Within the depth-psychology corpus, ‘North’ operates simultaneously as a cardinal geographic direction, a symbolic axis of orientation, and a charged locus of numinous ambivalence. The most sustained treatment comes from Henry Corbin, who, drawing on Iranian Sufi theosophy — particularly Sohravardi — establishes the cosmic North as the vertical dimension of inner existence, the pole around which spiritual life revolves. For Corbin, the North is not an earthly compass point but the suprasensory Orient of ascent, the Qibla of mystical prayer shared by Mandeans, Manicheans, and Buddhists alike. The midnight sun, the Pole Star, and the Terra lucida all converge in this northern symbolics. Jung approaches the same symbolic complex from a different angle: the North in Babylonian tradition and in Christian exegetical literature is simultaneously the origin of divine vision — Ezekiel’s theophany — and the source of evil, the home of the ‘malign spirit’ Aquilo, whose north wind carries threefold ignorance. This polarity exemplifies, for Jung, the coincidentia oppositorum at the root of primitive God-images and the compensatory function of alchemy. Corbin explicitly warns against collapsing this tension into a spurious coincidentia. In astrological contexts, the North appears through the lunar North Node as a marker of destined becoming. The term thus traverses cosmological, theological, psychological, and initiatory registers, unified by its persistent function as a pole of orientation.
the heavenly pole situated on the vertical of human existence, the cosmic north. And even in geographic latitudes where we should hardly think it possible for the phenomenon to occur, its archetypal Image exists.
Corbin establishes the cosmic North as an archetypal image — the vertical pole of inner existence — that precedes all empirical geography and anchors active imagination.
, The Man of Light in Iranian Sufism, 1971thesis
the Mandeans, the Sabeans of Harran, the Manicheans, the Buddhists of Central Asia take the north as the Qibla (the axis of orientation) of their prayer.
Corbin demonstrates that the North as spiritual axis of prayer is a pan-traditional orientation shared across multiple mystical lineages, confirming its status as a cosmological archetype.
, The Man of Light in Iranian Sufism, 1971thesis
these Babylonian ideas about the significance of the north make it easier for us to understand why Ezekiel’s vision of God came from that quarter, despite the fact that it is the birthplace of all evil.
Jung reads the North as an archetypal site of the coincidentia oppositorum — simultaneously the origin of divine vision and the source of evil — and uses it to illuminate the inadequacy of Christian dogma’s treatment of the devil.
, Aion: Researches into the Phenomenology of the Self, 1951thesis
The Victorine monk Garnerius says that the ‘malign spirit’ was called Aquilo, the north wind. Its coldness meant the ‘frigidity of sinners.’ Adam Scotus imagined there was a frightful dragon’s head in the north from which all evil comes.
Jung documents the medieval Christian identification of the North with demonic cold and threefold ignorance, contrasting it with the theophanic north of Ezekiel.
, Aion: Researches into the Phenomenology of the Self, 1951thesis
the Mandeans also believe that this Earth of light is in the north, separated from our world by a high mountain of ice; while they make it clear that it is ‘between Heaven and Earth,’ this belief points out precisely that what is in question is not the earthly north, but the cosmic north.
Corbin distinguishes the cosmic North from its geographical counterpart, locating the Earth of Light and the Twin of Light in the imaginal north situated between Heaven and Earth.
, The Man of Light in Iranian Sufism, 1971supporting
it is this mandala upon which we should meditate in order to find again the northern dimension with its symbolic power, capable of opening the thres[hold]
Corbin links the recovery of the northern symbolic dimension to mandala meditation, proposing that geocentric cosmology properly understood discloses an inner vertical axis irreducible to exoteric geography.
, The Man of Light in Iranian Sufism, 1971supporting
At the Moon’s North Node we see
Rudhyar introduces the North Node as the astrological marker of destined becoming, contrasting the ego-centered human will with the superconscious solar Self.
, The Astrology of Personality: A Re-formulation of Astrological Concepts and Ideals in Terms of Contemporary Psychology and Philosophy, 1936supporting
An analogy can be drawn between the north and south nodes and the human brain. One part of the brain stores what is inbred and instinctual and serves to maintain the organism.
Sasportas maps the north-south nodal polarity onto the neurological distinction between instinctual and self-reflective consciousness, aligning the North Node with evolutionary development toward higher psychological capacities.
, The Twelve Houses: An Introduction to the Houses in Astrological Interpretation, 1985supporting
a northern hemisphere, the dorsal striatum, which works quite differently. It doesn’t care about the value of rewards, it isn’t attuned to likely pleasures
Lewis uses a north-south anatomical metaphor for contrasting striatal subsystems, a rhetorical parallel to symbolic north-south distinctions rather than a depth-psychological claim.
, The Biology of Desire: Why Addiction Is Not a Disease, 2015aside
1. The Pole of Orientation 1 / 2. The Symbols of the North 4 / III. MIDNIGHT SUN AND CELESTIAL POLE 39
The table of contents of Corbin’s work reveals the structural centrality of North as an organizing symbolic category, with dedicated chapters on the pole of orientation, the symbols of the North, and the midnight sun.
, The Man of Light in Iranian Sufism, 1971aside