Sep 8, 2022·edited Sep 8, 2022Liked by Psychology & The Cross
Jung sees the cross as the quaternary sign of wholeness. In fact, as everybody knows, it is the sign of torture, destruction, suffering and death. God hides in suffering, and a Christian shall always live in the shadow of the cross. Luther explains that "God can be found only in suffering and the cross". The quaternity of the cross tears the sinner apart. Only when he is hanging on the cross, metaphorically speaking, can he open the eye of faith. Alister McGrath says:
"Our moral and religious insights are all too often like Towers of Babel, human structures defiantly erected in the face of God [...]. The cross passes judgment upon these Towers of Babel, sweeping them away as mere fiction, and confronting us with a vision of the living God. Far from endorsing our natural insights, God contradicts them—not necessarily because they are wrong, but because they have been erected into a defensive wall which excludes God. The cross represents an act of God which is simultaneously annihilating and creative—it destroys our preconceptions of God, and in their place allows the living God to make his entrance. The cross places a question mark against our values, and directs our gaze away from ourselves, towards God. It assists us to remove the obstacle which we ourselves place in God's way." (McGrath, "The Mystery of the Cross", pp.167-68)
Is not Jungian psychology such a Tower of Babel? Although not necessarily wrong, it serves as a defensive wall against God. God must destroy before he can build, and that's why our intellectual and moral edifices must be swept away in the name of the cross.
Jung sees the cross as the quaternary sign of wholeness. In fact, as everybody knows, it is the sign of torture, destruction, suffering and death. God hides in suffering, and a Christian shall always live in the shadow of the cross. Luther explains that "God can be found only in suffering and the cross". The quaternity of the cross tears the sinner apart. Only when he is hanging on the cross, metaphorically speaking, can he open the eye of faith. Alister McGrath says:
"Our moral and religious insights are all too often like Towers of Babel, human structures defiantly erected in the face of God [...]. The cross passes judgment upon these Towers of Babel, sweeping them away as mere fiction, and confronting us with a vision of the living God. Far from endorsing our natural insights, God contradicts them—not necessarily because they are wrong, but because they have been erected into a defensive wall which excludes God. The cross represents an act of God which is simultaneously annihilating and creative—it destroys our preconceptions of God, and in their place allows the living God to make his entrance. The cross places a question mark against our values, and directs our gaze away from ourselves, towards God. It assists us to remove the obstacle which we ourselves place in God's way." (McGrath, "The Mystery of the Cross", pp.167-68)
Is not Jungian psychology such a Tower of Babel? Although not necessarily wrong, it serves as a defensive wall against God. God must destroy before he can build, and that's why our intellectual and moral edifices must be swept away in the name of the cross.