tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3507854116233804879.post9140850440871840237..comments2023-09-06T04:57:02.780-07:00Comments on The C.G. Jung Society of Vermont: Clinical Perspectives: Body and Archetype PresentationThe C.G. Jung Socitey of Vermonthttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14823230353203443754noreply@blogger.comBlogger1125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3507854116233804879.post-27282897700844987692010-03-13T08:19:48.272-08:002010-03-13T08:19:48.272-08:00Dear Ms. Sberna,
Thank you for sharing your impre...Dear Ms. Sberna,<br /><br />Thank you for sharing your impressions of my book, The Body of Myth, with members of the C.G. Jung Society of Vermont. (The publisher, Inner Traditions, is a Vermont company, by the way, located in Rochester.) You might usefully consult Judith E. Kovach's monograph on "Contemplation in Movement: the Significance of Walking in Zen Meditative Practice [kinhin]," Master's Thesis, UCLA, 1990. Ms. Kovach, whom I had the good sense to marry, was for many years a modern dancer who reoriented herself later in life to the academic side of the subject of dance and religion after training in Noh drama and bugaku.<br /><br />My debt to Carl Jung enters primarily in my appreciation of the importance of myth in particular and of religion in general, as well as the attention he paid to the esoteric element in antique culture. His editorship of the Eranos series of lectures was a signal contribution to reuniting us with our past, from which I benefited enormously.<br /><br />At the same timer, I must confess that, insofar as mythology is concerned, I am not a Jungian, the chief reason being that I have long been convinced that psychoanalysis (of whatever stripe) has not much to contribute to the question of the why of myths - Why are there such things? - as it does to the admittedly interesting question of to what uses they have been put by subsequent generations. That comes down to claiming that the psychodynamics of mythopoeisis are secondary in understanding it. The psychological state critical to understanding the why of myth is, not to put to fine a point on the matter, that of salvation of the soul. The reason that myths from all over the world are important or that they should hold any interest for human beings many thousands of years after they were composed is that they are about the knowledge of God. Knowledge of man is knowledge of God. That is the source of their timeless appeal. There is really no simpler or more accurate way of putting it.Joe Sansonesenoreply@blogger.com