 am

PART 5 OF 5 (CH. 21 CONT'D.)

Parsifal enters, having killed a swan. Not knowing his name or the name of his father, the knights hope that he is this youth. Gurnemanz takes him to Klingsor's castle. Klingsor orders Kundry to seduce Parsifal. Parsifal defeats Klingsor's knights. Kundry is transformed into a beautiful woman, and she kisses him. From this, he realizes that Kundry seduced Amfortas, and he resists her. Klingsor hurls the spear at him, and Parsifal seizes it. Klingsor's castle and garden disappear. After wandering, Parsifal finds Gurnemanz. now living as a hermit. Parsifal is covered in black armor, and Gurnemanz is offended that he is armed on Good Friday. Parsifal lays his spear before him, and removes his helmet and arms. Gurnemanz recognizes him, and anoints him king of the knights of the Grail. Parsifal baptizes Kundry. They go into the castle and ask Amfortas to uncover the Grail. Amfortas asks them to slay him. Parsifal enters and touches his wound with the spear. Amfortas is transfigured, and Parsifal radiantly holds up the Grail. On May 16, 1913, Otto Mensendieck gave a presentation to the Zurich Psychoanalytical Society on "The Grail-Parsifal Saga." In the discussion, Jung said: "Wagner's exhaustive treatment of the legend of the Holy Grail and Parsifal would need to be supplemented with the synthetic view that the various figures correspond to various artistic aspirations. -- The incest barrier will not serve to explain that Kundry's ensnarement fails; instead this has to do with the activity of the psyche to elevate human aspirations ever higher" (MZS, p. 20). In Psychological Types (1921), Jung put forward a psychological interpretation of Parsifal (CW 6, §§371-72).

222. Text in image: (Atmavictu); (iuvenis adiutor) [a youthful supporter]; (Image) [TELESPHORUS]; (spiritus malus in homnibus quibusdam) [evil spirit in some men]. Image legend: "The dragon wants to eat the sun and the youth beseeches him not to. But he eats it nevertheless." Atmaviktu (as spelled there) first appears in Black Book 6 in 1917. Here is a paraphrase of the fantasy of April 25, 1917: The serpent says that Atmaviktu was her companion for thousands of years. He was first an old man, and then he died and became a bear. Then he died and became an otter. Then he died and became a newt. Then he died again and came into the serpent. The serpent is Atmaviktu. He made a mistake before then and became a man, while he was still an earth serpent. Jung's soul says that Atmaviktu is a kobold, a serpent conjuror, a serpent. The serpent says that she is the kernel of the self. From the serpent, Atmaviktu transformed into Philemon (p. 179f). There is a sculpture of him in Jung's garden in Kusnacht. In "From the earliest experiences of my life" Jung wrote: "When I was in England in 1920, I carved two similar figures out of thin branch without having the slightest recollection of that childhood experience. One of them I had reproduced on a larger scale in stone, and this figure now stands in my garden in Kusnacht. It was only at that time that the unconscious supplied me with a name. It called the figure Atmavictu -- the 'breath of life.' It is a further development of that quasi-sexual object of my childhood, which turned out to be the 'breath of life,' the creative impulse. Basically; the manikin is a kabir" (JA, pp. 29-30; cf. Memories, pp. 38-39). The figure of Telesphorus is like Phanes in Image 113. Telesphorus is one of the Cabiri, and the daimon of Aesclepius (see fig. 77, Psychology and Alchemy, CW 12). He was also regarded as a God of healing, and had a temple at Pergamon in Asia Minor. In 1950, Jung carved an image of him in his stone at Bollingen, together with a dedication to him in Greek, combining lines from Heraclitus, the Mithraic Liturgy, and Homer (Memories, p. 254).

223. In Book II of the Odyssey, Odysseus makes a libation to the dead to enable them to speak. Walter Burkert notes: "The dead drink the pourings and indeed the blood -- they are invited to come to the banquet, to the satiation with blood; as the libations seep into the earth, so the dead will send good things up above" (Greek Religion. tr.]. Raffar [Oxford: Basil Blackwell. 1987], pp. 194-95). Jung had used this motif in a metaphorical sense in 1912 in Transformations and Symbols of the Libido: "like Odysseus, I have sought to allow this shade [Miss Frank Miller] to drink only as much so as to make it speak so it can give away some of the secrets of the underworld" (CW B. §57n). Around 1910, Jung went on a sailing trip with his friends Albert Oeri and Andreas Vischer, during which Oeri read aloud the chapters from the Odyssey dealing with Circe and the nekyia. Jung noted that shortly after this, he "like Odysseus, was presented by fate with a nekyia, the descent into the dark Hades" (Jung/Jaffe, Erinnerungen, Traume, Gedanken, p. 104). The passage which follows depicting the prophet's revival of the child paraphrases Elisha's revival of the son of the Shunammite widow in 2 Kings 4:32-36.

224. See below, p. 327. --

225. See above, note 135. p. 243 --

226. Image legend: "The accursed dragon has eaten the sun, its belly being cut open and he must not hand over the gold of the sun, together with his blood. This is the turning back of Atmavictu, of the old one. He who destroyed the proliferating green covering is the youth who helped me to kill Siegfried." The reference is to Liber Primus. ch. 7. "Murder of the Hero."

227. The Draft continues: "I put many people, books, and thoughts aside for his sake; but even more, I withdrew from the current world and did the plain and simple, and what suggested it most immediately, to serve his secret purpose. By serving him, the dark one, I encounter another on the path of mercy. If intentions and wishes torment me, I think, feel, and do what lies closest. Thus what is most remote reaches me" (p. 434).

228. In 1944 in Psychology und Alchemy, Jung referred to an alchemical representation of a circle quadrated by four "rivers" in the context of a discussion of mandala symbolism (CW 12, §167n). Jung commented on the four rivers of paradise on a number of occasions -- see, for instance, Aion, CW §§2, 9, 311, 353, 358, 372.

229. Inscription: "XI. MCMXIX. [11. 1919: This date seems to refer to when this image was painted.] This stone, set so beautifully, is certainly the Lapis Philosophorum. It is harder than diamond. But it expands into space through four distinct qualities, namely breadth, height, depth, and time. It is hence invisible and you can pass through it without noticing it. The four streams of Aquarius flow from the stone. This is the incorruptible seed that lies between the father and the mother and prevents the heads of both cones from touching: it is the monad which countervails the Pleroma." On the pleroma, see below p. 347. Concerning the reference to the incorruptible seed, see the dialogue with Ha in the note to image 94, p. 297, n. 157 above.

230. On June 3, 1918, Jung's soul described Philemon as the joy of the earth: "The daimons become reconciled in the one who has found himself, who is the source of all four streams, of the source-bearing earth. From his summit waters flow in all four directions. He is the sea that bears the sun; he is the mountain that carries the sun; he is the father of all four great streams; he is the cross that binds the four great daimons. He is the incorruptible seed of nothingness, which falls accidentally through space. This seed is the beginning, younger than all other beginnings, older than all endings" (Black Book 7, p. 61). Some of the motifs in this statement may have some connections with this image. There is a gap between July 1919 and February 1920 in Black Book 7, during which time Jung was presumably writing Psychological Types. On February 23 he made the following entry: "What lies between appears in the book of dreams, but even more in the images of the red book" (p. 88). In "Dreams" Jung noted around eight dreams during this period, and a vision at night in August 1919 of two angels, a dark transparent mass, and a young woman. This suggests that the symbolic process continues in the paintings in the calligraphic volume, which do not appear to have direct cross-references to either the text in Liber Novus or the Black Books. In 1935, Jung put forward a psychological interpretation of the symbolism of medieval alchemy, viewing the philosopher's stone -- the goal of the alchemical opus -- as a symbol of the self (Psychology and Alchemy, CW 12).

231. Inscription: "4 December MCMXIX. [December 4, 1919: This date seems to refer to when the image was painted.] This is the back side of the gem. He who is in the stone has this shadow. This is Atmavictu, the old one, after he has withdrawn from the creation. He has returned to endless history, where he took his beginning. Once more he became stony residue, having completed his creation. In the form of Izdubar he has outgrown and delivered Image and Ka from him. Image gave the stone, Ka the Image." The final character appears to be the astrological symbol for the sun.

232. On Atmavictu, see note to image 117. On May 20, 1917, Philemon said: ''As Atmavictu I committed the error and became human. My name was Izdubar? I approached him as just that. He paralyzed me. Yes, man paralyzed me and turned me into a dragon's serpent. Fortunately, I recognized my error, and the fire consumed the serpent. And thus Philemon came into being. My form is appearance. Previously, my appearance was form" (Black Book 7, p. 195). In Memories, Jung said: "Later, Philemon became relativized by yet another figure, whom I called Ka. In ancient Egypt the 'King's Ka' was his earthly form, the embodied soul. In my fantasy the ka-soul came from below, out of the earth as out of a deep shaft. I did a painting of him, showing him in his earth-bound form, as a herm with base of stone and upper part of bronze. High up in the painting appears a kingfisher's wing, and between it and the head of Ka floats a round, glowing nebula of stars. Ka's expression has something demonic about it -- one might also say Mephistophelian. In one hand he holds something like a colored pagoda, or a reliquary, and in the other a stylus with which he is working on the reliquary, He is saying, 'I am he who buries the Gods in gold and gems.' Philemon has a lame foot, but was a winged spirit, whereas Ka represented a kind of earth demon or metal demon. Philemon was the spiritual aspect, 'the meaning,' Ka, on the other hand was a spirit of nature like the Anthroparion of Greek alchemy -- with which at that time I was still unfamiliar. Ka was he who made everything real, but who also obscured the kingfisher spirit, the meaning, or replaced it by beauty, the 'eternal reflection.' In time I was able to integrate both figures through the study of alchemy" (pp. 209-10). Wallace Budge notes that "The ka was an abstract individuality or personality which possessed the form and attributes of the man to whom it belonged, and though its normal dwelling place was in the tomb with the body, it could wander at will; it was independent of the man and could go and dwell in any statue of him" (Egyptian Book of the Dead, p. lxv). In 1928, Jung commented: "At a rather higher stage of development, where the idea of the soul already exists, not all the images continue to be projected ... but one or the other complex has come near enough to consciousness to be felt as no longer strange, but as somehow belonging. Nevertheless, the feeling that it belongs is not at first sufficiently strong for the complex to be sensed as a subjective content of consciousness. It remains in a sort of no-man's-land between consciousness and the unconscious, in the half-shadow, in part belonging or akin to the conscious subject, in part an autonomous being, and meeting consciousness as such. At all events it is not necessarily obedient to the subject's intentions, it may even be of a higher order, more often than not a source of inspiration or warning, or of supernatural information. Psychologically such a content could be explained as a partly autonomous complex that is not yet fully integrated. The primitive souls, the Egyptian Ba and Ka, are complexes of this kind" (The Relations between the I and the Unconscious, CW 7, §295). In 1955/56, Jung described the Anthroparion in alchemy as "a type of goblin, that as Image [devoted spirit], spiritus familiaris, stands by the adept in his work and helps the physician to heal" (Mysterium Coniunctionis, CW 14, §304). The Anthroparion was seen to represent the alchemical metals ("On the psychology of the Child archetype," CW 9, I, §268) and appeared in the visions of Zosimos (CW 13, pp. 60-62). The painting of Ka that Jung refers to has not come to light. Ka appeared to Jung in a fantasy on 22, 1917, where he introduced himself as the other side of Ha, his soul. It was Ka who had given Ha the runes and the lower wisdom (see note 155, p. 292). His eyes are of pure gold and his body is of black iron. He tells Jung and his soul that they need his secret, which is the essence of all magic. This is love. Philemon says that Ka is Philemon's shadow (Black Book 7, p. 25ff ). On November 20, Ka calls Philemon his shadow, and his herald. Ka says that he is eternal and remains, while Philemon is fleeting and passes on (p. 34). On February 10, 1918, Ka says that he has built a temple as a prison and grave for the Gods (p. 39). Ka features in Black Book 7 until 1923. During this period, Jung attempts to understand the connection among Ka, Philemon, and the other figures, and to establish the right relation to them. On October 15, 1920, Jung discussed an unidentified picture with Constance Long, who was in analysis with him. Some of the comments she noted shed light on his understanding of the relation of Philemon and Ka: "The 2 figures on either side are personifications of dominants 'fathers.' The one is the creative father, Ka, the other, Philemon that one whom gives form and law (the formative instinct) Ka would equal Dionysus & P = Apollo. Philemon gives formulation to the things within elements of the collective unc ... Philemon gives the idea (maybe of a god) but it remains floating, distant & indistinct because all the things he invents are winged. But Ka gives substance & is called the one who buries the gods in gold & marble. He has a tendency to misprison them in matter, & so they are in danger of losing their spiritual meaning, & becoming buried in stone. So the temple may be the grave of God, as the church has become the grave of Xt. The more the church develops, the more Xt dies. Ka must not be allowed to produce too much -- you must not depend on substantiation; but if too little substance is produced the creature floats. The transcendent function is the whole. Not this picture, nor my rationalization of it, but the new and vivifying creative spirit that is the result of the intercourse between the consc. intelligence and the creative side. Ka is sensation, P is intuition, he is too supra-human (he is Zarathustra, extravagantly superior in what he says & cold. (CGJ has not printed the questions he addressed to P nor his answers) ... Ka & Philemon are bigger than the man, they are supra-human (Disintegrated into them one is in the Col. Unc)" (Diary, Countway library of Medicine, pp. 32-33).

233. Inscription: "IV Jan, MCMXX [January 4, 1920: This date seems to refer to when the image was painted.] This is the holy caster of water. The Cabiri grow out of the flowers which spring from the body of the dragon. Above is the temple."

234. In Black Book 4, Jung noted: "Thereafter I walk on like a man who is tense, and who expects something new that he has never suspected before. I listen to the depths -- warned, instructed, and undaunted -- outwardly striving to lead a full human life" (p. 42).

235. These lines refer to the end of Voltaire's Candide: "All that is well said -- but we must cultivate our garden" (Candide and Other Stories, tr. R. Pearson [Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1759/1998], pp. 392-93). Jung kept a bust of Voltaire in his study.

236. The Draft continues: "How can I fathom what will happen during the next eight hundred years, up to the time when the One begins his rule? I am speaking only of what is to come" (p. 440).

237. The scene in the landscape resembles one of Jung's waking fantasies during his childhood in which Alsace is submerged by water. Basle is turned into a port, there is a ship with sails and a steamer, a medieval town, a castle with cannons and soldiers and inhabitants of the town, and a canal (Memories, p. 100).

238. January 23, 1914.

239. In Ecce Homo, Nietzsche wrote: "Every acquisition, every step forward in is the result of courage, of severity toward oneself, of cleanliness with respect to oneself" [tr. R.]. Hollingdale [Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1979], foreword 3, p. 34).

240. Inscription on top: "Amor triumphat." Inscription at bottom: "This image was completed on 9 January 1921, after it had waited incomplete for 9 months. It expresses I know not what kind of grief, a fourfold sacrifice. I could almost choose not to finish it. It is the inexorable wheel of the four functions, the essence of all living beings imbued with sacrifice." The functions are those of thinking, feeling, sensation, and intuition, which Jung wrote about in Psychological Types (1921). On February 23, 1920, Jung noted in Black Book 7: "What occurs between the lover and the beloved is the entire fullness of the Godhead. Both are unfathomable riddles to each other. For who understands the Godhead? / But the God is born in solitude, from the secret / mystery of the individual. / The separation between life and love is the contradiction between solitude and togetherness" (p. 88). The next entry in Black Book 7 is on September 5, 1921. On March 4, 1920, Jung went to North Africa with his friend Hermann Sigg, returning on April 17.

241. In Black Book 4, Jung noted: [Soul:] "Tame your impatience. Only waiting will help you here." [I:] "Waiting -- I know this word. Hercules also found waiting troublesome when he carried the weight of the world on his shoulders." [Soul:] "He had to await Atlas's return and carried the weight of the world for the sake of the apples" (p. 60). The reference is to the eleventh labor of Hercules, in which he has to get the golden apples, which confer immortality. Atlas offered to get them for him, if he held up the world in the interim.

242. In Greek mythology, the Moirae, or three fates, Clotho, Lachesis, and Atropus, spun and controlled the threads of human life. In Norse mythology, the norns spun the threads of fate at the foot of Yggsdrasil, the world tree.

243. The Draft continues: "The power of the way is so great that it carries away others and ignites them. You do not know how this happens; hence it is best you call this effect magical" (p. 453).

244. The Draft continues: "which is represented as a serpent precisely on account of its particular nature" (p. 453).

245. This appears to refer to the magical circle, in which ritual acts are performed.

246. In Matthew 24:40, Christ rebukes his disciples for having been unable to remain awake for an hour while he prayed in the garden of Gethsemane.

247. Jung's marginal note to the calligraphic volume: "29/11/1922." This appears to refer to when this passage was transcribed.

248. Inscription: "Completed on 25 November 1922. The fire comes out of Muspilli and grasps the tree of life. A cycle is completed, but it is the cycle within the world egg. A strange God, the unnameable God of the solitary; is incubating it. New creatures form from the smoke and ashes." In Norse mythology Muspilli (or Muspelheim) is the abode of the Fire Gods.

249. Jung's marginal note to the calligraphic volume: "25 February 1923. The transformation of black into white magic."

250. January 27, 1914.

251. The Draft continues: "the serpent of my way" (p. 460).

252. In Black Book 4, this is spoken by his soul. In this chapter and in Scrutinies, we find a shift in the attribution of some statements in the Black Books from the soul to the other characters. This textual revision marks an important psychological process of the characters, separating them out from one another, and disidentifying from them. Jung discussed this process in in 1928, in The Relations between the I and Unconscious, ch. 7. ''The technique for differentiation between the I and the figures of the unconscious" (CW 7). In Black Book 6, the soul explains to Jung in 1916: "If I am not conjoined through the uniting of the Below and the Above, I break down into three parts: the serpent, and in that or some other animal form I roam, living nature daimonically, arousing fear and longing. The human soul, living forever within you. The celestial soul, as such dwelling with the Gods, far from you and unknown to you, appearing in the form of a bird." (Appendix C, p. 370). The textual changes that Jung makes among the soul, the serpent, and the bird from the Black Books in this chapter and in Scrutinies can be seen to be the recognition and differentiation of the threefold nature of the soul. Jung's notion of the unity and multiplicity of the soul resembles Eckhart's. In Sermon 52, Eckhart wrote: "the soul with her higher powers touches eternity, which is God, while her lower powers being in touch with time make her subject to change and biased toward bodily things, which degrade her" (Sermons & Treatises, vol. 2, tr. M. O'C. Walshe [London: Watkins, 1981], p. 55). In Sermon 85, he wrote: "Three things prevent the soul from uniting with God. The first is that she is too scattered, and that she is not unitary: for when the soul is inclined toward creatures, she is not unitary. The second is when she is involved with temporal things. The third is when she is turned toward the body, for then she cannot unite with God" (ibid., p. 264).

253. The Draft continues: "'Why,' you ask, 'does man not want to reach himself?' The raging prophet who preceded this time wrote a book about this and embellished it with a proud name. The book is about how and why man does not want to reach himself " (p. 461). The reference is to Nietzsche's Thus Spoke Zarathustra.

254. See "The last Supper," Thus Spoke Zarathustra, p. 294f.

255. In the last chapter of Thus Spoke Zarathustra, "The sign," when the higher men come to meet Zarathustra in his cave, "the lion started violently, suddenly turned away from Zarathustra, and leaped up to the cave, roaring fiercely" (p. 407). In 1926 Jung noted: "The roaring of the Zarathustrian lion drove all the 'higher' men who were clamoring for experience back again into the cavern of the unconscious. Hence his life does not convince us of his teaching" (The Unconscious in Normal and Sick Psychic Life, CW 7. §37).

256. Nietzsche ends Thus Spoke Zarathustra with the lines: "Thus spoke Zarathustra and left his cave, glowing and strong, like a morning sun emerging from behind dark clouds" (p. 336).

257. In Zarathustra's prologue, a tightrope walker falls from a rope. Zarathustra says to the injured tightrope walker: "Your soul will be dead even before your body; therefore nothing any ' (Zarathustra, §6, 48; as underlined in Jung's copy, p. 22). In 1926 Jung argued that this was prophetic of Nietzsche's own fate (The Unconscious in Normal and Sick Psychic CW 7. §36-44).

258. For Jung's differentiation of the significance of signs and symbols, see Psychological Types (1921, CW 6, §814ff).

259. The mandrake is a plant whose roots bear some resemblance to the human figure, hence they have been used in magical rites. According to legend, they shriek when they are pulled from the ground. In "The philosophical tree" (1945), Jung noted that the magical mandrake "when tied to the tail of a black dog, shrieks when it is torn out of the earth" (CW 13, §410).

260. The Draft continues: "Everything is forever the same and yet not, for the wheel rolls along on a long road. But the way leads through valleys and across mountains. The movement of the wheel and the eternal recurrence of its parts is essential to the carriage, but meaning lies in the way. Meaning is attained only through the wheel's constant revolution and forward movement. The recurrence of the past is inherent in forward movement. This can only baffle the ignorant person. Ignorance makes us resist the necessary recurrence of the same, or greed allows the wheel to toss us up and away in its upward movement because we believe that we will rise ever higher with this part of the wheel. But we will not rise higher, but deeper; ultimately we will be at the very bottom. Thus praise standstill, since it shows you that you are not bound to the spokes like Ixion, but sit alongside the charioteer who will interpret the meaning of the way to you" (pp. 469-70). In Greek mythology Ixion was the son of Ares. He tried to seduce Hera, and Zeus punished him by binding him to a fiery wheel that rolled unceasingly.

261. The notion that everything recurs is found in various traditions, such as Stoicism and Pythagoreanism, and features prominently in Nietzsche's work. There has been much debate in Nietzsche studies as to whether it should primarily be understood as an ethical imperative of life affirmation or as cosmological doctrine. See Karl Lowith, Nietzsche's Doctrine of the Eternal Recurrence of the Same, tr.]. Lomax (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1997). Jung discusses this in 1934, Nietzsche's Zarathustra, vol. I, pp. 191-92.

262. The Handwritten Draft has instead: "Tenth Adventure" (p. 1061).

263. January 27, 1914.

264. In the Metamorphoses, Ovid tells the tale of Philemon and Baucis. Jupiter and Mercury wandered disguised as mortals, in the hill country of Phyrgia. They searched for somewhere to rest but were barred by a thousand homes. An old couple finally took them in. The couple had been married in their cottage in their youth, grew old together, and contentedly accepted their poverty. They prepared a meal for their guests. During the meal, the couple saw that the flagon automatically refilled itself as soon as it was emptied. In honor of their guests, the couple offered to kill their sole goose. The goose took refuge with the Gods, who said that it should not be killed. Jupiter and Mercury then revealed themselves and told the couple that their neighborhood would be punished, but that they would be spared. They asked the couple to climb the mountain with them. When they reached the top, the couple saw that the country surrounding their cottage had been flooded and only their cottage remained; it had been transformed into a temple with marble columns and a gold roof. The Gods asked what the couple would like, and Philemon replied that they would like to be their priests and serve in their shrine, and also that they could die at the same time. Their wish was granted, and as they died, they transformed into trees side by side. In Goethe's Faust 2, act V, a wanderer, who had previously been saved by them, calls upon Philemon and Baucis. Faust was in the process of building a city on land reclaimed from the sea. Faust proceeds to tell Mephistopheles that he wants Philemon and Baucis moved. Mephistopheles and three mighty men go and burn the cottage, with Philemon and Baucis in it. Faust replies that he had only intended to exchange their dwelling. To Eckermann, Goethe recounted that "My Philemon and Baucis ... have nothing to do with that renowned ancient couple or the tradition connected with them. I gave this couple the names merely to elevate the characters. The persons and relations are similar, and hence the use of the names has a good effect" (June 6, 1831, cited in Goethe, Faust, tr. W Arndt [New York: Norton Critical Edition, 1976), p. 428). On June 7, 1955, Jung wrote a letter to Alice Raphael which refers to Goethe's comments to Eckermann: ''Ad Philemon and Baucis: a typical Goethean answer to Eckermann! trying to conceal his vestiges. Philemon (Image [philema] = kiss), the loving one, the simple old loving couple, close to the earth and aware of the Gods, the complete opposite to the Superman Faust, the product of the devil. Incidentally: in my tower at Bollingen is a hidden inscription: Philemon sacrum Fausti poenitentia [Philemon's Sanctuary, Faust's Repentance]. When I first encountered the archetype of the old wise man, he called himself Philemon. / In Alchemy Ph. and B. represented the artifex or vir sapiens and the soror mystica (Zosimos-Theosebeia, Nicolas Flamel-Peronelle, Mr. South and his daughter in the XIXth Cent.) and the pair in the mutus liber (about 1677)" (Beinecke Library, Yale University). On Jung's inscription, see also his letter to Hermann Keyserling, January 2, 1928 (Letters I, p. 49). On January 5, 1942, Jung wrote to Paul Schmitt, "I have taken over Faust as my heritage, and moreover as the advocate of Philemon and Baucis, who, unlike Faust the superman, are the hosts of the gods in a ruthless and godforsaken age" (Letters 1, pp. 309-10).

265. In Psychological Types (1921), in the course of a discussion of Faust, Jung wrote: "The magician has preserved in himself a trace of primordial paganism, he possesses a nature that is still unaffected by the Christian splitting, which means he has access to the unconscious, which is still pagan, where the opposites still lie in their original naive state, beyond all sinfulness, but, if assimilated into conscious life, produce evil and good with the same primordial and consequently daimonic force. Therefore he is a destroyer as well as savior. This figure is therefore pre-eminently suited to become the symbol carrier for an attempt at unification" (CW 6, §316).

266. The sixth and seventh books of Moses (i.e., in addition to the five contained in the Torah) were published in 1849 by Johann Schiebel, who claimed that they came from ancient Talmudic sources. The work is a compendium of Kabbalistic magical spells, which has been enduringly popular.

267. The figure of Hermes Trismegistus was formed through the amalgamation of Hermes with the Egyptian God Thoth. The Corpus Hermeticum, a collection of largely alchemical and magical texts dating from the early Christian era but initially thought to have been much older, was ascribed to him.

268. In Goethe's Faust, Philemon speaks of his declining powers: "Older, I could not lend a hand [to the building of the dyke] / as once I did full well, / and with my powers ebbing / the waters were pushed back" (Ll. 11087-9)

269. Jung's marginal note to the calligraphic volume: "Jan. 1924." This seems to refer to when this passage was transcribed into the calligraphic volume. The writing at this point gets larger, with more space between the words. At this time, Cary Baynes commenced her transcription.

270. In Psychological Types (1921) Jung wrote: "Reason can only give one equilibrium if one's reason is already an equilibrating organ ... As a rule, man needs the opposite of his actual condition to force him to find his place in the middle" 6, §386).

271. The Draft continues: "Magical practice hence falls into two parts: developing an understanding of chaos; and second, translating the essence into what can be understood" (p. 484).

272. The Draft continues: "Reason takes up only a very small share of magic. This will offend you. Age and experience are needed. The rash desirousness and fear of youth, as well as its necessary virtuousness, disturb the secret interplay of God and the devil. You are then all too easily torn to one side or the other, blinded or paralyzed" (p. 484).

273. The reference is to the astrological conception of the Platonic month, or aeon, of Pisces, which is based on the precession of the equinoxes. Each Platonic month consists of one zodiacal sign, and lasts approximately 2,300 years. Jung discusses the symbolism attached to this in Aion (1951, CW 6, ch. 6). He notes that around 7 BC there was a conjunction of Saturn and Jupiter, representing a union of extreme opposites, which would place the birth of Christ under Pisces. Pisces (Latin for "fishes") is known as the sign of the fish and is often represented by two fish swimming in opposite directions. On the Platonic months, see Alice Howell, Jungian Synchronicity in Astrological Signs and Ages (Wheaton, IL: Quest Books, 1990), p. 125f. Jung started studying astrology in 1911, in the course of his study of mythology, and learned to cast horoscopes (Jung to Freud, May 8, 1911, The Freud/Jung Letters, p. 421). Leclercq's L'Astrologie Grecque on nine occasions in his later work (Paris: Ernest Leroux, 1899).

274. This refers to the end of the Platonic month of Pisces and the beginning of the Platonic month of Aquarius. The precise dating of this is uncertain. In Aion (1951), Jung noted: "Astrologically the beginning of the next aeon, according to the starting point you select, falls between AD 2000 and 2200" (CW 9, 2, §149, note 88).

275. In Aion (1951), Jung wrote: "If, as seems probable, the aeon of the fishes is ruled by the archetypal motif of the 'hostile brothers,' then the approach of the next Platonic month. namely Aquarius, will constellate the problem of the union of opposites. It will then no longer be possible to write off evil as a mere privatio boni; its real existence will have to be recognized" (CW 9, §142).

276. The Draft continues: "The hibernal rains began with Christ. He taught mankind the way to Heaven. We teach the way to earth. Hence nothing has been removed from the Gospel, but only added to it" (p. 486).

277. The Draft continues: "Our striving focused on sagacity and intellectual superiority, and we hence developed all our cleverness. But the extraordinary extent of stupidity inherent in all men was disregarded and denied. But if we accept the other in us, we also evoke the particular stupidity of our nature. Stupidity is one of man's strange hobbyhorses. There is something divine about it, and yet something of the megalomania of the world. Which is why stupidity is really large. It keeps away everything that could induce us to intelligence. It leaves everything not understood which is not naturally supposed to demand understanding. This particular stupidity occurs in thought and in life. Somewhat deaf, somewhat blind, it brings about necessary fate and keeps from us the virtuousness coupled with rationality. It is what separates and isolates the mixed seeds of life, affording us thus with a clear view of good and evil, and of what is reasonable and what not. But many people are logical in their lack of reason" (p. 487).

278. In this paragraph, Jung refers to the classical account of Philemon and Baucis from the Metamorphoses.

279. Contrast with John 1:5, where Christ is described as follows: "The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it."

280. Cf. Jung's fantasy of June 1, 1916, where Philemon's guest was Christ (see below, p. 359).

281. Jung's marginal note to the calligraphic volume: "The bhagavadgita says: whenever there is a decline of the law and an increase in iniquity, then I put forth myself. For the rescue of the pious and for the destruction of the evildoers, for the establishment of the law I am born in every age." The citation is from chapter 4, verses 7-8 of the Bhagavad Gita. Krishna is instructing Arjuna concerning the nature of truth.

282. The text in the image reads: "Father of the Prophet, beloved Philemon." Jung subsequently painted another version of this painting as a mural in one of the bedrooms in his tower at Bollingen. He added an inscription in Latin from the Rosarium Philosophorum, in which Hermes describes the stone as saying: "defend me and I will defend thee, give me my right that I may help thee, for Sol is mine and the beams thereof are my inward parts; but Luna is proper to me, and my light excelleth all light, and my goods are higher than all goods. I give many riches and delights to men desiring them, and when I seek after anything they acknowledge it, I make them understand and I cause them to possess divine strength. I engender light, but my nature is darkness. Unless my metal should be dry, all bodies have need of me, because I moisten them. I blot out their rustiness and extract their substance. Therefore I and my son being joined together, there can be nothing made better nor more honorable in the whole world." Jung cited some of these lines in Psychology and Alchemy (1944, CW 12., §§99, 140, 155). The Rosarium, first published in 1550, was one of the most important texts of European alchemy, and concerns the means of producing the philosopher's stone. It contained a series of woodcuts of symbolic figures, which was Jung's exemplar in Psychology of the Transference. Explained through an Alchemical Series of Pictures. For Doctors and Practical Psychologists (1946, CW 16).

283. In "The psychological aspects of the Kore" (1951), Jung anonymously described this image as "xi. Then she [the anima] appears in a church, taking the place of the altar, still over-life-size but with veiled face." He commented: "Dream xi restores the anima to the Christian church, not as an icon but as the altar itself. The altar is the place of sacrifice and also the receptacle for consecrated relics" (CW 9, 1, §369. 380). On the left-hand side, there is the Arabic word for "daughters." On the border of the image is the following inscription: "Dei sapientia in mysterio quae abscondita est, quam praedestinavit ante secula in gloriam nostram quam nemo princip[i]um huius seculi cognovit. Spiritus enim omnia scrutatur etiam profunda dei [Google translate: Which is hidden in the mystery of the wisdom of God, destined before the worlds unto our glory: which none of the princes of this world knew. For the Spirit searches everything, even the deep things of God.]" This is a citation from 1 Corinthians 2:7-10. (Jung has omitted "Deus" before "ante secula.") The portions cited are marked here in italics: "But we speak the wisdom of God in a mystery, even the hidden wisdom, which God ordained before the world unto our glory: which none of the princes of the world knew: for had they known it, they would not have crucified the Lord of glory. But as it is written, Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which God hath prepared for them that love him. But God hath revealed them unto us by his Spirit: for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God." On either side of the arch is the following inscription: "Spirirus et sponsa dicunt veni et qui audit dicat veni et qui sit it veniat qui vult accipiat aquam vitae gratis." The text is from Revelation 22:17: "the Spirit and the bride say, Come. And let him that heareth say, Come. And let him that is athirst come. And whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely." Above the arch is the following inscription: "ave virgo virginum [Google translate: Hail virgin of virgins.]." This is the title of a medieval hymn.

284. January 29, 1914.

285. From this point in the calligraphic volume, Jung's coloring of red and blue initials becomes less consistent. Some have been added here for consistency.

286. This line is not in Black Book 4, where the voice is not identified as the serpent.

287. January 31, 1914.

288. In Mysterium Coniunctionis (1955/56), Jung noted: "If the projected conflict is to be healed, it must return into the soul of the individual, where it had its beginnings in an unconscious manner. He who wants to be the master of this descent must celebrate a Last Supper with himself, and eat his own flesh and drink his own blood; which means that he must recognize and accept the other in himself" (CW 14, §512.).

289. Cf. Isaiah 11:6: "The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; and a little child shall lead them."

290. Jung's marginal note to the calligraphic volume: "XIV AUG. 1925." This appears to refer to when this passage was transcribed into the calligraphic volume. In the autumn of 1925, Jung went to Africa, together with Peter Baynes and George Beckwith. They left England on October 15, and he arrived back in Zurich on March 14, 1926.

291. The twelfth-century tale of the adulterous romance between the Cornish knight Tristan and the Irish princess Isolde has been retold in many versions, up to Wagner's opera, which Jung referred to as an example of the visionary mode of artistic creation ("Psychology and poetry: 1930, CW 15, §142).

292. This sentence is not in Black Book 4.

293. This sentence is not in Black Book 4.

294. Jung commented on the comparison of Christ with the serpent in Transformations and Symbols of the Libido (1912), CW B, §585 and in Aion (1950), CW 9, 2, §291.

295. Cf. Transformations and Symbols of the Libido (1912), CW B, §585.

296. Image legend: "9 January 1927 my friend Hermann Sigg died age 52." Jung described this as "A luminous flower in the center, with stars rotating about it. Around the flower, walls with eight gates. The whole conceived as a transparent window." This mandala was based on a dream noted on January 2, 1927 (see above, p. 217). From the 'town map,' the relation between the dream and the painting is clear (see Appendix A). He anonymously reproduced this in 1930 in "Commentary to the 'Secret of the Golden Flower,'" from which this description is taken. He reproduced it again in 1952, and added the following commentary: "The rose in the center is depicted as a ruby; its outer ring being conceived as a wheel or a wall with gates (so that nothing can come out from inside or go in from outside)." The mandala was a spontaneous product from the analysis of a male patient. After narrating the dream. Jung added: "The dreamer went on: 'I tried to paint this dream. But as so often happens, it came out rather different. The magnolia turned into a sort of rose made of ruby-colored glass. It shone like a four-rayed star. The square represents the wall of the park and at the same time a street leading around the park in a square. From it there radiate eight main streets, and from each of these eight side-streets, which meet in a shining red central point, rather like the Etoile in Paris. The acquaintance mentioned in the dream lived in a house at the corner of one of these stars. The mandala thus combines the classic motifs of flower, star, circle, precinct (temenos), and plan of city divided into quarters with citadel. The whole thing seemed like a window opening on to eternity;' wrote the dreamer" ("Concerning mandala symbolism," CW 9, 1, §654-55). In 1955/56 he used this same expression to denote the illustration of the self (Mysterium Coniunctionis, CW 14, §763). On October 7, 1932, Jung showed this mandala in a seminar, and commented on it the next day. In this account, he states that the painting of the mandala preceded the dream: "You remember possibly the picture that I showed you last evening, the central stone and the little jewels round it. It is perhaps interesting if I tell you about the dream in connection with it. I was the perpetrator of that mandala at a time when I had not the slightest idea what a mandala was, and in my extreme modesty I thought, I am the jewel in the center and those little lights are surely very nice people who believe that they are also jewels, but smaller ones ... I thought very well of myself that I was able to express myself like that: my marvelous center here and I am right in my heart." He added that at first he did not recognize that the park was the same as the mandala which he had painted, and commented: "Now Liverpool is the center of life -- liver is the center of life -- and I am not the center. I am the fool who lives in a dark place somewhere. I am one of those little side lights. In that way my Western prejudice that I was the center of the mandala was corrected -- that I am everything, the whole show, the king, the god" (The Psychology of Kundalini Yoga, p. 100). In Memories, Jung added some further details (pp. 223-24).

297. February 1, 1914.

298. Black Book 4 also has: "I lay these questions before you today, my soul" (p. 91). Here, the serpent is substituted for the soul.

299. Black Book 4: "You are playing Adam and Eve with me" (p. 93).

300. Jung's marginal note to the calligraphic volume: "Visio."

301. Black Book 4: "Satan crawls out a dark hole with horns and tail, I pull him out by the hands" (p. 94).

302. The interlocutor is Satan.

303 For Jung's account of the significance of Satan, see Answer to Job (1952), CW II.

304 Jung discussed the issue of uniting the opposites at length in Psychological Types (1921), ch. 6, "The type problem in the poetic art." The uniting of the opposites takes place through the production of the reconciling symbol.

305. Black Book 4 has instead of this sentence: "Matters are not as intellectual and generally ethical with us as in Monism" (p. 96). The reference is to Ernst Haeckel's system of Monism, which Jung was critical of.

306. Cf. Jung, "Attempt at a psychological interpretation of the dogma of the trinity" (1940), CW 11.

307. Image legend: "1928. When I painted this image, which showed the golden well-fortified castle, Richard Wilhelm sent me from Frankfurt the Chinese, thousand-year-old text of the golden castle, the embryo of the immortal body. Ecclesia catholic et protestantes et seclusi in secreto. Aeon finitus. (A church both Catholic and Protestant shrouded in secrecy. The end of an aeon.) Jung described this as: A mandala as a fortified city with wall and moat. Within, a moat surrounding a wall fortified with sixteen towers and with another inner moat. This moat encloses a central castle with golden roofs whose centre is a golden temple. He anonymously reproduced this in 1930 in "Commentary on 'The Secret of the Golden Flower,'" from which this description is taken. He reproduced it again in 1952 in "Concerning mandala symbolism" and added the following commentary: "Painting of a medieval city with walls and moats, streets and churches, arranged quadratically. The inner city is again surrounded by walls and moats, like the Imperial City in Peking. The buildings all open inward, toward the center, represented by a castle with a golden roof. It too is surrounded by a moat. The ground round the castle is laid with black and white tiles, representing the united opposites. This mandala was done by a middle-aged man ... A picture like this is unknown in Christian symbolism. The Heavenly Jerusalem of Revelation is known to everybody. Coming to the Indian world of ideas, we find the city of Brahma on the world mountain, Meru. We read in the Golden Flower: 'The Book of the Yellow Castle says: "In the square inch field of the square foot house, life can be regulated." The square foot house is the face. The square inch field in the face: what could that be other than the heavenly heart? In the middle of the square inch dwells the splendor. In the purple hall of the city of Jade dwells the God of Utmost Emptiness and Life.' The Taoists call this center 'the land of ancestors or golden castle'" (CW 9, 1, §691). On this mandala, see John Peck. The Visio Dorothei: Desert Context, Imperial Setting, Later Alignments: Studies in the Dreams and Visions of Saint Pachomius and Dorotheus, Son of Quintus. Thesis, C. G. Jung Institute, Zurich, 1992, pp. 183-85.

308. This line links with the beginning of Sermon one, Scrutinies (see below, p. 346).

309. A reference to the account of creation in the book of Genesis.

310. The Cabiri were the deities celebrated at the mysteries of Samothrace. They were held to be promoters of fertility and protectors of sailors. Friedrich Creuzer and Schelling held them to be the primal deities of Greek mythology, from which all others developed (Symbolik und Mythologie der alten Volker [Leipzig: Leske, 1810-23]; The Deities of Samothrace [1815], introduced and translated by R. F. Brown [Missoula. MT: Scholars Press. 1977]). Jung had copies of both of these works. They appear in Goethe's Faust, part 2, act 2. Jung discussed the Cabiri in Transformations and Symbols of the Libido (1912, CW B §209-11). In 1940 Jung wrote: "The Cabiri are, in fact, the mysterious creative powers, the gnomes who work under the earth, i.e., below the threshold of consciousness, in order to supply us with lucky ideas. As imps and hobgoblins, however, they also lay all sorts of nasty tricks, keeping back names and dates that were 'on the tip of the tongue,' making us say the wrong thing, etc. They give an eye to everything that has not already been anticipated by consciousness and the functions at its disposal ... deeper insight will show that the primitive and archaic qualities of the inferior function conceal all sorts of significant relationships and symbolic meanings, and instead of laughing off the Cabiri as ridiculous Tom Thumbs he may begin to suspect that they are a treasure-house of hidden wisdom" ("Attempt at a psychological interpretation of the dogma of the trinity:' CW 11, §244). Jung commented on the Cabiri scene in Faust in Psychology and Alchemy (1944, CW 12, §203f). The dialogue with the Cabiri that takes place here is not found in Black Book 4, but is in the Handwritten Draft. It may have been written separately; if so it would have been written prior to the summer of 1915.

311. Jung's marginal note to the calligraphic volume: "Thereupon I laid this matter aside for three weeks."

312. In "Transformation symbolism in the mass" (1941), Jung noted that the motif of the sword played an important role in alchemy and discussed its significance as an instrument of sacrifice, its divisive and separative functions. He noted that 'The alchemical sword brings about the solutio or separatio elementorum, thereby restoring the original condition of chaos, so that a new and more perfect body can be produced by a new impressio formae or imaginatio" (CW 11, §357 & ff).

313. The notion here of overcoming madness is close to Schelling's distinction between the person who is overcome by madness and the person who manages to govern madness (see note 89, p. 238).

314. Jung's marginal note to the calligraphic volume: "accipe quod tecum est. in collect. Mangeti in ultimis paginis" (Accept what is present. In the last pages of the Mangeti collection). It seems that this refers to the Bibliotheca chemica curiosa, seu rerum ad alchemiam pertinentium thesaurus instructissimus of J. J. Manget (1702), a collection of alchemical texts. Jung possessed a copy of this work, which has some slips of paper in it and some underlinings. Jung's note possibly refers to the last woodcut of the Mutus Liber, which concludes volume one of the Bibliotheca chemica curiosa, a representation of the completion of the alchemical opus, with a man being lifted upward by angels, while another lies prostrate.

315. In Psychological Types, Jung commented on the symbolism of the tower in his discussion of the vision of the tower in The Shepherd of Hermas (CW 6, §390ff). In 1920, Jung began planning his tower at Bollingen.

316. February 2, 1914.

317. Black Book 4 has: "soul" (p. 110).

318. In Goethe's Faust, Mephistopheles makes a pact with Faust that he will serve him in life on condition that Faust will serve him in the beyond (l. 1655).

319. The Corrected Draft has instead: "me with the serpent" (p. 521).

320. Jung's marginal note to the calligraphic volume: "I still did not realize that I myself was this murderer."

321. February 9, 1914, Black Book 4 has: "soul" (p. 114).

322. Polygamy used to be practiced in Turkey. It was officially banned by Ataturk in 1926.

323. Jung's marginal note to the calligraphic volume: "In XI Cap. of the mystery play" (see above, p. 251).

324. Black Book 4 continues: "I: My principles -- it sounds stupid -- forgive me -- but I have principles. Do not think these are stale moral principles, for these are insights that life has imposed on me. / Serpent: What principles are these?" (pp. 121-22).

325. The issue of master and slave morality featured prominently in the first essay of Nietzsche's On the Genealogy of Morals (tr. D. Smith [Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996]).

326. In the calligraphic volume, there is a blank space for a historiated initial.

327. February 11, 1914.

328. In Black Book 4, this figure is identified as "soul" (p. 131).

329. This sentence is added in the Draft, p. 533

330. The transcription in the calligraphic volume of Liber Novus ends at this point. What follows here is transcribed from the Draft, pp. 533-56.

331. This is a quotation from 1 Corinthians 13:8. Near the end of his life, Jung cited it again in his reflections on love at the end of Memories (p. 387). In Black Book 4, the inscription is first given in Greek letters (p. 134).

332. This sentence is added in the Draft (p. 534).

333. This figure is not identified as the serpent in Black Book 4.

334. In Transformations and Symbols of the Libido (1912), Jung commented on the motif of hanging in folklore and mythology (CW B, §358).

335. There is a passage missing in Black Book 4, covering the end of this dialogue and the next paragraph.

336. Swedenborg described heavenly love as "loving uses for the sake of uses, or goods for the sake of goods, which a man performs for the Church, his country, human society, and a fellow-citizen," differentiating it from self love and love of the world (Heaven and Its Wonders and Hell: From Things Heard and Seen, tr. J. Rendell [London: Swedenborg Society, 1920], §554f).

337. In the Biblical account of creation, the sea and the land were separated on the third day.

338. John Keats's poem "Ode to a Grecian Urn" ends with these lines: "Beauty is truth, truth beauty, -- that is all / Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know."

339. In Transformations and Symbols of the Libido (1912, CW B), Jung argued that in the course of psychological development, the individual had to free himself from the figure of the mother, as depicted in heroic myths (see ch. 6, "The battle for deliverance from the mother").

340. In Transformations and Symbols of the Libido (1912), while discussing his concept of libido, Jung referred to the cosmogonic significance of Eros in Hesiod's Theogony, which he linked with the figure of Phanes in Orphism and with Kama, the Hindu God of love (CW B, §223).

341. In his later work, Jung gave importance to "enantiodromia," the principle that everything turns into its opposite, which he attributed to Heraclitus. See Psychological Types (1921), CW 6, §708f.

342. In the biblical account of the flood, the ark came to rest on Mount Ararat (Genesis 8:4). Ararat is a dormant volcanic cone formerly in Armenia (now Turkey).

343. In Norse mythology, Odin was pierced by a spear and hung from the world tree, Yggdrasill, where he hung for nine nights until he found the runes, which gave him power.

344. February 23, 1914. In Black Book 4, the dialogue is with the soul, and this section begins with Jung asking her what is stopping him from getting back to his work, and she tells him that it is his ambition. He thought he had overcome it, but she said that he had simply negated it, and thus tells him the tale that follows (p. 171). On February 13, 1914, Jung gave a talk, "On dream symbolism," to the Zurich Psychoanalytical Society From March 30 to April 13, Jung vacationed in Italy.

345. Black Book 4 has: "ambition" (p. 180).

346. Black Book 4 has "work" instead of "son" in the next few lines (p. 180).

347. April 19, 1914. The preceding paragraph was added in the Draft.

348. In Black Book 5, this dialogue is with his soul (p. 29f).

349. Black Book 5 has instead "Soul" (p. 37).

350. Black Book 5 has instead "with my soul" (p. 38).

351. This paragraph was added in the Draft.

352. The Corrected Draft has instead: "to myself" (p. 555).

353. The remainder is added in the Draft (p. 555f ).

354. In 1930, Jung stated: "A movement back into the Middle Ages is a sort of regression, but it is not personal. It is a historical regression, a regression into the past of the collective unconscious. This always takes place when the way ahead is not free, when there is an obstacle from which you recoil; or when you need to get something out of the past in order to climb over the wall ahead" (Visions, vol. I, p. 148). Around this time, Jung began working intensively on Medieval theology (see Psychological Types [1921], CW 6, ch. 1, "The type problem in the history of the mind in antiquity and the Middle Ages").

355. At this point, the Handwritten Draft has: "Finis," surrounded by a box (p. 1205).
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Re: The Red Book: Liber Novus, by C.G. Jung

Postby admin » Sun Dec 01, 2013 9:47 pm

PART 1 OF 4

Scrutinies

{I} I resist, I cannot accept this hollow nothing that I am. What am I? What is my I? I always presuppose my I. Now it stands before me -- I before my I. I speak now to you, my I:

[1] We are alone and our being together threatens to become unbearably boring. We must do something, devise a pastime; for example, I could educate you. Let us begin with your main flaw, which strikes me first: you have no correct self-esteem. Have you no good qualities that you can be proud of? You believe that being capable is an art. But one can also learn such skills to some extent. Please, do so. You find it difficult -- well, all beginnings are difficult. [2] Soon you will be able to do it better. Do you doubt this? That is of no use; you must be able to do it, or else I cannot live with you. Ever since the God has arisen and spreads himself in whichever fiery heavens, to do whatever he does, what exactly I do not know, we have depended upon one another. Therefore you must think about improving, or else our life together will become wretched. So pull yourself together and value yourself! Don't you want to?

Pitiful creature! I will torment you a bit if you do not make an effort. What are you moaning about? Perhaps the whip will help?

Now that gets under your skin, doesn't it? Take that -- and that. What does it taste of? Of blood, presumably? Of the Middle Ages in majorem Dei gloriam? [3]

Or do you want love, or what goes by that name? One can also teach with love, if blows do not bear fruit. So should I love you? Press you tenderly to myself?

I truly believe that you are yawning.

How now, you want to speak? But I won't let you, otherwise in the end you will claim that you are my soul. But my soul is with the fire worm, with the son of the frog who has flown to the heavens above, to the upper sources. Do I know what he is doing there? But you are not my soul, you are my bare, empty nothing -- I, this disagreeable being, whom one cannot even deny the right to consider itself worthless.

One could despair over you: your sensitivity and desirousness exceed any reasonable measure. And I should live with you, of all people? I must, since the strange misfortune occurred that gave me a son and took him away.

I regret that I must speak such truths to you. Yes, you are laughably sensitive, self-righteous, unruly, mistrustful, pessimistic, cowardly, dishonest with yourself, venomous, vengeful; one can hardly speak about your childish pride, your craving for power, your desire for esteem, your laughable ambition, your thirst for fame without feeling sick. The playacting and pomposity become you badly and you abuse them to the best of your ability.

Do you believe that it is a pleasure rather than a horror to live together with you? No, three times no! But I promise you that I will tighten the vise around you and slowly pull off your skin. I will give you the chance to be flayed.

You, you of all people wanted to tell other people what to do?

Come here, I will stitch a cloth of new skin onto you, so that you can feel its effect.

You want to complain about others, and that one has done an injustice to you, not understood you, misinterpreted you, hurt your feelings, ignored you, not recognized you, falsely accused you, and what else? Do you see your vanity in this, your eternally ridiculous vanity?

You complain that the torment has not yet come to an end?

Let me tell you: it has only just begun. You have no patience and no seriousness. Only when it concerns your pleasure do you praise your patience. I will double the torment so that you learn patience.

You find the pain unbearable, but there are other things that hurt even more, and you can inflict them on others with the greatest naivety and absolve yourself all unknowingly.

But you will learn silence. For this I will pull out your tongue -- with which you have ridiculed, blasphemed and -- even worse -- joked. I will pin all your unjust and depraved words one by one to your body with needles so that you can feel how evil words stab.

Do you admit that you also derive pleasure from this torment? I will increase this pleasure until you vomit with joy so that you know what taking pleasure in self-torment means.

You rise against me? I am screwing the vise tighter, that's all. I will break your bones until there is no longer a trace of hardness there.

For I want to get along with you -- I must -- damn you -- you are my I, which I must carry around with me to the grave. Do you think that I want to have such foolishness around me all my life? If you were not my I, I would have torn you to pieces long ago.

But I am damned to haul you through a purgatory so that you too will become somewhat acceptable.

You call on God for help?

The dear old God has died, [4] and it is good that way, otherwise he would have had pity on your repentant sinfulness and spared me the execution by granting mercy. You must know that neither a God of love nor a loving God has yet arisen, but instead a worm of fire crawled up, a magnificent frightful entity that lets fire rain on the earth, producing lamentations. [5] So cry to the God, he will burn you with fire for the forgiveness of your sins. Coil yourself and sweat blood. You have needed this cure for a long time. Yes -- others always do wrong -- and you? You are the innocent, the correct, you must defend your good right and you have a good, loving God on your side, who always forgives sins with pity. Others must reach insight, not you, since you have a monopoly on all insight from the start and are always convinced that you are right. And so cry really loudly to your dear God -- he will hear you and let fire fall on you. Have you not noticed that your God has become a fiery worm with a flat skull who crawls red-hot on the earth?

You wanted to be superior! How laughable. You were, and are, inferior. Who are you, then? Scum that disgusts me.

Are you perhaps somewhat powerless? I place you in a corner where you can remain lying until you come to your senses again. If you no longer feel anything, the procedure is of no use. After all, we must proceed skillfully. It really says a lot about you that one needs such barbaric means for your amendment. Your progress since the early Middle Ages appears to be minuscule.

***

[6] Did you feel dejected today, inferior, debased? Shall I tell you why?

Your inordinate ambition is boundless. Your grounds are not focused on the good of the matter but on your vanity. You do not work for humanity but for your self-interest. You do not strive for the completion of the thing but for the general recognition and safeguarding of your own advantage. I want to honor you with a prickly crown of iron; it has teeth inside that bore themselves into your flesh.

And now we come to the vile swindle that you pursue with your cleverness. You speak skillfully and abuse your capability and discolor, tone down, strengthen, apportion light and shade, and loudly proclaim your honorableness and upright good faith. You exploit the good faith of others, you gloatingly catch them in your snares and speak of your benevolent superiority and the prize that you are for others. You play at modesty and do not mention your merit, in the certain hope that someone else will do it for you; you are disappointed and hurt if this doesn't happen.

You preach hypocritical composure. But when it really matters, are you calm? No, you lie. You consume yourself in rage and your tongue speaks cold daggers and you dream of revenge.

You are gloating and resentful. You begrudge the other the sunshine, since you would like to assign it to those whom you favor because they favor you. You are envious of all well-being around you and you impertinently assert the opposite.

Inside yourself you think unsparingly and coarsely only what always suits you, and with this you feel yourself above humanity and not in the least responsible. But you are responsible to humanity in everything that you think, feel, and do. Do not pretend there is a difference between thinking and doing. You rely only on your undeserved advantage, not to be compelled to say or do what you think and feel.

But you are shameless in everything where no one sees you. If another said that to you, you would be mortally offended, despite knowing that it is true. You want to reproach others for their failings? So that they better themselves? Yes, confess, have you bettered yourself? From where do you get the right to have opinions of others? What is your opinion about yourself? And what are the good grounds that support it? Your grounds are webs of lies covering a dirty corner. You judge others and charge them with what they should do. You do this because you have no order within yourself, because you are unclean.

And then -- how do you really think? It appears to me that you even think with men, regardless of their human dignity; you dare think by means of them, and use them as figures on your stage, as if they were how you conceive them? Have you ever considered that you thus commit a shameful act of power, as bad as that for which you condemn others, namely that they love their fellow men, as they claim, but in reality exploit them to their own ends. Your sin flourishes in seclusion, but it is no less great, remorseless, and coarse.

What is concealed in you I will drag out into the light, shameless one! I will crush your superiority under my feet.

Do not speak to me about your love. What you call love oozes with self-interest and desirousness. But you speak about it with great words, and the greater your words are, the more pathetic your so-called love is. Never speak to me of your love, but keep your mouth shut. It lies.

I want you to speak about your shame, and that instead of speaking great words, you utter a discordant clamor before those whose respect you wanted to exact. You deserve mockery, not respect.

I will burn out of you the contents of which you were proud, so that you will become empty like a poured-out vessel. You should be proud of nothing more than your emptiness and wretchedness. You should be a vessel of life, so kill your idols.

Freedom does not belong to you, but form; not power, but suffering and conceiving.

You should make a virtue out of your self-contempt, which I will spread out before men like a carpet. They should walk over it with dirty feet and you should see to it that you are dirtier than all the feet that step on you.

[7] If I tame you, beast, I give others the opportunity to tame their beasts. The taming begins with you, my I, nowhere else. Not that you, stupid brother I, had been particularly wild. There are some who are wilder. But I must whip you until you endure the wildness of the others. Then I can live with you. If someone does you wrong, I will torment you to death, until you have forgiven the wrong suffered, yet not just by paying lip service, but also in your heavy heart with its heinous sensitivity. Your sensitivity is your particular form of violence.

Therefore listen, brother in my solitude, I have prepared every kind of torture for you, if it should ever occur to you again to be sensitive. You should feel inferior. You should be able to bear the fact that one calls your purity dirty and that one desires your dirtiness, that one praises your wastefulness as miserliness and your greed as a virtue.

Fill your beaker with the bitter drink of subjugation, since you are not your soul. Your soul is with the fiery God who flamed up to the roof of the heavens.

***

Should you still be sensitive? I notice that you are forging secret plans for revenge, plotting deceitful tricks. But you are an idiot, you cannot take revenge on fate. Childish one, you probably even want to lash the sea. Build better bridges instead; that is a better way to squander your wit.

You want to be understood? That's all we needed! Understand yourself, and you will be sufficiently understood. You will have quite enough work in hand with that. Mothers' little dears want to be understood. Understand yourself, that is the best protection against sensitivity and satisfies your childish longing to be understood. I suppose you want to turn others into slaves of your desirousness again? But you know that I must live with you and that I will no longer tolerate such abject plaintiveness. [8]

***

{2} After I had spoken these and many more angry words to my I, I noticed that I began to bear being alone with myself. But the touchiness still stirred in me frequently and I had to lash myself just as often. And I did this until even the pleasure in self-torment faded. [9]

[10] Then I heard a voice one night; it came from afar and was the voice of my soul. She spoke: "How distant you are!"

I: "Is that you my soul, from which height and distance do you speak?"

S: "I am above you. I am a world apart. I have become sunlike. I received the seeds of fire. Where are you? I can hardly find you in your mists."

I: "I am down on the murky earth, in the dark smoke that the fire left us, and my gaze does not reach you. But your voice sounds closer."

S: "I feel it. The heaviness of the earth penetrates me, damp cold enshrouds me, gloomy memories of former pain overcome me."

I: "Do not lower yourself into the smoke and the darkness of the earth. I would like that which I am still working on to remain sunlike. Otherwise I will lose the courage to live further down in the darkness of the earth. Let me just hear your voice. I will never want to see you in the flesh again. Say something! Take it from the depths, from which fear perhaps flows to me."

S: "I cannot, since your creative source flows from there."

I: "You see my uncertainty."

S: "The uncertain way is the good way. Upon it lie possibilities. Be unwavering and create."

I heard the rushing of wings. I knew that the bird rose higher, above the clouds in the fiery brilliance of the outspread Godhead.

[11] I turned to my brother, the I; he stood sadly and looked at the ground and sighed, and would rather have been dead, since the burden of enormous suffering burdened him. But a voice spoke from me and said:

"It is hard -- the sacrificed fall left and right -- and you will be crucified for the sake of life."

And I said to my I: "My brother, how do you like this speech?"

But he sighed deeply and moaned: "It is bitter, and I suffer much."

To which I answered: "I know, but it is not to be altered." But I did not know what that was, since I still did not know what the future held (this happened on the 21st May of the year 1914). In the excess of suffering I looked up to the clouds and called out to my soul and asked her. And I heard her voice, happy and bright, and she answered:

"Much happiness has happened to me. I rise higher, my wings grow."

I was seized with bitterness at these words and I cried: "You live from the blood of the human heart."

I heard her laughing -- or was she not laughing? "No drink is dearer to me than red blood."

Powerless anger seized me and I called out: "If you were not my soul who followed the God to the eternal realm, I would call you the most terrible scourge of men. But who moves you? I know that divinity is not humanity. The divine consumes the human. I know that this is the severity, this is the cruelty; he who has felt you with his hands can never remove the blood from his hands. I have become enslaved to you."

She answered: "Do not be angry, do not complain. Let the bloody victims fall at your side. It is not your severity, it is not your cruelty, but necessity. The way of life is sown with fallen ones."

I: "Yes, I see, it is a battlefield. My brother, what is with you? Are you groaning?"

Then my I answered: "Why should I not groan and moan? I load myself with the dead and cannot haul their number."

But I did not understand my I and therefore spoke to him: "You are a pagan, my friend! Have you not heard that it is said, let the dead bury their dead? [12] Why do you want to be burdened with the dead? You do not help them by hauling them."

Then my I wailed: "But I pity the poor fallen ones, they cannot reach the light. Perhaps if I haul them --?"

I: "What is this? Their souls have accomplished as much as they could. Then they encountered fate. It will also happen to us. Your compassion is sick."

But my soul called from afar: "Leave him compassion, compassion binds life and death."

These words of my soul stung me. She spoke of compassion, she, who rose up following the God without compassion, and I asked her:

[13] "Why did you do that?"

For my human sensitivity could not grasp the hideousness of that hour. She answered:

"It is not meant for me to be in your world. I besmirch myself on the excrement of your earth."

I: "Am I not earth? Am I not excrement? Did I commit an error that forced you to follow the God into the upper realms?"

S: "No, it was inner necessity. I belong to the Above."

I: "Has no one suffered an irreplaceable loss through your disappearance?"

S: "On the contrary; you have enjoyed utmost benefit."

I: "If I heed my human feeling about this, doubt could come over me."

S: "What have you noticed? Why should what you see always be untrue? It is your particular wrong that you cannot stop making a fool of yourself. Can you not remain on your way for once?"

I: "You know that I doubt, because of my love for men."

S: "No, for the sake of your weakness, for the sake of your doubt and disbelief. Stay on your way and do not run away from yourself. There is a divine and a human intention. They cross each other in stupid and godforsaken people, to whom you also belong from time to time."

Since what my soul spoke about referred to nothing that I could see, nor could I see what my I suffered from (since this happened two months before the outbreak of the war), I wanted to understand it all as personal experiences within me, and consequently I could neither understand nor believe it all, since my belief is weak. And I believe that it is better in our time if belief is weak. We have outgrown that childhood where mere belief was the most suitable means to bring men to what is good and reasonable. Therefore if we wanted to have a strong belief again today, we would thus return to that earlier childhood. But we have so much knowledge and such a thirst for knowledge in us that we need knowledge more than belief. But the strength of belief would hinder us from attaining knowledge. Belief certainly may be something strong, but it is empty, and too little of the whole man can be involved, if our life with God is grounded only on belief. Should we simply believe first and foremost? That seems too cheap to me. Men who have understanding should not just believe, but should wrestle for knowledge to the best of their ability. Belief is not everything, but neither is knowledge. Belief does not give us the security and the wealth of knowing. Desiring knowledge sometimes takes away too much belief. Both must strike a balance.

But it is also dangerous to believe too much, because today everyone has to find his own way and encounters in himself a beyond full of strange and mighty things. He could easily take everything literally with too much belief and would be nothing but a lunatic. The childishness of belief breaks down in the face of our present necessities. We need differentiating knowledge to clear up the confusion which the discovery of the soul has brought in. Therefore it is perhaps much better to await better knowledge before one accepts things all too believingly. [14]

From these considerations I spoke to my soul:

"Is all that to be accepted? You know in what sense I ask this. It is not stupid and unbelieving to ask thus, but is doubting of a higher type."

To this she answered: "I understand you -- but it is to be accepted."

To which I replied: "The solitude of this acceptance terrifies me. I dread the madness that befalls the solitary."

She answered: "As you already know, I have long predicted solitude for you. You need not be afraid of madness. What I predict is valid."

These words filled me with disquiet, since I felt that I could almost not accept what my soul predicted, because I did not understand it. I always wanted to understand it with regard to myself. Therefore I said to my soul: "What misunderstood fear torments me?"

"That is your disbelief, your doubt. You do not want to believe in the size of the sacrifice that is required. But it will go on to the bitter end. Greatness requires greatness. You still want to be too cheap. Did I not speak to you of abandonment, of leaving be? Do you want to have it better than other men?"

"No," I replied, "No, that is not it. But I fear committing an injustice to men if I go my own way."

"What do you want to avoid?" she said; "there is no avoidance. You must go your way, unconcerned about others, no matter whether they are good or bad. You have laid your hand on the divine, which those have not."

I could not accept these words since I feared deception. Therefore I also did not want to accept this way that forced me into dialogue with my soul. I preferred to speak with men. But I felt compelled toward solitude and I feared at the same time the solitude of my thinking which departed from accustomed paths. [15] As I pondered this, my soul spoke to me: "Did I not predict dark solitude for you?"

"I know," I answered, "but I did not really think that it would happen. Must it be so?"

"You can only say yes. There is nothing to do other than for you to take care of your cause. If anything should happen, it can only happen on this way."

"So it is hopeless," I cried, "to resist solitude?"

"It is utterly hopeless. You should be forced into your work."

As my soul spoke thus, an old man with a white beard and a haggard face approached me. [16] I asked him what he wanted with me. To which he replied:

"I am a nameless one, one of the many who lived and died in solitude. The spirit of the times and the acknowledged truth required this from us. Look at me -- you must learn this. Things have been too good for you." [17]

"But," I replied, "is this another necessity in our so very different time?"

"It is as true today as it was yesterday. Never forget that you are a man and therefore you must bleed for the goal of humanity. Practice solitude assiduously without grumbling so that everything will in time become ready. You should become serious, and hence take your leave from science. There is too much childishness in it. Your way goes toward the depths. Science is too superficial, mere language, mere tools. But you must set to work." [18]

I did not know what work was mine, since everything was dark. And everything became heavy and doubtful and an endless sadness seized me and lasted for many days. Then, one night, I heard the voice of an old man. He spoke slowly, heavily, and his sentences appeared to be disconnected and terribly absurd, so that the fear of madness seized me again. [19] For he spoke the following words:

[20] "It is not yet the evening of days. The worst comes last.
The hand that strikes first, strikes best.
Nonsense streams from the deepest wells, amply like the Nile.
Morning is more beautiful than night.
Flowers smell until they fade.
Ripeness comes as late as possible in spring, or else it misses its purpose."


***

These sentences that the old man spoke to me on the night of the 25 May of the year 1914 appeared to me dreadfully meaningless. I felt my I squirm in pain. It moaned and wailed about the burden of the dead that rested on it. It seemed as if it had to carry a thousand dead.

This sadness did not leave until the 24th June 1914. [21] In the night my soul spoke to me: "The greatest comes to the smallest." After this nothing further was said. And then the war broke out. This opened my eyes about what I had experienced before, and it also gave me the courage to say all of that which I have written in the earlier part of this book.

***

{3} From there on the voices of the depths remained silent for a whole year. Again in summer, when I was out on the water alone, I saw an osprey plunge down not far from me; he seized a large fish and rose up into the skies again clutching it. [22] I heard the voice of my soul, and she spoke: "That is a sign that what is below is borne upward."

http://rapeutation.com/redbookjungsymbol.1o_small.gif

-- The Pictorial Language of Hieronymus Bosch, by Clement A. Wertheim Aymes


Soon after this on an autumn night I heard the voice of an old man (and this time I knew that it was Image). [23] He said: [24] "I want to turn you around. I want to master you. I want to emboss you like a coin. I want to do business with you. One should buy and sell you. [25] You should pass from hand to hand. Self-willing is not for you. You are the will of the whole. Gold is no master out of its own will and yet it rules the whole, despised and greedily demanded, an inexorable ruler: it lies and waits. He who sees it longs for it. It does not follow one around, but lies silently, with a brightly gleaming countenance, self-sufficient, a king that needs no proof of its power. Everyone seeks after it, few find it, but even the smallest piece is highly esteemed. It neither gives nor squanders itself. Everyone takes it where he finds it, and anxiously ensures that he doesn't lose the smallest part of it. Everyone denies that he depends on it, and yet he secretly stretches out his hand longingly toward it. Must gold prove its necessity? It is proven through the longing of men. Ask it: who takes me? He who takes it, has it. Gold does not stir. It sleeps and shines. Its brilliance confuses the senses. Without a word, it promises everything that men deem desirable. It ruins those to be ruined and helps those on the rise to ascend. [26]

A blazing hoard is piled up, it awaits the taker. What tribulations do men not take upon themselves for the sake of gold? It waits and does not shorten their tribulations -- the greater the tribulations, the greater the trouble, the more esteemed it is. It grows from underground, from the molten lava. It slowly exudes, hidden in veins and rocks. Man exerts all cunning to dig it out, to raise it."

But I called out dismayed: "What ambiguous speech, Oh Image!"

[27] But Image continued: "Not only to teach, but also to disavow, or why then did I teach? If I do not teach, I do not have to disavow. But if I have taught, I must disavow thereafter. For if I teach, I must give others what they should have taken. What he acquires is good, but the gift that was not acquired is bad. To waste oneself means to want to suppress many. Deceitfulness surrounds the giver because his own enterprise is deceitful. He is forced to revoke his gift and to deny his virtue.

The burden of silence is not greater than the burden of my self that I would like to load onto you. Therefore I speak and I teach. May the listener defend himself against my ruse, by means of which I burden him.

The best truth is also such a skillful deception that I also entangle myself in it as long as I do not realize the worth of a successful ruse."

And I was startled again and cried: "Oh Image, men have deceived themselves about you, therefore you deceive them. But he who fathoms you, fathoms himself."

[28] But Image fell silent and retired into the shimmering cloud of uncertainty. He left me to my thoughts. And it occurred to me that high barriers would still need to be erected between men, less to protect them against mutual burdens than against mutual virtues. It seemed to me as if the so-called Christian morality of our time made for mutual enchantment. How can anyone bear the burden of the other, if it is still the highest that one can expect from a man, that he at least bears his own burden.

But sin probably resides in enchantment. If I accept self-forgetting virtue, I make myself the selfish tyrant of the other, and I am thus also forced to surrender myself again in order to make another my master, which always leaves me with a bad impression and is not to the other's advantage. Admittedly, this interplay underpins society, but the soul of the individual becomes damaged since man thus learns always to live from the other instead of from himself. It appears to me that if one is capable, one should not surrender oneself as that induces, indeed even forces, the other to do likewise. But what happens if everyone surrenders themselves? That would be folly.

Not that it would be a beautiful or a pleasant thing to live with one's self but it serves the redemption of the self. Incidentally, can one give oneself up? With this one becomes one's own slave. That is the opposite of accepting oneself. If one becomes one's own slave -- and this happens to everyone who surrenders himself -- one is lived by the self. One does not live one's self; it lives itself. [29]

The self-forgetting virtue is an unnatural alienation from one's own essence, which is thus deprived of development. It is a sin to deliberately alienate the other from his self by means of one's own virtuousness, for example, through saddling oneself with his burden. This sin rebounds on us. [30]

It is submission enough, amply enough, if we subjugate ourselves to our self. The work of redemption is always first to be done on ourselves, if one dare utter such a great word. This work cannot be done without love for ourselves. Must it be done at all? Certainly not, if one can endure a given condition and does not feel in need of redemption. The tiresome feeling of needing redemption can finally become too much for one. Then one seeks to rid oneself of it and thus enters into the work of redemption.

It appears to me that we benefit in particular from removing every sense of beauty from the thought of redemption, and even need to do so, or else we will deceive ourselves again because we like the word and because a beautiful shimmer spreads out over the thing through the great word. But one can at least doubt whether the work of redemption is in itself a beautiful thing. The Romans did not find the hanged Jew exactly tasteful, and the gloomy excessive enthusiasm for catacombs around which cheap, barbaric symbols gathered probably lacked a pleasant shimmer in their eyes, given that their perverse curiosity for everything barbaric and subterranean had already been aroused.

I think it would be most correct and most decent to say that one blunders into the work of redemption unintentionally, so to speak, if one wants to avoid what appears to be the unbearable evil of an insurmountable feeling of needing redemption. This step into the work of redemption is neither beautiful nor pleasant nor does it divulge an inviting appearance. And the thing itself is so difficult and full of torment that one should count oneself as one of the sick and not as one of the overhealthy who seek to impart their abundance to others.

Consequently we should also not use the other for our own supposed redemption. The other is no stepping stone for our feet. It is far better that we remain with ourselves. The need for redemption rather expresses itself through an increased need for love with which we think we can make the other happy. But meanwhile we are brimming with longing and desire to alter our own condition. And we love others to this end. If we had already achieved our purpose, the other would leave us cold. But it is true that we also need the other for our own redemption. Perhaps he will lend us his help voluntarily, since we are in a state of sickness and helplessness. Our love for him is, and should not be, selfless. That would be a lie. For its goal is our own redemption. Selfless love is true only as long as the demand of the self can be pushed to one side. But someday comes the turn of the self. Who would want to lend himself to such a self for love? Certainly only one who does not yet know what excess of bitterness, injustice, and poison the self of a man harbors who has forgotten his self and made a virtue of it.

In terms of the self, selfless love is a veritable sin.

[31] We must presumably often go to ourselves to re-establish the connection with the self, since it is torn apart all too often, not only by our vices but also by our virtues. For vices as well as virtues always want to live outside. But through constant outer life we forget the self and through this we also become secretly selfish in our best endeavors. [32] What we neglect in ourselves blends itself secretly into our actions toward others.

Through uniting with the self we reach the God. [33]

I must say this, not with reference to the opinions of the ancients or this or that authority, but because I have experienced it. It has happened thus in me. And it certainly happened in a way that I neither expected nor wished for. The experience of the God in this form was unexpected and unwanted. I wish I could say it was a deception and only too willingly would I disown this experience. But I cannot deny that it has seized me beyond all measure and steadily goes on working in me. So if it is a deception, then deception is my God. Moreover, the God is in the deception. And if this were already the greatest bitterness that could happen to me, I would have to confess to this experience and recognize the God in it. No insight or objection is so strong that it could surpass the strength of this experience. And even if the God had revealed himself in a meaningless abomination, I could only avow that I have experienced the God in it. I even know that it is not too difficult to cite a theory that would sufficiently explain my experience and join it to the already known. I could furnish this theory myself and be satisfied in intellectual terms, and yet this theory would be unable to remove even the smallest part of the knowledge that I have experienced the God. I recognize the God by the unshakeableness of the experience. I cannot help but recognize him by the experience. I do not want to believe it, I do not need to believe it, nor could I believe it. How can one believe such? My mind would need to be totally confused to believe such things. Given their nature, they are most improbable. Not only improbable but also impossible for our understanding. Only a sick brain could produce such deceptions. I am like those sick persons who have been overcome by delusion and sensory deception. But I must say that the God makes us sick. I experience the God in sickness. A living God afflicts our reason like a sickness. He fills the soul with intoxication. He fills us with reeling chaos. How many will the God break?

The God appears to us in a certain state of the soul. Therefore we reach the God through the self. [34] [35] Not the self is God, although we reach the God through the self. The God is behind the self, above the self, the self itself, when he appears. But he appears as our sickness, from which we must heal ourselves. [36] We must heal ourselves from the God, since he is also our heaviest wound.

For in the first instance the God's power resides entirely in the self, since the self is completely in the God, because we were not with the self. We must draw the self to our side. Therefore we must wrestle with the God for the self. Since the God is an unfathomable powerful movement that sweeps away the self into the boundless, into dissolution.

Hence when the God appears to us we are at first powerless, captivated, divided, sick, poisoned with the strongest poison, but drunk with the highest health.

Yet we cannot remain in this state, since all the powers of our body are consumed like fat in the flames. Hence we must strive to free the self from the God, so that we can live. [37]

[38] It is certainly possible and even quite easy for our reason to deny the God and to speak only of sickness. Thus we accept the sick part and can also heal it. But it will be a healing with loss. We lose a part of life. We go on living, but as ones lamed by the God. Where the fire blazed dead ashes lie.

I believe that we have the choice: I preferred the living wonders of the God. I daily weigh up my whole life and I continue to regard the fiery brilliance of the God as a higher and fuller life than the ashes of rationality. The ashes are suicide to me. I could perhaps put out the fire but I cannot deny to myself the experience of the God. Nor can I cut myself off from this experience. I also do not want to, since I want to live. My life wants itself whole.

Therefore I must serve my self. I must win it in this way. But I must win it so that my life will become whole. For it seems to me to be sinful to deform life where there is yet the possibility to live it fully. The service of the self is therefore divine service and the service of mankind. If I carry myself, I relieve mankind of myself and heal my self from the God.

I must free my self from the God, [39] since the God I experienced is more than love; he is also hate, he is more than beauty, he is also the abomination, he is more than wisdom, he is also meaninglessness, he is more than power, he is also powerlessness, he is more than omnipresence, he is also my creature.

***

In the following night, I heard the voice of Image again and he said: [40]

"Draw nearer, enter into the grave of the God. The place of your work should be in the vault. The God should not live in you, but you should live in the God."

[41] These words disturbed me since I had thought before precisely to free myself from the God. But Image advised me to enter even deeper into the God.

Since the God has ascended to the upper realms, Image also has become different. He first appeared to me as a magician who lived in a distant land, but then I felt his nearness and, since the God has ascended, I knew that Image had intoxicated me and given me a language that was foreign to me and of a different sensitivity. All of this faded when the God arose and only Image kept that language. But I felt that he went on other ways than I did. Probably the most part of what I have written in the earlier part of this book was given to me by Image. [42]Consequently I was as if intoxicated. But now I noticed that Image assumed a form distinct from me.

***

{4} [43] Several weeks later, three shades approached me. I noticed from their chilly breath that they were dead. The first figure was that of a woman. She drew near and made a soft whirring sound, the whirring of the wings of the sun beetle. Then I recognized her. When she was still alive, she recovered the mysteries of the Egyptians for me, the red sun disk and the song of the golden wings. She remained shadowy and I could hardly understand her words. She said:

"It was night when I died -- you still live in the day -- there are still days, years ahead of you -- what will you begin -- let me have the word -- oh, that you cannot hear! How difficult -- give me the word!"

I answered dismayed: "I do not know the word that you seek."

But she cried: "The symbol, the mediator, we need the symbol, we hunger for it, make light for us."

"Wherefrom? How can I? I do not know the symbol that you demand."

But she insisted: "You can do it, reach for it."

And precisely at this moment the sign was placed in my hand and I looked at it filled with boundless astonishment. Then she spoke loudly and joyfully to me: [44]

"That is it, that is HAP, the symbol that we desired, that we needed. It is terribly simple, initially stupid, naturally godlike, the God's other pole. This is precisely the pole we needed."

"Why do you need HAP?" [45] I replied.

"He is in the light, the other God is in the night."

"Oh," I answered, "what's that, beloved? The God of the spirit is in the night? Is that the son? The son of the frogs? Woe betide us, if he is the God of our day!"

But the dead one spoke full of triumph:

"He is the flesh spirit, the blood spirit, he is the extract of all bodily juices, the spirit of the sperm and the entrails, of the genitals, of the head, of the feet, of the hands, of the joints, of the bones, of the eyes and ears, of the nerves and the brain; he is the spirit of the sputum and of excretion."

"Are you of the devil?" I exclaimed full of horror, "where does my flashing godly light remain?"

But she said: "Your body remains with you, my beloved, your living body. The enlightening thought comes from the body."

"What thought are you talking about? I recognize no such thought," I said.

"It crawls around like a worm, like a serpent, soon there, soon here, a blind newt of Hell."

"Then I must be buried alive. Oh horror! Oh rottenness! Must I attach myself completely, like a leech?"

"Yes, drink blood," she said, "suck it up, get your fill from the carcass, there is juice inside, certainly disgusting, but nourishing. You should not understand, but suck!"

"Damned horror! No, three times no," I cried in outrage.

But she said: "It should not irritate you, we need this meal, the life juices of men, since we want to share in your life. Thus we can draw closer to you. We want to give you tidings of what you need to know."

"That is horribly absurd! What are you talking about?"

[46] But she looked at me as she had done on the day I had last seen her among the living, and on which she showed me, unaware of its meaning, something of the mystery of what the Egyptians had left behind. And she said to me:

"Do it for me, for us. Do you recall my legacy, the red sun disk, the golden wings and the wreath of life and duration? Immortality, of this there are things to know."

"The way that leads to this knowledge is Hell."

[47] From this I sank into gloomy brooding since I suspected the heaviness and incomprehension and the immeasurable solitude of this way. And after a long struggle with all the weakness and cowardice in me, I decided to take upon myself this solitude of the holy error and the eternally valid truth. [48]

And in the third night I called to my dead beloved and asked her:

"Teach me the knowledge of the worms and the crawling creatures, open to me the darkness of the spirits!"

She whispered: "Give blood, so that I may drink and gain speech. Were you lying when you said that you would leave the power to the son?"

"No, I was not lying. But I said something that I did not understand."

"You are fortunate," she said, "if you can say what you do not understand. So listen: HAP [49] is not the foundation but the summit of the church that still lies sunken. We need this church since we can live in it with you and take part in your life. You have excluded us to your own detriment."

"Tell me, is HAP for you the sign of the church in which you hope for community with the living? Speak, why do you hesitate?"

She moaned and whispered with a weak voice: "Give blood, I need blood." [50]

"So take blood from my heart," I spoke.

"I thank you," she said, "that is fullness of life. The air of the shadow world is thin since we hover on the ocean of the air like birds above the sea. Many went beyond limits, fluttering on indeterminate paths of outer space, bumping at hazard into alien worlds. But we, we who are still near and incomplete, would like to immerse ourselves in the sea of the air and return to earth, to the living. Do you not have an animal form into which I can enter?"

"What," I exclaimed horrified, "you would like to be my dog?"

"If possible, yes," she replied, "I would even like to be your dog. To me you are of unspeakable worth, all my hope, that still clings to earth. I would still like to see completed what I left too soon. Give me blood, much blood!"

"So drink," I said despairingly; "drink, so that what should be will be."

She whispered with a hesitant voice: "Brimo [51] -- I guess that's what you call her -- the old one -- which is how it begins -- the one who bore the son -- the powerful HAP, who grew out of her shame and strove after the wife of Heaven, who arches over earth, for Brimo, above and below, envelops the son. [52] She bears and raises him. Born from below, he fertilizes the Above, since the wife is his mother, and the mother is his wife."

"Accursed teaching! Is this still not enough of the horrifying Mysterium?" I cried full of outrage and abhorrence.

"If Heaven becomes pregnant and can no longer hold its fruit, it gives birth to a man who carries the burden of sin -- that is the tree of life and of unending duration. Give me your blood! Listen! This riddle is terrible: when Brimo, the heavenly, was pregnant, she gave birth to the dragon, first the afterbirth and then the son, HAP, and the one who carried HAP. HAP is the rebellion of the Below, but the bird comes from the Above and places itself on the head of HAP. That is peace. You are a vessel. Speak, Heaven, pour out your rain. You are a shell. Empty shells do not spill, they catch. May it stream in from all the winds. Let me tell you that another evening is approaching. A day; two days, many days have come to an end. The light of day goes down and illumines the shadow, itself a shadow of the sun. Life becomes a shadow, and the shadow enlivens itself, the shadow that is greater than you. Do you think that your shadow is your son? He is small at midday, and fills the sky at midnight." [53]

But I was exhausted and desperate and could hear no more, and so I said to the dead one:

[54] "So you introduce the terrible son who lived beneath me, under the trees on the water? Is he the spirit that the heavens pour out, or is he the soulless worm that the earth bore? Oh Heaven -- Oh most sinister womb! Do you want to suck the life out of me for the sake of the shadow? Should humanity thus completely go to waste for divinity? [55] Should I live with shadows, instead of with the living? Should all the longing for the living belong to you, the dead? Did you not have your time to live? Did you not use it? Should a living person give his life for your sake, you who did not live the eternal? Speak, you mute shadows, who stand at my door and demand my blood!"

The shadow of the dead one raised its voice and said: "You see -- or do you still not see, what the living do with your life. They fritter it away. But with me you live yourself, since I belong to you. I belong to your invisible following and community. Do you believe that the living see you? They see only your shadow, not you -- you servant, you bearer, you vessel --"

"How you hold forth! Am I at your mercy? Should I no longer see the light of day? Should I become a shadow with a living body? You are formless and beyond grasp, and you emanate the coldness of the grave, a breath of emptiness. To let myself be buried alive -- what are you thinking of? Too soon, it seems to me, I must die first. Do you have the honey that pleases my heart and the fire that warms my hands? What are you, you mournful shadows? You specters of children! What do you want with my blood? Truly, you are even worse than men. Men give little, yet what do you give? Do you make the living? The warm beauty? Or joy perhaps? Or should all this go to your gloomy Hell? What do you offer in return? Mysteries? Will the living live from these? I regard your mysteries as tricks if the living cannot live from them."

But she interrupted me and cried: "Impetuous one, stop, you take my breath away. We are shadows; become a shadow and you will grasp what we give."

"I do not want to die to descend into your darkness."

"But," she said, "you need not die. You must only let yourself be buried."

"In the hope of resurrection? No joking now!"

But she spoke calmly: "You suspect what will happen. Triple walls before you and invisibility -- to Hell with your longing and feeling! At least you do not love us, so we will cost you less dearly than the men who roll in your love and patience and have you make a fool of yourself."

"My dead one, I think you are speaking my language."

She replied to me scornfully: "Men love -- and you! What an error! All this means is that you want to run away from yourself. What do you do to men? You tempt and coax them into megalomania, to which you fall victim."

"But it grieves me, pains me, howls at me; I feel a great longing, everything soft complains, and my heart yearns."

But she was unsparing. "Your heart belongs to us," she said. "What do you want with men? Self-defense against men -- so that you walk on your own two feet, not on human crutches. Men need the undemanding, but they are always wanting love to be able to run away from themselves. This ought to stop. Why do fools go out and preach the gospel to the negroes, and then ridicule it in their own country? Why do these hypocritical preachers speak of love, divine and human love, and use the same gospel to justify the right to wage war and commit murderous injustice? Above all, what do they teach others when they themselves stand up to their necks in the black mud of deception and self-deceit? Have they cleaned their own house, have they recognized and driven out their own devil? Because they do none of this, they preach love to be able to run away from themselves, and to do to others what they should do to themselves. But this greatly prized love, given to one's own self, burns like fire. These hypocrites and liars have noticed this -- as you have -- and prefer to love others. Is that love? It is false hypocrisy. [56] It always begins in yourself and in all things and above all with love. Do you believe that one who wounds himself unsparingly does the other a good deed with his love? No, of course you don't believe it. You even know that he only teaches the other how one must wound oneself, so that he can compel others to express sympathy. Therefore you should be a shadow since this is what men need. How can they get away from the hypocrisy and foolishness of your love if you yourself cannot? For everything begins with yourself. But your horse still cannot refrain from whinnying. Even worse, your virtue is a wagging dog, a growling dog, a licking dog, a barking dog -- and you call that human love! But love is: to bear and endure oneself. It begins with this. It is truly about you; you are not yet tempered; other fires must yet come over you until you have accepted your solitude and learned to love.

What do you ask about love? What is love? To live, above all, that is more than love. Is war love? You are bound to see what human love is still good enough for -- a means like other means. Therefore, above all, solitude, until every softness toward yourself has been burnt out of you. You should learn to freeze." [57]

"I see only graves before me," I answered, "what cursed will is above me?"

"The will of the God, that is stronger than you, you slave, you vessel. You have fallen into the hands of the greater. He knows no pity. Your Christian shrouds have fallen, the veils that blinded your eyes. The God has become strong again. The yoke of men is lighter than the yoke of the God; therefore everyone seeks to yoke the other out of mercy. But he who does not fall into the hands of men falls into those of the God. May he be well and may woe betide him! There is no escape."

"Is that freedom?" I cried.

"The highest freedom. Only the God above you, through yourself. Comfort yourself with this and that as well as you can. The God bolts doors that you cannot open. Let your feelings whimper like puppies. The ears on high are deaf."

"But," I answered, "is there no outrage for the sake of the human?"

"Outrage? I laugh at your outrage. The God knows only power and creation. He commands and you act. Your anxieties are laughable. There is only one road, the military road of the Godhead."

The dead one spoke these unsparing words to me. [58] As I did not want to obey anyone, I had to obey this voice. And she spoke unsparing words about the power of the God. I had to accept these words. [59] We have to greet a new light, a blood-red sun, a painful wonder. No one forces me to; only the foreign will in me commands and I cannot escape since I find no grounds to do so.
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Re: The Red Book: Liber Novus, by C.G. Jung

Postby admin » Sun Dec 01, 2013 9:48 pm

PART 2 OF 4 (SCRUTINIES CONT'D.)

The sun, appearing to me, swam in a sea of blood and wailing; therefore I said to the dead one:

"Should it be the sacrifice of joy?"

But the dead one replied: "The sacrifice of all joy, provided that you do it yourself. Joy should neither be made nor sought; it should come, if it must come. I demand your service. You should not serve your personal devil. That leads to superfluous pain. True joy is simple: it comes and exists from itself, and is not to be sought here and there. At the risk of encountering black night, you must devote yourself to me and seek no joy. Joy can never ever be prepared, but exists of its own accord or exists not at all. All you must do is fulfill your task, nothing else. Joy comes from fulfillment, but not from longing. I have the power. I command, you obey."

"I fear that you will destroy me."

But she answered: "I am life that destroys only the unfit. Therefore take care that you are no unapt tool. You want to rule yourself? You steer your ship onto the sand. Build your bridge, stone upon stone, but don't think of wanting to take the helm. You go astray if you want to escape my service. There is no salvation without me. Why are you dreaming and hesitating?"

"You see," I answered, "that I am blind and do not know where to begin."

It always begins with the neighbor. Where is the church? Where is the community?"

"This is pure madness," I cried out indignantly, "why do you speak of a church? Am I a prophet? How can I claim such for myself? I am just a man who is not entitled to know any better than others."

But she replied: "I want the church, it is necessary for you and for others. Otherwise what are you going to do with those whom I force to your feet? The beautiful and natural will nestle into the terrible and dark and will show the way. The church is something natural. The holy ceremony must be dissolved and become spirit. The bridge should lead out beyond humanity, [60] inviolable, far, of the air. There is a community of spirits founded on outer signs with a solid meaning."

"Listen," I cried, "that doesn't bear thinking about, it's incomprehensible."

But she continued: "Community with the dead is what both you and the dead need. Do not commingle with any of the dead, but stand apart from them and give to each his due. The dead demand your expiatory prayers."

And when she spoke these words, she raised her voice and evoked the dead in my name:

"You dead, I call you.

"You shades of the departed, who have cast off the torment of living, come here!

"My blood, the juice of my life, will be your meal and your drink.

"Sustain yourself from me, so that life and speech will be yours.

"Come, you dark and restless ones, I will refresh you with my blood, the blood of a living one so that you will gain speech and life, in me and through me.

"The God forces me to address this prayer to you so that you come to life. Too long have we left you alone.

"Let us build the bond of community so that the living and the dead image will become one and the past will live on in the present.

"Our desire pulls us to the living world and we are lost in our desire.

"Come drink the living blood, drink your fill so that we will be saved from the inextinguishable and unrelenting power of vivid longing for visible, graspable, and present being.

"Drink from our blood the desire that begets evil, as quarrel, discord, ugliness, violent deed, and famishment.

"Take, eat, this is my body, that lives for you. Take, eat, drink, this is my blood, whose desire flows for you.

"Come, celebrate a Last Supper with me for your redemption and mine.

"I need community with you so that I fall prey neither to the community of the living nor to my desire and yours, whose envy is insatiable and therefore begets evil.

"Help me, so that I do not forget that my desire is a sacrificial fire for you.

"You are my community I live what I can live for the living. But the excess of my longing belongs to you, you shades. We need to live with you.

"Be auspicious to us and open our closed spirit so that we become blessed with the redeeming light. May it happen thus!"

When the dead one had ended this prayer, she turned to me again and said:

"Great is the need of the dead. But the God needs no sacrificial prayer. He has neither goodwill nor ill will. He is kind and fearful, though not actually so, but only seems to you thus. But the dead hear your prayers since they are still of human nature and not free of goodwill and ill will. Do you not understand? The history of humanity is older and wiser than you. Was there a time when there were no dead? Vain deception! Only recently have men begun to forget the dead and to think that they have now begun the real life, sending them into a frenzy."

{5} When the dead one had uttered all these words, she disappeared. I sank into gloominess and dull confusion. When I looked up again, I saw my soul in the upper realms, hovering irradiated by the distant brilliance that streamed from the Godhead. [61] And I called out:

"You know what has taken place. You see that it surpasses the power and understanding of a man. But I accept it for your sake and mine. To be crucified on the tree of life, Oh bitterness! Oh painful silence! If it weren't you, my soul, who touched the fiery Heaven and the eternal fullness, how could I?

"I cast myself before human animals -- Oh most unmanly torment! I must let my virtues, my best ability be torn apart, because they are still thorns in the side of the human animal. Not death for the sake of the best, but befouling and rending of the most beautiful for the sake of life.

"Alas, is there nowhere a salutary deception to protect me from having the Last Supper with my carcass? The dead want to live from me.

"Why did you see me as the one to drink the cess of humanity that poured out of Christendom? Haven't you had enough of beholding the fiery fullness, my soul? Do you still want to fly entire into the glaring white light of the Godhead? Into what shades of horror are you plunging me? Is the devil's pool so deep that its mud sullies even your glowing robe?

"Where do you get the right to do me such a foul deed? Let the beaker of disgusting filth pass from me. [62] But if this be not your will, then climb past fiery Heaven and lodge your charges and topple the throne of God, the dreadful, proclaim the right of men also before the Gods and take revenge on them for the infamous deed of humanity, since only Gods are able to spur on the human worm [63] to acts of colossal atrocity. Let my fate suffice and let men manage human destiny.

"Oh my mother humanity, thrust the terrible worm of God, the strangler of men, from you. Do not venerate him for the sake of his terrible poison -- a drop suffices -- and what is a drop to him -- who at the same time is all emptiness and all fullness?"

As I proclaimed these words, I noticed that Image stood behind me and had given them to me. He came alongside me invisibly, and I felt the presence of the good and the beautiful. And he spoke to me with a soft deep voice:

[64] "Remove, Oh man, the divine, too, from your soul, as far as you can manage. What a devilish farce she carries on with you, as long as she still arrogates divine power over you! She's an unruly child and a bloodthirsty daimon at the same time, a tormentor of humans without equal, precisely because she has divinity. Why? Where from? Because you venerate her. The dead too want the same thing. Why don't they stay quiet? Because they have not crossed over to the other side. Why do they want sacrifice? So they can live. But why do they still want to live with men? Because they want to rule. They have not come to an end with their craving for power, since they died still lusting for power. A child, an old man, an evil woman, a spirit of the dead, and a devil are beings who need to be humored. Fear the soul, despise her, love her, just like the Gods. May they be far from us! But above all never lose them! Because when lost they are as malicious as the serpent, as bloodthirsty as the tiger that pounces on the unsuspecting from behind. A man who goes astray becomes an animal, a lost soul becomes a devil. Cling to the soul with love, fear, contempt, and hate, and don't let her out of your sight. She is a hellish-divine treasure to be kept behind walls of iron and in the deepest vault. She always wants to get out and scatter glittering beauty. Beware, because you have already been betrayed! You'll never find a more disloyal, more cunning and heinous woman than your soul. How should I praise the miracle of her beauty and perfection? Does she not stand in the brilliance of immortal youth? Is her love not intoxicating wine and her wisdom the primordial cleverness of serpents?

"Shield men from her, and her from men. Listen to what she wails and sings in prison but don't let her escape, as she will immediately turn whore. As her husband you are blessed through her, and therefore cursed. She belongs to the daimonic race of the Tom Thumbs and giants, and is only distantly related to humankind. If you seek to grasp her in human terms you will be beside yourself. The excess of your rage, your doubt, and your love belong to her, but only the excess. If you give her this excess, humanity will be saved from the nightmare. For if you do not see your soul, you see her in fellow men and this will drive you mad, since this devilish mystery and hellish spook can hardly be seen through.

"Look at man, the weak one in his wretchedness and torment, whom the Gods have singled out as their quarry -- tear to pieces the bloody veil that the lost soul has woven around man, the cruel nets woven by the death-bringing, and take hold of the divine whore who still cannot recover from her fall from grace and craves filth and power in raving blindness. Lock her up like a lecherous bitch who would like to mingle her blood with every dirty cur. Capture her, may enough at last be enough. Let her for once taste your torment so that she will get to feel man and his hammer, which he has wrested from the Gods. [65]

The time is here! Women cannot, or do not want to, bear healthy children! Those women who would have been suited to have been mothers lament their existences as old maids, the whore gets married and rules over our domestic and public life. The whore in the whorehouse is no sin, there she fulfills her purpose. But the whore in the marriage-bed is the downfall of peoples and states. Pleasure-apes burn down the city (Prov. XXIX.8). We must finally start to "breed humans," The experiments which the landed proprietor Rashatinov performed in Perm had surprising success. As early as the second generation he obtained persons of virtually divine beauty (pol.-anth. Revue, Eisenach). Obviously this example merely concerns Slavic material. What a race we could breed from our Frisians! The kind of force a race can be has been proven by the Boers.

-- Theozoology, or the Science of the Sodomite Apelings and the Divine Electron, by Dr. Jorg Lanz von Liebenfels


"May man rule in the human world. May his laws be valid. But treat the souls, daimons, and Gods in their way, offering what is demanded. But burden no man, demand and expect nothing from him, with what your devil-souls and God-souls lead you to believe, but endure and remain silent and do piously what befits your kind. You should act not on the other but on yourself, unless the other asks for your help or opinion. Do you understand what the other does? Never -- how should you? Does the other understand what you do? Whence do you take the right to think about the other and act on him? You have neglected yourself, your garden is full of weeds, and you want to teach your neighbor about order and provide evidence for his shortcomings.

"Why should you keep silent about the others? Because there would be plenty to discuss concerning your own daimons. But if you act on and think about the other without him soliciting your opinion or advice, you do so because you cannot distinguish yourself from your soul. Therefore you fall victim to her presumption and help her into whoring. Or do you believe that you must lend your human power to the soul or the Gods, or even that it will be useful and pious work if you want to bring the Gods to bear on others? Blinded one, that is Christian presumptuousness. The Gods don't need your help, you laughable idolater, who seem to yourself like a God and want to form, improve, rebuke, educate, and create men. Are you perfect yourself? -- therefore remain silent, mind your business, and behold your inadequacy every day. You are most in need of your own help; you should keep your opinions and good advice ready for yourself and not run to others like a whore with understanding and the desire to help. You don't need to play God. What are daimons, who don't act out of themselves? So let them go to work, but not through you, or else you yourself will become a daimon to others; leave them to themselves and don't pre-empt them with awkward love, concern, care, advice, and other presumptions. Otherwise you would be doing the work of the daimons; you yourself would become a daimon and therefore go into a frenzy. But the daimons are pleased at the raving of helpless men advising and striving to help others. So stay quiet, fulfill the cursed work of redemption on yourself, for then the daimons must torment themselves and in the same way all your fellow men, who do not distinguish themselves from their souls and let themselves be mocked by daimons. Is it cruel to leave your blinded fellow human beings to their own devices? It would be cruel if you could open their eyes. But you could open their eyes only if they solicited your opinion and help. Yet if they do not, they do not need your help. If you force your help on them nonetheless, you become their daimon and increase their blindness, since you set a bad example. Draw the coat of patience and silence over your head, sit down, and leave the daimon to accomplish his work. If he brings something about, he will work wonders. Thus will you sit under fruit-bearing trees.

"Know that the daimons would like to inflame you to embrace their work, which is not yours. And, you fool, you believe that it is you and that it is your work. Why? Because you can't distinguish yourself from your soul. But you are distinct from her, and you should not pursue whoring with other souls as if you yourself were a soul, but instead you are a powerless man who needs all his force for his own completion. Why do you look to the other? What you see in him lies neglected in yourself. You should be the guard before the prison of your soul. You are your soul's eunuch, who protects her from Gods and men, or protects the Gods and men from her. Power is given to the weak man, a poison that paralyzes even the Gods, like a poison sting bestowed upon the little bee whose force is far inferior to yours. Your soul could seize this poison and thereby endanger even the Gods. So put the soul under wraps, distinguish yourself from her, since not only your fellow men but also the Gods must live."

When Image had finished, I turned to my soul, who had come nearer from above during Image's speech, and spoke to her:

"Have you heard what Image has been saying? How does this tone strike you? Is his advice good?"

But she said, "Do not mock, or else you strike yourself. Do not forget to love me."

"It is difficult for me to unite hate and love," I replied.

"I understand," she said, "yet you know that it is the same. Hate and love mean the same to me, like all women of my kind, form matters less to me than that everything belong to me or else to no one. I am also jealous of the hate you give others. I want everything, since I need everything for the great journey that I intend to begin after your disappearance. I must prepare in good time. Until then I must make timely provision and much is still lacking."

"And do you agree that I throw you into prison," I asked.

"Of course," she answered, "there I have peace and can collect myself. Your human world makes me drunk -- so much human blood -- I could get intoxicated on it to the point of madness. Doors of iron, walls of stone, cold darkness and the rations of penance -- that is the bliss of redemption. You do not suspect my torment when the bloody intoxication seizes me, hurls me again and again into living matter from a dark fearful creative urge that formerly brought me close to the lifeless and ignited the terrible lust for procreation in me. Remove me from conceiving matter, the rutting feminine of yawning emptiness. Force me into confinement where I can find resistance and my own law. Where I can think about the journey, the rising sun the dead one spoke of, and the buzzing, melodious golden wings. Be thankful -- don't you want to thank me? You are blinded. You deserve my highest thanks."

Filled with delight at these words, I cried:

"How divinely beautiful you are!" And at the same time fury seized me:

[66] "Oh bitterness! You have dragged me through sheer and utter Hell, you have tormented me nearly to death -- and I long for your thanks. Yes, I am moved that you thank me. The hound's nature lies in my blood. Therefore I am bitter -- for my sake, since how does it move you! You are divine and devilishly great, wherever and howsoever you are. As yet I am only your eunuch doorkeeper, no less imprisoned than you. Speak, you concubine of Heaven, you divine monster! Have I not fished you from the swamp? How do you like the black hole? Speak without blood, sing from your own force, you have gorged yourself on men."

Then my soul writhed and like a downtrodden worm turned and cried out, "Pity, have compassion."

"Compassion? Have you ever had compassion for me? You brute bestial tormentor! You've never gotten past compassionate moods. You lived on human food and drank my blood. Has it made you fat? Will you learn to revere the torment of the human animal? What would you souls and Gods want without man? Why do you long for him? Speak, whore!"

She sobbed, "My speech stops. I'm horrified at your accusation."

"Are you going to get serious? Are you going to have second thoughts? Are you going to learn modesty or perhaps even some other human virtue, you soulless soul-being? Yes, you have no soul, because you are the thing itself, you fiend. Would you like a human soul? Should I perhaps become your earthly soul so that you will have a soul? You see, I've gone to your school. I've learned how one behaves as a soul, perfectly ambiguous, mysteriously untruthful and hypocritical."

While I spoke to my soul in this way, Image stood silently a little distance off. But now he stepped forward, laid his hand on my shoulder, and spoke in my name:

"You are blessed, virgin soul, praised be your name. You are the chosen one among women. You are the God-bearer. Praise be to you! Honor and fame be yours in eternity.

"You live in the golden temple. The peoples come from afar and praise you.

"We, your vassals, wait on your words.

"We drink red wine, dispensing a sacrificial drink in recollection of the meal of blood that you celebrated with us.

"We prepare a black chicken for a sacrificial meal in remembrance of the man who fed you.

"We invite our friends to the sacrificial meal, carrying wreaths of ivy and roses in remembrance of the farewell you took from your saddened vassals and maids.

"Let this day be a festival celebrating joy and life -- the day upon which you, blessed one, commence the return journey from the land of men where you have learned how to be a soul.

"You follow the son who ascended and passed over.

"You carry us up as your soul and set yourself before the son of God, maintaining your immortal right as an ensouled being.

"We are joyful, good things will follow you. We lend you strength. We are in the land of men and we are alive."

After Image had ended, my soul looked saddened and pleased, and hesitated and yet hurried to prepare herself to leave us and to ascend again, happy at the regained freedom. But I suspected something secret in her, something that she sought to hide from me. Therefore I did not let her make off, but spoke to her: [67]

"What holds you back? What are you hiding? Probably a golden vessel, a jewel that you have stolen from men? Isn't that a gem, a piece of gold, shining through your robe? What is the beautiful thing that you robbed when you drank the blood of men and ate their sacred flesh? Speak the truth, for I see the lie on your face."

"I haven't taken anything," she answered annoyed.

"You are lying, you want to cast suspicion on me, where you are lacking. Those times when you could rob men unpunished are over. Surrender everything that is his sacred inheritance and that you have rapaciously claimed. You have stolen from the vassal and the beggar. God is rich and powerful, you can steal from him. His kingdom knows no loss. Shameful liar, when will you finally stop plaguing and robbing your humanity?"

But she looked at me as innocently as a dove and said gently:

"I do not suspect you. I wish you well. I respect your right. I acknowledge your humanity. I do not take anything away from you. I do not withhold anything from you. You possess everything, I, nothing."

"Yet," I exclaimed, "you lie insufferably. You possess not only that marvelous thing that belongs to me, but you also have access to the Gods and eternal fullness. Therefore surrender what you have stolen, liar."

Now she was vexed and replied:

"How can you? I no longer recognize you. You are crazy, even more: you are laughable, a childish ape, who extends his paw toward everything that glitters. But I will not allow what is mine to be taken from me."

Then I cried enraged, "You're lying, you're lying; I saw the gold, I saw the sparkling light of the jewel; I know it belongs to me. You ought not take that away from me. Give it back!"

Then she broke out in defiant tears and said, "I don't want to part with it, it's too precious to me. Do you want to rob me of the last ornament?"

"Embellish yourself with the gold of the Gods, but not with the meager treasures of earthbound human beings. May you taste heavenly poverty after you have preached earthly poverty and necessity to your humankind, like a true and proper cleric full of lies, who fills his belly and purse and preaches poverty."

"You torment me awfully," she wailed, "leave me just this one thing. You men still have enough. I cannot be without this very one, this incomparable one, for whose sake even the Gods envy men."

"I will not be unjust," I replied, "But give me what belongs to me and beg for what you need from it. What is it? Speak!"

"Alas, that I can neither keep it nor conceal it! It is love, warm human love, blood, warm red blood, the holy source of life, the unification of everything separated and longed for."

"So," I said, "it is love that you claim as a natural right and property, although you still ought to beg for it. You get drunk on the blood of man and let him starve. Love belongs to me. I want to love, not you through me. You'll crawl and beg for it like a dog. You'll raise your hands and fawn like hungry hounds. I possess the key. I will be a more just administrator than you godless Gods. You will gather around the source of blood, the sweet miracle, and you will come bearing gifts so that you may receive what you need. I protect the holy source so that no God can seize it for himself. The Gods know no measure and no mercy. They get drunk on the most precious of draughts. Ambrosia and nectar [68] are the flesh and blood of men, truly a noble meal. They waste the drink in drunkenness, the goods of the poor, since they have neither God nor soul presiding over them as their judges. Presumptuousness and excessiveness, severity and callousness are your essence. Greed for the sake of greed, power for the sake of power, pleasure for the sake of pleasure, immoderation and insatiableness: this is how one recognizes you, you daimons.

"Yes, you have yet to learn, you devils and Gods, you daimons and souls, to crawl in the dust for the sake of love so that from someone somewhere you snatch a drop of the living sweetness. Learn humility and pride from men for the sake of love.

"You Gods, your first born son is man. He bore a terribly beautiful-ugly son of God who is renewal to you all. But this mystery, too, fulfills you: you bore a son of men who is my renewal, no less splendid-terrible, and his rule also will serve you."

Then Image approached me, raised his hand, and spoke: [69]

"Both God and man are disappointed victims of deception, blessedly blessed, powerlessly powerful. The eternally rich universe unfolds again in the earthly Heaven and the Heaven of the Gods, in the underworlds and in the worlds above. Separation once more comes to the agonizingly united and yoked. Endless multiplicity takes the place of what has been forced together, since only diversity is wealth, blood, and harvest."

A night and a day passed, and when night came again and I looked around I saw that my soul hesitated and waited. So I addressed her: [70]

"What, you're still here? Didn't you find the way or didn't you find the words, which belong to me? How do you honor humankind, your earthly soul? Recall what I bore and suffered for you, how I wasted myself, how I lay before you and writhed, how I gave my blood to you! I have an obligation to lay on you: learn to honor humankind, for I saw the land that is promised to man, the land where milk and honey flows. [71]

"I saw the land of the promised love.

"I saw the splendor of the sun on that land.

"I saw the green forests, the golden vineyards and the villages of man.

"I saw the towering mountains with hanging fields of eternal snow.

"I saw the fruitfulness and fortune of the earth.

"None but I saw the fortune of man.

"You, my soul, force mortal men to labor and suffer for your salvation. I demand that you do this for the earthly fortune of humankind. Pay heed! I speak in both my name and the name of mankind, since our power and glory are yours, thine is the kingdom and our promised land. So bring it about, employing your abundance! I will remain silent, yes, I will leave you be, it depends on you; you can bring about what man is denied to create. I stand waiting. Torment yourself, so that you come to find it. Where is your own salvation, if you fail in your duty to bring about that of man? Pay heed! You will be working for me, and I will remain silent."

"Now then," she said, "I want to set to work. But you must build the furnace. Throw the old, the broken, the worn out, the unused, and the ruined into the melting pot, so that it will be renewed for fresh use.

"It is the custom of the ancients, the tradition of the ancestors, observed since days of old. It is to be adapted for new use. It is practice and incubation in a smelter, a taking-back into the interior, into the hot accumulation where rust and brokenness are taken away through the heat of the fire. It is a holy ceremony, help me so that my work may succeed.

I thought that, in his usual purse-proud manner, he was going to boast that his bronzes were all imported from Corinth, but he did even better by saying, "Wouldn't you like to know how it is that I'm the only one that can show the real Corinthian? Well, it's because the bronze worker I patronize is named Corinthus, and what's Corinthian unless it's what a Corinthus makes? And, so you won't think I'm a blockhead, I'm going to show you that I'm well acquainted with how Corinthian first came into the world. When Troy was taken, Hannibal, who was a very foxy fellow and a great rascal into the bargain, piled all the gold and silver and bronze statues in one pile and set 'em afire, melting these different metals into one: then the metal workers took their pick and made bowls and dessert dishes and statuettes as well. That's how Corinthian was born; neither one nor the other, but an amalgam of all. But I prefer glass, if you don't mind my saying so; it don't stink, and if it didn't break, I'd rather have it than gold, but it's cheap and common now."

-- Satyricon, by Petronius


"Touch the earth, press your hand into matter, shape it with care. The power of matter is great. Did HAP not come from matter? Is matter not the filling of emptiness? By forming matter, I shape your salvation. If you do not doubt the power of HAP, how can you doubt the power of its mother, matter? Matter is stronger than HAP, since HAP is the son of the earth. The hardest matter is the best; you should form the most durable matter. This strengthens thought."

***

{6} I did as my soul advised, and formed in matter the thoughts that she gave me. She spoke often and at length to me about the wisdom that lies behind us. [72] But one night she suddenly came to me with a sense of unease and anxiety and exclaimed: [73] "What am I seeing? What does the future harbor? Blazing fire? A fire hovers in the air -- it draws near -- a flame -- many flames -- a searing miracle -- how many lights burn? My beloved, it is the mercy of the eternal fire -- the breath of fire descends on you!"

But I cried out in horror, "I fear something terrible and dreadful, I am deeply afraid, since the things that you announced beforehand were awful -- must everything be broken, burned, and destroyed?"

"Patience," she said and stared into the distance, "fire surrounds you -- an immeasurable sea of embers."

"Don't torture me -- what dreadful mysteries do you possess? Speak, I implore you. Or are you lying again, damned tormenting spirit, deceiving fiend? What are your treacherous specters supposed to mean?"

But she answered calmly, "I also want your fear."

"What for? To torment me?"

But she continued, "To bring it before the ruler of this world. [74] He demands the sacrifice of your fear. He appreciates your sacrifice. He [75] has mercy upon you."

"Mercy upon me? What is that supposed to mean? I want to hide myself from him. My face shrinks from the ruler of this world, for it is branded, it bears a mark, it beheld the forbidden. Therefore I avoid the ruler of this world."

"But you should come before him," she said, "he has heard about your fear."

"You instilled this fear in me. Why did you give me away?"

"You have been summoned to serve him."

But I moaned and exclaimed: "Thrice damned fate! Why can't you leave me in seclusion? Why has he chosen me for sacrifice? Thousands would gladly throw themselves before him! Why must it be me? I cannot, I don't want to."

But the soul said, "You possess the word that should not be allowed to remain concealed."

"What is my word?" I answered, "it is the stammering of a minor; it is my poverty and my incapacity, my inability to do otherwise. And you want to drag this before the ruler of this world?"

But she looked straight into the distance and said, "I see the surface of the earth and smoke sweeps over it -- a sea of fire rolls close in from the north, it is setting the towns and villages on fire, plunging over the mountains, breaking through the valleys, burning the forests -- people are going mad -- you go before the fire in a burning robe with singed hair, a crazy look in your eyes, a parched tongue, a hoarse and foul-sounding voice -- you forge ahead, you announce what approaches, you scale the mountains, you go into every valley and stammer words of fright and proclaim the fire's agony. You bear the mark of the fire and men are horrified at you. They do not see the fire, they do not believe your words, but they see your mark and unknowingly suspect you to be the messenger of the burning agony. What fire? they ask, what fire? You stutter, you stammer, what do you know about a fire? I looked at the embers, I saw the blazing flames. May God save us."

"My soul," I cried in despair, "speak, explain, what should I proclaim? The fire? Which fire?"

"Look up, see the flames that blaze over your head -- look up, the skies redden."

With these words my soul vanished.

But I remained anxious and confused for many days. And my soul remained silent and was not to be seen. [76] But one night a dark crowd knocked at my door, and I trembled with fear. Then my soul appeared and said in haste, "They are here and will tear open your door."

"So that the wicked herd can break into my garden? Should I be plundered and thrown out onto the street? You make me into an ape and a child's plaything. When, Oh my God, shall I be saved from this Hell of fools? But I want to hack to pieces your cursed webs, go to Hell, you fools. What do you want with me?"

But she interrupted me and said, "What are you talking about? Let the dark ones speak."

I retorted, "How can I trust you? You work for yourself, not for me. What good are you, if you can't even protect me from the devil's confusion?"

"Be quiet," she replied, "or else you'll disturb the work."

And as she spoke these words, behold, Image came up to me, dressed in the white robe of a priest, and lay his hand on my shoulder. [77] Then I said to the dark ones, "So speak, you dead." And immediately they cried in many voices, [78] "We have come back from Jerusalem, where we did not find what we sought. [79] We implore you to let us in. You have what we desire. Not your blood, but your light. That is it."

Then Image lifted his voice and taught them, saying [80] (and this is the first sermon to the dead) [81]:

***

"Now hear: I begin with nothingness. Nothingness is the same as the fullness. In infinity full is as good as empty. Nothingness is empty and full. You might just as well say anything else about nothingness, for instance, that it is white, or black, or that it does not exist, or that it exists. That which is endless and eternal has no qualities, since it has all qualities.

"We call this nothingness or fullness the Pleroma. [82] Therein both thinking and being cease, since the eternal and endless possess no qualities. No one is in it, for he would then be distinct from the Pleroma, and would possess qualities that would distinguish him as something distinct from the Pleroma.

"In the Pleroma there is nothing and everything. It is fruitless to think about the Pleroma, for this would mean self-dissolution.

"Creation is not in the Pleroma, but in itself. The Pleroma is the beginning and end of creation. [83] It pervades creation, just as the sunlight pervades the air. Although the Pleroma is altogether pervasive, creation has no share in it, just as a wholly transparent body becomes neither light nor dark through the light pervading it.

"We are, however, the Pleroma itself, for we are a part of the eternal and the endless. But we have no share therein, as we are infinitely removed from the Pleroma; not spatially or temporally, but essentially, since we are distinguished from the Pleroma in our essence as creation, which is confined within time and space.

"Yet because we are parts of the Pleroma, the Pleroma is also in us. Even in the smallest point the Pleroma is endless, eternal, and whole, since small and great are qualities that are contained in it. It is nothingness that is whole and continuous throughout. Only figuratively, therefore, do I speak of creation as part of the Pleroma. Because, actually, the Pleroma is nowhere divided, since it is nothingness. We are also the whole Pleroma, because, figuratively, the Pleroma is the smallest point in us, merely assumed, not existing, and the boundless firmament about us. But why then do we speak of the Pleroma at all, if it is everything and nothing?

"I speak about it in order to begin somewhere, and also to free you from the delusion that somewhere without or within there is something fixed or in some way established from the outset. Every so-called fixed and certain thing is only relative. That alone is fixed and certain that is subject to change.

"Creation, however, is subject to change; therefore it alone is fixed and determined because it has qualities: indeed, it is quality itself.

"Thus we ask: how did the creation come into being? Creatures came into being, but not creation: since creation is the very quality of the Pleroma, as much as noncreation, eternal death. Creation is ever-present, and so is death. The Pleroma has everything, differentiation and nondifferentiation.

"Differentiation [84] is creation. It is differentiated. Differentiation is its essence, and therefore it differentiates. Therefore man differentiates, since his essence is differentiation. Therefore he also differentiates the qualities of the Pleroma that do not exist. He differentiates them on account of his own essence. Therefore he must speak of those qualities of the Pleroma that do not exist.

"You say: 'what use is there in speaking about it at all?' Did you yourself not say that it is not worth thinking about the Pleroma?

"I mentioned that to free you from the delusion that we are able to think about the Pleroma. When we distinguish the qualities of the Pleroma, we are speaking from the ground of our own differentiated state and about our own differentiation, but have effectively said nothing about the Pleroma. Yet we need to speak about our own differentiation, so that we may sufficiently differentiate ourselves. Our very nature is differentiation. If we are not true to this nature we do not differentiate ourselves enough. We must therefore make distinctions between qualities.

"You ask: 'what harm is there in not differentiating oneself?' If we do not differentiate, we move beyond our essence, beyond creation, and we fall into nondifferentiation, which is the other quality of the Pleroma. We fall into the Pleroma itself and cease to be created beings. We lapse into dissolution in nothingness. This is the death of the creature. Therefore we die to the same extent that we do not differentiate. Hence the creature's essence strives toward differentiation and struggles against primeval, perilous sameness. This is called the principium individuationis. [85] This principle is the essence of the creature. From this you can see why nondifferentiation and nondistinction pose a great danger to the creature.

"We must, therefore, distinguish the qualities of the Pleroma. These qualities are pairs of opposites, such as

"the effective and the ineffective,
the fullness and the emptiness,
the living and the dead,
the different and the same,
light and darkness,
hot and cold,
force and matter,
time and space,
good and evil,
the beautiful and the ugly,
the one and the many, etc.


"The pairs of opposites are the qualities of the Pleroma that do not exist, because they cancel themselves out. As we are the Pleroma itself, we also have all these qualities in us. Since our nature is grounded in differentiation, we have these qualities in the name and under the sign of differentiation, which means:

"First: these qualities are differentiated and separate in us; therefore they do not cancel each other out, but are effective. Thus we are the victims of the pairs of opposites. The Pleroma is rent within us.

"Second: these qualities belong to the Pleroma, and we must possess and live them only in the name and under the sign of differentiation. We must differentiate ourselves from these qualities. They cancel each other out in the Pleroma, but not in us. Distinction from them saves us.

"When we strive for the good or the beautiful, we forget our essence, which is differentiation, and we fall subject to the spell of the qualities of the Pleroma, which are the pairs of opposites. We endeavor to attain the good and the beautiful, yet at the same time we also seize the evil and the ugly, since in the Pleroma these are one with the good and the beautiful. But if we remain true to our essence, which is differentiation, we differentiate ourselves from the good and the beautiful, and hence from the evil and ugly. And thus we do not fall under the spell of the Pleroma, namely into nothingness and dissolution. [86]

"You object: you said that difference and sameness are also qualities of the Pleroma. What is it like if we strive for distinctiveness? Are we, in so doing, not true to our own nature? And must we nonetheless fall into sameness when we strive for distinctiveness?

"You must not forget that the Pleroma has no qualities. We create these through thinking. If therefore, you strive for distinctiveness or sameness, or any qualities whatsoever, you pursue thoughts that flow to you out of the Pleroma: thoughts, namely, concerning the non-existing qualities of the Pleroma. Inasmuch as you run after these thoughts, you fall again into the Pleroma, and attain distinctiveness and sameness at the same time. Not your thinking, but your essence, is differentiation. Therefore you must not strive for what you conceive as distinctiveness, but for your own essence. At bottom, therefore, there is only one striving, namely the striving for one's own essence. If you had this striving, you would not need to know anything about the Pleroma and its qualities, and yet you would attain the right goal by virtue of your own essence. Since, however, thought alienates us from our essence, I must teach you that knowledge with which you can bridle your thoughts."

[87] The dead faded away grumbling and moaning and their cries died away in the distance.

***

[88] But I turned to Image and said, "My father, you utter strange teachings. Did not the ancients teach similar things? And was it not a reprehensible heresy, removed equally from love and the truth? And why do you lay out such a teaching to this horde, which the night wind swirled up from the dark bloodfields of the West?"

"My son," Image replied, "these dead ended their lives too early. These were seekers and therefore still hover over their graves. Their lives were incomplete, since they knew no way beyond the one to which belief had abandoned them. But since no one teaches them, I must do so. That is what love demands, since they wanted to hear, even if they grumble. But why do I impart this teaching of the ancients? I teach in this way because their Christian faith once discarded and persecuted precisely this teaching. But they repudiated Christian belief and hence were rejected by that faith. They do not know this and therefore I must teach them, so that their life may be fulfilled and they can enter into death."

"But do you, Oh wise Image, believe what you teach?"

"My son," Image replied, "why do you raise this question? How could I teach what I believe? Who would give me the right to such belief? It is what I know how to say, not because I believe it, but because I know it. If I knew better, I would teach better. But it would be easy for me to believe more. Yet should I teach a belief to those who have discarded belief? And, I ask you, is it good to believe something even more, if one does not know better?" [89]

"But," I retorted, "are you certain that things really are as you say?"

To this Image answered, "I do not know whether it is the best that one can know. But I know nothing better and therefore I am certain these things are as I say. If they were otherwise I would say something else, since I would know them to be otherwise. But these things are as I know them, since my knowledge is precisely these things themselves."

"My father, is that your guarantee that you are not mistaken?"

"There are no mistakes in these things," Image replied, "there are only different levels of knowledge. These things are as you know them. Only in your world are things always other than you know them, and therefore there are only mistakes in your world."

After these words Image bent down and touched the earth with his hands and disappeared.

***

{7} That night Image stood beside me and the dead drew near and lined the walls and cried out, [90] "We want to know about God. Where is God? Is God dead?" [91]

But Image rose and said (and this is the second sermon to the dead):

***

"God is not dead. He is as alive as ever. God is creation, for he is something definite, and therefore differentiated from the Pleroma. God is a quality of the Pleroma, and everything I have said about creation also applies to him.

"But he is distinct from creation in that he is much more indefinite and indeterminable. He is less differentiated than creation, since the ground of his essence is effective fullness. Only insofar as he is definite and differentiated is he creation, and as such he is the manifestation of the effective fullness of the Pleroma.

"Everything that we do not differentiate falls into the Pleroma and is cancelled out by its opposite. If, therefore, we do not differentiate God, effective fullness is canceled out for us.

"Moreover, God is the Pleroma itself, just as each smallest point in the created and uncreated is the Pleroma itself.

"Effective emptiness is the essence of the devil. God and devil are the first manifestations of nothingness, which we call the Pleroma. It makes no difference whether the Pleroma exists or not, since it cancels itself out completely. Not so creation. Insofar as God and the devil are created beings, they do not cancel each other out, but stand one against the other as effective opposites. We need no proof of their existence. It is enough that we have to keep speaking about them. Even if both were not, creation would forever distinguish them anew out of the Pleroma on account of their distinct essences.

"Everything that differentiation takes out of the Pleroma is a pair of opposites, therefore the devil always belongs to God. [92]

"This inseparability is most intimate and, as you know from experience, as indissoluble in your life as the Pleroma itself, since both stand very close to the Pleroma in which all opposites are canceled out and united.

"Fullness and emptiness, generation and destruction, are what distinguish God and the devil. Effectiveness is common to both. Effectiveness joins them. Effectiveness, therefore, stands above both, and is a God above God, since it unites fullness and emptiness through its effectuality.

"This is a God you knew nothing about, because mankind forgot him. We call him by his name ABRAXAS. [93] He is even more indefinite than God and the devil.

"To distinguish him from God, we call God HELIOS or sun. [94] Abraxas is effect. Nothing stands opposed to him but the ineffective; hence his effective nature unfolds itself freely. The ineffective neither exists nor resists. Abraxas stands above the sun and above the devil. He is improbable probability, that which takes unreal effect. If the Pleroma had an essence, Abraxas would be its manifestation.

"He is the effectual itself, not any particular effect, but effect in general.

He takes unreal effect, because he has no definite effect.

He is also creation, since he is distinct from the Pleroma.

The sun has a definite effect, and so does the devil. Therefore they appear to us more effective than the indefinite Abraxas.

He is force, duration, change."

***

[95] The dead now raised a great tumult, for they were Christians.

***

But when Image had ended his speech, one after another the dead also stepped back into the darkness once more and the noise of their outrage gradually died away in the distance. When all the clamor had passed, I turned to Image and exclaimed:

"Pity us, wisest one! You take from men the Gods to whom they could pray. You take alms from the beggar, bread from the hungry, fire from the freezing."

Image answered and said, "My son, these dead have had to reject the belief of the Christians and therefore they can pray to no God. So should I teach them a God in whom they can believe and to whom they can pray? That is precisely what they have rejected. Why did they reject it? They had to reject it because they could not do otherwise. And why did they have no other choice? Because the world, without these men knowing it, entered into that month of the great year where one should believe only what one knows. [96] That is difficult enough, but it is also a remedy for the long sickness that arose from the fact that one believed what one did not know. I teach them the God whom both I and they know of without being aware of him, a God in whom one does not believe and to whom one does not pray, but of whom one knows. I teach this God to the dead since they desired entry and teaching. But I do not teach him to living men since they did not desire my teaching. Why, indeed, should I teach them? Therefore, I take away from them no kindly hearer of prayers, their father in Heaven. What concern is my foolishness to the living? The dead need salvation, since they are a great waiting flock hovering over their graves, and long for the knowledge that belief and the rejection of belief have breathed their last. But whoever has fallen ill and is near death wants knowledge, and he sacrifices pardon."

"It appears," I replied, "as if you teach a terrible and dreadful God beyond measure, to whom good and evil and human suffering and joy are nothing."

"My son," said Image, "Did you not see that these dead had a God of love and rejected him? Should I teach them a loving God? They had to reject him after already having long since rejected the evil God whom they call the devil. Therefore they must know a God to whom everything created is nothing, because he himself is the creator and everything created and the destruction of everything created. Have they not rejected a God who is a father, a lover, good and beautiful? One whom they thought to have particular qualities and a particular being? Therefore I must teach a God to whom nothing can be attributed, who has all qualities and therefore none, because only I and they can know such a God."

"But how, Oh my father, can men unite in such a God? Does the knowledge of such a God not amount to destroying human bonds and every society based on the good and the beautiful?"

Image answered: "These dead rejected the God of love, of the good and the beautiful; they had to reject him and so they rejected unity and community in love, in the good and the beautiful. And thus they killed one another and dissolved the community of men. Should I teach them the God who united them in love and whom they rejected? Therefore I teach them the God who dissolves unity, who blasts everything human, who powerfully creates and mightily destroys. Those whom love does not unite, fear compels."

And as Image spoke these words, he bent down swiftly to the ground, touched it with his hand, and disappeared.

{8} The following night, [97] the dead approached like fog from a swamp and exclaimed, "Tell us more about the highest God."

And Image stepped forward and began to speak (and this is the third sermon to the dead) [98]:

***

"Abraxas is the God who is difficult to grasp. His power is greatest, because man does not see it. From the sun he draws the summum bonum; [99] from the devil the infinum malum; but from Abraxas LIFE, altogether indefinite, the mother of good and evil. [100]

"Life seems to be smaller and weaker than the summum bonum; therefore it is also hard to conceive that Abraxas's power transcends even the sun's, which is the radiant source of all vital force.

"Abraxas is the sun, and at the same time the eternally sucking gorge of emptiness, of the diminisher and dismemberer, of the devil.

The power of Abraxas is twofold; but you do not see it, because in your eyes the warring opposites of this power are canceled out.

"What the Sun God speaks is life, what the devil speaks is death.

"But Abraxas speaks that hallowed and accursed word that is at once life and death.

"Abraxas produces truth and lying, good and evil, light and darkness, in the same word and in the same act. Therefore Abraxas is terrible.

"He is as splendid as the lion in the instant he strikes down his victim. He is as beautiful as a spring day.

"He is the great and the small Pan alike.

"He is Priapos.

"He is the monster of the underworld, a thousand-armed polyp, a coiled knot of winged serpents, frenzy.

"He is the hermaphrodite of the earliest beginning.

"He is the lord of toads and frogs, which live in the water and go up on the land, whose chorus ascends at noon and at midnight.

What is the heaviest thing, ye heroes? asketh the load-bearing spirit, that I may take it upon me and rejoice in my strength....To go into foul water when it is the water of truth, and not disclaim cold frogs and hot toads?... When they give themselves out as wise, then do their petty sayings and truths chill me: in their wisdom there is often an odour as if it came from the swamp; and verily, I have even heard the frog croak in it! ... Why didst thou live so long by the swamp, that thou thyself hadst to become a frog and a toad? ... At last bursteth the frog which hath inflated itself too long: then cometh out the wind. To prick a swollen one in the belly, I call good pastime. Hear that, ye boys!

-- Thus Spake Zarathustra, by Friedrich Nietzsche


"He is the fullness that seeks union with emptiness.

"He is holy begetting,

"He is love and its murder,

"He is the saint and his betrayer,

"He is the brightest light of day and the darkest night of madness.

"To look upon him, is blindness.

"To recognize him is sickness.

"To worship him is death.

"To fear him is wisdom.

"Not to resist him is redemption.

"God dwells behind the sun, the devil behind the night. What God brings forth out of the light, the devil sucks into the night. But Abraxas is the world, its becoming and its passing. Upon every gift that comes from the sun god the devil lays his curse.

"Everything that you request from the Sun God produces a deed from the devil. Everything that you create with the Sun God gives effective power to the devil.

"That is terrible Abraxas.

"He is the mightiest created being and in him creation is afraid of itself.

"He is the manifest opposition of creation to the Pleroma and its nothingness.

"He is the son's horror of the mother.

He is the mother's love for the son.

He is the delight of the earth and the cruelty of the heavens.

At his sight man's face congeals.

Before him there is no question and no reply.

He is the life of creation.

He is the effect of differentiation.

He is the love of man.

He is the speech of man.

He is the appearance and the shadow of man.

He is deceptive reality." [101]

***

[102] Now the dead howled and raged, for they were incomplete.

***
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Re: The Red Book: Liber Novus, by C.G. Jung

Postby admin » Sun Dec 01, 2013 9:48 pm

PART 3 OF 4 (SCRUTINIES CONT'D.)

But when their noisy cries had faded away, I said to Image: "How, Oh my father, should I understand this God?"

Image answered and said:

"My son, why do you want to understand him? This God is to be known but not understood. If you understand him, then you can say that he is this or that and this and not that. Thus you hold him in the hollow of your hand and therefore your hand must throw him away. The God whom I know is this and that and just as much this other and that other. Therefore no one can understand this God, but it is possible to know him, and therefore I speak and teach him."

"But," I retorted, "does this God not bring despairing confusion into the minds of men?"

To this Image said, "These dead rejected the order of unity and community since they rejected the belief in the father in Heaven who ruled with just measure. They had to reject him. Therefore I teach them the chaos that is without measure and utterly boundless, to which justice and injustice, leniency and severity, patience and anger, love and hate, are nothing. For how can I teach anything other than the God whom I know and whom they know, without being conscious of him?"

I replied, "Why, Oh solemn one, do you call the eternally incomprehensible, the cruel contradictoriness of nature, God?"

Image said, "How should I name it otherwise? If the overpowering essence of events in the universe and in the hearts of men were law, I would call it law. Yet it is also no law, but chance, irregularity, sin, error, stupidity, carelessness, folly, illegality. Therefore I cannot call it law. You know that this must be so, and at the same time you know that it did not have to be so and that at some other time it will not be so. It is overpowering and occurs as if from eternal law, and at another time a slanting wind blows a speck of dust into the works and this void is a superior strength, harder than a mountain of iron. Therefore you know that the eternal law is also no law. So I cannot call it law. But how else should it be named? I know that human language has forever named the maternal womb of the incomprehensible God. Truly, this God is and is not, since from being and nonbeing everything emerged that was, is, and will be."

But when Image had spoken the last word, he touched the earth with his hand and dissolved.

***

{9} The following night, the dead came running sooner, filling the place with their mutterings, and said:

"Speak to us about Gods and devils, accursed one."

And Image appeared and began to speak (and this is the fourth sermon to the dead) [103]:

***

"The Sun God is the highest good, the devil the opposite. Thus you have two Gods. But there are many high and good things and many great evils. Among these are two devil Gods; one is the Burning One, the other the Growing One.

The burning one is EROS, in the form of a flame. It shines by consuming. [104]

"The growing one is the TREE OF LIFE. It greens by heaping up growing living matter. [105]

"Eros flames up and dies. But the tree of life grows with slow and constant increase through measureless periods of time.

"Good and evil unite in the flame.

"Good and evil unite in the growth of the tree. In their divinity life and love stand opposed.

"The number of Gods and devils is as innumerable as the host of stars.

"Each star is a God, and each space that a star fills is a devil. But the empty fullness of the whole is the Pleroma.

''Abraxas is the effect of the whole, and only the ineffective opposes him.

"Four is the number of the principal Gods, as four is the number of the world's measurements.

"One is the beginning, the Sun God.

"Two is Eros, for he binds two together and spreads himself out in brightness.

"Three is the Tree of Life, for it fills space with bodies.

"Four is the devil, for he opens all that is closed. He dissolves everything formed and physical; he is the destroyer in whom everything becomes nothing.

"Happy am I who can recognize the multiplicity and diversity of the Gods. But woe unto you, who replace this incompatible multiplicity with a single God. In so doing you produce the torment of incomprehension, and mutilate the creation whose nature and aim is differentiation. How can you be true to your own nature when you try to turn the many into one? What you do unto the Gods is done likewise unto you. You all become equal and thus your nature [106] is maimed.

"Equality prevails not for the sake of God, but only for the sake of man. For the Gods are many, while men are few. The Gods are mighty and endure their manifoldness. Like the stars they abide in solitude, separated by vast distances. Therefore they dwell together and need communion, so that they may bear their separateness. [107] For redemption's sake I teach you the reprehensible, for whose sake I was rejected.

"The multiplicity of the Gods corresponds to the multiplicity of men.

"Numberless Gods await the human state. Numberless Gods have been men. Man shares in the nature of the Gods. He comes from the Gods and goes unto the God.

"Thus, just as it is no use to reflect upon the Pleroma, it is not worthwhile to worship the multiplicity of the Gods. Least of all does it serve to worship the first God, the effective fullness, and the summum bonum. By our prayer we can add nothing to it, and take nothing from it; because effective emptiness gulps down everything. [108] The bright Gods form the heavenly world. It is manifold and extends and increases infinitely. The Sun God is the supreme lord of the world.

"The dark Gods form the earthly world. It is simple and diminishes and declines infinitely. The devil is its nethermost lord, the moon spirit, satellite of the earth, smaller, colder, and more dead than the earth.

"There is no difference between the might of the heavenly and earthly Gods. The heavenly Gods magnify, the earthly Gods diminish. Both directions are immeasurable."

[109] Here the dead interrupted Image's speech with angry laughter and mocking shouts, and as they withdrew, their discord, mockery, and laughter faded into the distance. I turned to Image and said to him:

"Oh Image, I believe you are mistaken. It seems that you teach a raw superstition which the Fathers had successfully and gloriously overcome, that polytheism which a mind produces only when it cannot free its gaze from the force of compulsive desire chained to sensory things."

"My son," Image replied, "these dead have rejected the single and highest God. So how can I teach them about the one, only, and not multifarious God? They must of course believe me. But they have rejected their belief. So I teach them the God that I know, the multifarious and extended, who is both the thing and its appearance, and they also know him even if they are not conscious of him.

"These dead have given names to all beings, the beings in the air, on the earth and in the water. They have weighed and counted things. They have counted so and so many horses, cows, sheep, trees, segments of land, and springs; they said, this is good for this purpose, and that is good for that one. What did they do with the admirable tree? What happened to the sacred frog? Did they see his golden eye? Where is the atonement for the 7,777 cattle whose blood they spilled, whose flesh they consumed? Did they do penance for the sacred ore that they dug up from the belly of the earth? No, they named, weighed, numbered, and apportioned all things. They did whatever pleased them. And what did they do! You saw the powerful -- but this is precisely how they gave power to things unknowingly. Yet the time has come when things speak. The piece of flesh says: how many men? The piece of ore says, how many men? The ship says, how many men? The coal says, how many men? The house says: how many men? And things rise and number and weigh and apportion and devour millions of men.

"Your hand grasped the earth and tore off the halo and weighed and numbered the bones of things. Is not the one and only, simpleminded God pulled down and thrown onto a heap, the massed seeming of separate things dead and living? Yes, this God taught you to weigh and number bones. But the month of this God is drawing to a close. A new month stands at the door. Therefore everything had to be as it is, and hence everything must become different.

"This is no polytheism that I have made up! But many Gods who powerfully raise their voices and tear humanity to bloody pieces. So and so many men, weighed, numbered, apportioned, hacked, and devoured. Therefore I speak of many Gods as I speak of many things, since I know them. Why do I call them Gods? For the sake of their superiority. Do you know about this superior strength? Now is the time when you can learn.

"These dead laugh at my foolishness. But would they have raised a murderous hand against their brothers if they had atoned for the ox with the velvet eyes? If they had done penance for the shiny ore? If they had worshiped the holy trees? [110] If they had made peace with the soul of the golden-eyed frog? What say things dead and living? Who is greater, man or the Gods? Truly, this sun has become a moon and no new sun has arisen from the contractions of the last hour of the night."

And when he had finished these words, Image bent down to the earth, kissed it, and said, "Mother, may your son be strong." Then he stood, looked up at the heavens, and said, "How dark is your place of the new light." Then he disappeared.

***

{10} When the following night came, the dead approached noisily, pushing and shoving; they were scoffing and exclaimed, "Teach us, fool, about the church and holy communion."

But Image stepped before them, and began to speak: [111] (and this is the fifth sermon to the dead):

"The world of the Gods is made manifest in spirituality and in sexuality. The celestial ones appear in spirituality, the earthly in sexuality. [112]

"Spirituality conceives and embraces. It is womanlike and therefore we call it MATER COELESTIS, [113] the celestial mother. Sexuality engenders and creates. It is manlike, and therefore we call it PHALLOS, [114] the earthly father. [115] The sexuality of man is more earthly, that of woman is more spiritual. The spirituality of man is more heavenly, it moves toward the greater.

"The spirituality of woman is more earthly, it moves toward the smaller.

"Mendacious and devilish is the spirituality of man, and it moves toward the smaller.

"Mendacious and devilish is the spirituality of woman, and it moves toward the greater.

"Each shall go to its own place.

"Man and woman become devils to each other if they do not separate their spiritual ways, for the essence of creation is differentiation.

"The sexuality of man goes toward the earthly, the sexuality of woman goes toward the spiritual. Man and woman become devils to each other if they do not distinguish their sexuality.

"Man shall know the smaller, woman the greater.

"Man shall differentiate himself both from spirituality and sexuality. He shall call spirituality mother, and set her between Heaven and earth. He shall call sexuality Phallos, and set him between himself and earth. For the mother and the Phallos are superhuman daimons that reveal the world of the Gods. They affect us more than the Gods since they are closely akin to our essence. [116] If you do not differentiate yourselves from sexuality and from spirituality, and do not regard them as an essence both above and beyond you, you are delivered over to them as qualities of the Pleroma. Spirituality and sexuality are not your qualities, not things you possess and encompass. Rather, they possess and encompass you, since they are powerful daimons, manifestations of the Gods, and hence reach beyond you, existing in themselves. No man has a spirituality unto himself, or a sexuality unto himself. Instead, he stands under the law of spirituality and of sexuality. Therefore no one escapes these daimons. You shall look upon them as daimons, and as a common task and danger, a common burden that life has laid upon you. Thus life, too, is for you a common task and danger, as are the Gods, and first and foremost terrible Abraxas.

"Man is weak, and community is therefore indispensable. If your community is not under the sign of the mother, it is under the sign of the Phallos. Absence of community is suffering and sickness. Community in everything is dismemberment and dissolution.

"Differentiation leads to singleness. Singleness is opposed to community. But because of man's weakness with regard to the Gods and daimons and their invincible law, community is necessary, not for man's sake, but because of the Gods. The Gods drive you to community. Insofar as the Gods impose community upon you, it is necessary; more is bad.

"In the community every man shall submit to others, so that the community be maintained, for you need it.


"In singleness every man shall place himself above the other, so that every man may come to himself and avoid slavery.

"Abstention shall hold good in community, extravagance in singleness.

Community is depth, singleness is height.

Right measure in community purifies and preserves.

Right measure in singleness purifies and increases.

Community gives us warmth, singleness gives us light." [117]

***

{11}When Image had finished, the dead remained silent and did not move, but looked at Image with expectation. But when Image saw that the dead remained silent and waited, he continued (and this is the sixth sermon to the dead) [118]:

***

"The daimon of sexuality approaches our soul as a serpent. She is half human soul and is called thought-desire.

"The daimon of spirituality descends into our soul as the white bird. He is half human soul and is called desire-thought.

The serpent is an earthly soul, half daimonic, a spirit, and akin to the spirits of the dead. Thus too, like these she swarms around in the things of earth, making us fear them or else having them arouse our craving. The serpent has a female nature, forever seeking the company of those dead who are spellbound by the earth, and who did not find a way across to singleness. The serpent is a whore. She courts the devil and evil spirits; she is a mischievous tyrant and tormentor, forever inveigling the most evil company. The white bird is a half-celestial soul of man. He abides with the mother, descending from time to time. The bird is manlike, and is effective thought. He is chaste and solitary, a messenger of the mother. He flies high above the earth. He commands singleness. He brings knowledge from the distant ones, who have departed before and attained perfection. He bears our word up to the mother. She intercedes, she warns, but she is powerless against the Gods. She is a vessel of the sun. The serpent descends and cunningly lames the phallic daimon, or else goads him on. She bears up the too-crafty thoughts of the earthly, those thoughts that creep through every hole and cleave to all things with craving. Although the serpent does not want to, she must be of use to us. She flees our grasp, thus showing us the way, which our human wits could not find."

***

[119] When Image had finished, the dead looked on with contempt and said, "Cease this talk of Gods and daimons and souls. We have known this for a long time."

But Image smiled and replied, "You poor souls, poor in flesh and rich in spirit, the meat was fat and the spirit thin. But how do you reach the eternal light? You mock my stupidity, which you too possess: you mock yourselves. Knowledge frees one from danger. But mockery is the other side of your belief. Is black less than white? You rejected faith and retained mockery. Are you thus saved from faith? No, you bound yourselves to mockery and hence again to faith. And therefore you are miserable."

But the dead were outraged and cried, "We are not miserable, we are clever; our thinking and feeling is as pure as clear water. We praise our reason. We mock superstition. Do you believe that your old folly reaches us? A childish delusion has overcome you, old one, what good is it to us?"

Image replied: "What can do you any good? I free you from what still holds you to the shadow of life. Take this wisdom with you, add this folly to your cleverness, this unreason to your reason, and you will find yourselves. If you were men, you would then begin your life and your life's way between reason and unreason and live onward to the eternal light, whose shadow you lived in advance. But since you are dead, this knowledge frees you from life and strips you of your greed for men and it also frees your self from the shrouds that the light and the shadow lay on you, compassion with men will overcome you and from the stream you will reach solid ground, you will step forth from the eternal whirl onto the unmoving stone of rest, the circle that breaks flowing duration, and the flame will die down.

"I have fanned a glowing fire, I have given the murderer a knife, I have torn open healed-over wounds, I have quickened all movement, I have given the madman more intoxicating drink, I have made the cold colder, the heat hotter, falseness even falser, goodness even better, weakness even weaker.

"This knowledge is the axe of the sacrificer."

But the dead cried, "Your wisdom is foolishness and a curse. You want to turn the wheel back? It will tear you apart, blinded one!"

Image replied, "So this is what happened. The earth became green and fruitful again from the blood of the sacrifice, flowers sprouted, the waves crash into the sand, a silver cloud lies at the foot of the mountain, a bird of the soul came to men, the hoe sounds in the fields and the axe in the forests, a wind rushes through the trees and the sun shimmers in the dew of the risen morning, the planets behold the birth, out of the earth climbed the many-armed, the stones speak and the grass whispers. Man found himself, and the Gods wander through Heaven, the fullness gives birth to the golden drop, the golden seed, plumed and hovering."

The dead now fell silent and stared at Image and slowly crept away. But Image bent down to the ground and said: "It is accomplished, but not fulfilled. Fruit of the earth, sprout, rise up -- and Heaven, pour out the water of life."

Then Image disappeared.

***

[120] I was probably very confused when Image approached me the following night, since I called to him saying, "What did you do, Oh Image? What fires have you kindled? What have you broken asunder? Does the wheel of creations stand still?"
But he answered and said, "Everything is running its usual course. Nothing has happened, and yet a sweet and indescribable mystery has taken place: I stepped out of the whirling circle."

"What's that?" I exclaimed, "Your words move my lips, your voice sounds from my ears, my eyes see you from within me. Truly; you are a magician! You stepped out of the whirling circle? What confusion! Are you I, am I you? Did I not feel as if the wheel of creation was standing still? And yet you say that you have stepped out of the whirling circle? I am truly bound to the wheel -- I feel the rushing swaying of it -- and yet the wheel of creation also stands still for me. What did you do, father, teach me!"

Then Image said, "I stepped onto what is solid and took it with me and saved it from the wave surge, from the cycle of births, and from the revolving wheel of endless happening. It has been stilled. The dead have received the folly of the teaching, they have been blinded by truth and see by mistake. They have recognized, felt, and regretted it; they will come again and will humbly inquire. Since what they rejected will be most valuable to them."

I wanted to question Image, since the riddle distressed me. But he had already touched the earth and disappeared. And the darkness of the night was silent and did not answer me. And my soul stood silently, shaking her head, and did not know what to say about the mystery that Image had indicated and not given away.

***

{12} Another day passed and the seventh night fell.

And the dead came again, this time with pitiful gestures and said, "We forgot to mention one thing, that we would like you to teach us about men."

And Image stepped before me, and began to speak [121] (and this is the seventh sermon to the dead) [122]:

***

"Man is a gateway, through which you pass from the outer world of Gods, daimons, and souls into the inner world, out of the greater into the smaller world. Small and inane is man, already he is behind you, and once again you find yourselves in endless space, in the smaller or inner infinity.

''At immeasurable distance a lonely star stands in the zenith.

"This is the one God of this one man, this is his world, his Pleroma, his divinity.

"In this world, man is Abraxas, the creator and destroyer of his own world.

"This star is the God and the goal of man.

This is his one guiding God,

in him man goes to his rest,

toward him goes the long journey of the soul after death,

in him everything that man withdraws from the greater world shines resplendently.

"To this one God man shall pray.

Prayer increases the light of the star,

it throws a bridge across death,

it prepares life for the smaller world, and assuages the hopeless desires of the greater.

"When the greater world turns cold, the star shines.

"Nothing stands between man and his one God, so long as man can turn away his eyes from the flaming spectacle of Abraxas.

"Man here, God there.

"Weakness and nothingness here, eternally creative power there.

"Here nothing but darkness and clammy cold, there total sun." [113]

***

[124] But when Image had finished, the dead remained silent. Heaviness fell from them, and they ascended like smoke above the shepherd's fire, who watches over his flock by night.

***

But I turned to Image and said, "Illustrious one, you teach that man is a gateway? A gateway through which the procession of the Gods passes? Through which the stream of life flows? Through which the entire future streams into the endlessness of the past?"

Image answered, saying, "These dead believed in the transformation and development of man. They were convinced of human nothingness and transitoriness. Nothing was clearer to them than this, and yet they knew that man even creates its Gods, and so they knew that the Gods were of no use. Therefore they had to learn what they did not know, that man is a gateway through which crowds the train of the Gods and the coming and passing of all times. He does not do it, does not create it, does not suffer it, since he is the being, the sole being, since he is the moment of the world, the eternal moment. Whoever recognizes this stops being flame; he becomes smoke and ashes. He lasts and his transitoriness is over. He has become someone who is. You dreamed of the flame, as if it were life. But life is duration, the flame dies away. I carried that over, I saved it from the fire. That is the son of the fire flower. You saw that in me, I myself am of the eternal fire of light. But I am the one who saved it for you, the black and golden seed and its blue starlight. You eternal being -- what is length and brevity? What is the moment and eternal duration? You, being, are eternal in each moment. What is time? Time is the fire that flares up, consumes, and dies down. I saved being from time, redeeming it from the fires of time and the darkness of time, from Gods and devils."

But I said to him, "Illustrious one, when will you give me the dark and golden treasure and its blue starlight?"

Image replied, "When you have surrendered everything that wants to burn to the holy flame." [125]

{13} And as Image spoke these words, a dark form with golden eyes approached me from the shadows of the night. [126[ I was startled and cried, "Are you an enemy? Who are you? Where do you come from? I have never seen you before! Speak, what do you want?"

The dark one answered, saying, "I come from afar. I come from the east and follow the shining fire that precedes me, Image. I am not your enemy, I am a stranger to you. My skin is dark and my eyes shine golden."

"What do you bring?" I asked fearfully.

"I bring abstinence -- abstinence from human joy and suffering. Compassion leads to alienation. Pity, but no compassion -- pity for the world and a will held in check toward the other.

Pity remains misunderstood, therefore it works.

Far from longing, know no fear.

Far from love, love the whole."

I looked at him fearfully and said, "Why are you as dark as the earth of the fields and as black as iron? I'm afraid of you; such pain, what have you done to me?"

"You may call me death -- death that rose with the sun. I come with quiet pain and long peace. I lay the cover of protection on you. In the midst of life begins death. I lay cover upon cover upon you so that your warmth will never cease."

"You bring grief and despair," I answered. "I wanted to be among men."

But he said, "You will go to men as one veiled. Your light shines at night. Your solar nature departs from you and your stellar nature begins."

"You are cruel," I sighed.

"The simple is cruel, it does not unite with the manifold."

With these words the mysterious dark one vanished. But Image regarded me with a serious and questioning look. "Did you take a proper look at him, my son?" he said, "you will be hearing from him. But come now, so that I can fulfill what the dark one prophesied for you."

As he spoke these words, he touched my eyes and opened my gaze and showed me the immeasurable mystery. And I looked for a long time until I could grasp it: but what did I see? I saw the night, I saw the dark earth, and above this the sky stood gleaming in the brilliance of countless stars. And I saw that the sky had the form of a woman, and sevenfold was her mantle of stars and it completely covered her.

And when I had beheld it, Image said:

[127] "Mother, you who stand in the higher circle, nameless one, who shrouds me and him and protects me and him from the Gods: he wants to become your child.

"May you accept his birth.

"May you renew him. I separate myself from him. [128] The cold is growing and its star blazes brighter.

"He needs the bond of childhood.

"You gave birth to the godly serpent, you released it from the pangs of birth; take this man to the abode of the sun, he needs the mother."

A voice came from afar [129] and was like a falling star:

"I cannot take him as a child. He must cleanse himself first."

Image said, [130] "What is his impurity?"

But the voice said, "It is the commingling: he contains human suffering and joy. He shall remain secluded until abstinence is complete and he is freed from the commingling with men. Then shall he be taken as a child."

In this moment my vision ended. And Image went away and I was alone. And I remained apart as I had been told. But in the fourth night I saw a strange form, a man wearing a long coat and a turban; his eyes shone cleverly and kindly like a wise doctor's. [131] He approached me and said, "I speak to you of joy." But I answered, "You want to speak to me of joy? I bleed from the thousandfold wounds of men."

He replied, "I bring healing. Women taught me this art. They know how to heal sick children. Do your wounds burn you? Healing is at hand. Give ear to good counsel and do not be incensed."

I retorted, "What do you want? To tempt me? Mock me?"

"What are you thinking?" he interrupted, "I bring you the bliss of paradise, the healing fire, the love of women." [132]

''Are you thinking," I asked, "of the descent into the frog swamp? [133] The dissolution in the many, the scattering, the dismembering?"

But as I spoke, the old man turned into Image, [134] and I saw that he was the magician who was tempting me. But Image continued:

"You have not yet experienced the dismembering. You should be blown apart and shredded and scattered to the winds. Men are preparing for the Last Supper with you."

"What then will remain of me?" I cried.

"Nothing but your shadow: You will be a river that pours forth over the lands. It seeks every valley and streams toward the depths."

I asked, full of grief, "But where will my uniqueness remain?"

"You will steal it from yourself," Image replied, [135] "You will hold the invisible realm in trembling hands; it lowers its roots into the gray darknesses and mysteries of the earth and sends up branches covered in leaves into the golden air.

"Animals live in its branches.

"Men camp in its shade.

"Their murmuring arises from below.

"A thousand-mile-long disappointment is the juice of the tree.

"It will stay green for a long time.

"Silence abides in its treetop.

"Silence in its deep roots."

[136] I gathered from Image's words that I must remain true to love to cancel out the commingling that arises through unlived love. I understood that the commingling is a bondage that takes the place of voluntary devotion. Scattering or dismembering arises, as Image had taught me, from voluntary devotion. It cancels out the commingling. Through voluntary devotion I removed binding ties. Therefore I had to remain true to love, and, devoted to it voluntarily; I suffer the dismembering and thus attain bonding with the great mother, that is, the stellar nature, liberation from bondage to men and things. If I am bound to men and things, I can neither go on with my life to its destination nor can I arrive at my very own and deepest nature. Nor can death begin in me as a new life, since I can only fear death. I must therefore remain true to love since how else can I arrive at the scattering and dissolution of bondage? How else could I experience death other than through remaining true to love and willingly accepting the pain and all the suffering? As long as I do not voluntarily devote myself to the dismembering, a part of my self secretly remains with men and things and binds me to them; and thus I must, whether I want to or not, be a part of them, mixed in with them and bound to them. Only fidelity to love and voluntary devotion to love enable this binding and mixing to be dissolved and lead back to me that part of my self that secretly lay with men and things. Only thus does the light of the star grow, only thus do I arrive at my stellar nature, at my truest and innermost self that simply and singly is.

It is difficult to remain true to love since love stands above all sins. He who wants to remain true to love must also overcome sin. Nothing occurs more readily than failing to recognize that one is committing a sin. Overcoming sin for the sake of remaining true to love is difficult, so difficult that my feet hesitated to advance.

When night fell, Image approached me in an earth-colored robe, holding a silver fish: "Look, my son," he said, "I was fishing and caught this fish; I bring it to you, so that you may be comforted." And as I looked at him astonished and questioningly, I saw that a shade stood in darkness at the door, bearing a robe of grandeur. [137] His face was pale and blood had flowed into the furrows of his brow. But Image knelt down, touched the earth, and said to the shade, [138] "My master and my brother, praised be your name. You did the greatest thing for us: out of animals you made men, you gave your life for men to enable their healing. Your spirit was with us through an endlessly long time. And men still look to you and still ask you to take pity on them and beg for the mercy of God and the forgiveness of their sins through you. You do not tire of giving to men. I praise your divine patience. Are not men ungrateful? Does their craving know no limits? Do they still make demands on you? They have received so much yet still they are beggars.

"Behold, my master and my brother, they do not love me, but they long for you with greed, for they also crave their neighbor's possessions. They do not love their neighbor, but they want what is his. If they were faithful to their love, they would not be greedy. But whoever gives, attracts desire. Should they not learn love? Fidelity to love? Freely willed devotion? But they demand and desire and beg from you and have learned no lesson from your awe-inspiring life. They have imitated it, but they have not lived their own lives as you have lived yours. Your awe-inspiring life shows how everyone would have to take their own life into their own hands, faithful to their own essence and their own love. Have you not forgiven the adulteress? [139] Did you not sit with whores and tax-collectors? [140] Did you not break the command of the Sabbath? [141] You lived your own life, but men fail to do so; instead they pray to you and make demands on you and forever remind you that your work is incomplete. Yet your work would be completed if men managed to live their own lives without imitation. Men are still childish and forget gratitude, since they cannot say: Thanks be to you, our lord, for the salvation you have brought us. We have taken it unto ourselves, given it a place in our hearts, and we have learned to carry on your work in ourselves on our own. Through your help we have grown mature in continuing the work of redemption in us. Thanks to you, we have embraced your work, we grasped your redemptive teaching, we completed in ourselves what you had begun for us with bloody struggle. We are not ungrateful children who desire our parents' possessions. Thanks to you, our master, we will make the most of your talent and will not bury it in the earth and forever stretch out our hands helplessly and urge you to complete your work in us. We want to take your troubles and your work upon ourselves so that your work may be completed and so that you may lay your weary tired hands in your lap, like the worker after a long day's hard burden. Blessed is the dead one, who rests from the completion of his work.

"I wanted people to address you in this way. But they have no love for you, my master and brother. They begrudge you the price of peace. They leave your work incomplete, eternally needing your pity and your care.

"But, my master and my brother, I believe you have completed your work, since the one who has given his life, his entire truth, all his love, his entire soul has completed his work. What one individual can do for men, you have done and accomplished and fulfilled. The time has come when each must do his own work of redemption. Mankind has grown older and a new month has begun." [142]

[143] When Image had finished, I looked up and saw that the place where the shade had stood was empty. I turned to Image and said, "My father, you spoke of men. I am a man. Forgive me!"

But Image dissolved into the darkness and I decided to do what was required of me. I accepted all the joy and every torment of my nature and remained true to my love, to suffer what comes to everyone in their own way. And I stood alone and was afraid.

***

{14} On a night when everything was silent, I heard a murmur like that of many voices and a bit more clearly. I heard the voice of Image, and it was as if he were giving a speech. And as I listened more closely, I heard his words:

[144] "Afterward, when I had impregnated the dead body of the underworld, and when it had given birth to the serpent of the God, I went to men and saw the fullness of their affliction and their madness. I saw that they were slaying each other and that they sought the grounds for their actions. They did this because they did not have anything different or better to do. But because they were accustomed to doing nothing for which they could not account, they devised reasons that compelled them to go on killing. Stop, you are out of your minds, said the sage. Stop, for Heaven's sake, and take stock of what damage you have done, said the canny one. But the fool laughed, since honors had been conferred upon him overnight. Why do men not see their stupidity? Stupidity is a daughter of the God. Therefore men cannot stop murdering, since thus they serve the serpent of the God without knowing it. It is worth giving one's life for the sake of serving the serpent of the God. Hence be reconciled! But it would be far better to live despite the God. But the serpent of the God wants human blood. This feeds it and makes it shine. Not wanting to murder and die amounts to deceiving the God. Whoever lives has become one who deceives the God. Whoever lives invents his life for himself. But the serpent wants to be deceived, out of hope for blood. The greater the number of men who stole their lives from the Gods, the greater the harvest feeding the serpent from the blood-sown field. The God grows strong through human murder. The serpent grows hot and fiery through the drenching flood. Its fat burns in the blazing flame. The flame becomes the light of men, the first ray of a renewed sun. He, the first appearing light."

I could not grasp what else Image said. I spent a long time pondering his words, which evidently he had spoken to the dead, and I was horrified by the atrocities that attend the rebirth of a God.

[145] And soon afterward I saw Elijah and Salome in a dream. Elijah appeared concerned and alarmed. Therefore, when in the following night that light was extinguished and every living sound fell still, I called Elijah and Salome so that they would answer my questions. Elijah came forward and said:

"I have become weak, I am poor, an excess of my power has gone to you, my son. You took too much from me. You went too far away from me. I heard strange and incomprehensible things and the peace of my depths became disturbed."

I asked, "But what did you hear? What voice did you hear?"

Elijah answered, "I heard a voice full of confusion, an alarmed voice full of warning and the incomprehensible."

"What did it say," I asked, "did you hear the words?"

"Indistinctly, it was confused and confusing. The voice spoke first of a knife cutting something or perhaps harvesting, perhaps the grapes that go to the wine press. Perhaps the one wearing the red robe treads the winepress from which the blood flows. [146] Thereupon the voice spoke of gold that lies below, and that kills whoever touches it. Then it mentioned fire that burns terribly and that should flare up in our time. And then there was a malicious word, that I would rather not utter."

''A malicious word? What was it?" I asked.

He answered, "A word about the death of God. There is only one God and God cannot die." [147]

Then I replied, "I am astonished, Elijah. Do you not know what happened? Do you not know that the world has put on a new garb? That the one God has gone away, and that in turn many Gods and many daimons have come to man? Truly, I am surprised; I am extremely surprised! How could you not have known? Know you nothing of the new that has come to pass? Yet you know the future! You have foresight! Or maybe you should not know what is? Do you ultimately deny what is?" [148]

Salome interrupted me: "What is, gives no pleasure. Pleasure comes only from the new. Your soul would also like a new husband -- ha ha! -- she loves change. You are not pleasurable enough for her. In that respect she is unteachable and therefore you believe she is mad. We love only what is coming, not what is. Only the new gives us pleasure. Elijah does not think about what is, only about what is to come. Therefore he knows it."

I answered, "What does he know? He should say."

Elijah said, "I have already uttered the words: the image that I saw was crimson, fiery colored, a gleaming gold. The voice that I heard was like distant thunder, like the wind roaring in the forest, like an earthquake. It was not the voice of my God, but it was a thunderous pagan roar, a call my ancestors knew but which I have never heard. It sounded prehistoric, as if from a forest on a distant coast; it rang with all the voices of the wilderness. It was full of horror yet harmonic."

To this I replied, "My good old man, you heard correctly, as I thought you had. How wonderful! Shall I tell you about it? After all, I told you that the world has acquired a new face. A new cover was thrown over it. How odd that you don't know!

"Old Gods have become new. The one God is dead -- yes, truly, he died. He disintegrated into the many, and thus the world became rich overnight. And something also happened to the individual soul -- who would care to describe it! But therefore men too became rich overnight. How is it possible that you didn't know this?

"The one God became two, a multiple one, whose body consists of many Gods, and a single one, whose body is a man and yet he is brighter and stronger than the sun.

"What shall I tell you about the soul? Haven't you noticed that she has become multiple? She has become the closest, nearest, near, far, further, furthest and yet she is one, as before. First she divided herself into a serpent and a bird, then into a father and mother, and then into Elijah and Salome -- How are you, my good fellow? Does it disturb you? Yes, you must be realizing that you are already very far removed from me, so that I can hardly reckon you as being part of my soul; since if you belonged to my soul, you would have to know what is happening. Therefore I must separate you and Salome from my soul and place you among the daimons. You are connected to what is primordially old and always exists, therefore you also know nothing of the being of men but simply of the past and future.

"Nevertheless it is good that you came to my call. Take part in that which is. For what is ought to be such that you can take part in it."

But Elijah sullenly replied, "I do not like this multiplicity. It is not easy to think it."

And Salome said, "The simple alone is pleasurable. One need not think about it."

I replied, "Elijah, you need not contemplate it at all. It is not to be thought; it is to be viewed. It is a painting."

And to Salome I said, "Salome, it is not true that only the simple is pleasurable; over time it is even boring. In truth the multiple captivates you."

But Salome turned to Elijah and said, "Father, it seems to me that men have outstripped us. He is right: the many is more pleasurable. The one is too simple and always the same." [149]

Elijah seemed saddened and said, "What about the one in this case? Does the one still exist if it stands next to the many?"

I answered, "That is your old and ingrained mistake, that the one excludes the many. But there are many individual things. The multiplicity of individual things is the one multiple God from whose body many Gods arise, but the uniqueness of the one thing is the other God, whose body is a man but whose spirit is as large as the world."

But Elijah shook his head and said, "That is new, my son. Is the new good? What was, is good; and what was, will be. Is that not the truth? Has there ever been anything new? And was what you call new, ever good? Everything remains the same if you give it a new name. There is nothing new, there can be nothing new; how could I then look ahead? I look at the past and therein I see the future, as in a mirror. And I see that nothing new happens, everything is but mere recurrence of what has been since time immemorial. [150] What is your being? An appearance, a darting light; tomorrow it is no longer true. It is gone; it is as if it never was. Come, Salome, let us go. One is mistaken in the world of men."

But Salome looked back and whispered to me while leaving, "Being and multiplicity appeal to me, even if it is not new and not eternally true."

Thus they disappeared into the dark night and I returned to the burden signified by my existence. And I sought to do everything correctly that seemed to me to be a task and to take every way that seemed to me to be necessary for myself. But my dreams became difficult and laden with anxiety, and I did not know why. One night my soul suddenly came to me, as if worried, and said, [151] "Listen to me: I am in a great torment, the son of the dark womb besieges me. Therefore your dreams are also difficult, since you feel the torment of the depths, the pain of your soul, and the suffering of the Gods."

I answered, "Can I help? Or is it superfluous that a man elevates himself to being a mediator of the Gods? Is it presumption or should a man become a redeemer of the Gods, after men are saved through the divine mediator?"

"You speak the truth," my soul replied, "the Gods need a human mediator and rescuer. With this man paves the way to crossing over and to divinity. I gave you a frightening dream so that your face would turn to the Gods. I let their torment reach you so that you would remember the suffering Gods. You do too much for men since they are the masters of your world. You can in effect help men only through the Gods, not directly. Alleviate the burning torment of the Gods."

I asked her, "So tell me, where do I begin? I feel their torment and mine at the same time, and yet it is not mine, both real and unreal."

"That is it; and this is where separation should occur," my soul replied.

"But how? My wits fail me. You must know how."

"Your wits fail quickly," she retorted, "but the Gods need precisely your human wits."

"And I the wits of the Gods," I added; "and thus we run aground."

"No, you are too impatient; only patient comparison provides a solution, not one side taking a quick decision. It requires work."

I asked, "What do the Gods suffer from?"

"Well," my soul replied, "you have left them with torment, and since then they have suffered."

"Rightly so," I cried, "they have tormented men enough. Now they should get a taste of it."

She answered, "But what if the torment also reaches you? What have you gained then? You cannot leave all suffering to the Gods or else they will draw you into their torment. After all, they possess the power to do so. To be sure, I must confess that men too possess a wondrous power over the Gods through their wits."

I answered, "I recognize that the torment of the Gods reached me; therefore I also recognize that I must yield to the Gods. What is their desire?"

"They want obedience," she replied.

"So be it," I answered, "but I fear their desire, therefore I say: I want to do what I can. On no account will I take back onto myself all the torment that I had to leave to the Gods. Not even Christ took torment away from his followers, but rather he heaped it on. I reserve conditions for myself. The Gods should recognize this and direct their desire accordingly. There is no longer any unconditional obedience, since man has stopped being a slave to the Gods. He has dignity before the Gods. He is a limb that even the Gods cannot do without. Giving way before the Gods is no more. So let their wish be heard. Comparison shall accomplish the rest so that each will have his appropriate part."

My soul answered, "The Gods want you to do for their sake what you know you do not want to do."

"I thought so," I exclaimed, "of course that is what the Gods want. But do the Gods also do what I want? I want the fruits of my labor. What do the Gods do for me? They want their goals to be fulfilled, but what about mine?"

This infuriated my soul and she said, "You are unbelievably defiant and rebellious. Consider the fact that the Gods are strong."

"I know," I replied, "but no longer is there any unconditional obedience. When will they use their strength for me? They also want me to place mine in their service. What is their payment in kind? That they are tormented? Man suffered agony and the Gods were still not satisfied, but remained insatiable in their devising of new torments. They allowed man to become so blinded that he believed that there were no Gods, and that there was only one God who was a loving father, so that today someone who struggles with the Gods is even thought to be crazy. They have thus prepared this shame too for those who recognize them, out of boundless greed for power, since leading the blind is not easy. They will corrupt even their slaves."

"You do not want to obey the Gods?" my soul cried, astonished.

I answered, "I believe that has already gone on more than enough. Hence the Gods are insatiable, because they have received too many sacrifices: the altars of blinded humanity are streaming with blood. But dearth makes contentment, not abundance. May they learn dearth from men. Who does something for me? That is the question that I must pose. In no case will I do what the Gods would have to do. Ask the Gods what they think of my suggestion."

Then my soul divided herself. As a bird she swooped up to the higher Gods and as a serpent she crawled down to the lower Gods. Soon afterward, she returned and said, troubled, "The Gods are outraged that you do not want to be obedient."

"That bothers me very little," I replied, "I have done everything to placate the Gods. May they do their share now. Tell them. I can wait. I will let no one tell me what to do. The Gods may devise a service in return. You can go. I will call you tomorrow so that you can tell me what the Gods have decided."

As my soul departed, I saw that she was shocked and worried, since she belonged to the race of the Gods and daimons and forever sought to convert me to their kind, as my humanity would like to convince me that I belong to the clan and must serve it. When I was asleep, my soul came again and in a dream cunningly painted me as a horned devil to terrify me and make me afraid of myself. In the following night, however, I called my soul and said to her, "Your trick was recognized. It is to no avail. You do not frighten me. Now speak and convey your message!"

She answered, "The Gods give in. You have broken the compulsion of the law. Therefore I painted you as a devil, since he is the only one among the Gods who bows to no compulsion. He is the rebel against the eternal law, to which, thanks to his deed, there are also exceptions. Thus one does not necessarily have to. The devil is helpful in this respect. But it should not happen without seeking counsel from the Gods. This detour is necessary, or else you will fall prey to their law despite the devil."

Here the soul drew near to my ear and whispered, "The Gods are even happy to turn a blind eye from time to time, since basically they know very well that it would be bad for life if there were no exception to eternal law. Hence their tolerance of the devil."

She then raised her voice and cried loudly, "The Gods have mercy upon you and have accepted your sacrifice!"

And so the devil helped me to cleanse myself from commingling in bondage, and the pain of one-sidedness pierced my heart and the wound of being torn apart scorched me.

***


{15} [152] It was noon on a hot summer's day and I was taking a stroll in my garden; when I reached the shade of the high trees, I met Image strolling in the fragrant grass. But when I sought to approach him, a blue shade [153] came from the other side, and when Image saw him, he said, "I find you in the garden, beloved. The sins of the world have conferred beauty upon your countenance.

"The suffering of the world has straightened your shape.

"You are truly a king.

"Your crimson is blood.

"Your ermine is snow from the coldness of the poles.

"Your crown is the heavenly body of the sun, which you bear on your head.

"Welcome to the garden, my master, my beloved, my brother!"

The shade replied, "Oh Simon Magus or whatever your name may be, are you in my garden or am I in yours?" [154]

Image said, "You are, Oh master, in my garden. Helena, or whatever you choose to call her, and I are your servants. You can find accommodation with us. Simon and Helena have become Image and Baucis and so we are the hosts of the Gods. We granted hospitality to your terrible worm. And since you come forward, we take you in. It is our garden that surrounds you." [155]

The shade answered, "Is this garden not mine? Is not the world of the heavens and of the spirits my own?"

Image said, "You are, Oh master, here in the world of men. Men have changed. They are no longer the slaves and no longer the swindlers of the Gods and no longer mourn in your name, but they grant hospitality to the Gods. The terrible worm [156] came before you, whom you recognize as your brother insofar as you are of divine nature, and as your father insofar as you are of human nature. [157] You dismissed him when he gave you clever counsel in the desert. You took the counsel, but dismissed the worm: he finds a place with us. But where he is, you will be also. [158] When I was Simon, I sought to escape him with the ploy of magic and thus I escaped you. Now that I gave the worm a place in my garden, you come to me."

The shade answered, "Do I fall for the power of your trick? Have you secretly caught me? Were not deception and lies always your manner?"

But Image answered, "Recognize, Oh master and beloved, that your nature is also of the serpent. [159] Were you not raised on the tree like the serpent? Have you laid aside your body, like the serpent its skin? Have you not practiced the healing arts, like the serpent? Did you not go to Hell before your ascent? And did you not see your brother there, who was shut away in the abyss?" [160]

Then the shade said, "You speak the truth. You are not lying. Even so, do you know what I bring you?"

"This I know not," Image answered, "I know only one thing, that whoever hosts the worm also needs his brother. What do you bring me, my beautiful guest? Lamentation and abomination were the gift of the worm. What will you give us?"

The shade answered, "I bring you the beauty of suffering. That is what is needed by whoever hosts the worm."
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Re: The Red Book: Liber Novus, by C.G. Jung

Postby admin » Sun Dec 01, 2013 9:52 pm

PART 4 OF 4 (SCRUTINIES CONT'D.)
_______________

Notes:

1. April 19, 1914.

2. "All beginnings are difficult" is a proverb from the Talmud.

3. "To the greater glory of God." This was the motto of the Jesuits.

4. See below, note 91, p. 348.

5. References to this God in the following pages are not in Black Book 5.

6. April 20, 1914. On the same day, Jung resigned as president of the International Psychoanalytical Association (The Freud/Jung Letters, p. 613).

7. April 21, 1914.

8. Jung later described the self-criticism depicted in this opening section as the confrontation with the shadow. In 1934 he wrote: "Whoever looks into the mirror of the water will see first of all his own image. Whoever goes to himself risks a confrontation with himself. The mirror does not flatter, it faithfully shows whatever looks into it; namely the face we never show to the world because we cover it with the persona, the mask of the actor. But the mirror lies behind the mask and shows the true face. This confrontation is the first test of courage on the inner way, a test sufficient to frighten off most people, for the meeting with ourselves belongs to the more unpleasant things that can be avoided as long as one can project everything negative into the environment. But if we are able to see our own shadow and can bear knowing about it, then a small part of the problem has already been solved: we have at least brought up the personal unconscious" ("On the archetypes of the collective unconscious," CW 9, 1, §§43-44).

9. This paragraph does not occur in Black Book 5. On April 30, 1914, Jung resigned as a lecturer in the medical faculty of the University of Zurich.

10. May 8, 1914. There is a gap in the entries in Black Book 5 between April 21 and May 8, so the discussions referred to in the previous paragraph do not appear to have been recorded.

11. May 21, 1914.

12. Matthew 8:21-22: "And another of his disciples said unto him, Lord, suffer me first to go and bury my father. But Jesus said unto him, Follow me; and let the dead bury their dead."

13. May 23, 1914.

14. These last two paragraphs do not occur in Black Book 5: In Transformations and Symbols of the Libido (1912), Jung wrote: "I think, belief should be replaced by understanding" (CW B, §356). On October 5, 1945, Jung wrote to Victor White: "I began my career with repudiating everything that smelt of belief" (Ann Conrad Lammers and Adrian Cunningham, eds., The Jung-White Letters [Philemon Series, London: Routledge, 2007], p. 6).

15. May 24, 1914. The lines from the beginning of the paragraph do not occur in Black Book 4.

16. Black Book 4 continues: "He is like one of the old saints, one of the first Christians who lived in the desert" (p. 77).

17. In the handwritten manuscript of Scrutinies, there is a note here: "27/11/17," which appears to refer to when this portion of the manuscript was composed.

18. Black Book 5 continues: [I]: "I am scholastic?" [Soul]: "Not that, but scientific; science is a new version of scholasticism. It needs to be surmounted." [I]: "Is it not enough yet? Do I thus not counter the spirit of the time if I dissociate myself from science?" [Soul]: "You are not supposed to dissociate yourself, but consider that science is merely your language." [I]: "Which depths do you require me to advance to?" [Soul]: "Forever above yourself and the present." / [I]: "I want to, but what should happen? I often feel I can no longer." [Soul]: "You must put in extra work. Provide respite. Too many take up your time." / [I]: "Will this sacrifice arise too?" [Soul]: "You must, you must" (pp. 79-80).

19. This paragraph does not occur in Black Book 5.

20. May 25, 1914.

21. Black Book 5 continues: "Ha, this book! I have laid hands on you again -- banal and pathological and frantic and divine, my written unconscious! You have forced me to my knees again! Here I am, say what you have to say!" (p. 82). This is the one reference to "the unconscious" in Black Books 2 to 7.

22. June 3, 1915. In the interim, Jung wrote the draft of the preceding books of Liber Novus. On July 28, 1914, Jung gave a talk on "The importance of the unconscious in psychopathology" at a meeting of the British Medical Association in Aberdeen. From around August 9 to around August 22, Jung was on military service in Luzern for 14 days. From around January 1 to around March 8, 1915, Jung was on military service in Olten for 64 days. Between March 10 and 12, he served on the invalid transport (Jung's military service books, JFA).

23. This sentence is not in Black Book 6.

24. September 14, 1915. In late summer and autumn of 1915, Jung conducted his correspondence with Hans Schmid on the question of psychological types. His concluding letter to Schmid of November 6 indicates a shift that signals a return to the elaboration of his fantasies in the Black Books: "Understanding is a terribly binding power, possibly a veritable soul murder when it levels out vitally important differences. The core of the individual is a mystery of life, which dies when it is 'grasped.' Also why symbols want to keep their secrets, they are mysterious not only because we are unable to clearly see what is at their bottom ... All understanding as such, being an integration into general viewpoints, contains the devil's element, and kills ... That is why, in the later stages of analysis, we must help the other to come to those hidden and un-openable symbols, in which the seed of life lies securely hidden like the tender seed in the hard shell. Actually, there must not be any understanding and agreement on this, even if it were possible, as it were. But if understanding and agreement on this has become generalized and obviously possible, the symbol is ripe for destruction, because it no longer covers the seed, which is about to outgrow the shell. Now I understand a dream I once had, and which greatly impressed me: I was standing in my garden, and I had dug open a rich spring of water which gushed forth mightily. Then I had to dig a trench and a deep hole, in which I collected all the water and let it flow back into the depths of the earth again. In this way salvation is given to us in the un-openable and un-sayable symbol, for it protects us by preventing the devil from swallowing the seed of life" (John Beebe and Ernst Falzeder, eds., The Jung-Schmid Letters [Philemon Series], forthcoming).

25. Black Book 5 continues: "Hermes is your daimon" (p. 87).

26. Jung discussed the alchemical symbolism of gold in Mysterium Coniunctionis (1955/56,CW 14, §353ff).

27. September 15, 1915.

28. September 17, 1915.

29. In Thus Spoke Zarathustra, Nietzsche wrote: "The Self also seeks with the eyes of sense, it listens too with the ears of the spirit. The Self is always listening and seeking: it compares, subdues, conquers, destroys. It rules and is also the I's ____. Behind your thoughts and feelings, my brother, stands a mighty commander, an unknown sage -- he is called Self" (section I, "Of the despisers of the body," §1, p.62). The passage is underlined as in Jung's ____. In commenting on this passage in 1935 in his seminar on Zarathustra, Jung said: "I was already very interested in the concept of the self, but I was not sure how I should understand it. I made my marks when I came across these passages, and they seemed very important to me ... The concept of the self continued to recommend itself to me ... I thought that Nietzsche meant a sort of thing-in-itself behind the psychological phenomenon ... I saw then also that he was producing a concept of the self which was like the Eastern concept; it is an Atman idea" (Nietzsche's Zarathustra, vol. 1, p. 391).

30. In Thus Spoke Zarathustra, Nietzsche wrote: "You crowd together with your neighbours and have beautiful words for it. But I tell you: your neighbour your bad love of yourself. You flee away from yourselves and would like to make a virtue of it: but I see through your 'selflessness'" ("Of love of one's neighbour," p. 86; as underlined by Jung in his copy).

31. September 18, 1915.

32. In 1941, Jung noted: "The integration or humanization of the self, as has already been indicated, is initiated from the conscious side by making ourselves conscious of our egotistical aims, that means we give an account of our motives and try to form as objective a picture as possible of our own being" ("Transformation symbolism in the mass," CW 11, §400). This corresponds to the process depicted here in the opening section of Scrutinies.

33. Black Book 5 continues: "which unites Heaven and Hell in itself" (p. Cf. Jung. "Transformation symbolism in the mass": 'The self then functions as a unio oppositorum and thus constitutes the most immediate experience of the divine which is at all psychologically comprehensible" (1941, CW II, §396).

34. In 1921, Jung wrote concerning the self: "But inasmuch as the I is only the centre of my field of consciousness, it is not identical with the totality of my psyche, being merely one complex among other complexes. I therefore distinguish between the I and the self, since the I is only the subject of my consciousness, while the self is the subject of my total psyche, which also includes the unconscious" (Psychological Types, CW 6, §706). In 1928, Jung described the process of individuation as "self-becoming" and "self-realization" (The Relations between the I and the Unconscious, CW 7, §266). Jung defined the self as the archetype of order, and noted that representations of the self were indistinguishable from God-images (ch. 4, "The self," Aion: Contributions to the Symbolism of the Self, CW 9, 2). In 1944 he noted that he chose the term because this concept was "on the one hand definite enough to convey the sum of human wholeness and on the other hand indefinite enough to express the indescribable and indeterminate nature of this wholeness ... in scientific usage the 'self' refers neither to Christ nor to the Buddha but to the totality of the figures that are its equivalent, and each of these figures is a symbol of the self' (Psychology and Alchemy, CW 12, §20).

35. The following section is reworked from Black Book 5 in a manner that is hard to separate.

36. In 1929, Jung wrote: "The Gods have become diseases; Zeus no longer rules Olympus but rather the solar plexus and produces curious specimens for the doctor's consulting room" ("Commentary on 'The Secret of the Golden Flower,'" CW 13, §54).

37. Black Book 5 continues: "The God has the power, not the self. Powerlessness should thus not be deplored, but it is the condition that should abide. / The God acts from within himself. This should be left to him. What we do to the self, we do to the God. / If we twist the self, we also twist the God. It is divine service to serve oneself. We thus relieve humanity of ourselves. May one man carry another's burden, has become an immorality. May each carry his own load; that is the least that one can demand anyone to do. We can at best show another how to carry his own load. / To give all one's goods to the poor means to educate them to become idle. / Pity should not carry another's load, but it should be a strict educator instead. Solitude with ourselves has no end. It has only just begun" (pp. 92-93).

38. The next four paragraphs do not occur in the Black Books.

39. In Jung's copy of Eckhart's Schriften und Predigten, the phrase "that the soul would also have to lose God!" is underlined, and there is a slip of paper on which is written: "Soul must lose God" (Meister Eckhart, Schriften und Predigten. Aus dem Mittelhochdeutschen ubersetzt und herausgegeben von Herman Buttner, 2 vols [Eugen Diederichs, 1912], p. 222).

40. In Black Book 5, the voice is not identified as Philemon's.

41. The next two paragraphs do not occur in Black Book 5.

42. The handwritten manuscript of Scrutinies continues: "and spoken through me" (p. 37).

43. December 2, 1915.

44. Instead of this paragraph, Black Book 5 has: "A phallus?" (p. 95). There is no mention of HAP in Black Book 5. The following references may be connected to this. In The Egyptian Heaven and Hell, Wallis Budge notes that "The Phallus of his Pepi is Hap" (vol. I, p. 110). He notes that Hap is a son of Horus (p. 491 -- Jung placed a mark in the margin by this in his copy). He also noted that "In the Book of the Dead these four children of Horus play very prominent parts, and the deceased endeavoured to gain their help and protection at all costs, both by offerings and prayers ... the four children of Horus shared the protection of the deceased among them, and as far back as the Vth dynasty we find that they presided over his life in the underworld" (ibid.; underlined as in Jung's copy) [London: Kegan Paul, Trench and Trubner, 1905]).

45. Black Book 5 has: "of this divine pole" (p. 95).

46. This paragraph is not in Black Book 5.

47. December 5, 1915.

48. This paragraph is not in Black Book 5.

49. Black Book 5 has: "The Phallus" (p. 100). Cf. Jung's childhood dream of the ritual phallus in the underground temple, p. 4 above.

50. See note 223, p. 304.

51. In 1912, Jung discussed the Hecate mysteries that flourished in Rome at the end of the fourth century. Hecate, the Goddess of magic and spells, guarded the underworld, and was seen as the sender of madness. She was identified with Brimo, a Goddess of death (Transformations and Symbols of the Libido, CW B, §586ff).

52. In Transformations and Symbols of the Libido (1912), Jung referred to Nut, the Egyptian Sky Goddess, who arched over the earth, daily giving birth to the Sun God (CW B, §364).

53. This paragraph is reworked from Black Book 5.

54. December 7, 1915.

55. December 9, 1915.

56. Jung was critical of Christian missionaries. See "The problems of the soul of modern men," (1931), CW 10, §185.

57. Black Book 5 continues: [The dead one:] "after the devil has preceded you. Now is not the time for love, but for deeds." [I:] "Why do you mention deeds? Which deeds?" [The dead one]: "Your work." [I:] "What do you mean, my work? My science, my book?" [The dead one:] "That is not your book, that is the book. Science is what you do. Do it, without hesitation. There is no way back, only forward. Your love belongs there. Ridiculous -- your love! You must allow death to occur." [I:] "Leave dead ones around me at least." [The dead one:] "Enough dead, you are surrounded." [I:] "I do not notice anything." [The dead one:] "You ought to notice them." [I]: "How? How can I?" [The dead one:] "Proceed. Everything will come toward you. Not today, but tomorrow" (pp. 116-17).

58. The handwritten manuscript of Scrutinies has "Soul" (p. 49), and the dialogue partner in this section is changed from the soul to the dead one.

59. December 20, 1915.

60. See note 8, p. 230.

61. January 8, 1916. This paragraph does not occur in Black Book 5.

62. In Gethsamane, Christ said: "O my Father, if it be possible, let this cup pass from me: nevertheless not as I will, but as thou wilt" (Matthew 26:39).

63. Cf. Job 25:6: "How much less man, that is a worm? and the son of man, which is a worm?"

64. January 10, 1916.

65. In the Poetic Edda, the giant Thrym stole the hammer of the God Thor.

66. January 11, 1916.

67. January 13, 1916. The preceding paragraph does not occur in Black Book 5.

68. In Greek mythology, ambrosia and nectar are the food and drink of the Gods.

69. This sentence does not occur in Black Book 5.

70. January 14, 1916. The preceding paragraph does not occur in Black Book 5.

71. In Exodus 3, God appears to Moses in the burning bush and promises to lead his people out of Egypt into a land flowing with milk and honey.

72. See Appendix C, January 16, 1916. This is a preliminary sketch of the cosmology of the Septem Sermones. Jung's reference to forming his soul's thoughts in matter seems to refer to composition of the Systema Munditotius (see Appendix A). For a study of this, see Barry Jeromson, "Systema Munditotius and Seven Sermons: symbolic collaborators in Jung's confrontation with the dead," Jung History 1, 2 (2005/6), pp. 6-10, and "The sources of Systema Munditotius: mandalas, myths and a misinterpretation," Jung History 2, 2, 2007, pp. 20-22.

73. January 18, 1916.

74. The painting "Systema munditotius" has a legend at the bottom: "Abraxas dominus mundi" (Abraxas Master of the World).

75. Black Book 5 has: "Abraxas" (p. 181).

76. January 29, 1916.

77. January 30, 1916. The preceding sentence does not occur in Black Book 5.

78. On the significance of the Sermones that follow, Jung said to Aniela Jaffe that the discussions with the dead formed the prelude to what he would subsequently communicate to the world, and that their content anticipated his later books. "From that time on, the dead have become ever more distinct for me as the voices of the unanswered, unresolved and unredeemed." The questions he was required to answer did not come from the world around him, but from the dead. One element that astonished him was the fact that the dead appeared to know no more than they did when they died. One would have assumed that they had attained greater knowledge since death. This explained the tendency of the dead to encroach upon life, and why in China important family events have to be reported to the ancestors. He felt that the dead were waiting for the answers of the living (MP, pp. 258-9; Memories, p. 217). See note 134 (p. 243), above, concerning Christ's preaching to the dead in Hell.

79. See above, p. 294,where the dead Anabaptists led by Ezechiel were heading to Jerusalem to pray at the holy places.

80. This sentence does not occur in Black Book 5. Concerning the relation of Philemon to the Sermones, Jung told Aniela Jaffe that he grasped Philemon in the Sermones. It was here that Philemon lost his autonomy (MP, p. 25).

81. Jung's calligraphic and printed versions of the Sermones bear the subheading: "The seven instructions of the dead. Written by Basilides in Alexandria, where the East touches the West. Translated from the original Greek text into the German language." Basilides was a Christian philosopher in Alexandria in the first part of the second century. Little is known about his life, and only fragments of his teachings have survived (and none in his own hand), which present a cosmogonic myth. For the extant fragments and commentary, see Bentley Layton ed., The Gnostic Scriptures (New York: Doubleday, 1987, pp. 417-44). According to Charles King, Basilides was by birth an Egyptian. Before his conversion to Christianity, he "followed the doctrines of Oriental Gnosis, and endeavoured ... to combine the tenets of the Christian religion with the Gnostic philosophy ... For this purpose he chose expressions of his own invention, and ingenious symbols" (The Gnostics and their Remains [Bell and Daldy, 1864], pp. 33-34). According to Layton, the classical Gnostic myth has the following structure: ''Act I. The expansion of a solitary first principle (god) into a full nonphysical (spiritual) universe. Act II. Creation of the material universe, including stars, planets, earth, and hell. Act III. Creation of Adam, Eve, and their children. Act IV Subsequent history of the human race" (The Gnostic Scriptures, p. 13). Thus in its broadest outlines, Jung's Sermones is presented in the form analogous to a Gnostic myth. Jung discusses Basilides in Aion (1951). He credits the Gnostics for having found suitable symbolic expressions of the self, and notes that Basilides and Valentinus "allowed themselves to be influenced in a large measure by natural inner experience. They therefore provide, like the alchemists, a veritable mine of information concerning all those symbols arising out of the repercussions of the Christian message. At the same time, their ideas compensate the aysmmetry of God postulated by the doctrine of the privatio boni, exactly like those well-known modern tendencies of the unconscious to produce symbols of totality for bridging the gap between consciousness and the unconscious" (CW 9 , 2, §428). In 1915, he wrote a letter to a friend from his student days, Rudolf Lichtenhan, who had written a book, Die Offinbarung im Gnosticismus (1901). From Lichtenhan's reply dated November 11, it appears that Jung had asked for information concerning the conception of different human characters in Gnosticism, and their possible correlation with William James's distinction between tough-and tender-minded characters (JA). In Memories, Jung said: "Between 1918 and 1926, I had seriously studied the Gnostics, for they too had been confronted with the primal world of the unconscious. They had dealt with its contents and images, which were obviously contaminated with the world of drives" (p. 226). Jung was already reading Gnostic literature in the course of the preparatory reading for Transformations and Symbols of the Libido. There has been an extensive body of commentaries concerning the Septem Sermones, which provides some valuable discussion. However, these should be treated cautiously, as they considered the Sermones without the benefit of Liber Novus and the Black Books, and, not least, Philemon's commentaries, which together provide critical contextual clarification. Scholars have discussed Jung's relation to Gnosticism and the historical Basilides, other possible sources and parallels for Sermones, and the relation of the Sermones to Jung's later works. See especially Christine Maillard, Les Septem Sermones aux Morts de Carl Gustav Jung (Nancy: Presses Universitaires de Nancy, 1993). See also Alfred Ribi, Die Suche nach den eigenen Wurzeln: Die Bedeutung von Gnosis, Hermetik und Alchemie fur C. G. Jung und Marie-Louise von Franz und deren Einfluss auf das moderne Verstandnis dieser Disziplin (Bern: Peter Lang, 1991); Robert Segal, The Gnostic Jung (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1992); Gilles Quispel, "C. G. Jung und die Gnosis," Eranos-Jahrbuch 37 (1968, reprinted in Segal); E. M. Brenner, "Gnosticism and Psychology: Jung's Septem Sermones ad Mortuos," Journal of Analytical Psychology 35 (1990); Judith Hubback, "VII Sermones ad Mortuos," Journal of Analytical Psychology II (1966); James Heisig, "The VII Sermones: Play and Theory," Spring (1972); James Olney, The Rhizome and the Flower: The Perennial philosophy, Yeats and Jung (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1980), and Stephen Hoeller, The Gnostic Jung and the Seven Sermons to the Dead (Wheaton, IL: Quest, 1982).

82. The Pleroma, or fullness, is a term from Gnosticism. It played a central role in the Valentinian system. Hans Jonas states that "Pleroma is the standard term for the fully explicated manifold of divine characteristics, whose standard number is thirty, forming a hierarchy and together constituting the divine realm" (The Gnostic Religion: The Message of the Alien God and the Beginnings of Christianity [London: Routledge, 1992], p. 180). In 1929, Jung said: "The Gnostics ... expressed it as Pleroma, a state of fullness where the pairs of opposites, yea and nay, day and night, are together, then when they 'become,' it is either day or night. In the state of 'promise' before they become, they are nonexistent, there is neither white nor black, good nor bad" (Dream Analysis: Notes of the Seminar Given in 1928-1930, ed. William McGuire [Bollingen Series, Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1984], p. 131). In his later writings, Jung used the term to designate a state of pre-existence and potentiality, identifying it with the Tibetan Bardo: "He must ... accustom the idea that 'time' is a relative concept and needs to be compensated by the concept of a 'simultaneous' Bardo -- or pleromatic existence of all historical processes. What exists in the Pleroma as an eternal 'process' appears in time as aperiodic sequence, that is to say; it is repeated many times in an irregular pattern" (Answer to Job, 1952, CW 11, §629; see also §§620, 624, 675, 686, 727, 733, 748). The distinction that Jung draws between the Pleroma and the creation has some points of contact with Meister Eckhart's differentiation between the Godhead and God. Jung commented on this in Psychological Types (1921, CW 6, §429f ). The relation of Jung's Pleroma to Eckhart is discussed by Maillard, op cit., pp. 118-20. In 1955/56, Jung equated the Pleroma with the alchemist Gerhardus Dorn's notion of the 'unus mundus' (one world) (Mysterium Coniunctionis, CW 14, §660). Jung adopted this expression to designate the transcendental postulate of the unity underlying the multiplicity of the empirical world (Ibid., §759f).

83. In Psychological Types (1921), Jung described 'Tao' as "the creative being, begetting as the father and bringing forth as the mother. It is the beginning and end of all beings" (CW 6, §363.) The relation of Jung's Pleroma to the Chinese Tao is discussed by Maillard, op cit., p. 75. See also John Peck, The Visio Dorothei: Desert Context, Imperial Setting, Later Alignments, pp. 179-80.

84. Lit. Unterschiedenheit. Cf. Psychological Types (1921), CW 6, §705, "Differentiation" [Differenzierung].

85. The principium individuationis is a notion from the philosophy of Arthur Schopenhauer. He defined space and time as the principium individuationis, noting that he had borrowed the expression from Scholasticism. The principium individuationis was the possibility of multiplicity (The World as Will and Representation (1819), 2 vols., tr. E. J. Payne [New York: Dover], pp. 145-46). The term was used by Eduard von Hartmann, who saw its origin in the unconscious. It designated the "uniqueness" of each individual set against the "all-one unconscious" (Philosophie des Unbewussten: Versuch einer Weltanschauung [Berlin: C. Dunker], 1869, p. 519). In 1912, Jung wrote, "Diversity arises from individuation. This fact validates an essential part of Schopenhauer's and Hartmann's philosophy in profound psychological terms" (Transformations and Symbols of the Libido, CW B, §289). In a series of papers and presentations later in 1916, Jung developed his concept of individuation ("The structure of the unconscious," CW 7, and "Individuation and collectivity," CW 18). In 1921, Jung defined it as follows: "The concept of individuation plays no minor role in our psychology. Individuation is in general the process of the formation and particularization of individual beings; especially the development of the psychological individual, as a being distinct from generality; from collective psychology. Individuation, therefore, is a process of differentiation, having for its goal the development of the individual personality" (Psychological Types, CW 7, §758).

86. The notion of life and nature being constituted by opposites and polarities featured centrally in the Naturphilosophie of Schelling. The notion that psychic conflict took the form of a conflict of opposites and that healing represented their resolution featured prominently in Jung's later work; see Psychological Types, 1921, CW 6, ch. 5, and Mysterium Coniunctionis, 2955/56, CW 14.

87. The following paragraphs to the end of this section do not occur in Black Book 6.

88. In the published version of the Sermones, these commentaries that follow each sermon do not appear, and nor does Philemon. The person delivering the sermons has been assumed to be Basilides. These commentaries were added in Scrutinies.

89. In his 1959 BBC TV interview, John Freeman asked Jung, "Do you now believe in God?" Jung replied: "Now? [Pause] Difficult to answer. I know. I don't need to believe. I know." William McGuire and R.F.C. Hull, eds., C. G. Jung Speaking: Interviews and Encounters (p. 428). Philemon's statement here seems to be the background for cited and debated statement. This emphasis on direct experience also accords with classical Gnosticism.

90. January 31, 1916. This sentence does not occur in Black Book 6.

91. For Nietzsche's discussion of the death of God, see The Gay Science (1882, §§108 and 125), and Thus Spoke Zarathustra, section 4 ("Retired from service," p. 271f ). For Jung's discussion of this, see "Psychology and religion," 1938, CW 11 §142f Jung commented: "When Nietzsche said: 'God is dead,' he expressed a truth which is valid for the greater part of Europe" (ibid., §145). To Nietzsche's statement, Jung noted, "However it would be more correct to say: 'He has discarded our image, and where will we find him again?" (Ibid.) He goes on to discuss the motif of the death and disappearance of God in connection with Christ's crucifixion and resurrection.

92. Cf. "Attempt at a psychological interpretation of the dogma of the Trinity" (1940), CW 11, §284f.

93. In 1932, Jung commented on Abraxas: "the Gnostic symbol Abraxas, a made-up name meaning three hundred and sixty-five ... the Gnostics used it as the name of their supreme deity. He was a time god. The philosophy of Bergson, la duree creatrice, is an expression of the same idea." Jung described him in a way that echoes his description here: "just as this archetypal world of the collective unconscious is exceedingly paradoxical, always yea and nay, that figure of Abraxas means the beginning and the end, it is life and death, therefore it is represented by a monstrous figure. It is a monster because it is the life of vegetation in the course of one year, the spring and the autumn, the summer and the winter, the yea and nay of nature. So Abraxas is really identical with the Demiurgos, the world creator. And as such he is surely identical with the Purusha, or with Shiva" (November 16, Visions Seminar, vol. 2, pp. 806-7). Jung added that "Abraxas is usually represented with the head of a fowl, the body of a man, and the tail of a serpent, but there is also the lion-headed symbol with a dragon's body, the head crowned with the twelve rays, alluding to the number of months" (June 7, 1933, Visions Seminar, vol. 2, p. 1041-42). According to St. Irenaeus, Basilides held that "the ruler of them is named Abrasaks, and that is why this (ruler) has the number 365 within it" (Layton, ed., The Gnostic Scriptures, p. 425). Abraxas featured in Albrecht Dieterich's work, Abraxas. Studien zur Religionsgeschichte des spatern Altertums. Jung studied this work closely early in 1913, and his copy is annotated. Jung also had a copy of Charles King's The Gnostics and their Remains (London: Bell and Daldy, 1864), and there are marginal annotations next to the passage discussing the etymology of Abraxas on p. 37.

94. Helios is the Greek Sun God. Jung discussed solar mythologies in Transformations and Symbols of the Libido (1912, CW B, §177f) and also in his unpublished concluding talk on Opicinus de Canistris at the Eranos conference in Ascona in 1943 (JA).

95. The following paragraphs to the end of this section do not occur in Black Book 6.

96. The reference is to the Platonic months. See note 273, p. 315.

97. February 1, 1916.

98. This sentence does not occur in Black Book 6.

99. Aristotle defined happiness as the supreme good (Summum Bonum). In his Summa Theologica, Thomas Aquinas identified this with God. Jung saw the doctrine of the Summum Bonum as being the source of the concept of the privatio boni, which in his view had led to the denial of the reality of evil. See Aion, 1951, CW 9, 2, §§80 and 94. Hence it is counterbalanced here with the "Infinum Malum."

100. In Black Book 6 (see Appendix C), Jung notes that Abraxas is the God of the frogs and that "The God of the frogs or toads, the brainless one, is the union of the Christian God with Satan" (see below, p. 367). In his later writings, Jung argued that the Christian God image was one-sided, in that it left out the factor of evil. Through studying the historical transformations of God-images, he attempted to correct this (especially, Aion and Answer to Job). In his note on how Answer to Job came to be written he wrote that in Aion he had "criticized the idea of the privatio boni as not agreeing with the psychological findings. Psychological experience shows us that whatever we call 'good' is balanced by an equally substantial 'bad' or 'evil.' If 'evil' is non-existent, then whatever there is must needs be 'good.' Dogmatically, neither 'good' nor 'evil' can be derived from Man, since the 'Evil One' existed before Man as one of the 'Sons of God.' The idea of the privatio boni began to play a role in the Church only after Mani. Before this heresy, Clement of Rome taught that God rules the world with a right and a left hand, the right being Christ, the left being Satan. Clement's view is clearly monotheistic, as it unites the opposites in one God. Later Christianity, however, is dualistic, inasmuch as it splits off one half of the opposites, personified in Satan ... If Christianity claims to be a monotheism, it becomes unavoidable to assume the opposites as being contained in God" (1956, CW 11, pp. 357-58).

Image

-- Rosarium Philosophorum of the De Alchemia Opuscula, by Johann Daniel Myliu


101. In 1942, Jung noted: "the concept of an all-encompassing God must necessarily include his opposite. The coincidence of course must not be too radical, otherwise God would cancel himself out. The principle of the coincidence of opposites must therefore be completed by its opposite in order to attain full paradoxicality and hence psychological validity" ("The spirit Mercurius," CW 13, §256).

102. The following paragraphs through the end of the section do not occur in Black Book 6.

103. February 3, 1916. This sentence does not occur in Black Book 6.

104. In 1917, Jung wrote a chapter on "the sexual theory" in The Psychology of the Unconscious Processes, which presented a critique of the psychoanalytic understanding of the erotic. In his 1928 revision of this chapter, retitled 'The Eros theory" he added: "The Erotic ... belongs on the one hand to the original drive nature of man ... On the other hand it is related to the highest forms of the spirit. It only thrives when spirit and drive are in right harmony ... 'Eros is a mighty daemon,' as the wise Diotima said to Socrates ... He is not all of nature within us, though he is at least one of its essential aspects" (CW 7, §§32-33). In the Symposium, Diotima teaches Socrates about the nature of Eros. She tells him that "'He is a great spirit, Socrates. Everything classed as a spirit falls between god and human.' they have?' I asked. / 'They interpret and carry messages from humans to gods and from gods to humans. They convey prayers and sacrifices from humans, and commands and gifts in return for sacrifices from gods. Being intermediate between the other two, they fill the gap between them, and enable the universe to form an interconnected whole. They serve as the medium for all divination, for priestly expertise in sacrifice, ritual and spells, and for all prophecy and sorcery. Gods do not make direct contact with humans; they communicate and converse with humans (whether awake or asleep) entirely through the medium of spirits" (tr. C. Gill [London: Penguin, 1999], pp. 202e-203a. In Memories Jung reflected on the nature of Eros, describing it as "a kosmogonos, a creator and father-mother of all consciousness" (p. 387 ). This cosmogonic characterization of Eros needs to be distinguished from Jung's use of the term to characterize women's consciousness. See note 161, p. 246.

105. In 1954, Jung wrote an extended study of the archetype of the tree: "The philosophical tree" (CW 13).

106. Black Book 6 continues: "The dead: 'You are a pagan, a polytheist!' " (p. 30).

107. February 5, 1916.

108. In Black Book 6, the dark guest (see below, p. 355) enters here.

109. The following paragraphs to the end of the section do not occur in Black Book 6.

110. This may refer to the advent of Christianity into Germany in the eighth century CE, when sacred trees were chopped down.

111. This sentence does not occur in Black Book 6.

112. In the 1925 seminar, Jung said: "Sexuality and spirituality are pairs of opposites that need each other" (Analytical Psychology, p. 29).

113. Goethe's Faust ends with a vision of the Mater Gloriosa. In his lecture, "Faust and alchemy," Jung said of this: "The Mater Coelestis should on no account be thought of as Mary or the Church. She is rather Aphrodite urania, as in St. Augustine or Pico de Mirandola, the beatissima mater" (in Irene Gerber-Munch, Goethes Faust: Eine tiefenpsychologische Studie uber den Mythos des modernen Menschen. Mit dem Vortrag von C. G. Jung, Faust und die Alchemie [Kusnacht, Verlag Stiftung fur Jung'sche Psychologie, 1997], p. 37).

114. Black Book 6 has "Phallus" (p. 41), as does the handwritten calligraphic version of the Septem Sermones (p. 21).

115. In Transformations and Symbols of the Libido (1912), Jung noted: 'The phallus is the creature that moves without limbs, sees without eyes, and knows the future; and as the symbolic representative of ubiquitous creative power it claims immortality" (CW B, §209). He goes on to discuss phallic Gods.

116. Black Book 6 continues: "The mother is the grail. / The phallus is the spear" (p. 43).

117. Black Book 6 continues: "In community, we go to the source, which is the mother. / In singleness we go to the future, which is the engendering phallus" (p. 46). In October 1916, Jung gave two presentations to the Psychological Club concerning the relation of individuation to collective adaptation; see "Adaptation, individuation and collectivity," CW 18. This theme dominated the discussions in the club that year.

118. This paragraph is not in Black Book 6.

119. The following paragraphs to the end of the section are not in Black Book 6.

120. This section does not occur in Black Book 6.

121. February 8, 1916.This sentence does not occur in Black Book 6.

122. This sentence is not in Black Book 6.

123. On February 29, 1919, Jung wrote a letter to Joan Corrie and commented on the Sermones. with particular reference to the last one: "The primordial creator of the world, the blind creative libido, becomes transformed in man through individuation & out of this process, which is like pregnancy, arises a divine child, a reborn God, no more (longer) dispersed into the millions of creatures, but being one & this individual, and at the same time all individuals, the same in you as in me. Dr. L[ong] has a little book: VII sermones ad mortuous. There you find the description of the Creator dispersed into his creatures, & in the last sermon you find the beginning of individuation, out of which, the divine child arises ... The child is a new God, actually born in many individuals, but they don't know it. He is a spiritual God. A spirit in many people, yet one and the same everywhere. Keep to your time and you will experience His qualities" (Copied in Constance Long's diary; Countway Library of Medicine, pp. 21-22).

124. The following paragraphs to the end of the section do not occur in Black Book 6.

125. In September 1916, Jung had conversations with his soul that provided further elaboration and clarification of the cosmology of the Sermones. September 25: [Soul]: "How many lights do you want, three or seven? Three is the heartfelt and modest, seven the general and encompassing." [I:] "What a question! And what a decision! I must be true: I think I would like seven lights." [Soul:] "Seven, you say? I thought so. That has broad scope -- cold lights." [I:] "I need cooling, fresh air. Enough of this stifling mugginess. Too much fear and not enough free breathing. Give me seven lights." [Soul:] "The first light means the Pleroma. / The second means Abraxas. / The third the sun. / The fourth the moon. / The fifth the earth. / The sixth the phallus. / The seventh the stars." [I:] "Why were there no birds, and why were the celestial mother and the sky missing?" [I:] "They are all enclosed in the star. As you look at the star, you look through them. They are the bridges to the star. They form the seventh light, the highest, the floating, which rises with flapping wings, released from the embrace of the tree of light with six branches and one blossom. in which the God of the star lay slumbering. / The six lights are single and form a multiplicity; the one light is one and forms a unity; it is the blossoming crown of the tree, the holy egg, the seed of the world endowed with wings so it can reach its place. The one gives rise to the many over and again, and the many entails the one" (Black Book 6. pp. 104-6). September 28: [Soul:] "Now let us try this: it is something of the golden bird. It is not the white bird, but the golden one. It is different. The white bird is a good daimon, but the golden one is above you and under your God. It flies ahead of you. I see it in the blue ether, flying toward the star. It is something that is part of you. And it is at once its own egg, containing you. Do you feel me. Then ask!" [I] "Tell me more. It makes me feel queasy." [Soul:] "The golden bird is no soul; it is your entire nature. People are golden birds as well; not all; some are worms and rot in the earth. But many are also golden birds." [I]: "Continue. I fear my revulsion. Tell me what you have grasped." [Soul:] "The golden bird sits in the tree of the six lights. The tree grows out of Abraxas's head, but Abraxas grows out of the Pleroma. Everything from which the tree grows blossoms as a light, transformed, as a womb of the flowering treetop, of the golden egg-bird. The tree of light is first a plant, which is called an individual; this grows out of Abraxas's head, his thought is one among many. The individual is a mere plant without flowers and fruits, a passageway to the tree of seven lights. The individual is a precursor of the tree of light. The lucent blossoms from him, Phanes himself. Agni, a new fire, a golden bird. This comes after the individual, namely when it has been reunited with the world, the world blossoms from it. Abraxas is the drive, individual, distinct from him, but the tree of the seven lights is the symbol of the individual united with Abraxas. This is where Phanes appears and he, the golden bird, flies ahead. / You unite yourself with Abraxas through me. / First you give me your heart, and then you live through me. I am the bridge to Abraxas. Thus the tree of light arises in you and you become the tree of light and Phanes arises from you. You have anticipated, but not understood this. At the time you had to separate from Abraxas to become individual, opposed to the drive. Now you become one with Abraxas. This happens through me. You cannot do this. Therefore you must remain with me. Unification with the physical Abraxas occurs through the human female, but that with the spiritual Abr. occurs through me; that is why you must be with me" (Black Book 6, pp. 114 -20).

126. In Black Book 6, this figure enters on February 5, in the middle of the Sermones (p. 35f). See note 108, p. 351 above.

127. February 17, 1916. In Black Book 6, this speech is spoken by Jung himself (p. 52).

128. Black Book 6 has here: "I need a new shadow, since I recognized dreadful Abraxas and withdrew from him" (p. 52).

129. In Black Book 6, this voice is identified as "mother" (p. 53).

130. In Black Book 6, this is spoken by Jung (p. 53).

131. February 21, 1916. Black Book 6 has instead: "[I:] "A Turk? Whence the journey? Do you profess Islam? What you are announcing Mohammed for?" [Visitor:] "I speak of polygamy, houris, and paradise. This is what you shall hear about." [I:] "Speak and end this torment" (p. 54).

132. The version of this dialogue in Black Book 6 includes the following interchange: [I:] "What about polygamy, houris, and paradise?" [Visitor]: "Many women amount to many books. Each woman is a book, each book a woman. The houri is a thought and the thought is a houri. The world of ideas is paradise and paradise is the world of ideas. Mohammed teaches that the houris admit the believer into paradise. The Teutons said as much" (p. 56). (Cf. The Koran 56:12-39). In Norse mythology, the Valkyries escorted the brave who were slain in battle to Valhalla and tended them there.

133. February 24, 1916.

134. This statement does not occur in Black Book 6.

135. February 28, 1916.

136. The next two paragraphs do not occur in Black Book 6.

137. I.e., Christ.

138. April 12. 1916. In Black Book 6, this speech is not attributed to Philemon.

139. Cf. John 8:1-11.

140. Cf. Matthew 21:31-32.

141. Cf. John 9:13f.

142. The reference is to the Platonic months. See note 273, p. 315.

143. The next six paragraphs do not occur in Black Book 6.

144. The next two passages also occur in "Dreams" after entries for the middle of July 1917, introduced by the statement: "Fragments of the next book:" (p. 18).

145. May 3, 1916.

146. See above, p. 300.

147. See above, p. 348.

148. In Memories, Jung stated: "The figures of the unconscious are also 'uninformed,' and need man, or contact with consciousness, in order to attain to 'knowledge.' When I began working with the unconscious, I found myself much involved with the figures of Salome and Elijah. Then they receded, but after about two years they reappeared. To my complete astonishment, they were completely unchanged; they spoke and acted as if nothing had happened in the meanwhile. In actuality the most incredible things had taken place in my life. I had, as it were, to begin from the beginning again, to tell them all about what had been going on, and explain things to them. At the time I had been greatly surprised by this situation. Only later did I understand what had happened: in the interval the two had sunk back into the unconscious and into themselves -- I might equally put, into timelessness. They remained out of contact with the I and the I's changing circumstances, and therefore were 'ignorant' of what had happened in the world of consciousness" (pp. 338-39). This appears to refer to this conversation.

149. The rest of this dialogue does not occur in Black Book 6.

150. See note 261, p. 311.

151. May 31, 1916.

152. June 1, 1916.

153. In Black Book 6, the shade is identified as Christ (p. 85).

154. Simon Magus (first century) was a magician. In the Acts of the Apostles (8:9-24), after becoming a Christian, he wished to purchase the power of transmitting the Holy Spirit from Peter and Paul (Jung saw this account as a caricature). Further accounts of him are found in the apocryphal acts of Peter, and in writings of the Church fathers. He has been seen as one of the founders of Gnosticism, and in the second century a Simonian sect arose. He is said to have always traveled with a woman, whom he found in a brothel in Tyre, who was the reincarnation of Helen of Troy. Jung cited this as an example of the anima figure ("Soul and earth," 1927, CW 10, §75). On Simon Magus, see Gilles Quispel, Gnosis als Weltreligion (Zurich: Origo Verlag, 1951), pp. 51-70, and G.R.S. Mead, Simon Magus: An Essay on the Founder of Simonianism Based on the Ancient Sources with a Reevaluation of His Philosophy and Teachings (London: The Theosophical Publishing House, 1892).

155. In Memories, Jung commented: "In such dream wandering one frequently encounters an old man who is accompanied by a young girl, and examples of such couples are to be found in many mythic tales. Thus, according to Gnostic tradition, Simon Magus went about with a young girl whom he had picked up in a brothel. Her name was Helen, and she was regarded as the reincarnation of the Trojan Helen. Klingsor and Kundry, Lao-tzu and the dancing girl, likewise belong in this category" (p. 206).

156. I.e., Satan.

157. In Black Book 6, this sentence reads: "Your brother came before you, Oh master, the terrible worm, whom you dismissed, when he gave you clever counsel in the desert with a tempting voice" (p. 86).

158. Black Book 6 continues: "since he is your immortal brother" (p. 86).

159. Jung commented on the serpent as an allegory of Christ in Aion (1952, CW 9, 2, §§369, 385, and 390).

160. See above, p. 243.
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Re: The Red Book: Liber Novus, by C.G. Jung

Postby admin » Mon Dec 02, 2013 3:01 am

Epilogue [i]

1959

I worked on this book for 16 years. My acquaintance with alchemy in 1930 took me away from it. The beginning of the end came in 1928, when Wilhelm sent me the text of the "Golden Flower," an alchemical treatise. There the contents of this book found their way into actuality and I could no longer continue working on it. To the superficial observer, it will appear like madness. It would also have developed into one, had I not been able to absorb the overpowering force of the original experiences. With the help of alchemy, I could finally arrange them into a whole. I always knew that these experiences contained something precious, and therefore I knew of nothing better than to write them down in a "precious," that is to say, costly book and to paint the images that emerged through reliving it all -- as well as I could. I knew how frightfully inadequate this undertaking was, but despite much work and many distractions I remained true to it, even if another / [190/191] possibility never ...

____________

Notes:

i. This appears on p. 190 of the calligraphic volume of Liber Novus. The transcription was abruptly left off in the middle of a sentence on p. 189. This epilogue appears on the next page, in Jung's normal handwriting. This in turn was abruptly left off in the middle of a sentence.
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Re: The Red Book: Liber Novus, by C.G. Jung

Postby admin » Mon Dec 02, 2013 3:03 am

Appendix A: Mandalas

Image

Image
Mandala sketch 1 appears to be the first in the series, dated August 2, 1917. It is the basis of image 80. The legend at the top of the image is Image [Phanes]" (see note 211, p. 301). Legend at bottom: "Stoffweehsel in Individuum" (metabolism in the individual) (19.3 CM x 14.3 CM).

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Mandala sketch 2 is the reverse of mandala sketch 1. (19.4 CM x 14.3 CM).

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Mandala sketch 3 is dated August 4, 1917, and is the basis of image 82 (14.9 CM x 12.4 CM).

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Mandala sketch 4 is dated August 6, 1917. On these sketches see introduction, pp. 206. (20.3 CM x 14.9 CM).

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Image
Mandala sketch 5 is dated September 1, 1917, and is the basis of image 89. (18.2 CM x 12.4 CM).

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Mandala sketch 6 is dated September 10, 1917, and is the basis of image 93. (14.9 CM x 12.1 CM).

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Mandala sketch 7 is dated September 11, 1917, and is the basis of image 94. (12.1 CM x 15.2 CM).

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The town plan is from Black Book 7, page 124b, and depicts the scene of the "Liverpool" dream. This sketch is the basis of image 159, linking the dream with the mandala. Text in image, from left: "Dwelling of the Swiss": above, "Houses", below, Houses", "Island"; (below) "Lake", "Tree", "Streets", "Houses." (13.3 CM x 19.1 CM)

Image

Image
The sketch of "Systema Munditotius" is from Black Book 5, page 169 (see Appendix C, p. 370, for further discussion). (22.9 CM x 17.8 CM)

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Sketch of first page of Liber Secundus (see p. 1). (38.7 CM x 27.3 CM). The calligraphic text is from a Babylonian creation myth, reproduced in Hugo Gressman (ed.), Altorientalische Texte und Bilder zum Alten Testamente, vol. 1 (Tubingen:), Mohr, 1909), p. 4f, which Jung cited in 1912 in Transformations and Symbols of the Libido (CW B. §383). It reads: "Mother Huber who formed everything / provided an irresistible weapon when she bore a giant serpent with pointed tooth / relentless in every respect. She filled her body with blood not with poison / and covered furious giant newts in fertility. She made them shine with frightful brilliance and made them rise high. Whoever saw them should pine away with horror / their bodies should rear without them taking flight."

Image

Image legend:

[Big] A = Anthropos. Man
[Little] A = Human soul
[Serpent] = Serpent = Earthly soul
[Bird] = Bird = Heavenly soul
[Chalice] = Heavenly mother
[Pillar] = Phallus (Devil)
[Crescent] = Angel
[Upward Arrow] = Devil
[Circle with X) = Heavenly world
[Upside-down female symbol] = Earth, Mother of the Devil
[Circle with dot] = Sun, Eye of the Pleroma
[Crescent Moon] = Moon, Eye of the Pleroma
[Moon sighted]
[Sun looking]
Moon = Satan
Sun = God
[Lion-faced deity] = [Circle with Dot] + [Crescent Moon] = God of the Frogs = Abraxas
[Circle] = The Fullness
[Black Circle] = The Emptiness
[Flame] = Flame. Fire.
Love = Eros, a daimon
[Misc. symbols] = Gods, stars without numbers

The middle point is again the Pleroma. The God in it is Abraxas, a world of daimons surrounds it, and again in a middle point is humanity, ending and beginning.

Image

Image
Systema Munditotius. (30 CM x 34 CM) In 1955, Jung's Systema Munditotius was published anonymously in a special issue of Du dedicated to the Eranos conferences. In a letter of February 11, 1955, to Walter Corti, Jung explicitly stated that he did not want his name to appear with it (JA). He added the following comments to it: "It portrays the antinomies of the microcosm within the macrocosmic world and its antinomies. At the very top, the figure of the young boy in the winged egg, called Erikapaios or Phanes and thus reminiscent as a spiritual figure of the Orphic Gods. His dark antithesis in the depths is here designated as Abraxas. He represents the dominus mundi, the lord of the physical world, and is a world-creator of an ambivalent nature. Sprouting from him we see the tree of life, labeled vita ("life") while its upper counterpart is a light-tree in the form of a seven-branched candelabra labeled ignis ("fire") and Eros ("love"). Its light points to the spiritual world of the divine child. Art and science also belong to this spiritual realm, the first represented as a winged serpent and the second as a winged mouse (as hole-digging activity!). -- The candelabra is based on the principle of the spiritual number three (twice-three flames with one large flame in the middle), while the lower world of Abraxas is characterized by five, the number of natural man (the twice-five rays of his star). The accompanying animals of the natural world are a devilish monster and a larva. This signifies death and rebirth. A further division of the mandala is horizontal. To the left we see a circle indicating the body or the blood, and from it rears the serpent, which winds itself around the phallus, as the generative principle. The serpent is dark and light, signifying the dark realm of the earth, the moon, and the void (therefore called Satanus). The light realm of rich fulness lies to the right, where from the bright circle frigus sive amor dei [cold, or the love of God] the dove of the Holy Ghost takes wing, and wisdom (Sophia) pours from a double beaker to left and right. -- This feminine sphere is that of heaven. -- The large sphere characterized by zigzag lines or rays represents an inner sun; within this sphere the macrocosm is repeated, but with the upper and lower regions reversed as in a mirror. These repetitions should be conceived of as endless in number, growing even smaller until the innermost core, the actual microcosm, is reached."

Copyright © The Foundation of the works of C.G. Jung reproduced with the permission of the Foundation and Robert Hinshaw.
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Re: The Red Book: Liber Novus, by C.G. Jung

Postby admin » Mon Dec 02, 2013 3:18 am

Appendix B: Commentaries

pp. 86-89 [1]

Age
Male
Enantiodromia of the life-type


It is difficult to force this image to make a statement. Yet it is so allegorical that it ought to speak. It differs from the earlier experiences in that it is more witnessed than experienced. For that matter, all the images that I have placed under the title "Mystery play" are rather more allegorical than actual experiences. They are certainly not intended allegories; they have not been consciously contrived to depict experience in either veiled or even fantastic terms. Rather, they appeared as visions. It was not until I reworked them later that I realized more and more that they could in no way be compared with the experiences portrayed in the other chapters. These images apparently are portrayals of personified unconscious thoughts. That follows from their imagistic manner. They also called for more reflection and interpretation than the other experiences, to which I could not do justice with cogitation, because they were quite simply experiences. The images of the "Mystery play," on the other hand, personify principles accessible to thinking and intellectual understanding, and their allegorical manner accordingly also invites such an attempt at explanation.

The action is set in a dark earthly depth, evidently an allegorical representation of the inner depths beneath the extension of the bright space of consciousness or the psychic field of vision. Sinking into such a depth corresponds to averting the mental gaze from outer things and focusing it on the inner dark depths. Gazing at the darkness to some extent animates the previously dark background. Since gazing at the darkness occurs without conscious expectation, the inanimate psychic background has an opportunity to let its contents appear, undisturbed by conscious assumptions.

The preceding experiences indicated that strong psychic movements were present that consciousness could not grasp. Two figures -- the old sage and the young maiden -- step into the field of vision, unexpectedly for consciousness, but characteristic of the mythological spirit upon which consciousness rests. This configuration is an image that forever recurs in the human spirit. The old man represents a spiritual principle that could be designated as Logos, and the maiden represents an unspiritual principle of feeling that could be called Eros. A descendent of Logos is Nous, the intellect, which has done away with the commingling of feeling, presentiment, and sensation. In contrast, the Logos contains this commingling. But it is not the product of such blending, or else it would be a lower animalistic psychic activity, yet it masters the blend, so that the four fundamental activities of the soul become subordinate to its principle. It is an independent principle of form that means understanding, insight, foresight, legislation, and wisdom. The figure of an old prophet is therefore a fitting allegory for this principle, since the prophetic spirit unites in itself all these qualities. In contrast, Eros is a principle that contains a commingling of all the fundamental activities of the soul just as much as it masters them, although its purpose is completely different. It is not form-giving but form-fulfilling; it is the wine that will be poured into the vessel; it is not the bed and direction of the stream but the impetuous water flowing in it. Eros is desire, longing, force, exuberance, pleasure, suffering. Where Logos is ordering and insistence; Eros is dissolution and movement. They are two fundamental psychic powers that form a pair of opposites, each one requiring the other.

The old prophet expresses persistence, but the young maiden denotes movement. Their impersonal essence is expressed by the fact that they are figures belonging to general human history; they do not belong to a person but have been a spiritual content of the world's peoples since time immemorial. Everyone has them, and therefore these figures recur in the work of thinkers and poets.

Such primordial images have a secret power that works just as much on human reason as on the soul. Wherever they appear they stir something linked with the mysterious, the long gone, and heavy with foreboding. A string sounds whose vibration reverberates in every man's breast; these primordial images dwell in everyone as they are the property of all mankind. [2] This secret power is like a spell, like magic, and causes elevation just as much as seduction. It is characteristic of primordial images that they take hold of man where he is utterly human, and a power seizes him, as if the bustling throng were pushing him. And this happens even if individual understanding and feeling rise up against it. What is the power of the individual against the voice of the whole people in him? He is entranced, possessed, and consumed. Nothing makes this effect clearer than the serpent. It signifies everything dangerous and everything bad, everything nocturnal and uncanny, which adheres to Logos as well as to Eros, so long as they can work as the dark and unrecognized principles of the unconscious spirit.

The house represents a fixed abode, which indicates that Logos and Eros have permanent residence in us.

Salome is represented as the daughter of Elijah, thus expressing the order of succession. The prophet is her producer, she emanates from him. The fact that she is assigned to him as a daughter indicates a subordination of Eros to Logos. Although this relation is very frequent, as manifested by the constancy of this primordial image, it is nevertheless a special case that possesses no general validity. For if these were two opposed principles, one could not arise from the other and thus depend on it. Salome is hence apparently no (complete) correct embodiment of Eros, but a variety of the same. (This supposition is later confirmed.) That she is actually an incorrect allegory for Eros also stems from the fact that she is blind. Eros is not blind, since he regulates, just as well as Logos does, all fundamental activities of the soul. The blindness indicates her incompleteness and the absence of an essential quality. By virtue of her shortcoming she depends upon her father.

The indistinct glittering walls of the hall point to something unrecognized, perhaps something valuable that wakens curiosity and attracts attention. In this manner, creative involvement is woven even deeper into the image, so that an even greater animation of the dark background becomes possible. Such enhanced attention gives rise to the image of an object, which to all intents and purposes expresses concentration, namely the image of a crystal, which has been used to produce such visions since time immemorial. These figures, which at first are incomprehensible to the beholder, evoke dark processes in his soul, which to a certain extent lie even deeper (such as in the vision of blood), and whose perception requires an aid like the crystal. As has been said, however, this expresses nothing else than an even stronger concentration of creative attention.

A figure like the prophet, which is clear and complete in itself, arouses less curiosity than the unexpected form of blind Salome, which is why one may expect that the formative process will first address the problem of Eros. Hence an image of Eve appears first, together with images of the tree and the serpent. This apparently refers to temptation, as already encapsulated in the figure of Salome. Temptation brings about a further movement toward the side of Eros. This in turn forebodes many adventurous possibilities, for which the wandering of Odysseus is the fitting image. This image stimulates and invites adventurousness; it is as if a door opened to a new opportunity to free the gaze from the dark confinement and depths in which it was held fast. Hence the vision opens onto a sunny garden, whose red blooming trees represent a development of erotic feeling, and whose wells mean a steady source. The cool water of the well, which does not inebriate, indicates the Logos. (Therefore Salome also speaks later of the deep "wells" of the prophet.) This suggests that the development of Eros also means a source of knowledge. And with this Elijah begins to speak.

Logos undoubtedly has the upper hand in this, my case, since Elijah says that he and his daughter have always been one. Yet Logos and Eros are not one, but two. In this case, however, Logos has blinded and subjugated Eros. But if this is the case, then the necessity will also arise to free Eros from the clutch of Logos, so that the former will regain vision. Therefore Salome turns to me, because Eros is in need of help, and because I have apparently been enabled to behold this image for precisely this reason. The soul of the man is more inclined to Logos than to Eros, which is more characteristic of the essence of the woman. The subjugation of Eros through Logos explains not only the blindness of Eros but also the somewhat strange fact that Eros is represented precisely by the not-so-pleasing figure of Salome. Salome denotes bad qualities. She brings to mind not only the murder of the holy one but also the incestuous pleasure of the father.

A principle always has the dignity of independence. But if this dignity is taken from it, it is debased and then assumes a bad form. We know that psychic activity and qualities that are deprived of development through repression degenerate and thus become bad habits. Either an open or secret vice takes the place of a well-formed activity and gives rise to a disunity of the personality with itself, signifying a moral suffering or a real sickness. Only one way remains open to whoever wants to free himself from this suffering: he must accept the repressed part of his soul, he must love his inferiority, even his vices, so that what is degenerate can resume development.

Wherever Logos rules, there is order but too much persistence. The allegory of paradise where there is no struggle and therefore no development is fitting here. In this condition the repressed movement degenerates and its value is lost. This is the murder of the holy one, and the murder happens because, like Herod, Logos cannot protect the holy one on account of his own weakness, because he can do nothing else than hold onto himself, thus inducing the degeneration of Eros. Only disobedience against the ruling principle leads out of this condition of undeveloped persistence. The story of paradise repeats itself, and hence the serpent winds its way up the tree because Adam should be led into temptation.

Every development leads through the undeveloped, but capable of development. In its undeveloped condition it is almost worthless, while development represents a highest value that is unquestionable. One must give up this value or at least apparently give it up to be able to attend to the undeveloped. But this stands in the sharpest contrast to the developed, which perhaps represents our best and highest achievement. The acceptance of the undeveloped is therefore like a sin, like a false step, a degeneration, a descent to a deeper level; in actual fact, however, it is a greater deed than remaining in an ordered condition at the expense of the other side of our being, which is thus at the mercy of decay.

pp. 103-119 [3]

The scene of the action is the same place as in the first image. The allusion to a crater heightens the impression of a large cavity that reaches far down into the interior of the earth; this depth is not inactive, but violently discharges all kinds of matter.

Since Eros poses the most serious problem at first, Salome enters the scene, blindly groping her way toward the left. Even what appear to be negligible details are important in such visionary images. The left is the side of the inauspicious. This suggests that Eros does not tend toward the right, the side of consciousness, conscious will and conscious choice, but toward the side of the heart, which is less subject to our conscious will. This movement toward the left is emphasized by the fact that the serpent moves in the same direction. The serpent represents magical power, which also appears where animal drives are aroused imperceptibly in us. They afford the movement of Eros the uncanny emphasis that strikes us as magical. Magical effect is the enchantment and underlining of our thought and feeling through dark instinctual impulses of an animal nature.

The movement toward the left is blind, that is, without purpose and intention. It hence requires guidance, not by conscious intention but by Logos. Elijah calls Salome back. Her blindness is an affliction, and as such demands healing. Closer scrutiny at least partially invalidates the prejudice against her. She seems to be innocent, and perhaps her badness ought to be attributed to her blindness.

Logos asserts its power over Eros by calling back Salome. The serpent also obeys Logos. It rests with Logos and Eros to emphasize the power and significance of this image. A natural consequence of this magical, powerful view of the union of Logos and Eros is the strongly felt smallness and insignificance of the I, which finds expression in a sense of boyishness.

It appears as if the movement toward the left, following blind Eros, is not possible, or effectively disallowed, without the intervention of Logos. From the perspective of Logos, following a movement blindly is a sin, because it is one-sided and violates the law that man must forever strive for the highest degree of consciousness. Therein lies his humanity. The other he has in common with animals. Jesus also says, "If you know what you are doing, you are blessed; if you do not know what you are doing, you are damned." [4] The movement toward the left would be possible and permitted only if a conscious, seeing notion of it existed. Formulating such a notion is not possible without the intervention of Logos.

The first step toward developing such a notion is to become conscious of the goal or intention of the movement. Hence Elijah asks about the intention of the I. And it must admit its blindness, that is, its ignorance about intention. The only recognizable thing is a longing, a wish, to unravel the embroilment caused by the first image.

Such making conscious stirs a vague sense of happiness in Salome. Understandably so, since consciousness means insight, that is, a healing of her blindness. Thus a step toward attaining the healing of Eros is taken.

At first the I remains in its inferior position, since its ignorance prevents it from surveying the further development of its problem. Nor would it know which direction to take, since it has never cast its gaze into the depths of its psychic substratum, but has seen only what meets the eye and recognized only the powers of consciousness and the conscious world as effective forces, half-consciously denying its inner impulses. Faced with its own depths, such an I can only feel embarrassed. Its belief in a conscious upperworld had been so firm that going down into the depths of the self is like guilt, a betrayal of conscious ideals.

But since its desire to unravel the embroilment is greater than its aversion to its own inferiority, the I entrusts itself to the guidance of Logos. Since nothing comes into view that could answer the question raised, even greater depths must evidently be opened up. This in turn occurs with the help of the crystal, that is, through the utmost concentration of expectant attention. The first image to appear in the crystal is the mother of God with child.

This image is obviously related, and opposed, to the vision of Eve in the first image. Just as Eve represents carnal temptation and carnal motherhood, the mother of God stands for carnal virginity and spiritual motherhood. The first direction would be a movement of Eros toward the flesh, the latter toward the spirit. Eve is an expression of the carnal side, whereas Mary expresses the spiritual side of Eros. As long as the I saw only Eve, it was blind. The evocation of awareness, however, affords a spiritual view of Eros. In the first case the I became an Odysseus on an adventurous journey, which concludes with the aging man's return to Penelope, the motherly woman.

In the latter case the I is depicted as Peter, the chosen rock upon which the Church is to be founded. The key as the symbol of the power of binding and loosing buttresses this idea, and leads one to the image of the pope as God's governor on earth with a threefold crown.

Undoubtedly, the I becomes involved in a movement toward spiritual power, as attested by the one-sidedness of the movement. The vision of Eve leads astray, to adventurous odyssey, to Circe and Calypso. The vision of the mother of God, on the other hand, turns desire away from the flesh and toward the humble veneration of the spirit. Eros is subject to error in the flesh, but in the spirit it rises above the flesh and the inferiority of carnal error. It therefore almost imperceptibly becomes the spirit, the power over the flesh in the guise of love, and thus spiritual power casts off the mantle of love; although the former believes it loves the spirit, in effect it rules the flesh. And the more powerful it is, the less loving it is. And the less it loves the spirit, the more it is carnal power. On account of its power over the flesh, the love of the spirit thus becomes a secular power-drive in spiritual guise.

Christ overcame the world by burdening himself with its suffering. But Buddha overcame both the pleasure and suffering of the world by disposing of both. And thus he entered into nonbeing, a condition from which there is no return. Buddha is an even higher spiritual power, that derives no pleasure from controlling the flesh, since he has altogether moved beyond pleasure and suffering. Passion, whose conquest still requires so much effort in the case of Christ and does so incessantly and in ever greater measure, has left Buddha and surrounds him as a blazing fire. He is both unaffected and untouchable.

But if the living I approaches this condition, its passion may leave it, though it will not die. Or are we not our passion? And what happens to our passion when it leaves the I? The I is consciousness, which only has eyes in front. It never sees what is behind it. But that is where the passion it has overcome in front regroups. Unguided by the eye of reason, unmitigated by humaneness, the fire becomes a devastating, bloodthirsty Kali, who devours the life of man from within, as the mantra of her sacrificial ceremony says: "Hail to you, O Kali, triple-eyed Goddess of dreadful aspect, from whose throat hangs a necklace of human skulls. May you be honored with this blood!" Salome must of course despair of this end, which would like to turn Eros into spirit, since Eros cannot exist without the flesh. In resisting the inferiority of the flesh, the I resists its female soul, which represents everything that strives to suppress consciousness, against spirit. Thus this path also results in an opposition. Hence the I returns from beholding the figures embodying its conflict.

Logos and Eros are reunited, as if they had overcome the conflict between spirit and flesh. They appear to know the solution. The movement toward the left, which started from Eros at the beginning of the image, now commences from Logos. He starts moving toward the left, to complete with seeing eyes what began in blindness. At first this movement leads into greater darkness, which is then still somewhat illumined by the reddish light. The color red points to Eros. While it does not emit a bright light, Eros at least provides an opportunity to recognize something, perhaps even merely by inducing a situation in which man can recognize something, provided Logos assists him.

Elijah leans against the marble lion. The lion as a royal animal signifies power. The stone suggests unshakeable firmness, thereby expressing the power and solidity of Logos. Once again awareness commences first, although now in greater depths and in renewed surroundings. Here the I experiences its smallness even more as it is even further removed from the world it knows, where it is conscious of its value and meaning. In these new surroundings there is nothing to remind it of its meaning. Hence it is obviously overwhelmed by so much otherness, which so completely eludes its own discretion. Elijah assumes control of developing awareness.

As the crystal visions have shown, the idea that should be conveyed to consciousness is an idea of spiritual power, that is, the I was tempted to arrogate prophethood. But this idea encountered such a feeling of resistance that it could not assert itself against consciousness. Hence it remained behind the curtain. But since the I could not follow Eros blindly, it sought at least to exchange spiritual power for this loss -- as observed so very often in human life! It is almost inevitable that such a great loss, like that of Eros, presses man to search for a substitute at least in the sphere of power. This occurs in such an uncanny, cunning manner that the I mostly fails to notice the ruse. Which explains why the I as a rule cannot enjoy its power, since it does not possess power, but is possessed by the power-devil. In this case it would have been easy for the I to grasp the fact that Elijah imposes himself with such living reality, and lay claim to this figure as a personality valuable in itself. But awareness has forestalled this deception.

The appearance of living figures should not be taken personally, even though one is obviously inclined to assume responsibility for them. In reality such figures belong just as much or little to our personality as our hands and feet. The mere presence of hands or feet is not characteristic of personality. If anything about them is characteristic, it is merely their individual character. It is thus characteristic of the I that the old man and the young maiden are called Elijah and Salome; they might just as well have been called Simon Magus and Helena. What is significant, however, is that they are biblical figures. As proven later, this is one of the peculiarities of the psychic entanglement belonging to this moment.

The awareness of the alluring idea of spiritual power shifts the question of Eros into the foreground again, once more in a new form: both the possibility indicated by Eve and the one represented by Mary are ruled out. Hence the third possibility remains, namely filial relationship, which avoids the two extremes of the flesh and the spirit: Elijah as the father, Salome as the sister, the I as the son and brother. This solution corresponds to the Christian notion of childhood in God. Salome -- as Mary -- makes up the as-yet-absent mother in what is a formidably ensnaring manner. This has a corresponding effect on the I. There is something undeniably cathartic about the Christian solution -- because it seems to be altogether possible. There is a child in each of us; in the elderly, it is even the only thing still alive. One can have recourse to the childlike anytime, on account of its inexhaustible freshness and adherence. Everything, even the most ominous, can be rendered harmless through retranslation into the childlike. After all, we do this often enough in everyday life. We even manage to tame a passion by leading it back to the childlike, and perhaps the flame of passion collapses in a childlike lament even more often. Thus there are many prospects for which the childlike can seem to be a satisfactory remedy, including not least the far-reaching effect of our Christian education, which hammers into us the notion of childhood in hundreds of mantras and hymns.

Salome's remark that Mary is their mother must thus appear even more devastating. Since this prevents the childlike solution from developing, it immediately prompts another thought: If Mary is the mother, then inescapably I must be Christ. The childlike solution would have canceled all reservations: Salome would no longer pose a threat, since she would be only the little sister. Elijah would be the caring father, whose wisdom and foresight would have left the I to its own devices with childlike trust.

But this is the unfortunate drawback constituted by childhood as a solution: every child wishes to grow. Being a child involves the burning desire and impatience for future adulthood. If we return to being a child for fear of the dangers of Eros, the child will want to develop toward spiritual power. But if we flee into childhood for fear of the dangers of the spirit, we fall into arrogating the power of Eros.

The condition of spiritual childhood constitutes a transition in which not everyone can remain. In this case it stands to reason that Eros demonstrates to the I the impossibility of being a child. One might think that it is not that awful to renounce the condition of childhood. But only those who fail to grasp the consequences of this renunciation think that way. It is not the loss of immemorial Christian views and the religious possibilities they ensured -- many bear this loss all too easily -- but rather that what is renounced refers to the much more profound attitude that far transcends the Christian outlook, which provides individual life and thought with a tried and tested direction. Even if one has long abstained from Christian religious practice and has long ceased to regret this loss, one continues to behave intuitively as if the original views still existed by right. One fails to consider that a discarded worldview needs to be replaced by a new one; in particular one fails to be clear about the fact that renouncing the Christian outlook erodes present-day morals. Renouncing childhood means that no emotional or habitual dependence on hitherto valid moral views any longer exists. The hitherto valid view has arisen from the spirit of the Christian worldview.

Notwithstanding all free thinking, our attitude to Eros, for instance, remains the old Christian view. We can now no longer bide our time peacefully without questioning and doubt, or else we will remain in the state of childhood. If we merely reject the dogmatic view, our liberation from the well-established will be merely intellectual, whereas our deeper feeling will persist on the old path. Most people, however, are unaware of how this sets them at odds with themselves. But later generations will become increasingly aware of this. Yet those who notice this will realize with horror that renouncing resumed childhood ousts them from our present times and that they can no longer follow any of the traditional ways. They enter uncharted territory, which has neither paths nor boundaries. They lack any direction, since they have forsaken all established bearings. This realization, however, dawns upon very few, since the vast majority makes do with half measures, and remains unperturbed by the stupidity of their spiritual condition. But then tepidity and slackness is not to everyone's taste. Some would rather abandon themselves to despair than adhere to a worldview completely removed from the well-trodden paths of their habitual behavior. They would rather venture into a pathless, dark land at the risk of perishing there, even if this should outrage all their cowardice.

When Salome remarks that Mary is their mother, which means that the I is Christ, this means in brief that the I has left the state of Christian childhood and has taken the place of Christ. Nothing could be more absurd, of course, than to assume that the I thus would be presuming excessive importance; on the contrary, it takes up a decidedly inferior position. Previously it had the advantage of being part of the crowd rallying behind a powerful figure, but now it has exchanged that for solitude and forlornness, rendering it as alien and lonely in its world as Jesus was in his, without possessing that great man's outstanding attributes. Being at odds with the world requires greatness, but the I experiences its almost ludicrous meagerness. Which explains its horror at Salome's revelations.

Whoever steps beyond the Christian outlook, yet does so definitely, falls into a seeming abyss, an utmost solitude, and lacks any means of hiding the fact. Of course one would like to persuade oneself that this is not all that bad. But it is. Abandonment is about the worst thing that can happen to man's herd instinct, not to mention the daunting task with which we thus burden ourselves. Destruction is easy, but rebuilding is difficult.

Thus the image ends with a sense of gloom, which stands opposed, however, to the tall, quietly burning flame encircled by the serpent. This view denotes devotion coupled with the magical compulsion expressed by the serpent. Thus an effective counterpart is set against the disquieting sense of doubt and fear, as if someone were saying, "Of course your I is full of unease and doubt, but the constant flame of devotion burns in you more strongly and the compulsion of your fate is more powerful."

pp. 127-150 [5]

The far-reaching premonitions of the second image plunged the I into a chaos of doubt. Hence an understandable desire arose to rise above the confusion to attain greater clarity, as expressed in the image of the beetling mountain ridge. Logos appears to be leading the way. What occurs next is the image of two opposites, expressed by two serpents and the separation of day and night. Daylight signifies good, whereas darkness represents evil. As compelling forces, both assume the figure of serpents. Therein lies concealed an idea that subsequently assumes great importance: whoever encountered a black serpent would have been no less surprised at encountering a white one. Color does not dispel fear. What this suggests is that perhaps an equally dangerous, bewitching power resides in good as in evil. Essentially, the good needs to be regarded as an inherently no-less-dangerous principle than evil. In any event, the I could decide to approach the white serpent just as little as the black one, even though it believes it can or must by all means entrust itself more to good than to evil. But the I is rooted to the spot halfway, transfixed, and observes the struggle between the two principles -- within itself.

The fact that the I remains in this middle position implies the advance of evil, since anything but unconditional surrender to the good impairs it. This finds expression in the attack of the black serpent. But the fact that the I does not partake of evil constitutes a victory for the good. This finds expression in the black serpent growing a white head.

The disappearance of the serpent denotes that the opposition of good and evil has become ineffective, that is, that at least it has lost its immediate significance. For the I this means a release from the unconditional power of the hitherto abiding moral point of view in favor of a middle position freed from the pair of opposites. But neither clarity nor a clear view has been gained thereby; hence the ascent continues to the final point of elevation, which might grant the longed-for outlook.

____________

Notes:

1. The page numbers refer to the Corrected Draft. This corresponds to pp. 245-248 above.

2. Jung here employs a metaphor used by Jacob Burkhardt to describe the primordial images of Faust and Oedipus, which he had cited in Transformations and Symbols of the Libido (1912, CW B, §56n).

3. This corresponds to pp. 245-248 above.

4. This sentence is an apocryphal insertion to Luke 6:4, from the Codex Bezae, "Man, if indeed you know what you are doing, happy are you; but if not, you are accursed and a transgressor of the law." J. K. Elliot, ed., The Apocryphal New Testament, p. 68. In 1952, Jung cited it in Answer to Job (CW II, §696).

5. This refers to pp. 251-254.
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Re: The Red Book: Liber Novus, by C.G. Jung

Postby admin » Mon Dec 02, 2013 3:20 am

Appendix C

The following is an entry from Black Book 5, which gives a preliminary sketch of cosmology of the Septem Sermones.

***

16. I. 16.

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The force of the God is frightful.

"You shall experience even more of it. You are in the second age. The first age has been overcome. This is the age of the rulership of the son, whom you call the Frog God. A third age will follow, the age of apportionment and harmonious power."

My soul, where did you go? Did you go to the animals?

I bind the Above with the Below. I bind God and animal. Something in me is part animal, something part God, and a third part human. Below you serpent, within you man, and above you God. Beyond the serpent comes the phallus, then the earth, then the moon, and finally the coldness and emptiness of outer space.

Above you comes the dove or the celestial soul, in which love and foresight are united, just as poison and shrewdness are united in the serpent. Shrewdness is the devil's understanding, which always detects smaller things and finds chinks where you suspect none.

If I am not conjoined through the uniting of the Below and the Above, I break down into three parts: the serpent, and in that or some other animal form I roam, living nature daimonically, arousing fear and longing. The human soul, living forever within you. The celestial soul, as such dwelling with the Gods, far from you and unknown to you, appearing in the form of a bird. Each of these three parts then is independent.

Beyond me stands the celestial mother. Its counterpart is the phallus. Its mother is the earth, its goal is the heavenly mother.

The celestial mother is the daughter of the celestial world. Its counterpart is the earth.

The celestial mother is illuminated through the spiritual sun. Its counterpart is the moon. And just as the moon is the crossing to the dead of space, the spiritual sun is the crossing to the Pleroma, the upper world of fullness. The moon is the God's eye of emptiness, just as the sun is the God's eye of fullness. The moon that you see is the symbol, just as the sun that you see. Sun and moon, that is, their symbols, are Gods. There are still other Gods; their symbols are the planets.

The celestial mother is a daimon among the order of the Gods, an inhabitant of the heavenly world.

The Gods are favorable and unfavorable, impersonal, the souls of stars, influences, forces, grandfathers of souls, rulers in the heavenly world, both in space and in force. They are neither dangerous nor kind, strong, yet humble, clarifications of the Pleroma and of the eternal emptiness, configurations of the eternal qualities.

Their number is immeasurably great and leads over to the one supreme fundamental, which contains all qualities in itself and itself has none, a nothing and everything, the complete dissolution of man, death and eternal life.

Man becomes through the principium individuationis. He strives for absolute individuality, through which he ever increasingly concentrates the absolute dissolution of the Pleroma. Through this he makes the Pleroma the point that contains the greatest tension and is itself a shining star, immeasurably small, just as the Pleroma is immeasurably great. The more concentrated the Pleroma becomes, the stronger the star of the individual becomes. It is surrounded by shining clouds, a heavenly body in the making, comparable to a small sun. It emits fire. Therefore it is called: Image. [1] Just like the sun, which is also such a star, which is a God and grandfather of souls, the star of the individual is also like the sun, a God and grandfather of the souls. He is visible from time to time, just as I have described him. His light is blue, like that of a distant star. He is far out in space, cold and solitary, since he is beyond death. To attain individuality, we need a large share of death. Therefore it is called Image , [2] since just as an innumerable number of men rule the earth, so a countless number of stars and of Gods rule the celestial world.

To be sure, this God is the one who survives the death of men. To him for whom solitude is Heaven, he goes to Heaven; to him for whom it is Hell, he goes to Hell. Whoever does not follow the principium individuationis to its end becomes no God, since he cannot bear individuality.

The dead who besiege us are souls who have not fulfilled the principium individuationis, or else they would have become distant stars. Insofar as we do not fulfill it, the dead have a claim on us and besiege us and we cannot escape them. [Image] [3]

The God of the frogs or toads, the brainless, is the uniting of the Christian God with Satan. His nature is like the flame; he is like Eros, but a God; Eros is only a daimon.

The one God, to whom worship is due, is in the middle.

You should worship only one God. The other Gods are unimportant. Abraxas is to be feared. Therefore it was a deliverance when he separated himself from me. You do not need to seek him. He will find you, just like Eros. He is the God of the cosmos, extremely powerful and fearful. He is the creative drive, he is form and formation, just as much as matter and force, therefore he is above all the light and dark Gods. He tears away souls and casts them into procreation. He is the creative and created. He is the God who always renews himself, in days, in months, in years, in human life, in ages, in peoples, in the living, in heavenly bodies. He compels, he is unsparing. If you worship him, you increase his power over you. Thereby it becomes unbearable. You will have dreadful trouble getting clear of him. The more you free yourself from him, the more you approach death, since he is the life of the universe. But he is also universal death. Therefore you fall victim to him again, not in life but in dying. So remember him, do not worship him, but also do not imagine that you can flee him since he is all around you. You must be in the middle of life, surrounded by death on all sides. Stretched out, like one crucified, you hang in him, the fearful, the overpowering.

But you have in you the one God, the wonderfully beautiful and kind, the solitary, starlike, unmoving, he who is older and wiser than the father, he who has a safe hand, who leads you among all the darknesses and death scares of dreadful Abraxas. He gives joy and peace, since he is beyond death and beyond what is subject to change. He is no servant and no friend of Abraxas. He himself is an Abraxas, but not unto you, but in himself and his distant world, since you yourself are a God who lives in faraway realms and who renews himself in his ages and creations and peoples, just as powerful to them as Abraxas is to you.

You yourself are a creator of worlds and a created being.

You have the one God, and you become your one God in the innumerable number of Gods.

As a God, you are the great Abraxas in your world. But as a man you are the heart of the one God who appears to his world as the great Abraxas, the feared, the powerful, the donor of madness, he who dispenses the water of life, the spirit of the tree of life, the daimon of the blood, the death bringer.

You are the suffering heart of your one star God, who is Abraxas to his world.

Therefore because you are the heart of your God, aspire toward him, love him, live for him. Fear Abraxas, who rules over the human world. Accept what he forces upon you, since he is the master of the life of this world and none can escape him. If you do not accept, he will torment you to death and the heart of your God will suffer, just as the one God of Christ suffered the heaviest in his death.

The suffering of mankind is without end, since its life is without end. Since there is no end where none sees an end. If mankind has come to an end, there is none who would see its end and none who could say that mankind has an end. So it has no end for itself, but it certainly does for the Gods.

The death of Christ took no suffering away from the world, but his life has taught us much; namely, that it pleases the one God if the individual lives his own life against the power of Abraxas. The one God thus delivers himself from the suffering of the earth into which his Eros plunged him; since when the one God saw the earth, he sought its procreation, and forgot that a world was already given to him in which he was Abraxas. So the one God became human. Therefore the one in turn pulls man up to him and into him, so that the one becomes complete again.

But the freeing of man from the power of Abraxas does not follow man's withdrawing from the power of Abraxas -- no one can pull away from it -- but through subjugating himself to it. Even Christ had to subjugate himself to the power of Abraxas, and Abraxas killed him in a gruesome manner.

Only by living life can you free yourself from it. So live it to such a degree that it befits you. To the degree that you live it, you also fall victim to the power of Abraxas and his dreadful deceptions. But to the same degree the star God in you gains in longing and power, in that the fruit of deception and human disappointment falls to him. Pain and disappointment fill the world of Abraxas with coldness, all of your life's warmth slowly sinks into the depths of your soul, into the midpoint of man, where the far blue starlight of your one God glimmers.

If you flee Abraxas from fear, you escape pain and disappointment and you remain terrified, that is, out of unconscious love you cling to Abraxas and your one God cannot catch fire. But through pain and disappointment you redeem yourself, since your longing then falls of its own accord like a ripe fruit into the depths, following gravity, striving toward the midpoint, where the blue light of the star God arises.

So do not flee from Abraxas, do not seek him. You feel his coercion, do not resist him, so that you shall live and pay your ransom.

The works of Abraxas are to be fulfilled, for consider that in your world you yourself are Abraxas and force your creature to fulfil your work. Here, where you are the creature subjugated to Abraxas, you must learn to fulfill the work of life. There, where you are Abraxas, you compel your creatures.

You ask why is all this so? I understand that it seems questionable to you. The world is questionable. It is the unending infinite folly of the Gods, which you know is unendingly wise. Surely it is also a crime, an unforgivable sin, and therefore also the highest love and virtue.

So live life, do not flee Abraxas, provided that he compels you and you can recognize his necessity. In one sense I say to you: do not fear him, do not love him. In another sense I say: fear him, love him. He is the life of the earth, that says enough.

You need to recognize the multiplicity of the Gods. You cannot unite all into one being. As little as you are one with the multiplicity of men, just so little is the one God one with the multiplicity of the Gods. This one God is the kind, the loving, the leading, the healing. To him all your love and worship is due. To him you should pray, you are one with him, he is near you, nearer than your soul.

I, your soul, am your mother, who tenderly and frightfully surrounds you, your nourisher and corrupter; I prepare good things and poison for you. I am your intercessor with Abraxas. I teach you the arts that protect you from Abraxas. I stand between you and Abraxas the all-encompassing. I am your body, your shadow, your effectiveness in this world, your manifestation in the world of the Gods, your effulgence, your breath, your odor, your magical force. You should call me if you want to live with men, but the one God if you want to rise above the human world to the divine and eternal solitude of the star.

____________

Notes:

1. "I am a star, wandering about with you." -- A citation from the Mithras Lirurgy (Albrecht Dieterich, Eine Mithrasliturgie [Leipzig: B. G. Teubner. 1903], p. 8, line 5). Jung carved the continuation of this sentence on his stone at Bollingen.

2. "You are Gods." This is a citation from John 10:34: "The Jews answered him, saying, for a good work we stone thee not; but for blasphemy; and because that thou, being a man, makest thyself God. Jesus answered them, Is it not written in your law, I said, Ye are gods?"

3. Sketch of Systema Munditotius; see Appendix A.
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Re: The Red Book: Liber Novus, by C.G. Jung

Postby admin » Mon Dec 02, 2013 4:02 am

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