Psychology of the Unconscious A Study of the...

Before I enter upon the contents of this second part, it seems necessary to cast a backward glance over the singular train of thought which the analysis of the poem “The Moth to the Sun” has produced. Although this poem is very different from the foregoing Hymn of Creation, closer investigation of the “longing for the sun” has carried us into the realm of the fundamental ideas of religion and astral mythology, which ideas are closely related to those considered in the first poem. The creative God of the first poem, whose dual nature, moral and physical, was shown especially clearly to us by Job, has in the second poem a new qualification of astral-mythological, or, to express it better, of astrological character. The God becomes the sun, and in this finds an adequate natural expression quite apart from the moral division of the God idea into the heavenly father and the devil. The sun is, as Renan remarked, really the only rational representation of God, whether we take the point of view of the barbarians of other ages or that of the modern physical sciences. In both cases the sun is the parent God, mythologically predominantly the Father God, from whom all living things draw life; He is the fructifier and creator of all that lives, the source of energy of our world. The discord into which the soul of man has fallen through the action of moral laws[204] can be resolved into complete harmony through the sun as the natural object which obeys no human moral law.

The sun is not only beneficial, but also destructive; therefore the zodiacal representation of the August heat is the herd-devouring lion whom the Jewish hero Samson[205] killed in order to free the parched earth from this plague. Yet it is the harmonious and inherent nature of the sun to scorch, and its scorching power seems natural to men. It shines equally on the just and on the unjust, and allows useful living objects to flourish as well as harmful ones. Therefore, the sun is adapted as is nothing else to represent the visible God of this world. That is to say, that driving strength of our own soul, which we call libido, and whose nature it is to allow the useful and injurious, the good and the bad to proceed. That this comparison is no mere play of words is taught us by the mystics. When by looking inwards (introversion) and going down into the depths of their own being they find “in their heart” the image of the Sun, they find their own love or libido, which with reason, I might say with physical reason, is called the Sun; for our source of energy and life is the Sun. Thus our life substance, as an energic process, is entirely Sun. Of what special sort this “Sun energy” seen inwardly by the mystic is, is shown by an example taken from the Hindoo mythology.[206] From the explanation of Part III of the “Shvetâshvataropanishad” we take the following quotation, which relates to the Rudra:[207]

Who this Tom-Thumb is can easily be divined—the phallic symbol of the libido. The phallus is this hero dwarf, who performs great deeds; he, this ugly god in homely form, who is the great doer of wonders, since he is the visible expression of the creative strength incarnate in man. This extraordinary contrast is also very striking in “Faust” (the mother scene):

United to this strength, Faust succeeded in accomplishing his real life task, at first through evil adventure and then for the benefit of humanity, for without the evil there is no creative power. Here in the mysterious mother scene, where the poet unveils the last mystery of the creative power to the initiated, Faust has need of the phallic magic wand (in the magic strength of which he has at first no confidence), in order to perform the greatest of wonders, namely, the creation of Paris and Helen. With that Faust attains the divine power of working miracles, and, indeed, only by means of this small, insignificant instrument. This paradoxical impression seems to be very ancient, for even the Upanishads could say the following of the dwarf god:

The phallus is the being, which moves without limbs, which sees without eyes, which knows the future; and as symbolic representative of the universal creative power existent everywhere immortality is vindicated in it. It is always thought of as entirely independent, an idea current not only in antiquity, but also apparent in the pornographic drawings of our children and artists. It is a seer, an artist and a worker of wonders; therefore it should not surprise us when certain phallic characteristics are found again in the mythological seer, artist and sorcerer. Hephaestus, Wieland the smith, and Mani, the founder of Manicheism, whose followers were also famous, have crippled feet. The ancient seer Melampus possessed a suggestive name (Blackfoot),[212] and it seems also to be typical for seers to be blind. Dwarfed stature, ugliness and deformity have become especially typical for those mysterious chthonian gods, the sons of Hephaestus, the Cabiri,[213] to whom great power to perform miracles was ascribed. The name signifies “powerful,” and the Samothracian cult is most intimately united with that of the ithyphallic Hermes, who, according to the account of Herodotus, was brought to Attica by the Pelasgians. They are also called μεγάλοι θεοί, the great gods.