The Archetype and its Refracted Images

About this poem

Concerning Archetypes, Religions, Mythologies, and the Numinous Expressions of ‘The Unseen Realm of the Collective Unconscious’: Archetypal images are containers of archetypes, which themselves are ‘psychic aspects’ or dispositions, universal patterns or images of the Jungian hypothesized ‘Collective Unconscious’ that are inherited along with the human brain structures. In short, to be ‘human,’ is to have the innate capacity to image the divine; is to have inherited in the DNA of one’s Collective Unconscious an archetypal image of the divine. An archetypal image is described generally as the form or representation of an archetype; as an attribute that appears physically, in concrete manifestation to the human material state of consciousness. Mankind, being incarnate, can only experience the powers of the non-physical spiritual realm in terms of anthropomorphic personification: hence, the conceptualization of that realm as such. Swiss psychiatrist, Carl Gustav Jung (1875-1961), referring to the indefiniteness of the archetype with its multiple meanings, describes it as “a [psychic] dynamism which makes itself felt in the [‘Mystery’ of the] numinosity and fascinating power of the [hidden] archetypal (Carl G. Jung, reporting “On the Nature of the Psyche” in Bollingen Series, CW 8, par. 414, 1967). Carl Jung, in his commentary on “Nietzsche’s Zarathustra: Notes of the Seminar Given in 1934-1939, Vol. 11 (19 October 1938), p. 1351,” states further: “All religions are full of [archetypal] figures from the [collective] unconscious.” To emphasize, it is Carl Jung’s contention that all powerful and religious symbols universally arise from the collective unconscious as their common source. This poem introduces its readers to the complex nature of archetypes, which reveal aspects of their numinous presence in their manifold association with ‘concrete’ archetypal images. Some classical examples of the many archetypes that are manifested universally in human existential experience are those of “The Hero,” “The Anti-Hero” or “Villain,” “The Wise Old Man,” “The Trickster,” “The Shadow,” “The Healer,” “The Savior,” “The Divine Father,” “The Divine Mother,” and the core archetype of “THE SELF” with its associated multicultural images. The archetypal images that are typically associated with those archetypes, appear to us as imaginary, real-life, historical, multicultural personalities considered to have led a life that is supremely representative or exemplary of, or ‘fits’ the archetype (the ‘divine’ or the ‘demonic’) , whose dynamic structure and inherent nature continue to baffle and to remain beyond the comprehension of the human intellect and beyond ordinary conscious experience. In short, archetypal images, as living motifs, or as physical representations of the conceptualized numinous archetypes, all of which are ‘cut from the same psychic wool,’ can be considered to be “refracted images” of the invisible and unknown archetypes themselves. As such, they present themselves in human perception and imagination, assigned with either ‘positive’ or ‘negative’ attribution. The Apostle Saint Paul of the New Testament, in his poignant declaration of our vague and obscure understanding of the numinous realm, states the following, in First Corinthians 13: 12: “For now, we [as mere mortals] ‘see’ [image the Supreme Divine Archetype of the Holy Spirit] through a [refracted] glass darkly, but then, face-to-face…” However, the Apostle Paul, in First Corinthians 3:17, and again, in First Corinthians 6:19, offers humanity a “Good News” outlook of the divine realm, suggesting that the human body, in concert with the Holy Spirit, is sacred space. In those passages he announces to his Corinthian audience and, by extension, to all succeeding generations the following: “Your body [as an archetypal image] is the [residential] temple of the Holy Spirit and you together are that temple.” Similarly, the Apostle Saint John (in John 15:5) makes mention of the mysterious symbiotic relationship of Spirit and Matter, as revealed in the declaration of Christ that “I am the vine, you are the branches.” Collectively, these statements declare categorically that all of humanity is made in God’s SELF-Image; and by the dispensation of the Holy Spirit, is given Grace. All of humanity may therefore be regarded as ‘refracted images’ (‘propagated psychic energy’) of the Archetype of the Indwelling Holy Spirit. This Holy Spirit, by Grace, is projected onto mortal human souls. Employing psychological language, Carl Jung declares this phenomenon as a core objective of the realm of the Collective Unconscious. Elaborating on this phenomenon, Jung declares that the teleological aim of the psyche for human civilization is to achieve a sense of fulfillment and wholeness, if not completion or perfection. This activity is summarized by Jung as the goal of Individuation, or the integration of the disparate components of the psyche. In the metaphorical language of Christianity’s projection of the numinous psyche, this transformative goal is expressed in the universality of the God archetype as humanity ‘becoming a new person in Christ.’ more »