MYSTERY: Murray Stein in conversation with Peter Kingsley about Jung's "Red Book"

[Music] I'm so pleased to have Peter Kingsley with me here in my office in Zurich we are at mr. Gossett nine just down the street from the grouse Minster Church in a historic building speaking about bringing the deep past they are archaic the ark a past alive into our times into the spirit of our times bringing it back somehow and the difficulties with this and how young red book might contribute to this effort to to approach the mysteries of the deep past and of the deep unconscious in such a way that we do not fall into defensiveness that we can allow ourselves to engage in these mysteries and be transformed by them as young was and so Peter is an expert on ancient Greek philosophy religion religious practices and he is sharing with us the results of his research he's been conducting on young the red book its relation to these mysteries in a book that will be published later this year or perhaps next year we're very much looking forward to your book Peter well I look forward to a discussion and questions I think that this one thing I'd like to say to begin with which is something that came to me last night and it has to do with the conversation we had a few weeks ago and I was very impressed and very moved by by something you said here we are together now I my main area is as you say ancient Greece and of course the question there is what is the relevance of that to you and then there is Jung himself saying if you want to understand my psychology you need to understand the Bible back to front you need to be able to speak Greek fluently you need to be able to speak Latin fluently and understand them then of course that rules out many people well just about everybody is out so here am i coming from a rather strange area to do with young and past if you like deep past not 19th century cultural context which has been quite popular the deep past and this is me on the one side and then there is you on the other side and this is where I I come back to our conversation a few weeks ago where if I remember right you and if I understand right you you said that really the red book is is something so extraordinary so potent so unique that you don't have much hope that it's ever going to be incorporated into the Union analytical training whether that's in Switzerland or the rest of Europe or South America or North America or Asia or wherever and I think you made a it's in my memory you making a couple of comments that somehow you felt that the red book is this text by yon that was published in 2009 that it's somehow making you aware maybe and a few other people aware that there is something missing in Jungian work in general that somehow the thread has maybe the thread has been lost something that something has been lost when I first read the red book in 2009 where it came out I was very put off by it I couldn't get into it I couldn't get into the English I didn't like the English language translation as I read it in German reads much better in German to me at this Yoos language and but it takes a long time to find yourself entering into that world effectively I find and when I think about the relation of the red book to the collected works to Jung's other writings it's a bit like the difference between poetry and prose the red book is poetry it is prophecy it is biblical it is it's a different kind of language a different way of thinking from his usual discourse in his scientific works and scientific works are much easier for modern people to read to get into and even those are difficult for a lot of people young is not easy to understand and the red book is harder than than the other works I find so it's a challenge and I would like to accept that challenge I would like to say yes the red book is essential to understanding humans psychology Jung's mind and gos approach to life and we can't really get P the depth and the best of Jung unless we go deeply into the red book and understand that absorbant integrated into the rest of about me understand about you whether that's realistic to propose something like that to the training programs that are very much in place and established and have gone their own directions I'm not optimistic about it I think the red book was not so well received at first by the Union community a lot of people thought it should never been published of his private something for young alone that's why he didn't publish it other people found it somewhat interesting I found it fascinating after I got into it written about it and now we're doing these three volumes of essays you're Young's Redbook for our time but I want to in our discussion see if we can flush out the depth of what's in the Redbook more and for that we really have to go to these Greek sources we have to go way back to the sources of Western culture because that's where young goes in the red book early I'm with you good but I think that for me it's very important to try and put this in context because still to me there is the question why should anybody who is the union practitioner analyst therapist why should they be concerned with the past what is the need you know we want to know about the past to help us go into the future but is that even that the right attitude you mentioned about Liebherr nervous when we spoke before the new book so here is your writing the red book which for him is the Liebherr Novus the new book we can actually say very specifically what you meant what he implied what he was getting out by calling the red book Libra nervous but the point that I find so interesting is even when Young is calling his red book new book he writes new book in Latin an old ancient language and there's a paradox there but there is also a logic there and I think that unless we start to sink into this logic of old and new together we're not really going to get to what you'll was was what the project was about one thing that struck me when I read it and continues to impress me is that the conversations he has and the figures who come to him are from the deep past they're not even from the rear pasture oh they're not from the 19th century 18th century gate it's not in their Schiller's not in their pitch is not in their isn't having conversations with those people he goes back to biblical figures Elijah and Salome Philemon Gnostic teacher it's debar character from the east Gilgamesh village why go back so far my my impression is my conclusion from from everything looked at this yes that he's reaching for something timeless I think there's something that we're missing here and to talk about the timeless I think is to go beyond something I think we need to go back and take the past this deep past very seriously for what it is and the reason why I mentioned this about Lieber Novus that the new is phrased in terms of the old that when Young says he is writing a Libra Novus which of course he never publishes when he says he's writing a new book he's actually using an old language there is a reason for this and actually to me that the reason the the the the explication of this paradox is in the red book there there's this very beautiful paragraph I I'm sure you're familiar with it where he says but I think every word of this is very very important and has to be taken seriously and if I remember right he says the task is to give birth to the old in a new time and then he goes into even more detail and he talks about I suppose one could use the word creativity but I think it's better to use the word creation because it's something even deeper than our personal creativity he says true creation and I think I'm paraphrasing here true creation is to give birth to the primordial ancient in a world that is new now he is not saying creation or the task is to give birth to the new no he says it's to give birth to the primordial II ancient it's to give birth to the old in the new the new looks after itself the new is this world we live in he is concerned with bringing the ancient into the new and to bring the ancient into the new you have to know the ancient you have to be with the ancient you have to be at home with the ancient you have to understand the ancient and this to me is the context the emphasis for young is his work was yes something new a new book but it's in Latin for a reason because the new is the old because the new is giving birth to the old to the ancient and that is his work you cannot just give birth to the new without being at home in the ancient in the primordial ancient and I find it psychologically very interesting that we nowadays in the 21st century find it very very very difficult to get a grip on this again I think I'm quoting here from the red book oh yes I am quoting because I remember it it made such an impression on me don't look forward so much but back and into yourself in case you fail to hear the dead don't look forward too much and we're doing that all the time we're looking for you saying don't look forward so much but back and into yourself in case you fail to hear the dead and the dead are our ancestors the dead are the ancient the dead are not just our father or mother or grandparents the dead are thousands of years in the past everything that is incomplete that we have to live out and take up and resolve as much as we can in our lifetimes and and this is something very very important again the dead I know that people are writing a bit about this it's such an important theme but for example towards the end of his life I came across a beautiful passage where towards just a few years before he died young was in despair and he said as he said so many times especially as he was getting older nobody understands me and he was very clear he meant nobody he says nobody understands me everybody is copying me imitating me and by that he was me he was referring to unions in his close circle he wasn't referring to people he met out in the street everybody is imitating me copying me and nobody understands that you have to find your own dead he said people want to take my dead they're copying me they're taking my dead what I say about my dear and trying to make my dead into their dead but they have to find their own dead and he said but the trouble is people are too lazy they can't be bothered it's too much effort and and and then of course the other factor which which you you referred to a little while ago the other factor is this with the two personalities personality number one as Jung called it and personality number two so personality number one corresponds loosely to the spirit of this age it is our personality it's what we use what we are in order to get by to have a nice affable personality and to play tricks on people and God knows what and then number two is the mystery personality number two is the personality of the depths it is this secret this hidden dark personality this dark side of our personality and as you know Marie very well for for young this number two person which he speaks about especially in memories dreams reflections one of the most important aspects of it it is its ancient was number two personality is what is in us what we are which belongs to two hundred or two thousand years ago now I really like what you're saying Peter I find it fascinating and very provocative our project is to discuss Jung's red book for our time and what you're saying is that what does would amount to is making the deep past present to our time how would we do that I think I'd like to just turn it around the other way and then we can go and go on and go deeper I hope number two personality is this ancient personality in us but but let's be human about it let's be practical psychologically and look that what happened I mean this is something that again I was very surprised looking at the literature speaking to people who knew people and so on and it's so interesting the difference between Jung and the people close to you and the people around you the later Union literature with Jung there is this numinous connection with personality number two and in spite of what some people have said there are ways in which he identified with personality number two especially when he was at Bolling him especially the whole pull back that the red book represents being drawn back inside himself he never identifies with the spirit of the depths that he does yield to it he's forced to and he has to go into there and he has to speak and there are points where the spirit of the depth says speak on my behalf you have to speak for me now that is a form a subtle form of identification when let something speak through you the identification is there even however conscious you are but what I find interesting is how people step back from number two as I say even the people who are quite close to you there is this element of fear there is this element of Oh No number two personality is to do with crazy youth it's to do with hallucinogenic drugs it's to do with our and it's like paying lip service to number two if you know what I mean it's like let's yes yes of course personality number two is there but let's breathe rapidly and personality number of two is over there and we're here firmly in personality number one and yes yes of course there is personality at number two but the thing is there is no of course with personality number two that you can't do that there is no that number two personality is biblically as the thief that breaks into your house in the middle of the night it is the spirit of the depths it is the voice calling from the underworld when you least expect it and and really to come to terms with that means having to make this descent into hell into the underworld which is where the young does which is what young died in the red book yeah which is what young does so that's what analysis has purported to do now analysis is a very multifaceted enterprise and people are trained to work as psychotherapist counsellors surface levels dealing with symptoms mostly dealing with personality number one adjustment adaptation but in what I have called and written about occasionally is advanced individuation you you do engage this level of personality number two maybe not nearly to the extent that you did but in in dreams and act of imagination Redbook is all active imagination a few dreams are told recorded but he's working in act of imagination which I think and our perlier discussions you've said to me isn't really understood what is active imagination and there you bring in Corbin and the world of the image imagine all it is engaging that world and letting that world speak to you and that I think is occasionally done within the context of Union analysis but the training programs by and large do not train analysts to do that they have to learn that on their own as they age as they mature as they continue studying but within the context of training programs I would say it's done if at all very light extremely light and that is in confirmed in the spirit of our times which is fast paced is wanting solutions now wanting to correct various and adjust various parts of the personality that handicap you from getting ahead and doing well in our society so yes I agree with you that the training programs have not really encouraged the development of that kind of deep engagement with personality number two with patients or with themselves well you know you was quite brutal many many times throughout his life about the the difficulty of and the rareness of individuation yeah he never said this is for everybody or this is even for many it was very very selectively and not as when he ran into the problem of elitism cause that's a yes which is another whole issue although interestingly according to mythology ancient Greek mythology Orpheus was put to death was killed because of his elitism so there are very interesting threads running through and backwards and forwards here historically and of course Jung masterfully managed to avoid that either there were many ways in which through the the sheer force of his being he was able to avoid the the accusations and avoid the reality of elitism yeah but then there is the question of at what cost you know what you say I understand and I you know I totally sympathize with and it is is beautiful it's wonderful whatever can be done in this world that I still see young in his library reading ancient Greek texts saying true imagination is different from fantasy true imagination is to perceive taw on toes on top and he was reading I have to emphasize again he was reading in the ancient Greek and that means true imagination means seeing what really truly is and this is really really quite extraordinary because you know we're talking hmm I'm sorry panting yes the antic but the antic of the on tick-tock want or Zonta this is the other this is the the hyper antic this is to see the reality behind the reality that is what active imagination was for young this is what he was annotating in his library this is what he was discussing with Henry Cabana they both realized there is a difference between active imagination and by the way it was you who put Koba on to a lot of his interest in a true imagination to begin with Colbert had other sources Cori and others but it was you who really opened up the world of imagination for Coburn interestingly that this is one of the aspects of their relationship that has come out in this ebook that I have in this book that I've tried to finish now that and young Soros was I'm sorry young Soros for understanding imagination young source was well isn't primarily as we know say from psychology and alchemy is his main source was alchemical texts [Music] rosarium and other texts and that but then there were the other as I discovered these ancient Greek texts as well so there is quite a story there to do with imagination as I say it's not just the historical story about what Jung was reading and what he was thinking but when you have active imagination for Jung actually being the perception the vision the cognition of what truly is this is why I said to you a few weeks ago I wonder how many people even now really understand what active imagination is because this is setting the bar very high or very low if you like you know you really have to go very very deep down inside yourself you remind me of that moment famous moment in face-to-face where Jon Freeman asks young do you believe in God and Jung says I have problems believing anything I know I know but there you are I mean that's how he knows it's a knowing it's AG enosis it's a knowing by experience and seeing yes and there he is repeating what Philemon said 50 years earlier yes 50 off a century earlier to him when he as he learned the lesson so much is just teacher yes but there you know Philemon can say too young in the red book I don't believe I know then almost half a century later on the PBC Jung says it that is his number two personality speaking I know yeah there is number two no longer is Philemon but as you himself there you are yeah so does number two become number one in the course of his lifetime I think they're always always the difference is young always knew how to play the game to smile in the photos he and well he was hellishly depressed even when he was going through excruciating experiences not just nineteen thirteen onwards during the red book deterring the descent but later on in his life he always knew how to put on a mask which i think is very much an aspect of personality number one and the number two was kept hidden even from Ruth Bailey even from the people around him he could manage to keep these two levels I would say separate all along who do you think really know him the most deeply very very surprising I mean to look at it you look again it's it's paradox and surprise I don't know I mean I could say who I don't think understood him so well but you know that doesn't really help but in terms of who did I fight for example to me one of the the person who made the most perceptive comments about young and personality number one and number two and having to know when you're dealing with young having to see and look in the moment where is he coming from is he coming from number one or number two was halt carl jung's english translator who was of course ostracized by the young community in zurich they all looked down at him from the top of their noses and said oh he's an intellectual he doesn't understand what he was doing he's one person who I think understood very well Carrie Baines again I would come back to carried him below there were people who understood Tony wolf you're like sure she's often given credit for who's making the journey with him during this time Emma I think I mean yeah because she I'm from Michael Ford and has some interesting common reminiscences about things that Emma I own and I said to her you know would suddenly burped out blurt out with him dinner dinners she was very very perceptive very very true but should should we go on to Orpheus with this as has then and then just open it up as it were that's got another good idea yeah you have written about and you obviously spoken because the article in journal of analytical psychology that I'm thinking of that was based on a conference lecture that you gave you have talked and written about about young and Orphic tradition Orpheus and this is obviously come to the forefront with the red book there's going to be much more coming with the black books as far as Orpheus is concerned and Orphic tradition Orphic theology the god fannie so I think maybe I should just say something introductory about Orpheus who obvious himself is a mythical legendary figure and he he was a very very great teacher a very great mystic a great poet and there is the Orphic tradition which is a very mystical tradition even in the ancient Greek world it was considered really the most mystical very very very unusual in many respects you have transmigration reincarnation very much to do with the soul the past the future of the soul is connected all of this this is the area of Orpheus Orpheus was also the founder of mysteries so again we come back to mysteries and Orpheus there are traditions of obvious is centrally important descent into the underworld again and this can be kind of missed if we're just looking at aspects of Orphic tradition in the red book Orpheus was a founder of mysteries a man who descends into the underworld of being who descends into the underworld very important traditions also I documented our line for the sole calling for the soleus very important traditions which I documented in my first book ancient philosophy mystery and magic that I'm going to in much more depth in this new book that I'm just finishing now preparing on Jung about incue bation or thick tradition is very much connected with Incubator II practice which is essentially the practice of lying down in a dark place usually a sacred place to fall asleep or often go into a state which is neither sleep nor waking in between where you have dreams incubation was the practice of evoking dreams so there are dream Oracle's dotted around especially Italy Sicily which are connected with Orphic tradition as well and Orpheus was connected with incantations and magical spells and he was historically and and young knew this very well of Orpheus and Orphic tradition in the ancient world were connected very closely with certain figures for example pon an ADIZ and Patek Lee's Jung was familiar with this area and again I I document these connections in my new book because they're all very important very relevant to you now the next question then is how does Jung come across Orpheus and Norfolk traditions well certainly there is the the passageway through Goethe but that is not the main point of access doorway that Jung had to obvious it was mainly through his own texts in his own library ancient Greek texts texts by certain scholars specialists in ancient Greek mysteries you read these books studied them devoured them as soon as they came out interest me you can see actually how quick he was around 1910 1911 1912 how quick he was to buy these books as soon as they were published usually in German and devour them and read them and suddenly you'd find within a year or the next year he's starting to publish on this material and this again is cause just before the red book period so these are the texts and one very important aspect that comes out historically and also again through Jung's interest is ethic tradition was very important for young because he recognized in it a major antecedent predecessor of the Gnostics very important because young traces his psychology back to narcissism and he said alchemy provided the link but then behind Gnosticism we have organism correct so that's the correct direct connection between Jungian psychology let's say modern expression of these themes directly back to the mysteries in the Orphic tradition yes this is the if this is yes I'm sorry a threat a threat and he didn't he deliberately left the pre Gnostic period obscure yeah and again this is something I write about it's very interesting he deliberately left it obscured it was enough for him to go back publicly to the Gnostics even that caused him a lot of trouble he didn't like to be identified with Gnostics now even even with the young codex even with the NAG Hammadi discoveries he really got very nervous and lover called a gnostic yes yes yes yes absolutely he wanted to keep out of it but but this going back behind the Gnostics to Orphic tradition to empirical ease our young talks about it he writes about it he mentions in seminars and other places but this is something he didn't want to go into publicly but it's real and you can see how real it is especially through the red book this is a prehistory of Union psychology that we're coming to now before the Gnostics and it has to do with incubation yeah and initiation yes I read this as a an initiation book yes the red book is an initiation into the mysteries absolutely like a yes yeah and incue bation and again this is a point that I go into in my book I'm sorry to repeat this but I have to because I'm just trying to just skim a little off here and there and just touch a little on on the themes I mean this is going to be a very big book at the biggest book I've ever written and one of the points that I mentioned it to be honest with you this is a point that I put in a note because half of the book is notes and essays about the main text because to me we are so far away from a real understanding of young an understanding of the history relating to you the real history the historical continuity I had to do these huge notes and a lot of the most important material is actually put in the notes one of the things that one of the points I mentioned is that when you compare the dropping that young experienced going down into the experiences that he documents in the black books and in the red book as he mentions in introduction to Union psychology he talks there quite a bit about the techniques he used for dropping down inside himself yeah classic incubation you know these are the classic incubation techniques used by Greeks and Romans 2,000 years ago still documented in ancient Greek sources for for going down he belongs in a in a tradition and I know we can talk about influences on the red book Stoudenmire and so and so but incue bation is a incubate ori tradition is a huge huge factor in sandra absolutely zero yeah so there's a CA meyer book on incubation yes yes yeah yes a dream incubation yes yes which was the first volume in the CG young Institute research publications program I think research program publications and I think was about that was the intention of the CG young Institute as a research to begin with as a research facility before it became what it became yeah a training facility now but yes and again number one volume if I believe I think you're right here so if I can just go on I'd like to give an example of yes Orpheus and you asked me about going to Jung's library yeah see again this is to me this is not just historically important this is very very important for for young and very important and we have the editor of the red book pointing out admittedly just in a footnote but pointing out Fannie's PHA NES Fannie's yeah which is the one of the gods of the Orphic theology the the literature ascribed to Orpheus Fannie's is Jung's God right oh this is a point you you've picked up on not many people have and very happy you have this is really quite a statement Fannie's is Jung's God and well just to say about the fan is very very quickly I mean one could read up about families and Fannie's comes from the Greek final final net which is its to do with appearance light but light out of the darkness it's to do with manifestation this is really a god of primordial manifestation for young Fannie's was connected with the son that I should say straight away this is the son for young su n this is the son not as we think of the Sun this is the primordial Sun this is the Sun in the sense that he discussed with Native Americans in New Mexico with mountain lake in Taos yeah this is the Sun the primordial Sun of creation rising at the dawn of creation and of course every day that he came across in Africa and again just as a side point I think it's important to mention that what what young were discovered through his encounters with Native Americans in New Mexico especially Mountain Lake of course and what he discovered in Africa in his time there why this was so important we can see this now with the red book is that he was actually finding elders wise people in these traditions who were saying essentially the same as what he'd said in the red book they were having they came from the same place they came from the same depth that you had already experienced so what affected him so much in his discussions of towers for example was not just hearing something new it was hearing the confirmation the recognition of something that he already knew inside him so you have Fannie's this mysterious God of manifestation who comes before way before the creation of our physical world who is Young's God and Orphic God a God of Orpheus is Young's God this will be quite shocking to many people many unions I'm sure but then there's the other problem which is apparent apparently a problem which is where does Ione fit into this I own a ioann being the god of time the god of eternity whom you'll experienced becoming yeah in December 1913 again one of the very very important experiences that goes into the red book the deification experience of becoming this lion headed ancient god from the Mithraic mysteries which does have its connection with Orphic mysteries historically the god Ione of the the Mithraic mysteries he becomes he is daya fight he becomes this God and if I could again if you'll allow me just to say in parentheses here I've noticed that people who really really should know better reputable Union authors and experts they will say oh well of course when Jung had his day if occasionally Rian's of becoming the god I own this wasn't a literal deification it was just symbolic and I don't know if we'll have the time today to talk about symbolism maybe not maybe we could assemble here but this to me is well not to me this factually is a total travesty of what Jung said repeatedly especially in the red book but not by any means only in the red book about you there is no such thing as just a symbol and people who say that something of his deification was not literal it was just symbolic honestly this is this is just really really such a missed misunderstanding I don't get psychic Riyad know the the the symbol is the reality and of course this is another whole story we could go into with with the symbol symbol on the Greek meaning Goethe on the symbol Paul this ship gave me this wonderful quote a couple of years ago from Goethe where Goethe says is it a symbol is the thing and not the thing and yet it is the thing you know that this is the parameter yes true imagination so you defecation we have an issue there we have a problem because Jung did experience symbolically or not and I'm totally happy for it to be symbolic he experienced becoming this God so the question there is what is the relationship between I on whose really so important for you and again I've documented through various sources how important I owned was for young and the people around him for the rest of his life and in my book I've documented that but there is I own as the God whom young became there is Fanny's is Young's God what is the connection and I would just tell this story because I find it very very interesting we have to go about 40 years to 1978 zeal quispel Yanis who was a colleague of yawns I think quispel was much fonder of young than young was a quibble but you know I mean that he was a good man I I knew quispel quite well and we met a lot in the 80s and 90s young humorous opinion of quispel was somewhat mixed but they did have some interesting talks about Gnosticism and about Orpheus because that was one of the the things that quispel and I used to discuss a lot in the 80s and 90s was it's surprising because quispel is often supposed to be or presented as someone who talked about the Jewish origins of Gnosticism absolutely but he always emphasized and especially in our conversations the ancient Greek and offic background to Gnosticism so there's a man in there the languages and he was translating the Coptic and so on so we have quispel in 1978 he published a piece in in a festive in a collection of articles and he it was a piece about young and her soup and he makes the very interesting comment which I think has been rather submerged in literature since then he makes the very interesting comment and he talks about Fanny's and you see this is 1978 but still quispel already before the red book he already knew how important Fanny's was for your there he had his sources and he said how come Fanny's were so important for young how come ion was so important for young that he actually became my own and he says what he says most probably this is because Young was familiar with and has read carefully iyslah's book published in 1910 in Munich vultan mantle and women's salt where iyslah has a whole section demonstrating what you can assay scholastically arguing or demonstrating that Fanny's is I'll ah that all the iconography the imagery the traditions of Fanny's in fact became the traditions of I own that they weren't two separate gods at all they were always one and quispel and I used to talk about that and he said yes I bet you he didn't ask him about that but he said I bet you young had read that book now when thanks to your kindness andreas Jung Hyung his grandson invited me to Jung's library a couple of years ago it was a wonderful experience you probably know how it works I went up with Andreas well we had a nice talk first of all and then he asked me which books I'd like to look at my I pulled them out and and then I went into another room and andreas bless him he came with a wooden tray bearing these books and the two of them I'd asked two of them that I'd asked for were the two volumes of iceless him a veteran mantle and him of Celt 1910 Munich Young's own Edition and I remember this that I spoke with Andreas and and Verena his wife afterwards and we had a good laugh about it because it's it's just a way you know how things work especially around young so there were I was sitting at the table I opened the the it's a huge work the second volume is over 700 pages long I knew the exact page reference for where iyslah identifies Fannie's and Isles and says they're the same God and I looked through both volumes and to my despair the-the-the the books were printed on glossy paper and young cared way too much for his books he wasn't going to do his usual his usual marginal pencil markings on lossy paper the the book was untouched there is no single no marking anywhere not a single marking so I opened the second volume and I have it on the table in front of me and there is this book that doesn't have a single which is very very unusual for you who doesn't have a single marginal note a single pencil marking anywhere a single comment or underlining or anything to give you a clue about what Jung was reading or what he wasn't and I was looking at this pristine book not a single marking in it there was the beginning of the on the right-hand page I remember the section where iyslah starts talking about Fanny's is iron and I'm looking out the window and I'm saying this is ridiculous I don't have a clue here and suddenly my eyes just went like this and there you know it was a 1910 there was a silk bookmark in each volume and there was the silk bookmark still old it was actually it hadn't done some marking on the glossy paper on exactly the page I was looking at so that page I was looking at had been bookmarked clearly very old you could see the markings by Europe that was the that was the passage in the iyslah book that he had marked so quispel was absolutely correct Young did know it he had marked that passage where Fanny's is Isle and this must have been a luminous moment for units I was there yeah yeah that was all so again it's the unexpected you know you think that pencil markings are going to be your clue and they're going to be the breadcrumbs and you give up and then there's something totally different so I can't you know we don't have time to go into the implications but here we have ion with as you know I mean there is I own the volume published in the 1950s there forty years after his red book enterprise and we have a most important book on the self I mean that's where he really poured himself and the book where he talks so much about the the Gnostic yes doesn't so there is iron there is Fanny's that this is something we can't talk about today maybe some other time if you wish and if we can do it but this is young was bringing the ancient figures into the modern time as this I mean he's making them alive is experiencing them is experiencing the mysteries through this incubation initiation process that's the red book that's what the red book tells us yes yes shows us yes but that I have to add Marie it's not just the red book it's Young's life see if I can just give you an example and you know about this because you wrote about it in your piece on how and why to read the red book you mentioned something very important you mentioned ethic incantation yes you are referring there to the passage the the famous passage it already famous in the red book about is to bar coming from the east and young has to help him save him you kill him and that is through incantations there is the section adding incantations and this is in the context as you pointed out of ethic traditions the egg and so on so we have Orphic incantations here and um specifically says in the red book I must recite these incantations not out a visor in the ancient manner I mean there's a gator give a water out also not Ulta rather the primordial ancient but we know what that means Goethe had talked about the war altar Orphic tradition so that is quite clear we know where we're going with that we have the Orphic incantations but I'm I need again for me there is this constant pushing and pulling and dialogue between the red book and the rest of Young's life because to me they feed into each other and the reason I mentioning this is because you think well incantation what does the incantation have to do with you well it has a lot actually think about that very famous case where young you know the young teacher who came to young because she couldn't sleep and she was very depressed and how was it that young intuitively and mysteriously and magically knew how to heal her by humming by chanting a lullaby and there's a beautiful comment he made just before the will I would say before he died the last few years of his life late 50s he made a beautiful comment when reciting that in an interview and he said if I remember right he said enchantment like that is the oldest form of medicine now we're coming to something very interesting here because here is young using enchantment using incantation using this lullaby this humming we have that one recorded famous example and of course you could say I could say well that's just young in his more mystical irrational number two personality erupting moments and of course he was the scientist he rationalized everything he made it scientific and this was his unique contribution he didn't just go with the the you know the the incantatory nonsense he he he made it scientific and the crucial one of the crucial points which I've been trying and trying to get over in this book because it's so important is this is what the offic tradition was already doing empirical ease for example who is very important for me this ancient Greek philosopher mystic whom Jung was also familiar with we know we have the traditions about him using incantations chanting reciting magical recitations but also he gave the scientific explanations in pedicle EES was he was making extraordinary discoveries in the fields of biology chemistry astronomy physics he was the first person we know of in the West to talk about the four elements he was really working things out creating a whole infrastructure for science adhere the mysticism and the science the incantations and the scientific view were hand in hand just as they were with you and this is so important for putting him in his context so we're not split Jung so we don't yes because that the splitting the dichotomies is still coming out with the red book you know we still have the problem with a red book are were the red books over there the collected scientific works are over there a bit worried about the red book it's a bit too you know so we find salvation and safety in the collected scientific works you probably know who I'm referring to but then there are all these different if we don't throw the red book in the in the garbage can we will what will we do we'll try and rationalize it make it acceptable dilute it water it down but we still have these dichotomies and and it is so important where you says enchantment like that is the oldest form of Medicine he is talking about something before Hippocrates before Hippocratic tradition we have we have Hippocratic texts specifically explicitly attacking in pedigrees who was a Norfolk practitioner because he used incantations and magic and also why did the Hippocratic writings also attack competitors they said that kind of doctor that kind of healer dares to use in contain stairs to use magic and also wants to talk about what humans were X our keys from the beginning and that's what that's what that's not pleased it and that's young and that is yours from the beginning you know this is cosmology now not metaphysics but this is evolution this is biology this is what in pedicle YZ was doing this is what yo was doing this is not Hippocratic medicine this is another kind of medicine that has been completely suppressed by Western history still is completely suppressed in western academia it's amazing the ways in which the evidence see the materials are suppressed if you want to get a grant if you want to get tenure in a Western University don't talk about this other tradition still it is taboo in the 21st century shamanic shamanic yes but it's a Western shamanic tradition yeah there is another step to this with the incantations you see one example of why it is important to know Greek and Latin if you're going to approach the red book as well as Jung is let's take the example you have the incantations in that episode remember in that same episode and just before Jung is talking about the poison yeah and the poison of the West poison of science has to be healed through incantations now the Greek word for incantations or incantatory spells is the same as the Greek word for poison pharmacon means an incantation each arm it means an incantation spell but it also means poison but it also means the remedy for the poison and it also means a magic spell and if you look at what is happening in the red book and if you look at this language maka you see that this is a world of magic that young was inhabiting it wasn't just a chapter in the red book and this magic is dangerous and this is why I that this is really the last point I'd like to make is we're talking here about magic as something real the magic of incantation the magic of healing a patient unexpectedly the magic of the poison then there is something very important that again you need to know the Greek to understand the significance you often uses the word apotropaic yes and it's a very important word for him what what he means by apotropaic is the ancient meaning is which is I'm not going to avoid something that frightens me I'm going to talk about it and talk about it and be very interested in it and be very respectful of it as a way of getting rid of it do you understand the more I ice mother it with my niceness the more I'm going to put it at a distance and the more I turn it away which is the word apotropaic what it means and you in the red book he talks that there's this amazing passage you know to no doubt know where he talks about he has all these languages for saying what happens when we are faced with the numinous reality the sacred and we we need to escape it and he says you you will use your clever truisms you will use your escape routes you will use your potions capable of inducing forgetfulness now that to me is the sign of a real magician because do you see what he's saying there he's not just talking about magical potions he's talking about how ordinary life the spirit of this time is also magic that is the potion that induces forgetfulness even our ordinary life is a potion it is magic too we have here magic against magic everything is magic did you understand what I mean I know and this is something he comes to often and there but that point is never made that the magic of the spirit of our times is defensive it's tits to keep it at a distance to keep it away oh no he does if you look at points ay and mystery of the community onus he will have in the alchemical texts he will have huge paragraphs and put in references to Michael Maya and Sansa and in it he will drop these little gems about Michael Myers shadow and about the problems and about he was encountering and he was encountering the the allergic reaction from the collective around him and he's there brings in this magical terminology comes in yeah it does come in I love that passage yes you know what I'm like his accent it just creeps in and all these places so it is there he's not going to talk about it obviously but it's in his language it's the way he speaks it sometimes an interview sometimes in seminars sometimes it will pop up and it's the kind of statement that is so easy to just skip over and say oh that's just allegory that's just metaphor so it may be that just to come back and close the circle from where we started the theme one of the results of the training programs we have set up or one of them may be one of the intentions unconsciously is to be aperture peg to keep the numinous at a distance I'm speaking about the times and staying with the times and the spirit of the times a kind of magic spell to keep it away it's possible because it's so powerful and as soon as you start touching the unconscious it begins to appear so how do you deal with it how do you look into that abyss talk better talk about it talk about it in distance that's quite an insight to me that that is again it's it I'm so glad to hear you say that because it's something that this is a very very fine knife search that we're on and it's a very fine knife search that young was huh I think that when he said he didn't want training he was he were and when he said when he actually predicted what would happen to his work in a generation he wasn't just being pessimistic or making things up and this is what you say is is yes I mean I get the impression sometimes you know there is this volume of articles on the numinous and I cannae I have it in fact Leon I'm friend he I have his coffee and I can't help reading the article sometimes without feeling this article is purely apotropaic this person is writing very knowledgeably about the numinous as a way of getting rid of the numinous yeah and and again maybe it's not about our learning bringing our learning it is about on one level bringing our learning to bear on the red book but all the time to ask ourselves is it up to the task and could it be that really it's not about our learning but about hearing something because there is tremendous pain in the red book tremendous suffering which was also something behind the pain there is a cry from behind the pain from behind the suffering and how can we let that cry come up through us through Jung's work into the world

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Length: 65min 31sec (3931 seconds)

Published: Sat Oct 13 2018