259 - Jung, Gods, and Modern Man

Jung, Gods, and Modern Man
By Antonio Moreno
274 pp. Notre Dame, University of Notre Dame Press, 1970. $7.95.

Midway in this book, after an elaborately systematic summary of Jung's thinking, as the author turns to critique, he supplies a quotation from Jung in which I find two keys to the book, neither of which the author intended. He cites Jung's observation that, although Christian dogma does give expression to the archetypes and yearnings found in the depths of the soul, "increasingly it had to rationalize its doctrines in order to stem the flood of irrationality" (p. 109, fn.).

First key: the only misprint I spotted in the book has Jung speak here of the "food of irrationality." Whether this slip proves it or not, the author is profoundly ambivalent about the irrational seethings Jung explored. Are they to be heeded, as Jung urged, or throttled, as Moreno finally accomplishes?

For-second key-the quote describes perfectly what Moreno has done to Jung. The scholastic philosopher rationalizes the prophet of irrationality-ostensibly to expound him, quite effectively to get him under control. So we have an elaborate and intricate synopsis of the Jungian

260 - Jung, Gods, and Modern Man

panoply of archetypes and myths, polarities and quaternities, and of how such things articulate with Christian doctrine-all without communicating any sense of the psychological surges Jung wanted us to know about. Jung is rendered plausible and impotent.

This is something like Robert Coles's recent ponderous exposition of Erik Erikson, giving us everything but the poetry and playfulness, which is where Erikson's insights come through. People like Jung and Erikson and Kierkegaard and William James are unsystematic on purpose-a message the systematizers never get. System forecloses and foreshortens understanding. When pressed for definition, Erikson once said that by "identity" he meant at least four different things and maybe some more that he did not know about yet.

Jung is turned into a scholastic philosopher; in fact, his anthropology and epistemology are frequently confirmed by lengthy quotes from Augustine and, of course, Aquinas, the two most cited authors after Jung. Jung's own self-definition is acknowledged… not everything I bring forth is written out of my head, but much of it comes from the heart also." But the distinction between "head" and "heart" is immediately transformed into the assertion that Jung writes not only psychology, but also philosophy and theology, that he thinks not only empirically but also theoretically (pp. 102f.). These seem strange but perhaps appropriately Thomistic inferences as to what went on in Jung's "heart."

But, alas, Jung is a philosopher/theologian in error. Moreno reminds us, with appropriate proof text from the Summa, that "Christian dogmas . . . are expressions concerning an infinite and transcendent God, and not the archetypes of the psyche" (p. III). And much of the last half of the book is given to a tedious, detailed indictment of how Jung falls short of Christian orthodoxy. To be sure, his support will still be taken, though not necessarily on his terms; Jung's suggestion of correspondence between archetypes and dogma may be interpreted as his " greatest contribution to theology. Christianity fits perfectly the psychological needs of man, even the needs unknown to us because they are unconscious" (p. 252).

In the concluding section, Moreno comes to grips, in his own way, with the dilemma the book poses for him. He argues whether Aquinas could permit the possibility of revelation through dreams. The answer seems to be yes, "when dreams are coming from God." But, then again, there are "the dangers of visions and dreams." So, "Let us say in conclusion that although revelations by dreams come sometimes from God and are helpful, it is better not to desire them, and to follow instead the way of pure faith" (p. 264)-a most remarkable perspective for a book on Jung. The "way of pure faith" and apparently the princi-

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pal methodological principle of the book is made clear in the final sentence, "There is no way to go astray holding fast to these principles [sanctifying grace, the teaching of the Church, the theological virtues, and the eminence of charity], all of them rooted in the Bible" (p. 264).

James E. Dittes
Yale University
New Haven, Connecticut