Dr. Paul Bishop - "In a World That Has Gone to Madness..." - Global Checkin #13 -
Channel: Carl Jung Depth Psychology Reading Group
Date: 24/04/2020

Paul Bishop (Timeline Below) Is William Jacks Chair in Modern Languages at the University of Glasgow and the Author of “In a World That Has Gone Mad, Is What We Really Need… A Red Book?” His essay appears in Jung’s Red Book for Our Time: Searching for Soul under Postmodern Conditions, edited by Dr. Murray Stein and Dr. Thomas Arzt.  Dr. Bishop offers comments In Memoriam of Dr. Arzt are contained especially at 06:40 and 11:55.  This discussion was conducted on April 21, 2020.  

Thumbnail: “Formation Skydiving…” ID 137996508 © Anton Podoshvin | Dreamstime.com

00:05 - Tim’s introduction to the idea of the Global Check-In 

04:20 - Introduction of our Featured Guest - Dr. Paul Bishop

06:40 - In Memoriam for Dr. Thomas Arzt and his book _C.G. Jung’s Journey to the other Pole of the World_.

07:59 - The relationship between Jung and the German intellectual tradition; Goethe;  Nietzche; and the Frankfurt School. 

09:15 - The German tradition is vital and important to us now.

10:05 - _The Red Book_ is interesting for our time; is relevant for our time; and speaks to it.  Nietzsche, Goethe, Schiller and Humboldt are important for our time now.

11:55 - Relevance of Dr. Thomas Arzt in his collaboration with Dr. Murray Stein on _Jung’s Red Book for our Time: Searching for Soul under Postmodern Conditions_.  

23:10 - Society needs to open up to the madness of the world.

25:25 - “Myth and madness and Enlightenment and rationality are not opposite, but are inextricably interrelated.”

26:15 - Behind the rational there is something very irrational.  This is an opportunity to recognize that myth is positive in Jung.

29:05 - The whole point of Plato’s “Allegory of the Cave. … The man who returns is not going to be listened to … if they can get their hands on him they would kill him.”

33:00 - “What I tried to show … the theme of madness is absolutely central to all these figures…. There are two types of madness.”

33:40 - “There is pathological madness that doesn’t get you very far.”

35:15 - “You need to be a little bit mad to be creative at all.”

35:25 - “What we think to be normal is in many ways deeply deeply mad ,.. because it is all about control.  It is paranoid and deeply about control.”

42:35 - In the modern world we have invented “surplus repression.”  “We turn repression itself into a form of pleasure; and we make pleasure itself a form of work.”

45:50 - What do we repress?  Deferment of gratification and aggression as well.  We need repression for civilization. But when Eros irrupts, violent Eros or Erotic violence.

47:40 - Tim’s image of a bridge.

54:45 - “Logos without Eros is a kind of poorer understanding; a low level understanding; a kind of Faustian understanding….. Understanding the subject and object together  [is the key].”

59:55 - “The best form of Logos is based on a form of Eros as well. … Eros conducts us to understanding.”

01:00:50 - “Experience linked to knowledge …” Just understanding is not enough.  You have to ‘grok’ it.”

01:02:15 - The role of _The Red Book_ is to open up a space in the Psyche.  

01:03:40 - Skip mentions his “Confrontation with the Unconscious” - _Meiko: Memoirs of a Woman_, the “autobiography of my Anima.”  

01:06:50 - Myles’s question about the young men who jump off mountains in winged suits.  They keep pushing the limit.  … In a world that has gone mad.”

01:11:20 -  Commenting on Myles’s statement about 9/11: “You’re certainly resisting the myth of certainty.”

01:12:30 - The whole point of history is that you have a methodology for history through Logos. 

01:13:00 - “If a patient thought that last night they were really on the Moon … Ah, that patient was on the Moon!”

01:13:45 - People attacking 5G masts in the UK.

01:14:55 - The real virus of madness is found in “the normal.”  

01:16:20 - “If we understand we’re out of control, that’s the first step toward getting back in control again.”

01:20:55 - Khushboo refers to a shooting in Newfoundland, which had happened the day before; and the day laborers who are “on the move” in India, becoming the largest migration in India since Partition.  

01:26:20 - “What is there that is archetypal about it? [Coronavirus Epidemics].”

01:34:55 - The Freudian analysts are having a much harder time with the Pandemic, while the Jungians are much more grounded.

01:42:15 - The practice of Yoga must bring the mind back to the body, otherwise it is not Yogo, it is just a pastime.

01:48:55 - An autistic view!  “I see how my parents and teachers are struggling much more than me.”

01:54:45 - “We try to pretend we are normal. … But everyone is a weirdo.” 

01:59:30 - Paul draws attention to “The Three Prophecies” in _The Red Book_.

02:04:50 - Khushboo’s prayer for all of the people of the world and the wellbeing of all of the worlds.

Fair Use Notice

We believe this constitutes a 'fair use' of any copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright Law.