Psychology and the Occult: (From Vols. 1, 8, 18 Collected Works)

by C.G. Jung

Book Overview

Extracted from Volumes 1, 8, and 18. Includes Jung's Foreword to Phenom?nes Occultes (1939), "On the Psychology and Pathology of So-called Occult Phenomena," "The Psychological Foundations of Belief in Spirits," "The Soul and Death," "Psychology and Spiritualism," "On Spooks: Heresy or Truth?" and Foreword to Jaff? Apparitions and Precognition.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0691017913
• ISBN13: 9780691017914
• Release Date: January 1978
• Publisher: Princeton University Press
• Length: 192 Pages
• Weight: 0.53 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.5" x 5.5" x 8.4"

Customer Reviews

Carl Jung on Psychology and the Occult.

_Psychology and the Occult_ from the Collected Works of Swiss psychoanalyst Carl Jung, published as part of the Bollingen Series of Princeton University Press, and translated by R. F. C. Hull, contains several important essays and lectures by Jung on the occult and parapsychology. Carl Jung, who was to come under the influence of Freud, maintained an interest in the occult throughout his life, beginning in his young adulthood. Jung, who wrote in a letter to Freud that he "dabbled in spookery", set out on a lifelong course to explain the occult and the "spirit world" in terms of the unconscious. While Jung may have believed in the reality of spirits, his writings take a more agnostic scientific/rationalist position as to their reality, while at the same time attempting to explain occult and spiritualistic phenomena in terms of the unconscious. Jung is perhaps most famous for his notion of the collective unconscious, the source of all inherited ancestral memories, and even within his dissertation for his medical doctorate the idea of the collective unconscious may be present. Indeed, Jung writes, "I waded through the occult literature so far as it pertained to this subject [the visions of Miss S. W.], and discovered a wealth of parallels with our gnostic system, dating from different centuries, but scattered about in all kinds of works, most of them quite inaccessible to the patient." Alternatively, at least initially Jung was to explain many of the statements of mediums in terms of hysteria and cryptomnesia (the coming into consciousness of unrecognized memory images). To understand Jung's fascination with the occult and spiritualism, one really must understand the sort of revival occultism and mysticism was undergoing at the time in continental Europe and America. The Romantic movement was underway and the writings of the Swedish seer, Swedenborg, were popular. In addition, a reaction was occurring against materialism, and this reaction provoked the sort of romanticism found behind spiritualism. Scientific investigations of occult phenomena were also sought as part of the Society for Psychical Research and research into the phenomena of parapsychology were being conducted at Duke University. In addition, new discoveries in theoretical physics regarding the nature of space and time, the dimensionality of the universe, and quantum phenomena were challenging preconceived notions. It is among this milieu that Carl Jung's ideas on the occult were to arise and have their greatest impact. The following items appear reprinted in this book: "Foreword to Jung: "Phenomens Occultes"" (1939) - A brief foreword relating Jung's theories on the occult and immortality. "On the Psychology and Pathology of So-Called Occult Phenomena" (1902) -This is Jung's dissertation for his medical doctorate written while he was at the Burgholzli. In this dissertation, Jung explains the role of hysteria and epilepsy (very similar) in the production of occul

Supernatural Reverie

The occult phenomenon that Jung considers is mostly the spiritualism and seances that were popular at the turn of the 20th century. Jung describes how some mediums were found to be unconsciously moving objects via automatic movements, as in table turning, "if a fairly heavy object is moving, the muscular tension is immediately apparent". I've been very impressed by how relevant Jung's observations about the psyche are to my inner life. Unfortunately Jung has fallen out of favor and the current attitude towards the unconscious is to suppress it and fear it. Although I read a lot of books, I have encountered few references to supernatural reverie, entrancing dreams, or other indications of a profound connection to the life of the psyche. You have to read 19th century Romantic poets to find the right sensibilities. There were two passages in this book that I found noteworthy; "When a complex of the collective unconscious becomes associated with the ego it is felt as strange, uncanny, and at the same time fascinating. At all events the conscious mind falls under its spell." This is a good description of a supernatural reverie when the soul seems to fall under the spell of some eerie recollection or a fascinating, poetic vision. Another accurate description is the following passage, "An integral component of any nocturnal, numinous experience is the diming of consciousness, the feeling that one is in the grip of something greater than oneself, a most singular feeling which one willy-nilly hoards up as a secret treasure. This is the purpose of the experiece - to make us feel the overpowering presence of a mystery." The most interesting point made here is that a numinous experience is treasured, profoundly mysterious, and kept to oneself. Jung genuinely valued the unconscious.