Jung on Christianity by Carl Jung

From Psychology and Religion: West and East.

I have dwelt at some length on the views of the Babylonians and Egyptians, and on Platonist philosophy, in order to give the reader some conception of the trinitarian and unitarian ideas that were in existence many centuries before the birth of Christianity. Whether these ideas were handed down to posterity as a result of migration and tradition or whether they arose spontaneously in each case is a question of little importance. The important thing is that they occurred because, once having sprung forth from the unconscious of the human race (and not just in Asia Minor! ), they could re-arise anywhere at any time. It is, for instance, more than doubtful whether the Church Fathers who devised the homoousios formula were even remotely acquainted with the ancient Egyptian theology of kingship. Nevertheless, they neither paused in their labours nor rested until they had finally reconstructed the ancient Egyptian archetype. Much the same sort of thing happened when, in A. D. 431, at the Council of Ephesus, whose streets had once rung with hymns of praise to many-breasted Diana, the Virgin Mary was declared the , ‘birth-giver of the god. ' As we know from Epiphanius, there was even a sect, the Collyridians, who worshipped Mary after the manner of an antique goddess. Her cult had its chief centres in Arabia, Thrace, and Upper Scythia, the most enthusiastic devotees being women. Their provocations moved Epiphanius to the rebuke that "the whole female sex is slippery and prone to error, with a mind that is very petty and narrow. " It is clear from this chastening sermon that there were priestesses who on certain feast days decorated a wagon or four-cornered seat and covered it with linen, on which they placed offerings of bakemeats "in the name of Mary" (, afterwards partaking of the sacrificial meal. This plainly amounted to a Eucharistic feast in honour of Mary, at which wheaten bread was eaten. The orthodox standpoint of the time is aptly expressed in the words of Epiphanius: "Let Mary be held in honour, and let the Father and the Son and the Holy Ghost be adored, but let no one adore Mary."