The Seba library treats Kidneys in 8 passages, across 7 authors (including Hakuin Ekaku, Jung, Carl Gustav, Moore, Thomas).
The kidneys, manifesting the water principle, are the major yin organ; they are located in the lower body. Contained within the five internal organs are seven marvelous powers, with the spleen and kidneys having two each.
In Taoist-inflected Chinese medical cosmology transmitted through Hakuin, the kidneys embody the water principle as the supreme yin organ and are assigned a double share of the body's marvelous powers.
, Wild Ivy: The Spiritual Autobiography of Zen Master Hakuin, 1999thesis
There is no 'rational' substitute for the archetype any more than there is for the cerebellum or the kidneys.
Jung uses the kidneys as an analogue to establish that archetypes, like physical organs, cannot be replaced by rational constructs—their necessity is biological and psychic alike.
, The Archetypes and the Collective Unconscious, 1959thesis
I can imagine interviewing my kidneys: Are you relaxed? Are you enjoying your activity today? Or am I doing something that is making you depressed?
Moore, via Ferenczi's organ eroticism, proposes that the kidneys be approached not as functional mechanisms but as soul-bearing organs capable of pleasure and suffering.
, Care of the Soul Twenty-fifth Anniversary Edition: A Guide, 1992thesis
The inhaled breath enters through the kidneys and liver. With each exhalation of breath, the defensive energy and nutritive blood move forward three inches in their conduits.
Hakuin's Taoist physiological model assigns the kidneys a specific respiratory role—receiving inhaled breath—situating them as a conduit for the circulation of vital energy throughout the body.
, Wild Ivy: The Spiritual Autobiography of Zen Master Hakuin, 1999supporting
devices in the brain stem and hypothalamus can coordinate, nonconsciously and with great efficiency, the jobs of the heart, lungs, kidneys, endocrine system, and immunological system such that the parameters that permit life are maintained within the adequate range
Damasio situates the kidneys within the nonconscious homeostatic machinery coordinated by the brain stem, distinguishing this somatic regulation from the higher-order problem-solving enabled by consciousness.
, The Feeling of What Happens: Body and Emotion in the Making of Consciousness, 1999supporting
notice the functioning of your different organs—your heart, lungs, liver, kidneys, digestive system, and so forth. Normally these organs function without difficulty and do not attract your attention unless they are in pain.
Thich Nhat Hanh incorporates the kidneys into a contemplative somatic awareness practice, framing all organs as interdependent participants in the body's interbeing.
, The Sun My Heart, 1988supporting
From the conduit of our drink, where it receives liquid that has passed through the lungs by the kidneys into the bladder and ejects it with the air that presses upon it, they pierced an opening communicating with the compact marrow which runs from the head down the neck and along the spine
Plato's Timaeus situates the kidneys anatomically within a hydraulic-generative system, connecting urinary filtration to the spinal marrow identified as the vehicle of seed and procreative desire.
, Plato's cosmology the Timaeus of Plato, 1997supporting
The air current is especially active in the lungs and as intelligence expressed through the hands (Gemini), in the kidney area (Libra), and it electrically charges the body in the ankle area (Aquarius).
Arroyo's astrological-polarity framework assigns the kidney area to the air element and the sign Libra, linking it to intelligence and electrical vitality within an esoteric anatomy.
, Astrology, Psychology, and the Four Elements: An Energy Approach to Astrology and Its Use in the Counseling Arts, 1975supporting