Jung's transcendent function is exactly what its name implies: the psychological function that produces transcendent experiences. Those experiences are always symbols that express the conjunction of opposites. They appear for a short moment in consciousness with an extreme numinosity. As is well known and because of their nature, opposites never merge in the real world. When a symbol of conjunction of opposites appears in consciousness, it is always a very precise phenomenon that is called a mystical or transcendent experience. In Mysterium Conjunctionis, Jung wrote:
“Experience shows that the union of antagonistic elements is an irrational occurrence which can fairly be described as ‘mystical,’ provided that one means by this an occurrence that cannot be reduced to anything else or regarded as in some way unauthentic.” (CW 14, par. 515)
Mystical or transcendent experiences have multiple names such as cosmic consciousness, enlightenment experience, oneness experience, samadhi, spiritual experience or unitive experience. Researchers in that field generally make no distinction between a spontaneous transcendent experience and a psychedelic experience but there is one important distinction: in the former one there is always a symbol of conjunction of opposites. Even if the feeling tone seems to be similar between the two types of experience, the symbol is the differentiation principle. For the purpose of our study, we will state a few qualities of the non-psychedelic transcendent experience:
▪ the experience is extremely numinous;
▪ the experience brings joy;
▪ the experience is a lived symbol of conjunction of opposites;
▪ the experience uses a symbol that is alive in the unconscious
Carl Jung spoke of mystical experiences or conjunction of opposites in almost every one of his books because they were revised multiple times after their first publication. It was in AION, Researches Into the Phenomenology of the Self (1951) that he explained thoroughly those experiences he thought were irruptions of the archetype of the Self in consciousness. Jung’s Self is, first and foremost, his hypothesis to explain the mystical experience phenomenon.
According to him, the Self contains all opposites and always manifest itself in consciousness as a conjunction of opposites. In AION, Jung specifies (paragraph 303) that the Self is not a discovery, but a lived experience that occurs to man spontaneously.
In a letter to Father Victor White, Jung wrote:
“The opposites are united by a neutral or ambivalent bridge, a symbol expressing either side in such a way that they can function together” (C. G. Jung letters, vol.II, p. 166);
and in a footnote “The bridge is the ‘uniting symbol,’ which represents psychic totality, the self” (p. 166, fn 11)
In AION, Jung shows that Gnosticism and Alchemy were primarily concerned with mystical experiences. In the book, Jung uses the Moses quaternio from the Gnostics to explain the combination of opposites (complexio oppositorum) that appears in the mystical experience.
Let’s see how the symbol of conjunction of those opposites appears in three examples of transcendent experiences. The first one comes from Nancy Clark (1941 –) who worked as a cancer researcher and cytology instructor at Ohio State University. She recalls her mystical experience:
“I was addressing the audience with the eulogy, and I spoke perhaps three sentences when all of a sudden, I became aware of a brilliant white light coming from the left rear of the chapel at the ceiling. I did not see this light with my eyes, but, rather with some other unexplainable source. It was more of an “inner awareness.” I find it very difficult to describe. I could see but it was definitely not through my human eyes.
Upon seeing this light, there was immediate recognition on my part that it was God. I felt I was in the presence of my creator, a very exhilarating, spiritual feeling. I can’t explain how I knew or how I recognized God’s presence. The best I can do is to say that there was a transference of knowledge placed directly into my consciousness. In other words, I was being fed the information that I was supposed to receive.
The light completely surrounded me. I felt as if I had merged completely with the light and “belonged” to it. I felt a greater sense of reality and truth in this state. I felt as if I was “home.” The love that was emanating from the light is by far the most difficult aspect of my experience to relate to others. I feel so inadequate to speak of this love. Not because I am not a scholar, a theologian, a scientist, or someone who can dissect it and analyze it. I am limited simply by being human! It was not a human kind of love. It was not within the framework of our human experiences. Therefore, it defies human explanation. I can only say that it is because of this love that was channeled to me that I am able to remain strong and travel down life’s highway knowing that a great truth has occurred.
I wanted to remain in the presence of this light forever! I felt as if I was in a state of grace.
All my sins were forgiven, and I felt perfectly and totally FREE. If I had somehow been asked at that moment if I wanted to go with this light and leave my earthly life behind, I would not have hesitated and I would have chosen to go. Not because earthly life is so bad, but, rather, that’s how incredibly beautiful the light was.”¹
What appears in this description is the symbol of the conjunction of opposites me-light or me-God. It is a very numinous and somewhat indescribable experience. The spiritual light associated with God is a regular occurrence in transcendent experiences. In her description, the experiencer becomes surrounded with God and felt merged in his light. This is exactly the symbol of conjunction of opposites me-God of the transcendent experience.
First mystical experiences always have at their core the symbol of conjunction of the opposites child-parent, me-God, me-universe or particle-totality. Thomas Merton’s first mystical experience bears the same symbols. It was the experience of the living presence of his, then deceased, father coming into his room near him and it carries the symbol of conjunction of opposites child-parent.
John of the Cross had a similar first mystical experience, but the symbols were more religious because they were those that were alive in his psyche. He put his vision in a drawing that has reached us:
The drawing shows Christ dying on the cross seen by his Father from above. The vision is the conjunction of opposites son-father, but it could also be interpreted as a symbol of John of the Cross taking the place of God watching his dying son. John of the Cross and God share the same view on the dying Christ as if John and God were one. It is a very powerful symbol that illustrate again the conjunction of opposites me-God.
Jung also had a similar mystical experience in December 1913. He recalls it in the 1925 Seminar on Analytical Psychology:
"Then I saw the snake approach me. She came close and began to encircle me and press me in her coils. The coils reached up to my heart. I realized as I struggled, that I had assumed the attitude of the Crucifixion. In the agony and the struggle, I sweated so profusely that the water flowed down on all sides of me. Then Salome rose, and she could see. While the snake was pressing me, I felt that my face had taken on the face of an animal of prey, a lion or a tiger. "(Introduction to Jungian Psychology P.104)
Here, we see the conjunction of the opposites me-God where the symbol of God take the form of the deus leonticephalus or the God Aion, the lion headed man with a snake coiled around him. But it is also the conjunction of the symbols me-Christ because he sees himself taking the posture of the crucifixion. Because Jung title this section of The Red Book MYSTERIUM, we can affirm that this experience was seen by him as mystical or transcendent.
In Mysterium Conjunctionis (1956), Jung wrote:
“For thirty years I have studied these psychic processes under all possible conditions and have assured myself that the alchemists as well as the great philosophies of the East are referring to just such experiences, and that it is chiefly our ignorance of the psyche if these experiences appear ‘mystic.’” (CW 14, ¶ 762)
It was Jung's lifelong goal to research and explain transcendent experiences. His books become surprisingly clear when we assess this factor.
For more
¹ from IMERE website
