Soul-Violence: Collected English Papers, Volume 3

489 Pages·2008·14.579 MB·English

by  Wolfgang Giegerich

SOUL-VIOLENCE
The Collected English Papers of Wolfgang Giegerich
The Collected English Papers of Wolfgang Giegerich makes the work of one
of archetypal psychology’s most brilliant theorists available in one place. A
practicing Jungian analyst and a long-time contributor to the field, Giegerich
is renowned for his dedication to the substance of Jungian thought and for his
unparalleled ability to think it through with both rigor and speculative strength.
The product of over three decades of critical reflection, Giegerich’s English
papers are collected in six volumes: The Neurosis of Psychology (Vol. I).
Technology and the Soul (Vol. 2), Soul-Violence (Vol. 3), and The Soul Always
Thinks (Vol. 4), The Flight into the Unconscious (Vol. 5), and Dreaming the
Myth Onwards (Vol. 6).
For a full list of titles in this series, please visit www.routledge.com/The-
Collected- English-Papers-of-Wolfgang-Giegerich/book-series/CEPWG
Titles in this series:
The Neurosis of Psychology: Primary Papers Towards a Critical Psychology
(Volume 1)
Technology and the Soul: From the Nuclear Bomb to the World Wide Web

(Volume 2)

Soul-Violence (Volume 3)

The Soul Always Thinks (Volume 4)

The Flight into the Unconscious: An Analysis of C. G. Jung’s Psychology Project

(Volume 5)
“Dreaming the Myth Onwards”: C. G. Jung on Christianity and on Hegel
(Volume 6)
SOUL-VIOLENCE
C E P
OLLECTED NGLISH APERS

VOLUME THREE
­
W G
OLFGANG IEGERICH
First published 2008 by Spring Journal Books

Published 2020 by Routledge

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ISBN: 978-0-367-48528-3 (hbk)
ISBN: 978-0-367-48530-6 (pbk)
ISBN: 978-1-003-04149-8 (ebk)
Contents

Introduction:
Psychology and the Other………………………………………..1

PART I: BASIC CONCEPTS OF PSYCHOLOGY: CHILD,
SHADOW, ANIMUS

Chapter One: The Rescued Child, or the Misappropriation
of Time: On the Search for Meaning…………………...45

Chapter Two: First Shadow, then Anima, or The Advent
of the Guest: Shadow Integration and the Rise of
Psychology……………………………………..……....77

Chapter Three: The Animus as Negation and as the Soul’s
Own Other: The Soul’s Threefold Stance toward Its
Experience of Its Other……………………………..….111

PART II: THE FOREIGNNESS OF THE ARCHAIC

PSYCHE

Chapter Four: The Sacrifice of Isaac and the Watershed
of History: Preparatory and Methodological Remarks
Concerning the Topic of Ritual Killings…………….....171

Chapter Five: Killings………………………………………….189

Chapter Six: Blood Brotherhood, Blood Revenge and
Devotio: Glimpses of the Archaic Psyche…….............….267

Chapter Seven: Once More, the Reality/Irreality Issue:
A Reply to Hillman’s Reply………..…………...……...317

PART III: PSYCHOLOGY’S PLACE AND ROLE IN

HISTORY

Chapter Eight: Comment on James Hillman’s “Psychology:
Monotheistic or Polytheistic?”……………………...…339

Chapter Nine: The Alchemy of History…………………....…...353

PART IV: REALITY EXTRA ANIMAM
Chapter Ten: Islamic Terrorism…………………………...…...417

Index…………………………………………………………...437

INTRODUCTION
Psychology and the Other
Volume 2 of this collection of my English papers already
conjoined two terms, “Technology” and “the Soul,” that at
first glance did not seem to fit together at all. The intimation
inherent in the title of the present book, Soul-Violence—that violence
might be an intrinsic ingredient in and important for the soul—again
amounts to an imposition. Of course, we can easily see and accept the
idea of the soul as a victim of violence, hurt by and suffering from it,
and we might also be willing to concede that there is a connection
between violence and the psyche, especially when something has gone
wrong: violence due to overwhelming affects and thus a mishap,
violence as a pathology, as part of certain perversions or psychopathy.
But violence and the soul? Violence perhaps even as a mode of soul-
making? This seems intolerable—in itself a violation of the very notion
of soul. The word soul cannot be divorced from the notion of
soulfulness. But the thesis of this book is precisely that there is a deep
connection between soul and violence. Violence, at least certain
instances of it, comes from the soul and is its own authentic form of
expression, indeed, at times, a soul need.
Volume 1 of this collection of my English papers was concerned
mainly with the particular style of psychological thinking in the sense
of a critical self-reflection of psychology, and Volume 2 with the question
of the object of psychology (or one particular object, technological
civilization). In both cases, psychology was somehow presupposed as
2 SOUL-VIOLENCE INTRODUCTION 3
an already existing field of study. If we want to find a common thread longer contain his life in all its fullness, then the soul begins to
running through most of the papers included here, papers written become a factor which can no longer be dealt with by the
independently and for various occasions, we could say that Volume 3, ordinary means. It is for this reason that we today have a
psychology that relies on empirical facts and not on articles of
by contrast, raises the question of how psychology came and comes into
faith or philosophical postulates. …
being in the first place, or what, so to speak, the entrance requirements
… But no culture before ours felt compelled to take this
are for psychology defined as the discipline of the logos of the soul, and
psychic background as such seriously. … This distinguishes our
which stages psychology has to pass through in order to come home to
time from all earlier ones (CW 10 §§ 158–161, translation
itself, fulfilling its concept. In other words, this volume is concerned
modified).
with the genesis of psychology, which has two different aspects, logical
The emergence of psychology as a modern discipline cannot be
genesis and historical genesis. Psychology did not exist at all times.
explained simply in terms of human scientific curiosity or as a chance
Interest in psychology is by no means an anthropological constant,
discovery. Rather, it is the result of a historical process, namely the
something that could be taken for granted. It is a completely new
psychological demise, first, of myth and ritual (the sacrificing cultures)
historical acquisition. The need for psychology arose only in modernity,
and, secondly, of religion and metaphysics, which produced a
since the 19th century. Jung is probably the only psychologist of the last
compelling necessity for Western man to “become psychological” after
two hundred years who was fully aware not only of the novelty of
all epochs before, as Jung said, had been decidedly “unpsychological.”
psychology, but also of the predicament that gave rise to the necessity
The substantial difference between a psychological and an
and possibility of psychology and who based his own conception of
unpsychological mode of being-in-the-world is explained by Jung with
psychology on this historical insight. In 1928 (or 1931) he wrote:
the notions “inside” and “outside.” Especially since Jung emphasizes
… [E]verything I have observed lies in the soul; everything, so the notion of two “sides,” these words foster a spatial imagination:
to speak, on the side of the inner. I must, however, add at once
“inside” as in us, “outside” as the world out there, around us, the
that this is something peculiar, inasmuch as the soul is not always
physical or cosmic dimension. This would be a very preliminary,
and everywhere on the inside. There are peoples and epochs
imperfect way of conceiving of this difference. We would do better to
where it is outside, peoples and epochs that are unpsychological,
comprehend psychology as the discipline of interiority or inwardness,
as, for example, all ancient cultures, and among them especially
not in a spatial, but a logical or methodological sense. Interiority here
Egypt with its magnificent objectivity and its just as magnificent,
naïve, negative confession of sins. Behind the spirit of the Apis does not refer to containment in something else, in a kind of vessel,
tombs of Saqqara and the Pyramids we cannot possibly imagine e.g., ourselves. It means the process or work of interiorizing a
psychological issues, no more than behind the music of Bach. phenomenon into itself, into its concept as its soul. “External” and
Whenever there exists externally a conceptual or ritual form “exteriority” would consequently refer primarily to that mode in which
in which all the yearnings and hopes of the soul are absorbed phenomena are not inwardized into themselves, but taken as how they
and expressed, that is, for example, a living religion, then the
appear, in their first immediacy, as empirical facts, as positivities.
soul is outside and there is no soul problem, just as there is then
All this has already been expounded in different places and contexts
no unconscious in our sense. It was therefore logical that the
in the previous two volumes and elsewhere. In this volume, one
discovery of psychology took place exclusively during the last
particular aspect of the condition of the possibility of psychological
decades, although former centuries possessed enough
interiority will be our focus. If psychology is essentially the work of
introspection and intelligence to gain knowledge about
psychological facts. … interiorizing phenomena into themselves, it is clear that psychological
… But as soon as he [man] outgrows the periphery of his phenomena have the form or structure of self.1 The symbolic image
Western local religion, that is, when his form of religion can no
1 Not to be confused with Jung’s (substantiated) notion of “the self.”
2 SOUL-VIOLENCE INTRODUCTION 3
an already existing field of study. If we want to find a common thread longer contain his life in all its fullness, then the soul begins to
running through most of the papers included here, papers written become a factor which can no longer be dealt with by the
independently and for various occasions, we could say that Volume 3, ordinary means. It is for this reason that we today have a
psychology that relies on empirical facts and not on articles of
by contrast, raises the question of how psychology came and comes into
faith or philosophical postulates. …
being in the first place, or what, so to speak, the entrance requirements
… But no culture before ours felt compelled to take this
are for psychology defined as the discipline of the logos of the soul, and
psychic background as such seriously. … This distinguishes our
which stages psychology has to pass through in order to come home to
time from all earlier ones (CW 10 §§ 158–161, translation
itself, fulfilling its concept. In other words, this volume is concerned
modified).
with the genesis of psychology, which has two different aspects, logical
The emergence of psychology as a modern discipline cannot be
genesis and historical genesis. Psychology did not exist at all times.
explained simply in terms of human scientific curiosity or as a chance
Interest in psychology is by no means an anthropological constant,
discovery. Rather, it is the result of a historical process, namely the
something that could be taken for granted. It is a completely new
psychological demise, first, of myth and ritual (the sacrificing cultures)
historical acquisition. The need for psychology arose only in modernity,
and, secondly, of religion and metaphysics, which produced a
since the 19th century. Jung is probably the only psychologist of the last
compelling necessity for Western man to “become psychological” after
two hundred years who was fully aware not only of the novelty of
all epochs before, as Jung said, had been decidedly “unpsychological.”
psychology, but also of the predicament that gave rise to the necessity
The substantial difference between a psychological and an
and possibility of psychology and who based his own conception of
unpsychological mode of being-in-the-world is explained by Jung with
psychology on this historical insight. In 1928 (or 1931) he wrote:
the notions “inside” and “outside.” Especially since Jung emphasizes
… [E]verything I have observed lies in the soul; everything, so the notion of two “sides,” these words foster a spatial imagination:
to speak, on the side of the inner. I must, however, add at once
“inside” as in us, “outside” as the world out there, around us, the
that this is something peculiar, inasmuch as the soul is not always
physical or cosmic dimension. This would be a very preliminary,
and everywhere on the inside. There are peoples and epochs
imperfect way of conceiving of this difference. We would do better to
where it is outside, peoples and epochs that are unpsychological,
comprehend psychology as the discipline of interiority or inwardness,
as, for example, all ancient cultures, and among them especially
not in a spatial, but a logical or methodological sense. Interiority here
Egypt with its magnificent objectivity and its just as magnificent,
naïve, negative confession of sins. Behind the spirit of the Apis does not refer to containment in something else, in a kind of vessel,
tombs of Saqqara and the Pyramids we cannot possibly imagine e.g., ourselves. It means the process or work of interiorizing a
psychological issues, no more than behind the music of Bach. phenomenon into itself, into its concept as its soul. “External” and
Whenever there exists externally a conceptual or ritual form “exteriority” would consequently refer primarily to that mode in which
in which all the yearnings and hopes of the soul are absorbed phenomena are not inwardized into themselves, but taken as how they
and expressed, that is, for example, a living religion, then the
appear, in their first immediacy, as empirical facts, as positivities.
soul is outside and there is no soul problem, just as there is then
All this has already been expounded in different places and contexts
no unconscious in our sense. It was therefore logical that the
in the previous two volumes and elsewhere. In this volume, one
discovery of psychology took place exclusively during the last
particular aspect of the condition of the possibility of psychological
decades, although former centuries possessed enough
interiority will be our focus. If psychology is essentially the work of
introspection and intelligence to gain knowledge about
psychological facts. … interiorizing phenomena into themselves, it is clear that psychological
… But as soon as he [man] outgrows the periphery of his phenomena have the form or structure of self.1 The symbolic image
Western local religion, that is, when his form of religion can no
1 Not to be confused with Jung’s (substantiated) notion of “the self.”