The hermaphroditic figure occupies a peculiarly dense node in the depth-psychology corpus, traversing alchemical symbolism, mythological scholarship, clinical phenomenology, and theories of psychic wholeness. Jung establishes the term’s central register: the hermaphrodite is an archetype of the preconscious, undifferentiated condition — ‘asexual’ in the strict sense because the two poles cancel each other — appearing in dreams at transitional moments of individuation. Yet it is simultaneously the goal of that process: Mercurius, the hermaphrodite par excellence, names the psyche itself as an ‘anima media natura,’ a half-bodily, half-spiritual being capable of uniting opposites. Neumann extends this into a developmental schema, reading the recovery of ‘original hermaphroditism’ through assimilation of anima or animus as a mature, integrative achievement rather than a regressive one. Kerényi grounds the figure mythologically in Hermaphroditos — the fused body of Hermes’ son and the naiad Salmakis — and in the domestic cult image representing the ‘primal condition restored in marriage.’ López-Pedraza radicalises the clinical significance: the Hermaphrodite provides a unique ‘bisexual hermetic consciousness’ that liberates therapeutic imagination from sexual polarity altogether. Adler’s 1910 concept of ‘psychic hermaphroditism,’ retrieved by Hillman, adds a further, more ambivalent strand, linking the figure to inferiority and antithetical thinking. Together these voices stage an unresolved tension between the hermaphroditic as primordial regression and as integrative telos.
the anima, as the ‘vinculum,’ the link between body and spirit, would be hermaphroditic, i.e., a coniunctio Solis et Lunae. Mercurius is the hermaphrodite par excellence.
Jung identifies the hermaphroditic condition with the soul itself as mediating principle between body and spirit, making Mercurius its supreme embodiment and the coniunctio its psychological correlate.
, The Practice of Psychotherapy: Essays on the Psychology of the Transference and Other Subjects, 1954thesis
the underlying idea of the psyche proves it to be a half bodily, half spiritual substance, an anima media natura, as the alchemists call it, an hermaphroditic being capable of uniting the opposites
Jung defines the psyche structurally as an hermaphroditic being, grounding wholeness in the capacity to unite opposites rather than in any fixed sexual identity.
, Collected Works Volume 16: The Practice of Psychotherapy, 1954thesis
If we conceive of the Hermaphrodite as a particular consciousness in itself, then, from its own level of consciousness it apprehends that basic reality of life which makes psyche possible: man and woman.
López-Pedraza elevates the Hermaphrodite from symbol to a mode of consciousness in its own right, one whose bisexual hermetic awareness uniquely enables psychotherapeutic movement beyond sexual polarity.
, Hermes and His Children, 1977thesis
the Platonic all-round being is a hermaphrodite, a bisexual condition which means asexual, because the two conditions check each other. It is the symbol for the infantile not-yet-differentiated state
Jung frames the hermaphrodite as the archetype of the preconscious, undifferentiated condition, appearing in analytical development at the threshold before a definite psychological identity becomes conscious.
, Dream Analysis: Notes of the Seminar Given in 1928-1930, 1984thesis
the personality gives up the primacy of its specific sexuality and, by assimilating the anima or animus, regains its original hermaphroditism
Neumann recasts the hermaphroditic as a mature integrative achievement of individuation rather than a regressive state, reached when the personality transcends one-sided sexuality through anima or animus assimilation.
, The Origins and History of Consciousness (Princeton, 2019thesis
the hermaphrodite within the house represents so to speak the origin of the source: he represents the primal condition restored in marriage, the one who precede
Kerényi grounds the hermaphroditic in domestic cult practice as the ancestral image of the primal undivided condition whose re-establishment is the telos of marriage and family.
, Hermes Guide of Souls, 1944thesis
The esoteric tradition describes the World dancer as hermaphroditic, the dual sexual organs concealed by the banner, as if to say that the unity they represent lies beyond our knowing.
Pollack situates the hermaphroditic as the concealed condition of the World card’s cosmic dancer, reading sexual union as the hidden ground of liberated, all-encompassing being.
, Seventy-Eight Degrees of Wisdom: A Tarot Journey to Self-Awareness, 1980supporting
hermaphroditic ambivalence itself indicates inferiority and is ‘apperceived in a strongly antithetical manner,’ which safeguards us from it
Hillman, drawing on Adler’s 1910 paper on ‘psychic hermaphroditism,’ exposes the shadow side of the concept: the hermaphroditic state as a marker of psychological inferiority and the anxious either/or thinking it provokes.
, Healing Fiction, 1983supporting
She became one with the son of Hermes and Aphrodite, that son who was called Hermaphroditos
Kerényi narrates the mythological origin of Hermaphroditos in the union of Salmakis and Hermaphroditos, establishing the etiological narrative underlying all subsequent psychological deployments of the figure.
, The Gods of the Greeks, 1951supporting
Hermes and Aphrodite could even be fused into the bisexual figure of Hermaphroditos — ancient mythological speculation is transformed into an artistic experiment in Hellenistic sculpture.
Burkert situates the hermaphroditic as the religious-historical result of the fusion of Hermes and Aphrodite cults, tracing its trajectory from mythological speculation to Hellenistic plastic art.
, Greek Religion: Archaic and Classical, 1977supporting
it was claimed for him that he was none other than the Hermaphroditos. His mother was said to be Aphrodite
Kerényi identifies Priapus with Hermaphroditos through mythological lineage, noting the characteristic ‘hermaphroditic’ quality of Priapus’s phallic excess as an extension of the figure’s ambiguous sexual nature.
, The Gods of the Greeks, 1951supporting
it was claimed for him that he was none other than the Hermaphroditus. With Aphrodite as his mother, he was said to have various other fathers: Dionysus, or sometimes Adonis, or even Zeus himself.
López-Pedraza uses the mythological identification of Priapus with Hermaphroditus to construct a composite psychological image of the phallic-hermaphroditic archetype operative in psychotherapeutic constellations.
, Hermes and His Children, 1977supporting
Now we come to the question, what is this unconscious fact and what has happened to it that he can now jump from the aeroplane? We find this partly answered in the dream of the hermaphrodite
Jung treats the hermaphrodite dream as a clinical marker indicating the point in psychological development where a preconscious undifferentiated condition becomes available to consciousness.
, Dream Analysis: Notes of the Seminar Given in 1928-1930, 1984supporting
their two bodies, joined together as they were, were merged in one, with one face and form for both.
López-Pedraza cites Ovid’s account of the physical merging of Hermaphroditos and Salmakis as the mythological substrate for understanding the hermaphroditic image in its full bodily and relational complexity.
, Hermes and His Children, 1977aside