Modern transpersonal psychology vs. traditional psychoanalysis

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AND NOW TO something completely different. A comment criticizing Sigmund Freud and Carl Gustav Jung from the occult perspective caught my eye the other day, contrasting it with the modern transpersonal school of psychology which was considered to be far more superior. Especially there was some critique against equating “archetypes” with angels, etc. It made me ponder somewhat regarding the nature of archetypes, as well as the purpose of psychotherapy in the context of initiation. So here I will exhibit yet some more of my mental mastrubation.

The reader should also be aware (or warned) that I have the personal ambition of trying to construct a Esoteric Psychology that also works from a strictly clinical sense, fusing elements from both Sigmund Freud and Carl Gustav Jung, as two representatives of the psychoanalytic tradition (and taking the benefit of their system of pathology), with that of the Hermetic and Qabalistic traditions, into a workable format in the psychoterapeutic context. In my own research I have found that as much as C.G. Jung can be attached to the Hermetic / Achemical tradition, S. Freud may be corresponded to that of the Holy Qabalah.

Perhaps this will come as a surprise to some, but probably not to regular followers of my blog (in particular if they can read Swedish). In my opinion the initiate of a hermetic initiatic school has much more to gain from taking regular traditional psychotherapy or psychoanalysis than he or she does from transpersonal therapy, such as psychosyntheis. Why? Because (and not counting the fact that the former kind of therapists often have a more solid education and clinical training) we need to access that dark, unconscious and repressed aspects of ourselves – the complexes to use the terminology of Jung and Freud.

Thus, as initiates we shouldn’t write off either Freud or Jung as important in the understanding of the human soul to quickly. I agree that they are limiting (especially Freud) when it comes to transpersonal experiences. But no school of therapy is better than psychoanalysis or analytical psychology, or modern psychodynamic therapy, in probing and giving initiates keys to unravel their subconscious strata, and create psychological healing at that.

Sigmund Freud

I happen to have experience of psychosynthesis, both in training and my own therapy as part of that course (although quite limited). I have all the more experience and solid study of psychoanalysis / psychodynamic therapy both in training and in self-therapy. Based on that I must inform you that I have been given a lot more tools and assistance in my search for self-knowledge through my traditional psychotherapeutic training and therapy, compared to what I managed to gather through my psychosynthesis (transpersonal therapy) course.

What the Hermetic schools lack in training and theory is that part of the psyche or aspect of the work in gaining self-knowledge of what in esoteric psychology is referred to as the subconscious; it does however provide us with a map to experience the terrains of the superconscious. Thus while being in an initiatic school I would say that a psychotherapy that lays its emphasis on the subconscious / unconscious is very beneficient in this respect, as it complements the traditional training of an initiate in a most optimal way.

Now, some of you will either think or say that regular meditation and mindfulness techiques, such as found in Eastern traditions, is much more efficient than regular Western psychotherapy. I beg to differ; in my opinion you need the significant other (that is the therapist or initiator) to gain self-knowledge. Regardie understood this very well, especially when it came to dealing with transferential and projective issues, which I find wholly lacking in the transpersonal schools in the way of tools and theory.

Simple guided meditations will not lead you to that as it involves the conscious mind and will-power to a greater extent; you need to evoke those infantile drives to become conscious of them through the transferential relation. However, spontaneous visualization techiques, such as Jungs active imagination or Katathym imaginative psychotherapy more recently developed by Hanscarl Leuner (while starting off with a guided meditation soon developes into spontaneous imaginary), have their value. But even these techniques presupposes the therapist as an active ingredient, that is the relation between two humans.

Carl Gustav Jung

In that same comment Regardie met some critique for attributing Angelic forces to the archetypes. But in my opinion Angels may in fact be referred to “archetypes” of a sorts when referring to the microcosm, in the same manner as demons can be attributed to our repressed complexes. We have them both inside of us, as well as they both do exist in the macrocosm as independent entities. The Divine Genius is that Angel that is most close to out heart and our Sphere, but there are also others beyond that. I am sure that Jung had a thorough understanding of Plato and thus borrowed the idea of archetypes from him, which in the context of the latter refer to eternal ideas which transcends the mundane world that but reflects them in a shadowy format. Remember that we as Man (microcosm) are made into the image of God (macrocosm).

However I also believe that Jung in a way simplified truth in several instances. In his system there seems to be nothing beyond our Divnie Genius of the Hermetic school, which should be the equivalent of the Self in Jungian terms, our personal God (spark) so to speak. Here I beg to differ with him. How I see it today the Jungian Self (which I equate with the Higher and Divine Genius) is but an emissary of the true God beyond. Jung also make the archetypes, as I interpret him, almost as aspects of the individual Self (the archetype of the archetypes). Thus, using his model the other archetypes, such as the Mother and Father archetypes, attach to the Self. This aspect of the analytical psychology of Jung may also be understood in light of the Holy Qabalah. May I propose the following cross-reference:

The strictly Jungian archetypes compose the Sephiroth of the Assiatic Tree of Life in 10 aspects. Here the Jungian Self corresponds to Kether, or Yechidah of Man. The other archetypes are represented by the other 8 Sephiroth which follows, the 10th sphere representing our personal psyche and the “personal unconscious”. The Holy Qabalah teaches us that all the other 9 Sephiroth are contained in a latent and united form in Kether, that they emanate and thus are hanging as pendants from Kether. This clearly is reminicent of how Jung explains the Self in relation to the archetypes, although he uses a more circular model to explain it.

The anatomical model of the psyche according to C.G. Jung

These archetypes that belong to Assiah are actually the reflection of the True Archetypes of Atziluth (the Archetypal World of the Qabalah). Thus the Higher Self in Assiah (the human world of action) is a reflection of Kether in Atziluth, the true Yechidah of the Greater World. However the Kether of Assiah has gone through lots of stages of descent and involution to reach its final destination which originated in Kether of Atziluth. In fact it emanates or grows out from Malkuth of Yetzirah (the world of formation and of angelical choirs), the feet of that mighty angel which overshadows each man. Thus, man’s Yechidah (that is Kether in Assiah) is but an incarnated emanation of the Yetziratic Angel (our Microcosmic Angel).

The orginal archetypes, that is the 10 Sephiroth of the World of Atziluth, are both macrocosmic and microcosmic, or in other words, there is no division between Man and God at this point. The same may be said of Briah as well, at least to a certain extent, the creative world in which the archetypes becomes embodied in the form of Macrocosmic Archangels and the Archangel of Man. In the latter case each Archangelic name represents an aspect of our Mighty Archangel. Thus an Archangel from Briah may interact with us through the medium of the World as well as we may invoke it from inside of ourself, through our own Microcosmic Archangel, in that realm which reaches beyond Assiah. But the lower (and I believe Jungian) archetypes belongs to the personal and solely microcosmic sphere of Assiah. Thus I interpret Jungs psychology as dealing with the anatomy of Assiah and perhaps the lowest statum (i.e. Malkuth) of Yetzirah.

The World of the Qlippoth

Theurgy goes way beyond this. So in this respect the school of analytical psychology don’t give you the keys to everything, but nevertheless it is a good starter to gain self-knowledge about your Assiatic self, that is the 10 Sephiroth of Assiah, while Freud’s theories limits itself even further down to Malkuth of Assiah, or even the infernal Qlippotic regions below, the dwelling place of the Red Dragon. But traditional Freudian teachiques, or schools that are based on his theories, are very good at gaining knowledge of that Mighty Dragon, I must add.

Note: This short essay has been duly amended in 2014-01-16.

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