Massa Confusa

The massa confusa — also massa informis — is the alchemical name for the chaotic starting state of the opus: the prima-materia in its undifferentiated aspect, a confused mixture of contrary components capable of differentiation but not yet differentiated. Jung describes it as “a piece of the original chaos… not yet differentiated but capable of differentiation; something, therefore, like shapeless, embryonic tissue. Everything could be made out of it” (Jung 1944, Psychology and Alchemy).

The term is descriptive of a real psychological condition — the unconscious encountered in its primary form, before consciousness has begun to discriminate within it. Jung is precise that the massa confusa is not harmony but conflict: it is “characterized not by the union of the elements but by their conflict” (Jung 1944). The opposites are present and at war; the opus begins by giving them their names.

The alchemists held that the massa confusa is “difficult to find, although it was ‘before all eyes’” (Jung 1944). It hides in plain sight because consciousness, trained on differentiated forms, looks past it. It is the threshold of the entire opus-alchymicum: the work is unavailable to a consciousness that will not consent to begin with the mess. The classical lineage runs back through the Timaeus’s precosmic chōra and the Hesiodic Chaos; Jung records that “this alchemical terminology was based on Plato’s Timaeus” (Jung 1955, Mysterium Coniunctionis). The first operation upon it — separatio — is the cosmogonic act recapitulated within the soul.

Relationships

• prima-materia
• nigredo-albedo-rubedo
• opus-alchymicum
• alchemical-operations
• mercurius
• chaos-cosmogony
• hesiodic-cosmogony-chaos
• separation-of-the-world-parents
• plato-timaeus

Primary sources

• jung-psychology-and-alchemy (Jung 1944)
• jung-mysterium-coniunctionis (Jung 1955)
• edinger-anatomy-of-the-psyche (Edinger 1985)
• alchemical-studies (Jung 1967)