Within the depth-psychology corpus, Atum — the Heliopolitan creator god of Egyptian theology — surfaces primarily as an archetype of cosmogonic self-sufficiency and solar completion. Neumann reads the deity’s autoerotic act of self-creation as the mythic signature of the uroboric principle: the procreative thrust of a universe that begets itself without external partner, simultaneously paternal and self-contained. Jung employs Atum in the context of solar identification and ritual deification, where the devotee’s declaration ‘I am daily together with my father Atum’ signals the ego’s aspiration toward union with the numinous ground of being. Campbell, drawing on both the Memphite Theology and the Pyramid Texts, triangulates Atum within the cosmogonic logic of the Ennead, showing how the deity stands at the apex of a psychological theology in which creation proceeds through thought and speech. Von Franz catalogues Atum among the self-creating Deus faber figures — artisan-gods whose act of world-fashioning is simultaneously an act of self-constitution. The term thereby occupies a crossroads of several major depth-psychological concerns: self-origination, the solar archetype, eschatological transcendence, and the psychology of the creative word. Tension exists between readings that privilege Atum’s cosmogonic solitude and those that situate him relationally, as the companion who promises perpetuity to Osiris at the end of time.
Atum’s answer passes beyond the next world; it is an eschatological answer that holds a promise of perpetuity even when the world has reverted to the uroboric state.
Neumann interprets Atum’s dialogue with the dead Osiris as the supremely eschatological statement of Heliopolitan theology, wherein the creator god promises the soul deathless companionship even after the cosmos dissolves back into primordial chaos.
, The Origins and History of Consciousness (Princeton, 2019thesis
when we read in Egyptian theology such passages as: Atum, who indulged himself in Heliopolis, took his phallus in his hand in order to a
Neumann cites Atum’s autoerotic self-creation as the mythic expression of the uroboric principle — the procreative thrust of a self-generating cosmos whose paternal impulse is harder to visualize than the maternal.
, The Origins and History of Consciousness (Princeton, 2019thesis
I am daily together with my father Atum. My impurity is driven out, and the sin which was in me is trodden under foot.
Jung cites an Egyptian funerary declaration in which the devotee identifies with the solar creator Atum, interpreting such ritual god-identification as an amplification of libidinal power and an antidote to personal weakness.
, Symbols of Transformation, 1952thesis
Thus were fashioned all the gods: even Atum and his Ennead. Every divine word came into existence by the thought of the heart and the commandment of the tongue.
Campbell presents the Memphite Theology’s psychological cosmogony, in which Ptah’s heart and tongue fashion even Atum and his Ennead through thought and speech — a psychological and metaphysical account of creation superior to the biblical command-and-refrain model.
, Oriental Mythology: The Masks of God, Volume II, 1962thesis
Thus were fashioned all the gods: even Atum and his Ennead. Every divine word has come into existence through the heart’s thought and tongue’s command.
Campbell elaborates the Memphite theological logic by which the entire pantheon, including Atum and the Ennead, is organically assimilated to the cosmic body of Ptah through the creative power of articulate speech.
, Oriental Mythology: The Masks of God, Volume II, 1962supporting
His father, Atum, lays hold of the arm of the deceased… He ascends on the hips of Isis; he climbs up on the hips of Nephthys.
Campbell draws on the Pyramid Texts to show Atum as the divine father who assists the deceased in the ascent toward heaven, functioning as the sustaining paternal principle in Egyptian afterlife mythology.
, The Mythic Image, 1974supporting
Tum of Pithum-Heroopolis not only carries the crux ansata as a symbol, but even has this emblem as the commonest of his titles, ankh or ankhi, which means ‘life’ or the ‘Living One.’
Jung identifies Tum/Atum as a solar deity whose principal emblem is the ankh — the sign of life — connecting the creator god to the broader symbolism of the tree of life, renewal, and the Agathodaimon serpent.
, Symbols of Transformation, 1952supporting
Tum/Atum: attributes of, 267f; of On-Heliopolis, 267
Jung’s index entry cross-references Tum/Atum specifically to his Heliopolitan attributes, situating the deity within the text’s broader symbolic catalogue of solar and libido-analogous figures.
, Symbols of Transformation, 1952supporting
Gods, Goddesses Atum human participation and Ku-bu Marduk Maya Ptah of Memphis raven Sedna the smith and Tiamat trickster two types of weaving motif and
Von Franz’s index groups Atum among the major creator-god figures surveyed in her comparative study of creation myths, placing the Egyptian deity in a cross-cultural taxonomy of cosmogonic divinities.
, Creation Myths, 1995aside
Atum (Ra) 196, 349
Greene’s index identifies Atum with Ra and assigns him a page entry in her astrological-mythological taxonomy, treating the deity as a solar-creative figure relevant to the Cancer archetype.
, The Astrology of Fate, 1984aside
Atum, 97, 267
Jung’s index locates Atum at two specific loci within Symbols of Transformation, indicating the deity’s role as a node in the text’s symbolic network rather than a sustained object of analysis.
, Symbols of Transformation, 1952aside