Jungian Taoism in the West

2015-09-25 22:34

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The West\'s understanding of Chinese culture has roughly gone through three stages.

In the late Renaissance and early Enlightenment, top Western thinkers such as Leibniz and Voltaire had a beautiful vision and high praise for Eastern civilization. In the late Enlightenment, especially after rationalism became the main theme of the era, the image of China was gradually given a negative value. Whether it was Hegel, Spengler, Marx or Weber, in their eyes, Chinese culture was nothing more than childish, precocious, backward and hopeless. This Western-centric mentality has fundamentally alienated the West from the East.

The First World War dealt a heavy blow to the Western people, but it also marked the beginning of a new era in which they reflected on themselves and looked back at the East.

Since the 1920s, outstanding Western thinkers have turned their attention to the East and China, seeking inspiration from Eastern culture. For example, among the German thinkers of Jung\'s time, there are many who have made in-depth studies on Taoism and Taoism and left behind great works, such as Martin Buber, Jaspers, Heidegger, etc. Jung can be said to be a microcosm. His deep absorption and outstanding development of Chinese thought also made him a representative figure in the new era of Sino-Western cultural exchanges.

Jung\'s study of Taoism is an integral part of his mystical spiritual journey. The perfect state of Taoism is an extension of the Gnostic concept of Pleroma, and the inner alchemy is a natural association of alchemy. Eastern and Western mysticism are integrated and blended in Jung\'s psychological system. Mysticism constitutes the basis for Jung\'s psychology to transcend rationality, making analytical psychology further away from the characteristics of the positivist era, thus echoing the irrationalist trend that gradually became mainstream in the 20th century.

Gnosticism is a secret religion that predates Christianity and prevails in the Mediterranean. As a remnant of Greek secular rational culture, it pursues Eastern knowledge, absorbs Persian dualism of good and evil and Indian concept of soul, and is later regarded as heresy by the Christian Church and excommunicated. Since then, it has been lurking in the disguise of alchemy. It was not until after World War II that people discovered the hidden Gnostic classics Nag Hammadi Book and Dead Sea Scrolls in Egypt and caves on the Dead Sea coast respectively. The intermediate existence believed in by this religion is called Pleroma, which means the nameless origin, the God who does not exist yet, the first, the unfathomable, the absolute abyss, the one before the origin, the one before the beginning or the one before the Father. This origin produces the seed of the universe, in which spiritual power lurks with material power, so it is the original same state of existence and non-existence, and God and the devil are its material. Jacob Boehme, a shoemaker philosopher in the Western Middle Ages, Bruno in the Italian Renaissance, and later Schelling were all influenced by it.

Jung said: In the pleroma there is nothing and yet there is all that is created. But they do not annihilate each other, but exist as effective opposites. When the two opposite poles merge or separate, they are very close to the pleroma. In the pleroma is where the two poles merge and dissolve.

Jung believed that this primitive state of identity is the core of personality, and the emphasis on this unconscious state is an important basis for the Eastern personality to maintain balance and perfection. Christianity shows more confrontation and tension at the conscious level. Evil and justice always seek balance in fierce struggles and short-term subjugation, but the opposition never ends, and the hidden worry of personality separation can never be eliminated. The sense of weightlessness in Western culture caused by such a tense atmosphere must be fundamentally treated in the face of the unconscious. Only in the archetype can the lost balance of Western personality be found. Eastern yoga, Zen, inner alchemy, etc., have revealed such news more than a thousand years ago, and have accumulated rich experience in long-term exploration, which is enough for Westerners to learn and draw lessons from.

Essentially, psychoanalytic psychology is a product of the irrationalist era and a fundamental correction to experimental psychology. Rationality can dominate science and create a great scientific era, but it cannot dominate religion, ethics, art, etc. The prosperity of rationalism is accompanied by the decline of religion, the weakness of morality, and the paleness of art. So there was Nietzsche\'s rebellion, Freud\'s declaration, the cry of existentialism, and the raging waves of postmodernism. The extremism of rationalism has narrowed the scope of human spirit. All secrets have become illegal, and what cannot be said does not exist. Any imagination of the mind may become an enemy of science and be despised. Therefore, the era of rationalism cannot accommodate any resources with mysterious imprints, whether it is in history or in real life.

The rise of irrationalism broke through the shackles of scientism on the human spirit and soul, and opened up a more complex kaleidoscope of human nature. Everything open, hidden, talkable, silent, imaginary, real, all exposed to the astonished and confused world. It is in this context that philosophers and psychologists have changed their perspectives and tried to re-examine the inner spiritual phenomena of human beings. Issues, ideas, figures and schools that were not valued or even banned in the era of rationalism have re-emerged; long-forgotten resources have been opened one by one; Eastern traditions that are very different from the mainstream spirit of the West since modern times have also gained extraordinary significance; the irrational spiritual world that Jung has worked hard to reveal has increasingly aroused widespread interest and has become the focus of spiritual disciplines, and his theories and methods have also gained exemplary significance. (Author: You Chongxia)????

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