Incarnating a Contradictory God

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Incarnating a Contradictory GodLawrence W. JaffePublished online: 20 Dec 2013.

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Incarnating a Contradictory God

Edward F. Edinger. The New God-Image: A Study ofJung’s Key Letters Concerning the Evolution of theWestern God-Image. Wilmette, Illinois, Chiron Publica-tions, 1996.

Reviewed by Lawrence W. Jaffe

One might wish for a reviewer in command of his ma-terial; instead we have one still struggling with it. The mag-nitude of Jung’s and Edinger’s vision exceeds my power tograsp it. All I can do is attempt an overview and offer thereader a few gems from the treasure house that is this book.

In accordance with his purpose of making Jung’s workmore accessible, Edward F. Edinger has produced a steadystream of elucidations of Jung’s writings. Besides the volumeunder consideration we have in just the last five years: TheAion Lectures: Exploring the Self in C.G. Jung’s “Aion”(Toronto, Inner City Books, 1996); The Mysterium Lectures:A Journey through C.G. Jung’s “Mysterium Coniunctionis”(Toronto, Inner City Books, 1995); The Mystery of TheConiunctio: Alchemical Image of Individuation (Toronto, In-ner City Books, 1994); Transformation of Libido: A Seminaron C.G. Jung’s “Symbols of Transformation” (Los Angeles,C.G. Jung Bookstore, 1994); and Transformation of the God-Image: An Elucidation of Jung’s “Answer to Job” (Toronto,Inner City Books, 1992).

What these books have in common structurally is thatthey derive from lectures Edinger has given at the C.G. JungInstitute in Los Angeles. What they have in common in termsof content is their emphasis on Jung’s mature writings, whichconcerned themselves increasingly with “ultimate things,”e.g., the ego’s relation to the Self or, in religious terms, the

Jaffe, L.W. (1998) The San Francisco Jung Institute Library Journal, 17:1, 5-17.

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relation between man and God.The lecture format proves to be a boon to the reader

because Edinger is more spontaneous and personal in hislectures than in most of his books, yet just as systematic andclear. Although not light reading, these works are invaluableto the student who may sometimes have difficulty followingJung’s intuitive leaps and scholarly asides. Edinger holdsyou by the hand, or at any rate by the sleeve, and rarely letsyou drift. His methodical, personal approach, his humor andexamples from everyday life, compensate for Jung’s intuitiveapproach. As for the emphasis on Jung’s mature writings inEdinger’s recent books I can probably do no better thanquote Jung’s description of John, the author of the Book ofRevelation:

In confinio mortis [the edge of death] and in the eveningof a long and eventful life a man will often see immensevistas of time stretching out before him. Such a man nolonger lives in the everyday world and in the vicissitudesof personal relationships, but in the sight of many aeonsand in the movement of ideas as they pass from centuryto century. (C.G. Jung. “Answer to Job,” Psychology andReligion: West and East, Collected Works, Vol. 11.R.F.C. Hull, Trans.; H. Read, M. Fordham, G. Adler,Eds. Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1969, par.717)

Edinger writes that this description might equally apply toJung. (Transformation of the God-Image: An Elucidation ofJung’s “Answer to Job.” Toronto, Inner City Books, 1992, p.19) It might apply to Edinger as well.

In his Introduction Edinger outlines the six stagesthrough which the God-Image has passed in Western civi-lization. The first three stages he names Animism (typical ofhunter/gatherer societies), Matriarchy (typical of agriculturalsocieties) and Hierarchical Polytheism (typical of urban so-cieties, e.g., Greek and Norse religion).

His final three stages, Tribal Monotheism, UniversalMonotheism and the stage we are now entering, Individua-tion, Edinger has previously placed in a slightly differentcontext. In The Creation of Consciousness (Toronto, InnerCity Books, 1984, p. 90), and also in The New God-Image,p. 93, Edinger referred to the 12th Century Italian theologian,Joaquim of Flora, who described the three stages of world


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history as follows: The Age of the Law or of the Father, whichwould correspond to “Tribal Monotheism” or the Hebrew Dis-pensation, the Age of the Gospel or of the Son, which wouldcorrespond to “Universal Monotheism” or the Christian Dis-pensation, and the Age of Contemplation or the Holy Spirit,which would correspond to “Individuation” or the Psychologi-cal Dispensation. The first three stages of religious develop-ment could be characterized by the word omen. As for thefinal three stages, law might go with Tribal Monotheism, faithwith Universal Monotheism and experience with the stage ofIndividuation. (God-Image, p. 38)

In the age defined by Tribal Monotheism in Westerncivilization, the Israelites, a collective, were chosen and sac-rificed by God. In the age of Universal Monotheism, JesusChrist, an individual, the son of God, was chosen and sac-rificed by God. In the age of Individuation, each individualis chosen and sacrificed by God. This means that whoeveris no longer contained in a living religion, say the Christianmyth, may now be impressed (as it were) into the service ofthe Self. Thus what was previously projected on Christ wouldnow be carried by the individual. This religious obligation, soto speak, may be identical with our vocation as depth psy-chotherapists, namely to facilitate the dialogue between egoand unconscious and to help others to do so.

Thus Edinger sets the stage for his treatment of thetheme of the new God-image in Jung’s letters. The volumeis divided into three parts: “Epistemological Premises,” “TheParadoxical God,” and “Continuing Incarnation.”

PART I: EPISTEMOLOGICAL PREMISES

What do we mean when we use the term God-image?We mean the same as when we speak of God except thatthe term God-image acknowledges that all we can know,psychologically speaking, is our idea of God and that wemake no claim to be speaking about the transcendent Godin his objective reality which is the subject matter of theology.For Jung and Edinger the God-image is equivalent to theJungian Self. Thus for practical purposes God, God-Imageand Self are equivalent.

Epistemology is the study of how we know what we thinkwe know. Edinger begins by explaining why, as psycholo-


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gists, we speak not of God but of the God-image. In orderto accomplish this he offers a pointed and very readableaccount of Kant’s thought as it influenced Jung. This boilsdown to two ideas: the forms of perception and the catego-ries of the mind. The forms of perception are space and timewhich we naively believe to be givens of external reality. Butas Kant demonstrated, “Space and time do not exist in theouter world. They are forms of perception that the humanmind imposes on the flux of sensory data to order it.”(Edinger, God-Image, p. 6)

The categories of the mind include cause and effect,relation, quantity, and quality. These, too, are innate struc-tures of the mind not given in reality. According to Kant, thenature of ultimate reality, (e.g., God) is unknowable. All wecan know is our experience of it (the God-image). Edingerwrites, “All experience is a subjective psychological experi-ence. It is an experience of the soul, because there is nothingelse to be experienced except the psyche.” (God-Image, p.7)

If we can know only psyche for certain, then we mightas well follow psyche. Edinger quotes Jung:

I was thrown back on experience alone. Always Paul’sexperience on the road to Damascus hovered beforeme, and I asked myself how his fate would have fallenout but for his vision. Yet this experience came upon himwhile he was blindly pursuing his own way. As a youngman I drew the conclusion that you must obviously fulfillyour destiny in order to get to the point where a donumgratiae [gift of grace] might happen along. But I was farfrom certain, and always kept the possibility in mind thaton this road I might end up in a black hole. I haveremained true to this attitude all my life.

From this you can easily see the origin of my psychol-ogy: only by going my own way, integrating my capaci-ties headlong (like Paul), and thus creating a foundationfor myself, could something be vouchsafed to me or builtupon it. (C.G. Jung. Letters, Vol. 2. Gerhard Adler, Ed.Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1975, pp. 257ff;God-Image, p. 16)

Jung’s reference to Paul is then filled out with a quote fromthe Jerusalem Bible. Paul/Saul is the speaker:

As for me, I once thought it was my duty to use everymeans to oppose the name of Jesus the Nazarene. This


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I did in Jerusalem. I myself threw many of the saints intoprison, acting on authority from the chief priests, andwhen they were sentenced to death I cast my voteagainst them. I often went around the synagogues in-flicting penalties, trying in this way to force them torenounce their faith; my fury against them was so ex-treme that I even pursued them into foreign cities.

On one such expedition I was going to Damascus,armed with full powers and a commission from the chiefpriests, and at midday as I was on my way . . . I sawa light brighter than the sun come down from heaven.It shone brilliantly around me and my fellow travelers.We all fell to the ground, and I heard a voice saying tome in Hebrew, “Saul, Saul, why are you persecutingme? It is hard for you, kicking like this against the goad.”Then I said: Who are you Lord? And the Lord answered,“I am Jesus, and you are persecuting me. But get upand stand on your feet, for I have appeared to you forthis reason: to appoint you as my servant and as wit-ness of this vision in which you have seen me, and ofothers in which I shall appear to you. I shall deliver youfrom the people and from the pagans, to whom I amsending you to open their eyes, so that they may turnfrom darkness to light.” (Acts 26:9, quoted in God-Im-age, pp. 16, 17)

Edinger continues:

Taking this example seriously, Jung expresses a basicidea: follow your libido wherever it takes you. Paul’slibido took him into a hatred of the Christians. He pouredhimself into his task with everything that he had. Jungdecided he would do the same—follow his libido—be-cause the example implied to him that grace was pos-sible in no other way and that nature would correct awrong course. It is a matter requiring not a little faith.The idea is that even if one gets into trouble by followingone’s libido with all the conviction at one’s disposal, itwill still be your trouble, not someone else’s trouble. Itwill be your experience; it will belong to your reality. Itis a dangerous doctrine, but that is what he is saying.(God-Image, p. 17, italics in original)

This little book is truly strewn with crucial insights. Here isanother, on a somewhat different subject: Jung’s idea thatmyth is primarily a social phenomenon,


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It is told by the many and heard by the many. It givesthe ultimately unimaginable religious experience an im-age, a form in which to express itself, and thus makescommunity life possible. (C. G. Jung, quoted in God-Image, p. 46)

Today we have no generally accepted myth which can con-nect us to the transpersonal dimension, hence community lifeis in disarray. As Gertrude Stein observed, “In the twentiethcentury nothing agrees with anything else.” We are probablynow in transition between the Christian myth and whatEdinger has called the Jungian myth, according to which thecoming age of individuation will see each person called uponto carry God. Corroboration is offered by the image ofAquarius the water-bearer, the zodiacal sign into which weare now entering. We are fated to assume the burden of theunconscious upon our shoulders, in contrast to the PisceanAge in which the ego swam around in the containing mediumof the unconscious.

PART II—THE PARADOXICAL GOD

Central to Jungian thought is an idea difficult for manyto accept—God is not all good, but represents a union ofopposites. Victor White, the Dominican priest and erstwhilefriend of Jung’s, could not accept it, and the ensuing dis-agreement culminated in the breakup of their friendship. Inthis central segment of the book Edinger examines Jung’sletters to Victor White and to Jung’s distinguished pupil, ErichNeumann, who also expressed his difficulty in accepting theimage of the paradoxical God.

Jung’s most salient work on the subject was Answer toJob. Although guiltless, Job was nearly crushed by a sus-picious God who permitted Satan (an aspect of Himself) totry Job’s faithfulness by calling down upon him a series ofcatastrophes beginning with the death of his children. De-spite the certainty of Job’s “comforters” that he was guilty ofsome unacknowledged sin that required atonement, Jobremained true to his own experience insisting on continuingthe dialogue with God until he obtained satisfaction. “Thoughhe slay me, yet will I trust in him. But I will maintain mineown ways before him.” (Job 13:15). Job’s self-awareness,together with his love and trust in God, permitted him to


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demand justice from God. In return for his devotion, courage,and self-knowledge God answered Job out of the whirlwindand revealed something about himself that had not previ-ously been known—that He was a phenomenon and not aman. Job wonders why God treats him throughout as if hewere an equal, “Wilt thou frighten a driven leaf and pursuedry chaff?” (Job 13:25 RSV) Jung notes, “Job is challengedas though he himself were a god.” (Jung, Answer, par. 594.)The myth suggests that Job’s consciousness had achievedgodlike proportions.

God makes it clear in the end that he favors the remon-strations of Job (to whom He restored prosperity) over thepious rationalizations of Job’s “comforters,” (whom Hethreatened for speaking untruthfully of Him). According to theJungian myth, God seeks his unity through humankind.(Jung quoted in Edinger, Transformation, p.15) Individuationcan thus be understood as the process by which theGod-image differentiates and evolves. Jung writes, “Job isno more than the outward occasion for an inward processof dialectic in God.” (Jung, Answer, par. 587) The idea thatGod has something to learn from man is hard for the modernmind to contemplate, in good part because of the “disastrousprejudice” that God is a conscious being. (Jung, Answer, par.600, n. 13.) The emotional necessity for that notion is therelatively childlike state of our collective consciousnesswhich requires the presence of a good parent on high. Theidea that our parent is a mixture of opposites is difficult toswallow and remains the most formidable stumbling-block tocomprehension of the Jungian myth of the transformation ofthe God-image.

In Transformation of the God-Image (p. 32) Edingeranalyzes the initial sentence of Jung’s Answer to Job: “TheBook of Job is a landmark in the long historical developmentof a divine drama.” (par. 560) Edinger wonders what “divinedrama” (which he regards as striking the keynote for Jung’sentire essay) could mean. Associating to this phrase,Edinger challenges us to do likewise. My idea is that inplacing the evolution of God at the center of history weachieve a Copernican revolution in the inner world. Insteadof humankind at the center of the universe, God is the pro-tagonist and human beings are relegated to a supporting role


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(just as Copernicus discovered that the earth revolvedaround the sun instead of vice-versa). If, however, we acceptour supporting roles in this divine drama, our relationshipwith God comes alive. Dispelled is the tedious image of acontrolling presence in heaven who has it all figured out withthe possible exception of whether we will be good or bad.

We seem to be moving toward a more participatorymodel of relationship and away from a dogmatic, patriarchal,idealized model in nearly every realm of modern life, e.g.,marriage, the doctor-patient relationship, and, with thespread of democracy, politics. This could portend the re-placement of the parent-child archetype in relation to Godwith the archetype of partnership. Certainly it is Jung’s notionthat we are involuntary partners of God in this divine drama,which seems to have as its goal consciousness—both ourown and the Creator’s. As Clement of Alexandria put it, “Ifa man knows himself he knows God.” Jung wrote, “Whoeverknows God has an effect on him.” (Answer, par. 617) Takentogether these two quotes can be said to epitomize theJungian myth, which Edinger sees as the central myth of theAge of Individuation.

PART III: CONTINUING INCARNATION

Edinger begins his third and final segment of The NewGod-Image with an examination of a letter (to ElinedKotschnig) which he regards as Jung’s most trenchant state-ment on the subject of the evolving God-image and the ego’srelation to it. If Edinger is right, and Jung’s works will someday be read as Scripture once was, this letter will occupy animportant place in that canon. (Incidentally, Kotschnig’s andthe other letters discussed by Edinger are to be found in theAppendix, unabridged.) The phrase continuing incarnationhas several references, one of which is Edinger’s definitionof individuation, “The continuing incarnation of God for thepurpose of divine transformation.” (Personal Communica-tion)

Here is an excerpt from the Kotschnig letter, written byJung in 1956 in English:

The significance of man is enhanced by the incarnation.We have become participants of the divine life and wehave to assume a new responsibility, viz. the continu-


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ation of the divine self-realization, which expresses it-self in the task of our individuation. Individuation doesnot only mean that man has become truly human asdistinct from animal, but that he is to become partiallydivine as well. This means practically that he becomesadult, responsible for his existence, knowing that hedoes not only depend on God but that God also dependson man. Man’s relation to God probably has to undergoa certain important change: Instead of the propitiatingpraise to an unpredictable king or the child’s prayer toa loving father, the responsible living and fulfilling of thedivine will in us will be our form of worship of andcommerce with God. His goodness means grace andlight and His dark side the terrible temptation of power.(Letters, p. 316)

Edinger comments,

He tells us what psychological maturity means from thestandpoint of Jungian psychology. He says it means,“the responsible living and fulfilling of the divine will inus.” What is that? . . . One might very well say, “I don’tknow anything about divine will: all I know is what I want. . . It is the problem of distinguishing between the egoand the Self. In the first half of life that distinction is notgoing to be made. The first half of life, barring excep-tions, is characterized by a degree of identification be-tween the ego and the Self which does not allow theirdistinction. In the second half of life, ideally at least, theego and Self have started to undergo some degree ofseparation. It becomes possible in a few cases for theego to become aware that a transpersonal center iscalling the shots in his life. If that level of awarenesstakes place, then the ego begins to get some idea ofwhat is meant by “the divine will in us.” (God-Image, p.87)

Edinger suggests that it is possible that “even God does notknow what his will is until the individual makes the discovery.It may be that consciousness happens simultaneously toboth the ego and the Self.” (God-Image, p. 88) But what isthe nature of this partnership between man and God, egoand unconscious? Jung writes, “Existence is only real whenit is conscious to somebody. That is why the Creator needsconscious man.” (Answer, Collected Works, Vol. 11, par.575) The Hebrew Bible reads, in portions, as if God turnswrathful at any wavering of attention.

This Hebrew Bible God-image can be found within


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ourselves in the form of infantile or narcissistic rage. Edingersuggests it as an example of the offended God-image, atendency to retaliate when one is “dissed,” when one’s senseof dignity is violated. (One manifestation Edinger points tois “road rage.”) Jung and Edinger are suggesting that thisYahweh within us, sometimes in the driver’s seat, is in theprocess of being humanized. The idea relates back to theKotschnig excerpt quoted above, where Jung writes that manhas “become partially divine. This means practically that hebecomes adult.” (Letters, p. 316) Jung is implying that be-coming adult, an opus with which we must often assist ourpatients, is equivalent to realizing the divine part of ournature. The offended God-Image represents a portion of thatdivine in us, an unadapted portion that does not understandthe limitations of the ego. The divine portion must learn whatlife is like in this world.

Edinger considers prayer an example of the dialoguebetween ego and Self. He equates prayer to active imagi-nation:

It is not a request for anything specific. It is a requestthat the unconscious reveal itself with an image of somekind which can then lead to a dialogue. . . . Also Iconsider it legitimate to ask for help in time of need ifone does not specify what it is. I think consulting the IChing in times of uncertainty is a kind of prayer, forinstance. (God-Image, p. 97)

For Jung, the uses of prayer are more restricted,

[Prayer] was and still is a problem for me. Some yearsago I felt that all demands which go beyond what is areunjustified and infantile, so that we shouldn’t ask foranything that is not granted. We can’t remind God ofanything or prescribe anything for him, except when hetries to force something on us that our human limitationcannot endure. (Jung quoted in God-Image, p. 87)

For Jung prayer is legitimate only when the Self tries to forcesomething upon the ego that the ego cannot stand. Then theego may inform the Self of its human limitations. What thisimplies is that the Self can and will force ideas on the ego.Such an instance is elaborated upon by Jung in the TerryLectures (Collected Works, Vol. 11, pars. 15ff) and referredto by Edinger (God-Image, pp. 19, 20): A patient believed he


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had cancer despite assurances from his doctors. He said,“I know I do not have cancer but I think I have cancer.” Jungobserved that to tell this man that he was imagining he hadcancer would be demoralizing. Edinger writes, “He is notimagining it. He does not choose to have such an idea, theidea is forced upon him.” (emphasis in original) There’s thatword “forced” again; the Self is forcing something upon theego. Jung writes, “[I]t is better for him to understand thathis complex is an autonomous power directed against hisconscious personality.” I read this as stating that the complexis directed against the ego by the Self. I will return to thisidea below.

In the final chapter of Part III the magnitude of this workreveals itself with explosive force. Edinger seems to gatherup strands that he has laid down in Part I, “EpistemologicalPremises” and Part II, “The Paradoxical God,” and weavethem into an intricate tapestry of Jung’s vision of the newcultural age of Individuation.

I can only hope to touch on one or two of the strandsand offer a glimpse of the vision to the reader. One strandparticularly helpful to me personally is to comprehend thereligious imagery psychologically. Jung explicitly equatesGod with the unconscious, Christ with the Self, incarnationwith integration of the unconscious, salvation or redemptionwith individuation, and crucifixion or sacrifice on the crosswith realization of the four functions or of wholeness. (Col-lected Works. Vol. 18, par. 1664)

With the incarnation in Christ the dark side of God wasomitted; hence the continuing incarnation will make itself feltfirst through that same dark side of God. Here Edinger ispicking up the strand of the paradoxical God-image. Hewrites, “Following the rule of the return of the repressed, themissing side of the God-image must show up first.” (God-Image, p. 10)

Edinger understands the “continuing incarnation” as oc-curring both in society at large and in the individual. It iseasier to see its effect in society perhaps because we havemore psychological distance from society than from our-selves. Collectively the continuing incarnation is evidentevery day in the news of the worldwide polarizations, con-flicts and factionalism.


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Finally Edinger picks up the strand of Kant’s epistemol-ogy when he warns us not to identify with our subjectiveexperience, for the reason that we did not make it. We areresponsible for our behavior but not for what goes on in ourpsyche:

We examine dreams, we do active imagination, wemake sand-trays, we paint pictures and what-not, all forthe same purpose of trying to promote dis-identificationfrom our subjectivity. In other words, to render oursubjectivity objective. The constant danger that we haveto be alert for is the unconscious assumption that isalways stalking us: I created that (when I did not). (God-Image, p. 116)

If we dis-identify with subjectivity we can better discern thework of the Self. If we take responsibility for what goes onin our psyche this means we are identifying with it, which isprecisely the error about which Kant warns us. Edinger says,“The task of the suffering ego becomes the objectification ofits subjectivity.” (God-Image, p.115)

When I first picked up this book and noticed that aquarter of it was given over to epistemology I was a littledisappointed, expecting to be bored. Now, at the end of thebook the contribution of epistemology becomes clear (andno, I wasn’t bored). Edinger wants us to understand some-thing hard to understand, namely that we shouldn’t take ourcomplexes personally, that they come from God and that inconsciously coming to grips with them, bearing them, and (ifwe’re fortunate), transforming them to some degree, we areengaged in God’s work.

I found it helpful to my own understanding to rememberwhat Jung said about the patient who thought he had can-cer—that it was an “autonomous power directed against theconscious personality.” I think Jung is implying that all ourcomplexes are like that. Jung has remarked elsewhere thatthe unconscious is ambivalent about consciousness. Godsends Moses on a mission to Pharoah and then seeks to killhim (Ex 4:25). Similarly, in Numbers 22, God orders Balaamto obey the summons of the Moabite king and defend theIsraelites before that authority. “No sooner does Balaampack his donkey and set out on his way then the angel ofthe Lord is dispatched to murder him on the road.” (LawrenceJaffe, Liberating the Heart: Spirituality and Jungian Psychol-


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ogy. Toronto, Inner City Books, 1992, pp 64, 65) Again, Godforces Hosea to marry a prostitute (Hosea 1:2, in Jung,Collected Works, Vol. 11, par 32; Letters, Vol. 2, p. 391)

Our sufferings, then, stem from “God’s tragic contradic-toriness” (Memories, Dreams, Reflections, p. 216), and weare not at the center of the universe. This is a hard truthwhich we are only just beginning to face. Assimilating it maybe a part of the process of becoming adult as a species.


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Incarnating a Contradictory God