Consciousness in Jung and Patañjali
General Information
ABOUT:
The East-West dialogue increasingly seeks to compare and clarify contrasting views on the nature of consciousness. For the Eastern liberatory models, where a nondual view of consciousness is primary, the challenge lies in articulating how consciousness and the manifold contents of consciousness are singular. Western empirical science, on the other hand, must provide a convincing account of how consciousness arises from matter. By placing the theories of Jung and Patañjali in dialogue with one another, Consciousness in Jung and Patañjali illuminates significant differences between dual and nondual psychological theory and teases apart the essential discernments that theoreticians must make between epistemic states and ontic beliefs.
Patañjali’s Classical Yoga, one of the six orthodox Hindu philosophies, is a classic of Eastern and world thought. Patañjali teaches that notions of a separate egoic “I” are little more than forms of mistaken identity that we experience in our attempts to take ownership of consciousness. Carl Jung’s depth psychology, which remains deeply influential to psychologists, religious scholars, and artists alike, argues that ego-consciousness developed out of the unconscious over the course of evolution. By exploring the work of key theoreticians from both schools of thought, particularly those whose ideas are derived from an integration of theory and practice, Whitney explores the extent to which the seemingly irremediable split between Jung and Patañjali’s ontological beliefs can in fact be reconciled.
This thorough and insightful work will be essential reading for academics, theoreticians, and postgraduate students in the fields of psychology, philosophy of science, and consciousness studies. It will also appeal to those interested in the East–West psychological and philosophical dialogue.
JOURNAL REVIEWS:
Consciousness in Jung and Patañjali has been reviewed in:
The Journal of Analytical Psychology, January 2019
The International Journal of Jungian Studies, March 2019
WHERE TO PURCHASE:
Consciousness in Jung and Patañjali is available in hardcover and paperback from various online retailers, including Abe Books and Amazon. An eprint is also available from several vendors, including Barnes and Nobles Nook, Amazon Kindle and Apple iTunes. To order or rent a copy directly from Routledge, please click here. Currently all Routledge texts are 20% off.
ONLINE INTERVIEW:
To watch a brief 7-minute overview of the book, please click here.
Recent Articles
The Sleep Paralysis Nightmare, Wrathful Deities, and the Archetypes of the Collective Unconscious
The sleep paralysis nightmare has been reported from antiquity to modernity across manifold cultures. Many people who experience nocturnal assaults by dark entities, demons, hags, or incubi during sleep paralysis ascribe them to evil spirits with varying degrees of malevolence. The majority report the episodes as terrifying, mysterious, and uncanny. Known in the neurocognitive literature as “isolated sleep paralysis” or “sleep paralysis with hypnagogic and hypnopompic hallucinations,” the phenomenon is fascinating to researchers across disciplines because it occurs when we are both asleep and awake, presenting fundamental questions on the subject of conscious experiences in sleep.
This article considers the nightmare of sleep paralysis to be an archetypal psychic process akin to Jung’s night sea journey and having correspondence to the wrathful deities presented in the Tibetan Book of the Dead. With a Jungian perspective directed at artwork created by a person who has experienced sleep paralysis, archetypal imagery emerges and reveals elements missing from conscious view. Utilizing the interpretive frameworks of Jungian-oriented depth psychology and Tibetan Buddhist psychology, this universally experienced nightmare of terror can also be undergone as a dream of transformation with potential for psychological and spiritual growth.
This article was co-written with my colleague Dr. Oreet Rees and was published in Psychological Perspectives: A Quarterly Journal of Jungian Thought, Volume 63, Issue 1, The Forgotten Feminine.
