… primitive psychology shuns abstractions. There are practically no concepts in primitive languages. In Arabic, there are sixty words for types of camels and no word for camel in the abstract….
Jung (1984)[1]
It is in the nature of political bodies always to see the evil in the opposite group,…
Jung (1956)[2]
Fundamentalism is the sin of literalism….
James Hollis (1995)[3]
Recently a student asked me what I thought Jung would make of the situation in the Middle East, what with the Arab Spring, the Syrian civil war, the rise of ISIS, and the situation with Iran. Off the cuff I said I didn’t know, but that I would think about it, and this essay is the result of that period of reflection.
First, I should note that, for regular readers of this blog, it will come as no surprise when I say that I generally hesitate to get too far removed from my sources: The copious footnotes in all these essays are testimony to my desire to allow Jung to speak for himself as much as possible.
But therein lies a problem. Jung died in 1961,[4] over 50 years ago, when the configurations and situations in the Middle East were different from what we see today. Assuming Jung waxed eloquent about the geopolitical realities in that part of the world (and I have not found any source indicating that he did),[5] his words of 50+ years ago might not provide much insight into our world today.
However, there are tidbits scattered among Jung’s published works that can help give us a general bead on how he might regard what’s going on in this tumultuous part of the planet. This essay builds on these tidbits, augmented with statements by a variety of Jungian analysts.
Projection of the Shadow
In an earlier essay archived on this blog site, “What is America’s Shadow?,” I defined the “shadow” as the “hidden or unconscious aspects of oneself,”[6] which the ego has either repressed or simply not recognized. It is “shadow” because we are “in the dark” about these parts of ourselves. Jung was adamant that integration of the shadow is a major component of undertaking the work of individuation and becoming conscious, and this task is usually part of the nigredo, or first stage of the process of alchemical transformation.[7]
While some elements of the shadow may be positive (simply parts of our potential we don’t recognize as “us”), the more difficult parts are the negatives, e.g. our capacity for lying, cheating, stealing, abusing others, committing violence, rebellion and murder. We recoil at the prospect of integrating an Osama bin Laden, or a Unibomber: “That can’t be me!” we say with self-righteous indignation.[8]
And there’s the key: self-righteousness. We repress, deny or project these horrible, immoral, unwanted parts out on to others. “Projection” is “an automatic process whereby contents of one’s own unconscious are perceived to be in others.”[9] We could add to Daryl Sharp’s definition the word “unconscious,” as the process is as unintended as it is automatic. The purpose of projection? Generally to maintain our self-righteousness, i.e. our ability to think well of ourselves. We attack the deficit, the problem, the evil we see “out there” in somebody else, or in some other group, all the while failing to see it in ourselves.
What’s this got to do with Jung and the Middle East? This can be answered on two levels, the general and the specific. On the general level, Jung recognized how the system of nation states fosters projection of the shadow when he noted that: “It is in the nature of political bodies always to see the evil in the opposite group,…”.[10] Any group that strikes us as “opposite,” very much unlike us, will likely get hung with our collective shadow projection. During his lifetime Jung repeatedly noted how Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union received our collective shadow projections, and he warned us, as individuals, to recognize this and work to assimilate these projections.[11]
Which brings us to the specific level: What cultures are very unlike us? Many of those in the Middle East, with their veiling and sequestering of women, their prohibitions of alcohol, their rentier economies,[12] their kingdoms, coups d’état and abuse of human rights—in so many ways the region is full of aspects of our collective Western shadow. This being so, the temptation is great for us to project shadow on to that geographic area and the cultures that are found there. Jung would caution us not to do this, but rather to try to learn as much as we can about this region and all the treasures it might have for us. To do so requires that we confront another challenge: our tendency to cosmic vanity.
Cosmic Vanity
Like “projection” this term appeared in an earlier blog essay, “The Law of Cause and Effect,” where I defined it as “… the claim to a privileged knowledge of the origin, structure and workings of the cosmos… a temptation that dogs all religion … ”.[13] In some sources it goes by the name “ontological arrogance,” which Fred Kofman has defined as: “Ontological arrogance is the belief that your perspective is privileged, that yours is the only true way to interpret a situation….”[14] “Ontological arrogance [is] when I assume that my truth is the truth.”[15]
Jung had little use for cosmic vanity, as it fosters both self-righteousness and divisiveness. On the collective level, it can lead to one country arrogantly arrogating to itself more than its fair share of the earth’s resources, throwing its military might around, and in a variety of other ways being an obnoxious member of the global community. Jung would have us remember that:
Our world has shrunk, and it is dawning on us that humanity is one, with one psyche. Humility is a not inconsiderable virtue which should prompt Christians, for the sake of charity—the greatest of all virtues—to set a good example and acknowledge that though there is only one truth it speaks in many tongues, and that if we still cannot see this it is simply due to lack of understanding. No one is so godlike that he alone knows the true word….[16]
Jung speaks here of “Christians” since he was writing within Western culture, for a Western readership, but the name of the followers of any other religion might be substituted for “Christians.”
How does cosmic vanity relate to our topic? Perhaps no region in the world is more rife with and fraught from cosmic vanity than the Middle East. Orthodox Jews, Salafi and Wahhabi Muslims, Sunnis and Shi’ites, Copts and Druses—all insist that theirs is the only right way. More than this, some of these sects think the solution to the reality of this variety of perspectives is to slaughter those who believe differently! This reflects another component of our topic: bi-polar thinking.
The Limitations in Either/Or, Bi-polar Thinking
Years ago, when I first taught a course on the history of the modern Middle East, I was struck by how Arabic refers to non-Muslims: dar al Harb. In this way of thinking, there is dar al Islam—the world of Islam (i.e. of Muslims, believers in Allah and Mohammed as His prophet), and there is dar al Harb, the world of war (i.e. of everyone else, non-believers, infidels).[17] One either believes in the right way, or one is at war with the right way—a rather stark approach to viewing reality.
Jung had little use for bi-polar thinking. He stressed “both/and” thinking, which simultaneously recognizes the opposites but also holds them in a fruitful tension which the transcendent function might eventually resolve.[18] By thinking either/or, we are much more likely to fall into one-sidedness, to forget the value of the other, especially when it is viewed as something lesser, something erroneous, something perhaps even evil.
Jung’s student, Erich Neumann, recognized both/and thinking as a key component of the “new ethic” he saw emerging from depth psychology: “… the ideal of the new ethics,… is the combination of the opposites in a unitary structure….”[19] We can’t combine the opposites if we are denigrating or dismissing one of the pair, or denying the reality of the “other.” But this is precisely what Arabic encourages in its depiction of non-Muslims.
Literalism and Sacred Scriptures
Another key concept germane to our topic is “literalism.” This is the tendency to handle scriptures in a “word for word” way,[20] stripped of symbolism, abjuring allegorical, or metaphorical meanings. Jungians are uniform in their recognition that literal readings of sacred texts—be they Christian, Muslim, Hindu, Buddhist or other religious texts—are “soul denying”[21] and “pathological.”[22] Why is this?
Because all sacred scriptures contain symbols—powerful imagery and expressions that hold soul-nourishing energy. John Dourley, a Jungian analyst and Roman Catholic priest explains:
As man loses conscious touch with the sacred, he inevitably loses the capacity to appreciate and to respond to the way it is expressed through the symbol. Religiously and theologically, the loss of the symbolic leads to the pathology of literalism….[23]
Sacred texts address Mystery, and “… in literalizing the Mystery, we reduce it and ourselves.”[24] Jungian analyst James Hollis regards literalism as a form of idolatry,[25] and both Hollis and Dourley associate literalism with fundamentalism.[26]
Religious fundamentalists are found all over the world, but are especially common in the American South and in the Muslim world.[27] Islam, as a religion, is noteworthy for its literal interpretation of the Koran. This might be why Jung felt “antipathy toward the culture and society”[28] of the Middle East.
Jung on Features of the Middle East
Jung traveled widely in Europe, America, India and Africa. He was familiar with the world of Islam from his ventures into Egypt, Africa and India. He shared one of his trips to Africa with Ruth Bailey, who later become his housekeeper/caretaker in Jung’s last years, and on their return from Kenya, while they waited in Port Said, Egypt, for their boat to take them to Genoa, Jung told Ruth that
… he ‘could never really relate to Islam.’ The Africa that had the most meaning for him was the primitive, where he could find ‘the cruel meaninglessness of an indescribable bliss.’…[29]
Although he was interested in Islamic art and architecture,[30] Jung never experienced bliss in his contacts with the Islamic world . Perhaps this was because of his sense of the “primitive psychology” of the region, as seen in its language:
… primitive psychology shuns abstractions. There are practically no concepts in primitive languages. In Arabic, there are sixty words for types of camels and no word for camel in the abstract….[31]
How did Jung know this? Perhaps from his travels, or perhaps from his years growing up around his father, who was fluent in Arabic and might have shared his impressions of the language with Jung.[32]
As a religion that eschews allegory and symbolism, Islam held little interest for Jung. In its absence of symbols and a valuation of symbolism, Islam had lost “… conscious touch with the sacred,”[33] and in so doing, had also lost “… the capacity to appreciate and to respond to the way it [the sacred] is expressed through the symbol….”.[34] The only type of Islam that Jung appreciated was its mysticism, e.g. Sufism. Jung told the students in his seminar on dream analysis that
“…we have a funny idea of Islam through bad education. It is represented by our theologians as dry and empty, but there is tremendous life in it, particularly in Islamic mysticism, which is the secret backbone of Islam….”[35]
Islam and the End of the World
The final piece of this essay would not have occurred to me if I had not recently read Shirley MacLaine’s The Camino, a memoir of her walking the pilgrimage path to the shrine of St. James of Compostela in Spain. In that account, she notes more or less in passing how
The ancient hatreds between religions were a source of deep sorrow for me. I had read the prophecies that claimed Islam would cause great destruction in the world. From Nostradamus to Edgar Cayce to interpretations of Revelations in the Bible, the presence of Islam was associated with the end of the world as we know it….[36]
MacLaine’s mention of “the end of the world as we know it” brought to mind Jung’s deathbed warning. As I noted in an earlier essay on this site, “Jung’s Prophetic Vision and the Alchemical of Our Time,” Jung’s waning energies in his last days were focused not on personal concerns, nor even concern for the Institute, but on the future of the world. On May 30th, 1961, eight days before he died, Jung dictated to his daughter his last visions. The images were sobering: “I see enormous stretches devastated, enormous stretches of the earth. But thank God, not the whole planet.”[37]
Given what we hear on the daily news about the turmoil in the Middle East and the seemingly intractable intransigence of the various religious sects and factions in that area, it would not be surprising if the seers’ prophecies play out in some sort of global nuclear war that leaves the Middle East uninhabitable for thousands of years (thus eliminating the Israeli-Arab conflict, the Sunni-Shi’ite conflict, the ISIS threat and whatever other conflicts arise in the region). Jung’s vision, while certainly unappealing, can give us hope that somewhere, among some remnant of humanity, life will go on. Jung would not have us fall into despair.
Bibliography
Armstrong, Karen (2000), The Battle for God: A Battle for Fundamentalism. New York: Ballantine Books.
Bair, Deirdre (2003), Jung: A Biography. New York: Little, Brown & Co.
Davis, Charles (1974), Temptation of Religion. New York: Harper & Row.
Dourley, John (1981), The Psyche as Sacrament. Toronto: Inner City Books.
Ehrman, Bart (1993), The Orthodox Corruption of Scripture. New York: Oxford University Press.
Hollis, James (1995), Tracking the Gods: The Place of Myth in Modern Life. Toronto: Inner City Books.
________ (1998), The Eden Project: In Search of the Magical Other. Toronto: Inner City Books.
Jung, C.G. (1970), “Civilization in Transition,” CW 10. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
________ (1976), ”The Symbolic Life,” CW 18. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
________ (1984), Seminar on Dream Analysis. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Kofman, Fred (2006), Conscious Business. Boulder CO: Sounds True.
MacLaine, Shirley (2000), The Camino: A Journey of the Spirit. New York: Pocket Books.
Neumann, Erich (1990), Depth Psychology and a New Ethic. Boston: Shambhala.
Patai,, Raphael (2007), The Arab Mind, rev. ed. New York: Hatherleigh Press.
Sharp, Daryl (1991), A C.G. Jung Lexicon. Toronto: Inner City Press.
Wagner, Suzanne (1998-1999), “A Conversation with Marie-Louise von Franz,” Psychological Perspectives, 38 (Winter 1998-1999), 12-39.
[1] Jung (1984), 485.
[2] Collected Works 10, ¶576. Hereafter Collected Works will be abbreviated CW.
[3] Hollis (1995), 10.
[4] Bair (2003), 623.
[5] If any reader of this essay finds such a source, please let me know; contact me via
[6] My definition is from Sharp (1991), 123.
[7] For more the phases of alchemy, see the essay “Jung’s Prophetic Vision and the Alchemy of Our Time,” archived on this blog site.
[8] For more on our collective shadow, see “What is America’s Shadow?,” archived on this blog site.
[9] Sharp (1991), 104.
[10] CW 10, ¶576.
[11] Cf. CW 10, ¶s430,437,438,440 & 443; CW 18, ¶s561 & 562.
[12] A rentier economy is one that derives a sizeable proportion of its national revenue from one product. The most common such product in the modern world is oil. The “petrostates” of Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates are rentier economies. All such economies are fragile, subject to the vagaries of the global market and geopolitical events.
[13] I drew for this definition on Charles Davis; Davis (1974), 28-29.
[14] Kofman (2006), 101.
[15] Ibid., 104.
[16] CW 10, ¶779.
[17] Patai (2007), 14.
[18] For more on the transcendent function see the essay “Jung on the Transcendent Function,” archived on this blog site.
[19] Neumann (1990), 101.
[20] Ehrman (1993), 45, note 115.
[21] Hollis (1998), 128.
[22] Dourley (1981), 31.
[23] Ibid.
[24] Hollis (1998), 129.
[25] Hollis (1995), 141.
[26] Ibid., 10, and Dourley (1981), 31.
[27] Armstrong (2000), 235-258, 267-268.
[28] Bair (2003), 765, note 48.
[29] Ibid., 354.
[30] Ibid., 765.
[31] Jung (1984), 485.
[32] Bair (2003), 13.
[33] Dourley (1981), 31.
[34] Ibid.
[35] Jung (1984), 336.
[36] MacLaine (2000), 114.
[37] Wagner (1998-99), 24.
