Quadrant Summer 1978

Psychotherapy and Alchemy I. Introduction— Edward F. Edinger

The process of psychotherapy, when it goes at all deep, sets into motion profound and mysterious happenings. It is very easy for both patient and therapist to lose their way. This is why narrow and inadequate theories of the psyche are clung to so desperately — at least they provide some sense of orientation. If we are not to submit psychic phenomena to the Procrustean bed of a preconceive theory, we must seek the categories for understanding the psyche within the psyche itself. An old alchemical dictum says, “Dissolve the matter in its own water.” This is what we do when we try to understand the process of psychotherapy in terms of alchemy.

As Jung studied alchemy he found that this luxuriant network of images was, indeed, the psyche’s “own water” which could be used to understand the complex contents of the psyche. … We can therefore say that alchemical images describe the process of depth psychotherapy which is identical with what Jung calls individuation. What I thus propose to do is to examine some of the basic images of alchemy to see how they correspond to the experiences of psychotherapy. …

Psychotherapy and Alchemy II. Calcinatio— Edward F. Edinger

As with most alchemical images, calcinatio derives in part from a chemical procedure. The chemical process of calcination entails the intense heating of a solid in order to drive off water and all other constituents that will volatilize. What remains is a fine, dry powder. … Any image that contains open fire burning or affecting substances will be related to the calcinatio. This opens up the whole rich and complicated subject of fire symbolism. Jung has demonstrated that fire symbolizes libido. This puts it very generally. In order to specify the implications of fire and its effects, we must examine the phenomenology of the image in its various ramifications. …

Presidential Address: International Association for Analytical Psychology — Gerhard Adler

… I am particularly glad to have seen from the resumés of the various papers that we shall have a lively discussion on account of their often very diverse views. It s these different views which I find so important and constructive. …

Eros in Language, Myth, and Dream — Russell A. Lockhart

Hidden away in the Sacellum Volupiae, the Roman Sanctuary of Pleasure, is a statue of Angerona. Her mouth is bound and sealed. An uplifted finger touching her lips points to her silence and her suffering. This quiet Angerona is goddess of silent suffering and the suffering of silence. I invoke her image as counterpoint to the clamor of voices speaking out on modern problems and crises in love and relationship.

Mirror: Metaphor and Symbol — Mary Jo Spencer

The first mirror that man ever knew was the natural mirror of water. In a world very different from our own, in a world where the only sounds would have been those of wind and storm, of waves, waterfalls, and streams, of animal cries and bird songs, surely, humans knelt countless times to drink at a still pool in the midst of a forest. At a given point in his life, some man must have understood what he saw as he leaned toward the water was not another, but himself. Whether he understood dimly or clearly, it must have been revealed to him that he — the being at the center of existence, the center of the universe — could now view himself as from the outside. The human sense of ego may well have had its beginning in the capacity to recognize one’s reflected image. …

Book Reviews

The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind— Julian Jaynes. Houghton Mifflin. Reviewed by Nathan Schwartz.

Oglala Religion— William K. Powers. University of Nebraska Press. Reviewed by C. Jess Groesbeck.

Psychotypes: A New Way of Exploring Personality— Michael Malone. E.P. Dutton & Co., Inc. Reviewed by Thomas H. Records.

Dionysos: Archetypal Image of Indestructible Life— Carl Kerényi. Translated by Ralph Manheim. Princeton University Press. Reviewed by Roger J. Woolger.

Psychology and the Occult from the Collected Works of C.G. Jung. Selection by William McGuire. Princeton University Press. Bollingen Paperbacks. Reviewed by James Kirsch.