The Gnostic Jung and the Seven Sermons to the Dead (Quest Books) [Paperback]

Stephan A. Hoeller (Author)

Book Description

Series: Quest Books | Publication Date: January 1, 1982

Gnosticism like mysticism pursues the inner way; its authority is not external but internal-a living personal experience-but without denying the outer world. Under the guise of Basilides, a second-century AD Gnostic sage, Jung wrote in 1916 the Seven Sermons to the Dead after he had received intense psychic experiences.The author has made his own translation of the sermons and sets forth a lengthy explanation and far-ranging commentary on Jung, Gnosticism, and the present condition of the Western individual. ---Choice Review

Product Details

• Paperback: 267 pages
• Publisher: Quest Books; 1st edition (January 1, 1982)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 083560568X
• ISBN-13: 978-0835605687
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.2 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 10.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (18 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #248,493 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

76 of 77 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Wake up... and read this book!, October 11, 2002

By 

Anne (Canada) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Gnostic Jung and the Seven Sermons to the Dead (Quest Books) (Paperback)

"The dead came back from Jerusalem, where they did not find what they were seeking." So begins the short esoteric treatise "The Seven Sermons to the Dead" by the late C.G. Jung, reproduced here with an introduction and extensive commentary and analysis by the learned and insightful Dr. Stephan A. Hoeller.

Who are the dead? They are really the living dead, the spiritually dead -- those who are ignorant of "the knowledge of the heart", or Gnosis. Why do they return from Jerusalem? Because it is the symbolic home of the dogmatism and "dead creeds" which have blinded men to their own true nature.

This book is part gnostic treatise and part academic exegesis of Jung's "Seven Sermons". It serves as an extremely enlightening introduction to both Gnosticism and Jungian psychology. Hoeller clears up many misunderstandings about the ancient Gnostics, who have been vilified by mainstream Christians as "heretics" since ancient times. He also restores dignity to the notion that we (post)moderns can draw on a store of "ancient wisdom". New Age gurus who can't hold a candle to Hoeller bandy this phrase about ad nauseum. Hoeller's knowledge of history and primary texts and his own insight and wisdom shine through to create a unique and vital synthesis that puts the New Age crowd to shame.

Hoeller's writing is intellectually sound and spiritually compelling. There is no dry analysis or tedious language here. Indeed, Hoeller clearly loves the English language and uses it more creatively and adeptly than many native speakers (English is not his first language). His style tends toward the esoteric, but such is the clarity of his thought that the sometimes archaic vocabulary doesn't distract one's attention for an instant. To give an example, Hoeller explains the symbolism of the rooster-head found on images of the ancient Gnostic "god" Abraxas as follows:

"The head of the rooster symbolizes vigilant wakefulness and is related to both the human heart and to universal heart, the sun, the rising of which is invoked by the matutinal clarion call of the chanticleer."

If such highbrow style isn't your cup of tea -- well, then, this book isn't for you. As for me, I found joy on every page and give Stephan Hoeller's "The Gnostic Jung" the highest possible recommendation.

58 of 59 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Beautiful, moving and true, September 2, 2002

By 

Pieter "Toypom" (Johannesburg) - See all my reviews
(HALL OF FAME REVIEWER)    (TOP 500 REVIEWER)   

This review is from: The Gnostic Jung and the Seven Sermons to the Dead (Quest Books) (Paperback)

Many decades later Jung commented thus upon these sermons: "All my work, all my creative activity, has come from those initial fantasies ... everything that I accomplished in later life was already contained in them ..."

The seven sermons deal with the self as the androgynous being Abraxas, with the message that self-knowledge may be attained by the conscious assimilation of the contents of the subconscious, in order to achieve unity. The "dead" are those who stopped growing spiritually by not questioning their egos. By not growing, they are in essence the living dead.

Jung considered his own work a link in the golden chain from ancient gnosticism via philosophical alchemy to the modern psychology of the subconscious. Just as in those ancient texts, his work reveals a fragmented self in which the image of the divine may be found.

The author made his own translation of the sermons and provided a comprehensive preface, exegesis of the sermons and afterword in which he comments grippingly on Jung, gnosticism and the current era. His views on the survival of the pansophic/theosophic tradition (through the arts) are particularly enlightening.

Jung's central doctrine of individuation is an ancient concept of the western esoteric tradition - the tendency of the individual consciousness not to surrender its light into nothingness. Unlike many eastern spiritual systems, the Western tradition never knew the permanent dissolution of the individual consciousness in the divine.

Already in the first sermon this question is discussed, i.e. how to remain an individual while simultaneously achieving an optimal degree of unity with the ineffable greatness of the pleroma within us. Jung gives us an undivided model of reality in which both causal and acausal connections, spirit and matter, are reconciled.

As for belief, Jung convincingly argues that human beings have a religious need - not a need for belief, however, but one for religious experience. This is a psychical experience that leads to the integration of the soul. Inner wholeness - gnosis - is achieved not by belief in ideas, but by experience.

In the place of a god to believe in, Jung thus offers us an existential truth that we can experience. He rejects the "god of belief" in favor of a symbol of lasting validity, and instead of the much abused concept of "belief", he offers the power of the imagination as the way to gnosis, just as in the magickal and alchemical traditions.

The seven sermons are gripping and poetic, while the commentary is full of insight and enriched by quotes from inter alia the Nag Hammadi texts, Plotinus, Helena Blavatsky, Emerson and others. The most beautiful is a moving poem by the mystic Angelus Silesius, of which I quote a part:

"God is such as he is,
I am what I must be;
If you know one, in truth
You know both him and me.

I am the vine, which he
Doth plant and cherish most;
The fruit which grows from me
Is God, the holy ghost."

This text, and Basilides' thoughts on the pleroma (fullness of god), reminded me of Patti Smith's song "Hymn" on her album Wave:

"When I am troubled in the night
He comes to comfort me
He wills me through the darkness
And the empty child is free

To take his hand, his sacred heart
The heart that breaks the dawn, amen.
And when I think I've had my fill
He fills me up again."

I highly recommend this book as a bridge between psychology and religion, or rather the religious experience in the human psyche. It ought to be read together with William James' "The Varieties of Religious experience" and Richard Maurice Bucke's "Cosmic Consciousness", for a breathtaking metaphysical and metatextual experience.

49 of 50 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Speaks to the sense of truth within..., April 2, 2001

By A Customer

This review is from: The Gnostic Jung and the Seven Sermons to the Dead (Quest Books) (Paperback)

Firstly, I am neither scholar nor religious zealot, and that this book, while it touched me very deeply, is only the first that I have read concerning gnosticism or the spiritual inquiries which drove much of Jung's psychological work. That said, this review is intended more for those who have little or no knowledge of the gnostic gospels who are curious if this book is a good point to embark upon a path of gnostic study. Before his exposition of Jung's Seven Sermons, Hoeller attempts to give the reader an understanding of Jung's life and work, a description of gnosticism, and how Jung's individuation through depth psychology work and the gnostic pursuit of wholeness through spiritual experience are inevitably related. The Sermons themselves, translated by Hoeller, are, to say the least, amazing. "Seven Sermons to the Dead" makes for an intimidating title, and while it is not literal, it is perhaps just as frightening in its true meaning. The dead, as Jung refers to them, are those who have ceased to grow into their higher self. They have ceased to question their existence as desirous egos, and so no longer do they continue to grow into their innately known, true self. Proceeding no further in their path to enlightenment, they are, essentially, the living dead. The sermons are a short discourse on the truths missed if one carries on blindly through their short stint at life. Hoeller then goes on giving his interpretation of the sermons, which are thoughtful and well written. Throughout the entire book, Hoeller managed to set the tone for the proper absorption of the material. His interpretations could easily be taken as a definitive word on the Seven Sermons, however, I think it must be impossible to read the sermons without already having some perspective of your own already, as it addresses issues which are inherently part of every man or woman's continuing search for wholeness. This book was a jewel to find, uniting different philosophies of mine so that they can be placed in one hat, alleviating the confusion I had in their differences. I shall keep these words in mind for a long time to come, and my hope is that they could widen the scope of your thoughts as well it did mine.