Friday, December 22, 2017

Carl Jung: The most important of the symbolical statements about Christ are those which reveal the attributes of the hero's life:




If we are to answer this psychological question, we must first of all examine the Christ-symbolism contained in the New Testament, together with the patristic allegories and medieval iconography, and compare this material with the archetypal content of the unconscious psyche in order to find out what archetypes have been constellated.

The most important of the symbolical statements about Christ are those which reveal the attributes of the hero's life:

Improbable origin
Divine father
Hazardous birth
Rescue in the nick of time
Precocious development
Conquest of the mother and of death
Miraculous deeds
A tragic, early end
Symbolically significant manner of death
Post-mortem effects (reappearances, signs and marvels, etc.)

As the Logos, Son of the Father, Rex gloriae, Judex mundi, Redeemer, and Saviour, Christ is himself God, an all-embracing totality, which, like the definition of Godhead, is expressed iconographically by the circle or mandala.

Here I would mention only the traditional representation of the Rex gloriae in a mandala, accompanied by a quaternity composed of the four symbols of the evangelists (including the four seasons, four winds, four rivers, and so on)

Another symbolism of the same kind is:

Choir of saints, angels, and elders grouped round Christ (or God) in the center. Here Christ symbolizes the integration of the kings and prophets of the Old Testament
As a shepherd he [Christ] is the leader and center of the flock
He is the vine, and those that hang on him are the branches
His body is bread to be eaten, and his blood wine to be drunk
He is also the mystical body formed by the congregation

In his human manifestation he is the hero and God-man, born without sin, more complete and more perfect than the natural man, who is to him what a child is to an adult, or an animal (sheep) to a human being ~Carl Jung, CW 11, Para 229

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