Lapis-Christ Parallel

Jung’s most controversial move in Psychology and Alchemy (CW 12, 1944) and its elaboration across Alchemical Studies (CW 13) and Aion (CW 9ii) is the identification of the lapis-philosophorum as a parallel figure to Christ — both being symbolic expressions of the archetype of the self. The alchemists, Jung argues, did not consciously transfer God’s attributes to the stone. What occurred was the reverse: “the stone for the alchemists was nothing less than a primordial religious experience which, as good Christians, they had to reconcile with their beliefs” (Jung, Alchemical Studies, 1967, §386). The parallel is ancient — it appears “as early as Zosimos” — and it is structural: as Christ clothed himself in “a human body capable of suffering” (ibid., §127), so the stone is the deus absconditus in matter, the hidden god in the prima materia awaiting redemption.

Jung is careful to mark the limit of the claim. The parallel is psychological and mythological, not metaphysical: “The parallel I have drawn here between Christ and the self is not to be taken as anything more than a psychological one, just as the parallel with the fish is mythological. There is no question of any intrusion into the sphere of metaphysics, i.e., of faith” (Aion, 1951, §122). The limit is what makes the claim tenable within Jung’s empirical method. The alchemists produced, under orthodox Christian cover, a shadow Christology in which the adept is not the redeemed but the redeemer — homo altus working for the liberation of the anima mundi imprisoned in matter (cf. anima-mundi-imprisoned-in-matter). The parallel is the tradition’s own record of a god too large for a single dogma.

Relationships

• self
• self-as-god-image
• lapis-philosophorum
• mercurius
• crucifixion-as-coniunctio

Primary sources

• jung-psychology-and-alchemy (Jung 1944)
• jung-alchemical-studies (Jung 1967, §127, §386)
• jung-aion (Jung 1951, §122)