Sunday 27 January 2008

Jung's Daemon

When searching through his own consciousness the great Austrian psychoanalyst Carl Gustav Jung claimed that he had encountered another personality. This being, another older man, was called Philemon. This being seemed to have an independent existence. Jung wrote:

“Philemon and other figures of my fantasies brought home to me the crucial insight that there are things in the psyche which I do not produce, but which produce themselves and have their own life. Philemon represented a force which was not myself. In my fantasies I held conversations with him, and he said things which I had not consciously thought. For I observed clearly that it was he who spoke, not I. He said I treated thoughts as if I generated them myself, but in his view thoughts were like animals in a forest, or people in a room, or birds in the air…It was he who taught me psychic objectivity, the reality of the psychi.”

This inner voice seems to be psychic in that it warns Jung about future events. It seems that Jung had a vision of Europe covered with blood. After this vision an inner voice (not directly identified as Philemon) says “Look at it well: it is wholly real and will be so. You cannot doubt it”. And in August 1914 it was to become real.

I suspect that Jung’s ‘Philemon’ is a manifestation of his Daemon. He finds this being deep within his own psychi and then discovers that not only does it have independent motivations but also an ability to know what is about to happen.

I would be interested in comments with regard to this observation.

6 comments:

SM Kovalinsky said...

When I was in my 20s I steeped myself in Jung's works, and all that you mention here has been long familiar to me. Of course I believe this is a manifestation of his daemon; everything points to it, and it is an almost perfect description of the entity and its functions. ,. This is why when I first came upon your essay on an internet search ("Cheating the Ferryman: A New Paradigm. . . ") I immediately felt as though my grasp of Jung was serving me well, and enabling me - through your essay(and later, your book) - to take a leap foreward.

Anthony Peake said...

You may be interested to know that yesterday one of the attendees at my talk in Hoylake was a Jungian scholar and he has invited me to talk to his group at some time in the future. Indeed you may also be interested to know that the great Deja Vu researcher Art Funkhouser actually earns his living as a Jungian analyst in Bern, Switzerland. I keep hoping that Art may contribute again to this blog. Let us wait in hope and anticipation.

SM Kovalinsky said...

That would be most appropos, and very timely and wonderful, if you were to address the Jungians. I only wish I could be there to see it. . .Would it be recorded, on video?: I would pay fortunes for it. I am sure Art will contribute in the future. So that's he, and Persinger: Just look at the company you are keeping. . .

Anthony Peake said...

I met Art when he attended a lecture I presented in Geneva this time last year. We then had dinner at the home of Evelyn Elsaesser-Valarino's home. Evelyn is well-respected NDE researcher who as well as writing books with Dr. Kenneth Ring has also written a touching novel describing a young girl's Near-Death Experience. Entitled "Talking With Angel" this is a wonderful, sad and ulimately uplifting book that I highly recommend to those who have recently lost loved ones, particularly children.
Art and I regularly swop emails and we both are fascinated by they way our respective theories on Deja Vu compliment each other.

SM Kovalinsky said...

That is wholly wonderful; I knew from the first that your work would resonate with the whole range of best writers and researchers. . .

Karl Le Marcs said...

You are only as jung as you philemon.
*runs away from expected cabbage throwing*