The Flight into the Unconscious: An analysis of C.G. Jung’s Psychology Project (Volume 5)

465 Pages·2013·12.934 MB·English

by  Wolfgang Giegerich

THE FLIGHT INTO
THE UNCONSCIOUS
A A C.G. J ’
N NALYSIS OF UNG S
P P
SYCHOLOGY ROJECT
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)
THE FLIGHT INTO
THE UNCONSCIOUS
A A C.G. J ’
N NALYSIS OF UNG S
P P
SYCHOLOGY ROJECT
C E P
OLLECTED NGLISH APERS
V F
OLUME IVE
W G
OLFGANG IEGERICH
First published 2013 by Spring Journal Books
Published 2020 by Routledge
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© 2020 Wolfgang Giegerieh
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Contents

Acknowledgments .............................................................................. vii

Sources and A bbreviations .................................................................. ix

Preface ............................................................................................... xi

CHAPTER ONE: eG. Jung's Psychology Project as a Response to

the Condition of the World ............................................................. 1

* * *

CHAPTER TWO: Psychology as Anti-Philosophy: eG. Jung ......... 21

Method ofapproach and textual basis ......................................... 22

Paradise Lost ............................................................................... 26

Ego resistance against his thought ................................................ 31

The ego resistance as instigated by the thought itself .................... 36

Disowninghis own thought. From "I" to "it" .............................. 39

The construction ofthe principle ofsubjective certainty

and immediacy ................................................................... 45

What looks like events is performed rituals ................................... 52

Intellectual isolation and renouncement oftruth .......................... 56

Ersatz ......................................................................................... 60

The thought ofnot-thinking ...................................................... 62

CHAPTER THREE: The Disenchantment Complex. eG. Jung

and the Modern World ................................................................... 67

CHAPTER FOUR: The Rejection of the Hic. Reflections on eG.

Jung's Communion Fiasco ............................................................... 91

"Was it my failure?" ..................................................................... 92

From hic t o alibi a nd the loss ofearth ......................................... 108

Psychological consumerism ........................................................ 117

The historical move from sensual enactment to logos and

thought and Jung's rescue ofthe sensual ........................... 122

Holding one's place within the negation and the

situation ofabsence .......................................................... 129

The communal nature ofsoul ................................................... 132

CHAPTER FIVE: The Smuggling Inherent in the Logic of the

"Psychology of the Unconscious" .................................................. 137
CHAPTER SIX: The Flight Into the Unconscious. C.G. Jung’s
Psychology Project.........................................................................173
I. The acquisition of the standpoint of “the unconscious”...........177
II. The flight into the unconscious.............................................199
III. Form change: Echo escapes Pan............................................217
IV. “Immediate experience”: Pan’s flight from Echo ....................230
V. Mysterium disiunctionis..........................................................236
VI. The logical generation of “the unconscious” .........................245
VII. The actual fabrication of “the unconscious”........................259
CHAPTER SEVEN: Liber Novus, that is, The New Bible. A First
Analysis of C.G. Jung’s Red Book ..................................................273
The book which is not a book...................................................273
Pitfalls for the superficial observer..............................................283
The project...............................................................................293
The construction of psychic objectivity......................................311
* * *
CHAPTER EIGHT: The Opposition of ‘Individual’ and
‘Collective’—Psychology’s Basic Fault. Reflections on Today’s
Magnum Opus of the Soul .............................................................325
Appendix .................................................................................350
Postscript 2011.........................................................................357
CHAPTER NINE: Closure and Setting Free or The Bottled Spirit
of Alchemy and Psychology...........................................................371
CHAPTER TEN: Mythic Illusory Appearance – Blindness to
Logical Form. C.G. Jung’s Faust Interpretation, for Instance.......405
I. The mode of artistic creation..................................................409
II. The topic and issues treated in Faust II...................................414
III. Logical form........................................................................419
Index...............................................................................................433
Acknowledgments
Versions of the following chapters have previously been published
elsewhere:
Chapter 2, “Psychology as Anti-Philosophy: C. G. Jung” was first
published in Spring 77 (Philosophy and Psychology), June 2007, pp.
11–51 and appears here in a slightly expanded version.
A slightly different version of Chapter 3, “The Disenchantment
Complex. C.G. Jung and the modern world,” was an invited paper
delivered at the Inaugural Regional Conference in London, July 2011,
of The International Association for Jungian Studies on “Enchantment
and Disenchantment: The Psyche in Transformation” and appeared
in print in International Journal of Jungian Studies vol. 4, no. 1, March
2012, pp. 4–20.
A considerably shorter, rudimentary oral version of Chapter 6,
“The Flight Into the Unconscious,” was presented September 2, 2000
at “An International Symposium of Archetypal Psychology” organized
by Pacifica Graduate Institute at the University of California, Santa
Barbara, and was made publicly available through audio tapes as well
as later, in 2009, in the Internet at http://www.rubedo.psc.br/artingle/
flight.htm. The present text of Chapter 6 is based on parts of several
different longer and very long versions both in German and in English
written between 1999 and 2002, presented at lecture series extending
over several semesters at the C.G. Jung Institute, Zurich as well as at
the Neresheim Seminars, and was augmented by the inclusion of a
new paradigm, the mytheme of Pan and Echo.
Chapter 7, “Liber Novus, that is, The New Bible. A First Analysis
of C.G. Jung’s Red Book” first appeared in Spring 2010, Vol. 83
(Minding the Animal Psyche), Spring 2010, pp. 361–411.
The original version of Chapter 8, “The Opposition of ‘Individual’
and ‘Collective’ – Psychology’s Basic Fault. Reflections On Today’s
Magnum Opus of the Soul” was presented orally to The Guild of
Pastoral Psychology, London, in May 1996, and published both in
Harvest. Journal for Jungian Studies vol. 42, No.2, 1996, pp. 7-27 and as
Guild of Pastoral Psychology Lecture Pamphlet No. 259, 1997, as well as
in Italian translation by Anna Accogli in l’imaginale 21, ottobre
1996, pp. 11–51.
Chapter 9, “Closure and Setting Free or The Bottled Spirit of
Alchemy and Psychology” first appeared in Spring 74 (Alchemy). A
Journal of Archetype and Culture, Spring 2006, pp. 31–62.
* * *
As with all the previous volumes, collaboration with the editor of
this series, Greg Mogenson, was very constructive, helpful, and
enjoyable. I wish to sincerely thank Greg for his accompanying the
genesis of this book with spirited involvement.
Sources and Abbreviations
For frequently cited sources, the following abbreviations have
been used:
CW: Jung, C. G. Collected Works. 20 vols. Ed. Herbert Read,
Michael Fordham, Gerhard Adler, and William McGuire.
Trans. R. F. C. Hull. Princeton: Princeton University Press,
1957-1979. Cited by volume and, unless otherwise noted, by
paragraph number.
GW: Jung, C. G. Gesammelte Werke. Zürich and Stuttgart (Rascher)
now Olten and Freiburg i:Br: Walter-Verlag, 1958 ff. Cited
by volume and, unless otherwise noted, by paragraph number.
Letters: Jung, C. G. Letters. 2 vols. Ed. Gerhard Adler. Bollingen Series
XCV: 2. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1975.
MDR: Jung, C. G. Memories, Dreams, Reflections. Rev. ed. Ed. Aniela
Jaffé. Trans. Richard and Clara Winston. New York: Vintage
Books, 1989. Cited by page number.
Erinnerungen: Erinnerungen Träume Gedanken von C.G. Jung.
Ed. Aniela Jaffé. Zurich and Stuttgart: Rascher Verlag, 1967.