The Red Book - Democratic Underground

Dover

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Sun Dec-20-09 05:26 AM
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The Red Book

Hello ASAH :hi:

I recently received my copy of Jung's long awaited Red Book, his deeply personal journey to the soul replete with amazing images and handwritten script created by his own hand, as well as his dreams, explorations and waking fantasies. I find the timing of its release intriguing and will likely be engrossed in its pages a lot in the next several months.

In celebration of the winter solstice and this holiday season I thought I'd share a few excerpts with my ASAH family that have stood out for me (though far more interesting to read them within the context of his narrative). I hope the book becomes more readily available (affordable) soon, as it is currently a bit of a burden relative to price, size and weight! Yet so stunningly beautiful and precious! Perhaps Santa will manage to get it down the chimney and placed under the tree for some lucky folks.

First this description:

During the first world war, Carl Jung embarked on an extended self-exploration he called his 'confrontation with the unconscious'. At the heart of this exploration was The Red Book, a grand, illuminated volume which he created between 1914 and 1930, in which he developed the nucleus of his later theories.

The book is a remarkable blend of calligraphy and art; an illuminated manuscript that bears comparison with The Book of Kells and William Blake. But while Jung considered The Red Book his most important work, only a handful of people have ever seen it. Finally, nearly 80 years after it was completed, it is available in a facsimile edited by Jung historian Sonu Shamdasani and published by WW Norton. View a handful of the pages here.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/gallery/2009/oct/16/1

A DREAM (Jung interpreted the following dreams as, perhaps, precognitive of the approach of WWI, but I wonder...)
“It happened in October of the year 1913 as I was leaving alone for a journey that during the day I was suddenly overcome in broad daylight by a vision. I saw a terrible flood that covered all the northern and low-lying lands between the North Sea and the Alps. It reached from England up to Russia, and from the coast of the North Sea right up to the Alps. I saw yellow waves, swimming rubble, and the death of countless thousands.

The vision lasted for two hours. It confused me and made me ill. I was not able to interpret it. Two weeks passed then the vision returned more violent than before, and an inner voice spoke. ‘Look at it, it is completely real, and it will come to pass. You cannot doubt this.’ I wrestled again for two hours with this vision but it held me fast. It left me exhausted and confused. And I thought my mind had gone crazy.

“From then on the anxiety toward the terrible event that stood directly before us kept coming back. Once I also saw a sea of blood over the northern lands

“In the year 1914 in the month of June, at the beginning and end of the month, and at the beginning of July, I had the same dream three times…”

THREE DREAMS

In the year 1914 in the month of June, at the beginning and end of the month, and at the beginning of July, I had the same dream three times. I was in a foreign land, and suddenly, overnight and right in the middle of summer, a terrible cold descended from space. All seas and rivers were locked in ice, every green living thing had frozen.

The second dream was thoroughly similar to this. But the third dream at the beginning of July went as follows:

I was in a remote English land. It was necessary that I return to my homeland with a fast ship as speedily as possible. I reached home quickly. In my homeland I found that in the middle of summer a terrible cold had fallen from space, which had turned every living thing into ice. There stood a leaf-bearing but fruitless tree, whose leaves had turned into sweet grapes full of healing juice throught the working of the frost. I picked some grapes and gave them to a great waiting throng.

Commentary about the first dream:

When I had the vision of the flood in October of the year 1913 it happened at a time that was significant for me as a man. At that time, in the fortieth year of my life, I had achieved everything taht I had wished for myself. I had achieved honor, power, wealth, knowledge, and every human happiness. Then my desire for the increase of these trappings ceased, the desire ebbed from me and horror came over me The vision of the flood seized me and I felt the spirit of the depths, but I did not understand him. Yet he drove me on with unbearable inner longing and I said: "My soul, where are you? do you hear me? I speak. I call you - are you there? I have returned. I am here again. I have shaken the dust of all the lands from my feet and I have come to you. I am with you. After long years of long wandering. I have come to you again. Should I tell you everything I have seen, experienced and drunk in? Or do you not want to hear about all the noise of life and the world? But one thing you must know; the one thing I have learned is that one must live this life.

This life is the way; the long sought-after way to the unfathomable which we call divine. There is no other way, all other ways are false paths. I found the right way, it led me to you, to my soul. I return tempered and purified. Do you still know me? How long the separation lasted! Everything has become so different. And how did I find you? How strange my journey was! What words should I use to tell you on what twisted paths a good star has guided me to you? Give me your hand, my almost forgotten soul. How warm the joy at seeing you again, you long disavowed soul. Life has led me back to you. Let us thank the life I have lived for all the happy and all the sad hours, for every joy, for every sadness. My soul, my journey should continue with you. I will wander with you and ascend to my solitude.

The spirit of the depths forced me to say this and at the same time to undergo it against myself, since I had not expected it then. I still labored misguidedly under the spirit of this time and thought differently about the human soul. I thought and spoke much of the soul. I knew many learned words for her, I had judged her and turned her into a scientific object. I did not consider that my sould cannot be the object of my judgement and knowledge: much more are my judgement and knowledge the objects of my soul. Therefore the spirit of the depths forced me to speak to my soul, to call upon her as a living and self-existing being. I had to become aware that I had lost my soul...cont'd

My friends,

Believe me. It is no teaching and no instruction that I give you. On what basis should I presume to teach you? I give you news of the way of this man, but not your own way. My path is not your path, therefore I cannot teach you. The way is within us, but not in Gods, nor in teachings, nor in laws. Within us is the way, the truth, the life.

Woe betide those who live by way of examples! Life is not with them. If you live according to an example, you thus live the life of that example, but who should live your own life if not yourself? So live yourselves.

The signposts have fallen, unblazed trails lie before us. Do not be greedy to gobble up the fruits of foreign fields. do you not know that you yourselves are the fertile acre which bears everything that avails you?

Yet who today knows this? Who knows the way to the eternally fruitful climes of the soul? You seek the way through mere appearances, you study books and give ear to all kinds of opinion. What good is all that?

There is only one way and that is your way.

You seek the path? I warn you away from my own. It can also be the wrong way for you.

May each go his own way.

I will be no savior, no lawgiver, no master teacher unto you. You are no longer little children.

Giving laws, wanting improvements, making things easier, has all become wrong and evil. may each one seek out his own way. The way leads to mutual love in community. Men will come to see and feel the similarity and commonality of their ways.

Laws and teachings held in common compel people to solitude, so that they may escape the pressure of undesirable contact, but solitude makes people hostile and venomous.

Therefore give people dignity and let each of them stand apart, so that each may find his own fellowship and love it.

Power stands against power, contempt against contempt, love against love.

Give humanity dignity, and trust that life will find the better way.

The one eye of the Godhead is blind, the one ear of the Godhead is deaf, the order of its being is crossed by chaos. So be patient with the crippledness of the world and do not overvalue its consummate beauty.