Babel

The Seba library treats Babel in 4 passages, across 3 authors (including Hillman, James, Jung, Carl Gustav, Bion, W.R.).

In the library 4 passages

Babel means that we cannot understand ourselves. Our reason can never fully comprehend even our own internal dialogue, and therefore we can never become so integrated as to speak with but one tongue.

Hillman transforms Babel into a foundational psychological principle, arguing that the irreducible multiplicity of the soul's voices renders complete self-integration impossible and makes psychopathology structurally inevitable.

Hillman, James, The Myth of Analysis: Three Essays in Archetypal Psychology, 1972thesis

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The dragon whose nature sulphur shares is often spoken of as the 'dragon of Babel' or, more accurately, the 'dragon's head' (caput draconis), which is a 'most pernicious poison,' a poisonous vapour breathed out by the flying dragon.

Jung's alchemical commentary equates Babel with the sinful, poisonous dimension of the sulphurous dragon, embedding the biblical city within a symbolic complex of dangerous, chthonic, and morally transgressive psychic energy.

Jung, Carl Gustav, Mysterium Coniunctionis: An Inquiry into the Separation and Synthesis of Psychic Opposites in Alchemy, 1955supporting

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Tower of Babel and, 187 work group and, 162

In Bion's index, the Tower of Babel appears in direct association with the Messianic hope and the work group, indicating its function as a symbol for the collapse of collective communication and shared purpose in group dynamics.

Bion, W.R., Experiences in Groups and Other Papers, 1959supporting

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Jung began a rectification of psychological language... He was speaking a new language and using an old language in a new way.

This passage contextualizes the problem of multiple psychological languages and the soul's need to bear witness in its own speech, providing the discursive ground from which Hillman's Babel argument emerges.

Hillman, James, The Myth of Analysis: Three Essays in Archetypal Psychology, 1972aside

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