From The Asheville Jung Center
Len Cruz, M.D.
May 15, 2010
Dream:
Jung and his father are in a mosque. They find themselves kneeling and beginning to bow. Evidently, Jung’s father bows fully allowing his head to make contact with the floor. However, Jung stops within a millimeter of the floor. He will not permit himself to bow completely
Yesterday Dr. Stein suggested that in Jung’s later years Jung stated that he did not believe but he knew.
This may reflect Jung’s integration of the figure of Philemon a sort of prophet with whom he had engaged in fertile relationship for years.
According to Dr. Stein, the famous dream described above reflected Jung having outgrown a childish faith. Soul had invited Jung to offer obedience to the gods, an exhortation he refused. He argues with this anima figure and refuses to offer unqualified, blind obedience. Instead, Jung proposed that if the gods wanted him to obey they must do something for him.
Dr. Stein suggested that this is evidence of Jung’s mature faith, a fully flowering faith founded upon knowing and not believing.
At an earlier point in the conference Dr. Stein explained that Jung did not oppose faith but that the German word to which he objected might be better translated as belief, the experience of believing in something because you have been told to do so or because it has been transmitted to you. Belief, in this context, is the untested, un-lived version of knowing. (more)
