A Reapraissal of Archetype Theory

8/18/2019 A Reapraissal of Archetype Theory

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Journal of Analytical Psychology, 2009, 54, 339–358

A reappraisal of classical archetype theoryand its implications for theory and practice

John Merchant, Sydney, Australia

Abstract : This paper begins with an overview of contemporary approaches to archetypetheory and notes the radical nature of certain deductions. Some argue that there is no‘archetype-as-such’ as a pre-existing entity at the core of a complex driving its formationwhilst the findings of current neuroscience are calling into question one very thing onwhich the classical theory is built – innatism. Knox’s argument for image schemas raises

the question as to the extent to which archetypes can be conceived in any preformationistsense.

The question is then posed – to what extent can Jung’s classical theory of archetypesbe read in light of these current models? The case examples Jung uses to evidencethe existence of archetypes, his explications of synchronicity and his own Philemonexperience are then reappraised.

The conclusion is drawn that it is difficult to evidence the existence of autonomousarchetypes unrelated to personal affective experience. Not only would this be expectedby emergent/developmental models of archetype but it can explain many of Jung’sdisjunctive statements about archetype constellation; the difficulties in separatingpersonal and collective psychic content and Jung’s apparent Lamarckianism. The

implications of these models for theory, clinical practice and analyst training are thenoffered for discussion.

Key words: affectivity, analysis, archetype, collective unconscious, countertransference,emergentism, preformationism, systems theory.

The new approaches to archetype theory

In 1996, Tresan used emergentism, supervenience and complexity theory asways to describe archetypes, thus heralding a new way in which archetypeswere discussed. Later, in arguing for archetypes as ‘symbolic forms’ withoutany biological underpinning, Pietikainen (1998) generated substantial debate inthis Journal. In subsequent responses it was not uncommon for archetypes tobe seen as ‘emergent properties’ and for aspects of Dynamic Systems Theory,self-organization and emergentism to be used in the discourse. As Hogensonsuccinctly states, ‘the archetype itself and the archetypal image are emergent

properties of a complex dynamic system’ (Stevens, Hogenson & Ramos 2003,p. 376). Different aspects of the aforementioned can be found in Cambray


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340 John Merchant

(2002, 2006), Hogenson (1998, 2003a, 2003b, 2004, 2005), Jones (2003),Knox (2003, 2004), McDowell (2001) and Merchant (2006).

There would appear to be two quite provocative lines of thought which have

developed out of these approaches to archetypal theory. The first comes fromthe work of Saunders & Skar (2001), who have taken the position that it is thecomplexes, not the archetypes, which arise out of self-organization. Instead, thearchetype can be seen as a property of the developmental dynamic that formsthe complexes, and can be defined as a class of complexes that fall into the samegeneral category. Skar (2004) further clarifies that

[Jung] postulated an archetype at the core of each complex which somehow affectedthe formation of the complex. Our modern understanding of the processes of self-organization allows us to see how complexes can form without some pre-existing

entity at the core, but it is still convenient to use the term archetype to separate thedevelopmental aspect from the individual manifestation of the complex. . .

. The words‘archetype’ and ‘archetypal’ remain effective in describing these key human processes,if we remember that the archetype is not the cause, but rather the essence of theexperience.

(pp. 247–48; italics added)

In commenting on Saunders and Skar’s (2001) approach, Hogenson (2004) saysthat ‘This argument is based in a dynamic systems mode of thinking, but I donot believe most Jungians have recognized its radical nature’ (p. 70). I believethe most radical assertion is in not seeing archetypes as pre-existing entities at

the core of complexes driving their formation.This poses the following questions – are archetypes innate psychic structures

which organize psychological life or is ‘archetype’ a categorizing word usedto describe clusters of similar complexes? Do such things as innate archetypesactually exist?

The second provocative line of thought has to do with the biological baseof archetypes. One prominent defence of the classical approach to archetypaltheory has been that of Stevens (1998, 2002) who has stressed the genetic andbiological underpinning to the theory. In his view, ‘the biological implications

of archetypal theory are enormous in their ramifications and help to placethe whole Jungian edifice on firm epistemological foundations’ (Stevens 1998,p. 351). For many, this position has substantial face validity but the appealto biology has led to certain questions about the innate, a priori aspects toarchetypal theory (Hogenson 1998; Stevens, Hogenson & Ramos 2003; Knox2003, 2004). This is because the findings of current neuroscience are callinginto question the very thing to which Stevens is appealing – innatism andwhat Developmental Systems Theory in biology calls ‘preformationism’ (seeOyama, Griffiths & Gray2001). [Preformationism in biology is the view that the

information for producing an organism is contained in the zygote and becomes‘read-out’ in an environment. The parallel position in analytical psychology is


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Reappraisal of classical archetype theory 341

thought in a number of areas such as Wilkinson’s (2006) work on trauma, itis Knox (1997, 2001, 2003, 2004) who has extensively applied the findings of neuroscience to archetypal theory through her elaboration of Mandler’s (1992)

concept of ‘image schemas’.

Archetypes and image schemas

Image schemas are understood to be foundational mind/brain structures whichare developmentally produced during human pre-verbal experience. Knox(2001) equates these image schemas with archetypes and explains them asfollows:

Innate mechanisms [previously referred to as ‘pre-experiential potentialities’ on p.

629]. . .

are activated by environmental cues, interacting with them and organizingthem, leading to the formation of primitive spatial and conceptual representations(image schemas or archetypes). These form the foundation on which later morecomplex representations can be built.

(p. 631)

And more specifically in relation to archetypal theory, Knox (2004) equatesimage schemas with Jung’s idea of the archetype-as-such:

Whilst image schemas are without symbolic content in themselves, they providea reliable scaffolding on which meaningful imagery and thought is organized and

constructed, thus meeting the need for a model that provides for the archetype-as-such and the archetypal image. If we adopt this model for archetypes, we have todiscard the view that they are genetically inherited and consider them to be reliablyrepeated early developmental achievements.

(p. 9)

Overall, it is the intense affectivity of infancy which drives the developmentalformation of image schemas about which psychotherapy would be interested,for from Shore’s research, Knox (2004) notes that ‘the intense relationships of early life directly influence the development of key parts of the brain’ (p. 6).

Furthermore, Knox (2001) argues that image schemas are stored in implicitmemory as ‘internal working models’ and that these image schemas providethe scaffolding for more complex and elaborate symbolization through variousprocesses of emergence and self-organization as the individual interacts with itsenvironment. The ongoing significance of intense affectivity will drive this laterscaffolding. Consequently, when similar affective experiences occur in adultlife they will resonate with the original scaffolding and constellate imagery.However, it needs to be noted that given the implicit level of organizationfrom which the later imagery arises, the imagery will appear as if innate

and unknown. As such, the imagery can be interpreted as ‘archetypal’ in theclassical Jungian sense even though it has arisen from mind/brain structureswhich were themselves developmentally produced In Knox’s (2004) view there


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What I believe to be unique about Knox’s model is that it combines both adevelopmental perspective and an emergent one thus enlarging its explanatorypower. The developmental component has to do with the formation of the image

schemas (archetype-as-such) in the first place and the emergent componenthas to do with the later scaffolding process (which underpins archetypalimagery). As Knox (2004) says, ‘archetypes [are] emergent structures resultingfrom a developmental interaction between genes and environment that isunique for each person’ (p. 4). For this reason I have previously referredto this approach as an emergent/developmental kind of model (Merchant2006).

Implications of Knox’s model

If image schemas equate with the archetype-as-such and they are developmen-tally produced then this is a radical re-formulation of Jung’s conception of archetype. For him, the archetype-as-such whilst understood to be a psychicstructure with biological underpinning was not viewed as being developmentallyproduced. It was inherited and hence innate.

If this reading is correct, then I believe the implications are similar tothose of Skar (2004) above, namely, the possibility that there are no suchthings as pre-existent, innate archetypal structures which direct psychological

life and which are at the core of complex development. Rather, therewould be developmentally produced mind/brain structures (image schemas)underpinning a later scaffolding through various processes of emergence andself-organization. It is the latter which has the capacity to generate symbolicimagery. The crucial point is that such imagery would be arising out of mind/brain structures which are themselves derived from early pre-verbaldevelopmental experience and not from innate archetypes. The ramificationsare substantial, for the very existence of archetypes as Jung conceived themis called into question. This raises the possibility that the whole way we have

envisaged the collective unconscious needs reformulating – an issue to which Ihave alluded previously (Merchant 2006).It does need to be noted at this point that it is still not clear why any one

person’s archetypal imagery takes the form that it does if it is not arising frominnate archetypes. There are a number of possibilities involving the culturalcontext within which the later scaffolding to image schemas occurs, a positionto which Pietikainen’s (1998) work may point. Similarly, Skar (2004) notes indiscussing the various cultural expressions of mother/child that these can beinstantly recognizable to us not because of innate archetypes but due to the

ubiquity of the common (species-typical) human experience of mothering. Atour current stage of knowledge, however, it needs to be admitted that providingan extensive explanation about any one individual’s archetypal imagery will


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This paper will explore the extent to which Jung’s classical theory can beread in light of a contemporary emergent/developmental model of archetypeslike that of Knox.

The critical features of Jung’s theory of archetype

In classical theory, it is generally agreed that archetypes become activated ‘whena certain lack in the conscious sphere calls for a compensation on the part of the unconscious’ (Jung 1953 / 1993, para. 1529).

An example would be Jung’s patient who experienced a synchronicity to dowith a scarab beetle when in the consulting room. Jung (1951 / 1991, 1952 / 1991)

describes this female patient as displaying an exceptional rationalism which sheused as a defensive manoeuvre so that the psychotherapy had fallen into animpasse. She then had a dream of being given a gold scarab. At the precisemoment of telling Jung this dream, he hears a tapping at the window, opensit to find a scarabaeid beetle trying to enter the room. On catching the beetle,

Jung presents it to the woman saying, ‘here is your scarab’. This synchronousevent had such a profound effect on the patient that the therapy progressedmarkedly from that point on. Of this case Jung (1952 / 1991) says, ‘It is this kindof situation that constellates the archetype with the greatest regularity’ (para.

847). In other words, the impasse in the therapy had activated a compensatoryarchetypal constellation to do with (psychic) rebirth for Jung knew that thescarab beetle was an ancient symbol of rebirth.

Whilst this explanation by Jung seems quite plausible, I want to highlightthe way the archetype gets constellated in the first place. We can safely assumethat for the patient, the therapeutic impasse would have been an emotionallydistressing occurrence and further, that this situation would have unfoldedwith Jung before the appearance of the archetypal image of the beetle inher dream. The point is that the personal context is important to note in

the sequence of events and that affectivity is suggested as being operativein the archetype’s constellation. This sequence of events would accord withan emergent/developmental model like that of Knox as outlined previously.The archetypal imagery has been activated by the intense affectivity of currentsubjective life experience because current experience is similar to a pre-existing‘internal working model’. The archetypal imagery has not arisen independentlyeven though the ‘choice’ of the beetle image needs explaining.

Jung (1912 / 1986) did believe that archetypal content can be activated bythe heightened affectivity of distressing life experience as the following from

Symbols of Transformation indicates:The changes that may befall a man are not infinitely variable; they are variations of

l h h l d b h h f d


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This position is maintained when Jung goes on to elaborate his theoryof synchronicity. In ‘Synchronicity: An acausal connecting principle’, Jung(1952 / 1991) devotes some attention to Rhine’s classic experiments on extrasen-

sory perception and psychokinesis undertaken at Duke University’s ParanormalPsychology Laboratory. What seems noteworthy is that despite Rhine beingable to demonstrate both extrasensory perception and psychokinesis beyondchance occurrence and whilst these were seen to operate over vast distanceswhich precluded fabrication, there was a decline effect over time, that is, thebest results were obtained at the beginning of the experiments. Jung suggeststhis is because of an initial emotional engagement and expectation on the partof the subjects. Jung’s description of the poor results in the experiments fromthe English medium (Mrs Eileen Garrett) attests to this, ‘as she herself admits,

she was unable to summon up any feeling for the “soulless” test-cards’ (para.838). Emotional engagement seems crucial in the whole process even if Jung’soverall explanation relies on his theory of synchronicity about a constellatedarchetype which separates into a physical occurrence and a psychological one.On summarizing Rhine’s experiments he says:

[Rhine] would never have got the results he did if he had carried out his experimentswith a single subject . . . He needed a constant renewal of interest, an emotionwith its characteristic abaissement mental, which tips the scales in favour of the unconscious . . . . The mantric procedures owe their effectiveness to this same

connection with emotionality.(para. 912; italics added)

What I believe an emergent/developmental model of archetype like that of Knox suggests is that archetypal constellation will always depend on heightenedemotionality so that it is not compensation alone which is operative. Rather,affectivity activates archetypal imagery because of its ability to lower thethreshold of consciousness (which is Jung’s point when developing his theoryof synchronicity) and set up a resonance with a pre-existing image schema.

Affectivity arises in people from their personal life experience and this meansin an emergent/developmental model, archetypal imagery is always constellatedthrough personal experience with the operative cause being emotionality. Thisis because the schema (archetype) on which the imagery is based has beendevelopmentally produced in the first place from out of the intense affectivity of pre-verbal infant experience and the current affectivity in adult life is activatingit.

In saying this it is not to argue that Jung was opposed to seeing any connectionbetween the psyche and its environmental conditions, for he says in ‘The

structure of the psyche’,

W ll d th t it ld b it i ibl t d t d th li i i


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the psyche. Its peculiar organization must be intimately connected with environmental conditions.

(Jung 1931 / 1991, paras. 323–24; italics added)

What needs to be noted is that such a statement is in perfect accord with anemergent/developmental model of archetypes like that of Knox. The peculiarorganization of the psyche is most definitely connected with environmentalconditions if archetypes (image schemas) become embedded as mind/brainstructures through early infant developmental experience.

In a similar way, Jung’s (1954 / 1991) following statement to do withphenomenal experience from ‘On the nature of the psyche’ can be understoodby an emergent/developmental model of the archetype:

[archetypes] essential being is unconscious to us, . . . they are experienced as sponta-

neous agencies.(para. 420; italics added)

In an emergent/developmental model, archetypes would be experienced ‘asif spontaneous’ because of the process of their emergence. Any particularmind/brain structural template (image schema) underpinning the activation of emergent imagery has originally been laid down developmentally in a stateof early infant ‘unconsciousness’. We only have to assume that when someresonating ‘now’ affect occurs, the pre-existing template is activated. But sinceit resides in the implicit/unconscious layer of the psyche, it will be experienced asif alien, ‘spontaneous’ and probably ‘innate’ and as if unconnected to anythingwhich we can consciously understand.

Consequently, an emergent/developmental model of archetype like that of Knox is not necessarily in disagreement with Jung’s position on synchronicityand the significance of environmental conditions. However, this is not the casewith Jung’s view of archetypes as innate a priori psychic structures which havethe capacity to direct psychological life. Here, Jung appears to give emphasis tothe autonomous and spontaneous activity of archetypes divorced from personalexperience. This aspect diverges substantially from an emergent/developmentalmodel of archetypes and requires re-examination.

The autonomous archetype

Jung’s (1931 / 1991) thinking eventually came to describe the collective uncon-scious as an ‘absolute unconscious which has nothing to do with our personalexperience. This absolute unconscious would then be a psychic activity which

goes on independently of the conscious mind and is not dependent even on theupper layers of the unconscious, untouched - and perhaps untouchable - bypersonal experience’ (para 311; italics added)


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archetype-as-such is an image schema which has actually come about throughpersonal experience.

It is later in ‘The psychology of the child archetype’ that Jung (1940 / 1990)

goes on to describe this psychic activity independent of the conscious mind asan ‘autochthonous revival’ and by 1948 in ‘A psychological approach to thedogma of the Trinity’ he says that archetypes will be ‘continually reproducingthemselves’ (para. 195). Six years later in a private letter to G.A. van denBergh von Eysinga, Jung (1954) makes it quite clear that he is thinking of thearchetypes’ ‘reproduction of themselves’ as occurring spontaneously and thatthis characteristic evidences their autonomous nature. He says,

As animals have no need to be taught their instinctive activities, so man also possessesprimordial psychic patterns, and repeats them spontaneously, independently of any

teaching. (p. 152; italics added)

It can be concluded that the concept of archetypal ‘autonomy’ is quite central to Jung’s conception of archetypes. It is also one which he himself saw as a uniquecontribution for he says in ‘The psychological aspects of the mother archetype’,

If I have any share in these discoveries [i.e., the idea of psychic a priori’s], it consistsin . . . having shown that archetypes are not disseminated only by tradition, language,and migration, but that they can rearise spontaneously, at any time, at any place, and without any outside influence.

(Jung 1954 / 1990b, para. 153; italics added)

Again, this ‘spontaneous’ conception is an entirely different one to that of an emergent/developmental model of archetype like that of Knox. In thatmodel, the archetype-as-such is an image schema which has actually come aboutthrough outside influence, that is, experience in the environment. The archetype-as-such is not only touched by personal experience, it comes into existencethrough it and later personal affective experience activates the archetypalimagery. The imagery is not spontaneously reproduced.

The question arises – can it really be evidenced that archetypes operatespontaneously and autonomously as if divorced from personal experience? Letus examine Jung’s main examples that he uses to evidence the existence of autonomous archetypes unconnected to personal experience.

In ‘The structure of the psyche’, Jung (1931 / 1991) uses two cases to illustratearchetypal autonomy – that of an army officer and the other of the ‘Solar-Phallus’ man.

Jung’s case of the army officer

The army officer had presented to Jung with three hysterical (conversiondisorder) symptoms – heart pains a choking sensation in the throat and a


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symptoms he had suffered a relationship breakdown when his girlfriend jiltedhim and became engaged to another man. During psychotherapy with Jung,the man’s real but unconscious affects were able to be expressed; the symptoms

of the heart pains (having analogously represented his ‘broken heart’) andthe lump in the throat (having analogously represented his ‘swallowed tears’)disappeared. But the pain in the heel remained. The man then had a dreamabout being bitten in the heel by a snake and becoming instantly paralysed.This dream image does give some clue as to why the man feels pain in his heelbut as Jung points out, the unconscious is striking in its use of a mythologicalmotif reminiscent of the Genesis story where Jahweh speaking to the serpent inthe Garden of Eden says, ‘I will put enmity between you and the woman, andbetween your seed and her seed; he shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise

his heel’ (The Holy Bible: Genesis 3:15).Because the dream image did not accord with any obvious rationalexplanation, Jung (1931 / 1991) concluded that it ‘probably derives from somedeeper layer [of the unconscious] that cannot be fathomed rationally’ (para.306). However, Jung also tells us that in discussing the dream with the man,other relevant factors emerged:

He had been the darling of a somewhat hysterical mother. She had pitied him, admiredhim, pampered him so much that he never got along properly at school because hewas too girlish. Later he suddenly swung over to the masculine side and went into the

army, where he was able to hide his inner weakness by a display of ‘toughness’. Thus,in a sense, his mother too had lamed him.(para. 306)

Jung goes no further and yet this information would appear critical in givingan interpretation to the dream imagery, a point which I will take up below.

To continue with Jung’s explication. He acknowledges that the man hadprobably heard the Genesis story at some stage in his life despite his knowledgeof the Bible being at a ‘lamentable minimum’ and that the snake image isnow being remembered from the deep unconscious and used at this suitable

opportunity. Given the situation between the officer and his mother, the line ‘Iwill put enmity between you and the woman’ is likely to have had significantpsychic resonance with his own personal dynamic. However, Jung concludesthat this ‘part of the unconscious evidently likes to express itself mythologically,because this way of expression is in keeping with its nature’(para.308) such that,

[the] dream of the snake reveals a fragment of psychic activity that has nothing whatever to do with the dreamer as a modern individual . It functions at a deeper level,so to speak, and only the results of this activity rise up into the upper layer where therepressed affects lie, as foreign to them as a dream is to waking consciousness.

(para. 309; italics added)

Jung goes on to say that the heel symptom is therefore raising all the man’s life


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cultures, such that he can identify or participate in the pain of all humanity.‘The healing effect of this needs no proof’ (para. 316), Jung concludes.

However, it seems that Jung quickly passes over the possibility of the

paralysing snake image being the most apt way for the officer to express theparalysing effect on him of his own hysterical mother. It could be understoodas no more than this. Jung does note that such an ‘as if’ motif accords withthe metaphorical way of thinking encountered in primitive cultures. Somethingsimilar is probably going on here with the officer. The image is related to early(and thus more primitive) levels of psychic functioning corresponding to theman’s early experiences with his mother. Thus the mythic imagery is pointingto the ‘earlyness’ of the experience for him since early infant experience coincideswith a time when the psyche and the affects it experiences are ‘primitive’. In

fact, mythological motifs derived from the broader culture may be the best wayfor the unconscious to articulate deep and early trauma (as if it is coming fromanother world) rather than these motifs saying anything about an hypothesizedpart of the unconscious expressing itself mythically ‘in keeping with its nature’(para. 308), as Jung asserts.

It needs to be noted that there is still a difficulty here in explaining why thespecific snake imagery is constellated in the officer but the cultural context to dowith the Genesis story would seem relevant. My main point is that the officer’simagery does not have to be seen as arising spontaneously and autonomously

from some zone untouched by personal experience. It is possible to understandit as a way of expressing something ‘psychically primaeval’ having to do with theofficer’s early problems with an hysterical and paralysing mother from which weknow he is in later life endeavouring to effect a compensatory solution. So thedream reveals that the officer sees his mother as a Satan/serpent whose effectshave had a paralysing effect on his masculinity. Hence it is not necessarily thecase that the ‘content . . . probably derives from some deeper layer that cannotbe fathomed rationally’ (para. 306), as Jung puts it. Lack of clear rationallyunderstood connections is not sufficient reason for us either to give up on the

task or to resort to ‘autochthonous’ explanations. The imagery is perfectlyunderstandable in light of the material about his mother relationship andtherefore has everything to do with the dreamer as a modern individual. Indeed,the fact that the dream re-works the mythic image more than likely points to this,for the Genesis story tells of a bruising not a paralysing sting, and there mustbe some very personal reason why this is changed by the officer’s unconsciousto produce the paralysis image. There must be some psychic resonance betweenthis and his own personal dynamic.

So it would appear that the unconscious is using a metaphorical mythic image

because it is endeavouring to express deep early problems from a time whenthe psyche operated in such primary process images. Thus it may not be that an‘immemorial pattern’ of the human mind ‘which we have not acquired but have


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express the problem of the deep unconscious and unresolved affects it containsfrom actual early life experience. The point to consider is that whilst archetypesin Knox’s view can conceptually exist, they do not operate autonomously in

a way disconnected from subjective and developmental experience. Rather,archetypal imagery emerges from particular image schemas which have arisendevelopmentally from specific affective experiences of childhood. In the case of the army officer, it could be argued that an original image schema to do withan emotionally paralysing mother has been activated by the intense affectivityof the adult relationship breakdown. The biblical snake image has been pickedup from the broader culture so as to express the personal complex.

Jung does consider the possibility that the dream image of the paralysingsnake may be no more than a ‘concretized figure of speech’ (para. 311)

and concludes that his thesis really needs as proof ‘a case where themythological symbolism is neither a common figure of speech nor an instance of cryptomnesia’ (para. 311) to show that the ‘absolute unconscious’ has nothingto do with personal experience. It is here he turns to the ‘Solar phallus’ case.

Jung’s case of the solar phallus man

In ‘The structure of the psyche’, Jung (1931 / 1991) describes a maleschizophrenic patient at the Burgh ölzli Mental Hospital who in 1906 reported

a hallucination of the sun’s phallus, the moving of which caused the wind.Subsequently in 1910, Jung came across a book by Dieterich describing aliturgy of the ancient Mithraic cult which contained the same concept as theschizophrenic’s hallucination so that Jung concluded, ‘The vision of my patientin 1906, and the Greek text first edited in1910, should be sufficiently far apart torule out the possibility of cryptomnesia on his side and of thought-transferenceon mine’ (para. 319). Jung saw this as another example of the spontaneousoccurrence of an archetype, the image of the sun’s phallus producing the windhaving arisen autonomously in the patient from a deep archetypal layer of the

psyche.In Symbols of Transformation, Jung (1912 / 1986) says of this patient thathe ‘was a small business employee with no more than a secondary schooleducation. He grew up in Zurich, and by no stretch of imagination can Iconceive how he could have got hold of the idea of the solar phallus’ (para.223). However, Dieterich’s publication had a first edition in1903 prior to Jung’scontact with this schizophrenic patient in 1906. This fact is noted by the editorsof the Collected Works (Jung 1931 / 1991, para. 318n; 1936 / 1990: para. 105n)but since the patient had been committed prior to 1903, any concerns were

considered inconsequential. Nonetheless, Jung (1931 / 1991) discounts both thepossibility of this schizophrenic with a ‘mixture of intelligence’ having esotericinterests (as many schizophrenic people do) and the possibility of him being


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the spirit descending through the disc of the sun) in mediaeval paintings which Jung notes saying that this ‘conception is common to the whole of late classicaland medieval philosophy’ (para. 319) and elsewhere he says ‘[t]he association

of sun and wind frequently occurs in ancient symbolism’ (Jung 1936 / 1990,para. 107). Jung knows that there are no paintings like this in the man’s hometown of Zurich and that the patient had not travelled. The man did, however,work in a consulate through which many travellers would have passed. I donot believe that the possibility of actual contact with the material or of culturaltransmission can be entirely ruled out. As Rivers (1923) says on the issue of the cultural transmission of archetypes, ‘the possibility cannot be excluded thatthe common tradition reaches the individual in infancy, childhood and youththrough the intermediation of parents, nurses, schoolfellows, the overhearing

of chance conversations, and many other sources’ (p. 178).The possibility of the transmission of such a ‘common tradition’ makes thiscase too inconclusive to support Jung’s hypothesis that the archetypal imageryis divorced from personal experience.

Given this examination of the case examples of the army officer and thesolar-phallus man, I believe Jung’s evidence is too inconclusive to provethat archetypes arise autonomously and spontaneously. What is noteworthyis that the case of the army officer is just as easily explained using anemergent/developmental model of archetype (with the caveat that it is still

difficult to provide the linkages that explain why the officer’s particulararchetypal imagery has arisen).

Jung’s own experience

In relation to his unfolding ideas, it is not unreasonable to assume that Jungwas influenced by his own personal experience of archetypal imagery. Theencounter with Philemon is one personal experience of archetypal imagery that

Jung (1963 / 1990) describes in some detail in Memories, Dreams, Reflections.

He says,Philemon and other figures of my fantasies brought home to me the crucial insight thatthere are things in the psyche which I do not produce, but which produce themselvesand have their own life.

(p. 207; italics added)

Later, in elaborating on the contents of the unconscious he says,

It is not too difficult to personify them, as they always possess a certain degree of autonomy, a separate identity of their own. Their autonomy is a most uncomfortablething to reconcile oneself to . . .

(p. 211; italics added)

However Jung’s experience of the Philemon figure and the apparent autonomy


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the unconscious’ but which other commentators have described in terms of a psychotic episode (Winnicott 1964; Atwood & Stolorow 1977). Such asubjective context could not be insignificant in relation to the appearance of

the archetypal imagery. If Philemon had appeared to Jung without the contextof the split with Freud there may be more justification for Jung’s position onthe autonomy of archetypes.

The difficulty of explaining the specifics of any individual’s archetypalimagery needs to be noted again at this point. In this example, the similarity of the Philemon image to Freud has been noted by some commentators but it isnot a perfect correspondence.

Nonetheless, Jung’s experience could be just as easily read in terms of anemergent/developmental model of archetype like that of Knox. Again, personal

context is important to note in the sequence of events and affectivity is suggestedas being operative in the archetype’s constellation. The archetypal imagery wasactivated by the intense affectivity of Jung’s current subjective life experience todo with Freud. Presumably, the current experience was similar to a pre-existing‘internal working model’ around father-son transferences (see Smith 1997). Thearchetypal imagery has not arisen independently even though the particulars of the Philemon image need explaining.

Furthermore, an emergent/developmental model of archetype can helpexplain certain difficulties in the classical theory to do with the separation of

personal and collective psychic content and Jung’s apparent Lamarckianism.

The separation of personal and collective psychic content

Jung (1916 / 1990) did see a difficulty in separating personal and collectivepsychic content. In the context of assessing the needs of individuation he says,

This distinction [between the personal unconscious and the collective psyche] is farfrom easy, because the personal grows out of the collective psyche and is intimatelybound up with it. So it is difficult to say exactly what contents are to be called personaland what collective.

(para. [241]462)

Subsequent writers have also commented on the indivisibility of the collectiveand personal unconscious both conceptually (because experience makes themhard to separate) and in terms of clinical technique. Neumann (1955) makes thepoint by stating that the connection between archetypal manifestations and anindividual’s personal life experience ought to be possible theoretically but maynot be achievable practically. Satinover (1985) and Stein (1987) both conclude

from their own clinical work that the distinction between the collective andthe personal psyche is difficult to maintain in practice. (They also argue that asmuch as possible this distinction needs to be achieved clinically lest the patient


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What an emergent/developmental model suggests is that these statementsby both Jung and others may be reflecting a true state of affairs and notjust practical difficulties. If archetypes (image schemas) are ‘reliably repeated

early developmental achievements’ (Knox 2004, p. 9) and not present inany preformationist sense before experience, then they have arisen fromdevelopmental experience and this means there need be no division between acollective psyche and the personal unconscious. There would only be differentiallayers of unconsciousness depending on the age of a person when the mind/brainstructures became embedded through developmental experience. As such, Jung’sstatement above (‘the personal grows out of the collective psyche’) would needreversing to read – ‘the experience of something apparently collective grows outof the personal’.

An emergent/developmental model of archetype has the capacity to makeunderstandable other statements by Jung like the following from ‘Concerningthe archetypes, with special reference to the anima concept’:

The repr´ esentations collectives [archetypes] have a dominating power, so it is notsurprising that they are repressed with the most intense resistance. When repressed,they do not hide behind any trifling thing but behind ideas and figures that havealready become problematical for other reasons, and intensify and complicate theirdubious nature. For instance, everything that we would like, in infantile fashion, toattribute to our parents or blame them for is blown up to fantastic proportions fromthis secret source.

(Jung 1954 / 1990a, para. 130)

An emergent/developmental model of the archetype provides an explanationas to why the interaction between archetypal imagery and personal experiencewould be noted as occurring this way. The situation will appear like this notbecause archetypes are preformed in the psyche and operate autonomouslybut because early infant experience from which archetypal imagery is derived,is very affectively intense. In other words, archetypes are not hiding behindother difficulties and intensifying them, rather, the intense affects of earlyexperience are developing the archetypal template(s). Again, this would reversethe direction of Jung’s perspective such that we could say – problematicalmaterial arising from personal experience actually forms mind/brain structures(image schemas) which lead to both archetypal imagery and numinous affect.

Jung’s apparent Lamarckianism

A further difficulty in Jung’s archetypal theory which commentators havenoted has to do with an apparent Lamarckianism in the way he understood

archetypes to become structural components of the psyche. [Lamarckianism isthe discredited view in biology that acquired characteristics can be inherited].On this issue Stevens (1982) notes that Jung’s early concept of ‘primordial


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in ‘The structure of the psyche’ (Jung 1931 / 1991) and these seem to arise fromhis belief that ‘the unconscious . . . is the deposit of all human experience rightback to its remotest beginnings’ (para. 339). As example,

the daily course of the sun and the regular alternation of day and night must haveimprinted themselves on the psyche in the form of an image from primordial times . . . .[T]he physical process imprinted itself on the psyche in this fantastic, distorted formand was preserved there, so that the unconscious still reproduces similar images today.

(para. 328)

And at a later point,

The psychological conditions of the environment naturally leave similar mythicaltraces behind them. Dangerous situations, be they dangers to the body or to thesoul, arouse affect-laden fantasies, and, in so far as such situations typically repeat

themselves, they give rise to archetypes.(para. 334)

So in relation to an everyday phenomenon like the family, he goes on toconclude, ‘These ordinary everyday facts, which are eternally repeated , createthe mightiest archetypes of all’ (para. 336; italics added).

Overall, this would appear to be a Lamarckian explanation as to howarchetypes arise – situations of ‘danger’ evoke ‘affects’ which lead to ‘fantasies’,the multiple repetition of which over a long period of time leads to archetypesas structural components of the psyche which somehow become embedded in

the genome.1

However, if the emergent/developmental model of archetype is correct, thensuch statements as – ‘Dangerous situations . . . arouse affect-laden fantasies,and, in so far as such situations typically repeat themselves, they give riseto archetypes’ (para. 334) – become quite understandable at least at the levelof the infant’s psychic development. An emergent/developmental explanationwould be in accord with this statement whilst avoiding anything Lamarckian.Dangerous situations arouse affect, which gets bio-structurally templated asimage schemas leading to archetypal imagery as an emergent phenomenon.

Jung is right then in that dangerous situations, especially if repeated, can giverise to archetypes. However, this does not imply that these archetypes need getincorporated into the genome, for the process can remain as Knox (2004) says,‘a reliably repeated developmental achievement’ (p. 9).

Overall it can be seen that an emergent/developmental model of archetype likethat of Knox is in accord with Jung’s position on affectivity and environmentalconditions with respect to archetype expression. The model is also able toexplain his case examples and his own experience without recourse to innate,

1 Hogenson (2001) has considered this claim that Jung used a Lamarckian model of evolution to


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354 John Merchant

preformed psychic structures. This highlights the possibility that such a modelderived from contemporary neuroscience to which Jung had no access couldbe representing the true state of affairs and as a consequence, such a model

requires further consideration because of the implications which flow from it. Iwould like to offer the following questions for further discussion.

Questions arising from of an emergent/developmental model of archetype

Does an emergent/developmental model of the archetype implythe necessity of reductive analyses?

It has been previously noted that both Satinover (1985) and Stein (1987)

conclude from their own clinical work that the distinction between the collectiveand the personal psyche needs to be achieved clinically lest the patient succumbto ego-inflation. Similarly, the so-called ‘London School’ for many years hashighlighted the need to attend to personal material in analysis. Such a positionis strengthened by the developmental component in Knox’s model because thestarting point of the archetype-as-such (image schema) is personal affectiveexperience. Thus when (archetypal) imagery arises in analysis, it would beimportant to address the original infancy experiences which developmentallyproduced the underpinning image schema. It could be the case that an

emergent/developmental model of archetype indicates that reductive analysesare necessary (and may even be sufficient).

Does an emergent/developmental model of the archetype implythe necessity of a reductive analysis in training analyses?

The developmental component to Knox’s model would also imply that traininganalyses should be similarly reductive.

I believe it is even more critical for training analyses to be reductive becauseof the connection between early infantile states and the psychic porositiesassociated with countertransferential phenomena. This position is based on oneview of the somatic countertransference which sees it as a vector establishedbetween analyst and analysand because the analyst’s own pockets of early infantdamage have become activated by, and resonate with, that of their analysands. If such an explanation of somatic countertransference phenomena is correct, thenthe psychic porosities of the analyst-in-training need to be processed through areductive analysis so that they can be used as a means of communication about

their analysands’ dynamics. Without this, the analyst could easily succumb tothe associated ‘psychic infections’ to which Jung (1937 / 1993) alludes.For these reasons training analyses would need to be more than supervision


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Is the term ‘archetype’ helpful any longer?

Skar (2004) has previously alluded to the fact that we may no longer need theconcept of the archetype-as-such to explain the formation of complexes,

When we employ a dynamical systems view of development, we no longer needthe ‘archetype-as-such’ to explain the formation of complexes. In fact, we could dowithout it altogether and still have the same basic psychological system that Jung

proposed .(p. 247)

If contemporary neuroscience does ultimately reveal that the archetype-as-suchis not innate as originally conceived, then the question arises – is the word‘archetype’ itself too suffused with innatism and preformationism meanings to

prevent confusion?Most Jungians would not like to lose the term ‘archetype’ and neither Knoxnor Skar argue for it to be dropped. However, we have to face the possibilitythat this and the previous questions are not just esoteric theoretical arguments.They are fundamentally significant, for if we continue to think, act and clinicallypractise as if archetypes are a priori, innate psychic structures which determinepsychological life when this is not the case, then we could become irrelevant tothe broader psychotherapeutic community.

TRANSLATIONS OF ABSTRACT

L’article d ébute par un passage en revue des approches contemporaines de la th éoriedes arch étypes et met en évidence la nature radicale de certaines de leurs d éductions.Certaines affirment qu’il n’existe pas d’arch étype en tant qu’entit é pr éexistante au cœurde la formation des complexes, tandis que les d écouvertes des neurosciences remettent enquestion l’un des piliers de la th éorie classique, ` a savoir l’inn éit é. La discussion de Knoxsur les sch émas d’images soul` eve la question de savoir dans quelle mesure les arch étypespeuvent ˆ etre conçus dans une perspective pr éform ée.

La question est alors pos ée; jusqu’` a quel point la th éorie arch étypique classiquede Jung peut-elle ˆ etre lue ` a la lumi` ere de ces mod` eles actuels? Les exemples de casutilis és par Jung pour asseoir l’ évidence de l’existence des arch étypes, ses explicationsde la synchronicit é et sa propre exp érience de Phil émon sont r é évalu és. Il en ressortqu’il est difficile de prouver l’existence d’arch étypes autonomes ind épendammentd’exp ériences affectives personnelles. Non seulement de telles conclusions sont-ellesen concordance avec les mod` eles arch étypiques émergents-d éveloppementaux, maiselles expliquent de nombreuses affirmations contradictoires de Jung ` a propos desconstellations arch étypiques; sa difficult é ` a s éparer le contenu personnel et collectif ainsi que son apparent lamarckisme. Les implications de ces mod` eles dans la th éorie, la

pratique analytique et la formation des analystes sont mises en discussion.


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356 John Merchant

Einige argumentieren, daß es keinen ‘Archetyp an sich’ g äbe, keine vorgegebene Einheitim Kern eines Komplexes, der dessen Ausformung bestimmt, derweil die Erkenntnisseder Neurowissenschaften einen ganz bestimmten Gegenstand in Frage stellen, auf demdie klassische Theorie aufbaut – Angeborenheit. Knox’ Argumentation f ür Bildschemata

l äßt die Frage aufkommen, in welchem Ausmaß überhaupt Archetypen im Sinne vonpr äformierten Mustern aktiviert werden k önnen.

Des weiteren wird zur Debatte gestellt, in welchem Umfang Jungs klassische Theoriedes Archetypus im Licht jener gegenw ärtigen Modelle gelesen werden kann. Die von Jungherangezogenen Fallbeispiele zur Belegung der Existenz von Archetypen, seine Erkl ärungder Synchronizit ät und seine eigene Philemonerfahrung werden neu ausgewertet. Esergibt sich der Schluß, daß sich eine Beweisf ührung f ür die Existenz autonomerArchetypen ohne Bezug auf pers önliche affektive Erfahrung schwierig gestaltet. Diesw äre bei auf Auftauchen / Entwicklungsverlauf abgestellten Modellen des Archetypis-chen zu erwarten. Weitergehend w ären hier über viele der differenzierenden Aussagen

Jungs über archetypische Konstellationen zu erkl ären sowie die Schwierigkeiten bei derUnterscheidung von pers önlichem und kollektivem psychischen Inhalt als auch Jungsoffensichtlicher Lamarckismus. Die Implikationen dieser Modelle f ür Theorie, klinischePraxis und analytische Ausbildung werden zur Diskussion gestellt.

Questo lavoro inizia con una rivisitazione degli approcci contemporanei alla teoriadegli archetipi e sottolinea la natura radicale di certe deduzioni. Alcuni sostengono chenon esiste nessun ‘archetipo in quanto tale’ come entit ` a preesistente al centro di un

complesso e che guida la sua formazione, mentre le scoperte delle attuali neuroscienzechiamano in causa proprio una cosa su cui ` e costruita la teoria classica: l’innatismo. Leargomentazioni della Knox per gli schemi di immagine sollevano la questione del fino ache punto gli archetipi possano essere concepiti come preformazionali. Viene poi postoil quesito –fino a che punto la classica teoria di Jung sull’archetipo pu ` o essere letta allaluce di questi modelli correnti?

Vengono ripresi gli esempi clinici che Jung usa per mettere in evidenza l’esistenza degliarchetipi, la sua spiegazione della sincronicit ` a e la sua stessa esperienza di Philemon. Sigiunge alla conclusione che ` e difficile dimostrare l’esistenza di archetipi autonomi non inrelazione con le esperienze affettive personali. Non solo ` e questo che ci si aspetterebbe dai

modelli emergenti di sviluppo dell’archetipo, ma ci ` o pu ` o spiegare molte delle asserzionicontraddittorie di Jung sulla costellazione dell’archetipo.; le difficolt ` a nel tenere separaticontenuti psichici personali e collettivi e l’apparente lamarkismo di Jung. Vengono poipresentate per la discussione le implicazioni che questi modelli hanno per la teoria, perla pratica clinica e per la formazione dell’analista.

Este trabajo comienza con una visi ón general de los enfoques contempor áneos a lateor ı́a del arquetipo y hace notar la naturaleza radical de ciertas deducciones. Algunosdiscuten que no hay ‘arquetipo-per-se’ como una entidad que preexiste en el centro de un

complejo el cual conduce a su formaci ón mientras, las conclusiones de la neurocienciaactual ponen en duda la esencia sobre la cual se ha elaborado la teor ı́a cl ásica– Innatismo.

l d b l d l l l d


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Se establece entonces la pregunta—¿hasta qu é punto puede la teor ı́a cl ásica de Jungde los arquetipo es le ı́da a la luz de estos modelos actuales? Son reevaluadas losejemplos de caso usados por Jung para evidenciar la existencia de los arquetipos, susexplicaciones sobre la sincronicidad y su propia experiencia de Philemon. Se describe

como conclusi ón que es dif ı́cil evidenciar la existencia de arquetipos aut ónomos norelacionados a la experiencia afectiva personal. No solo puede ser esperado lo anterioren los modelos emergentes/de desarrollo del arquetipo sino que pueden explicar muchasde las declaraciones disyuntivas de Jung acerca de las constelaciones arquetipales; lasdificultades de Jung para separar los contenidos ps ı́quicos colectivos y personales y suaparente Lamarckanismo. Se ofrecen para la discusi ón las implicaciones de estos modelospara la teor ı́a, pr áctica cl ı́nica y el entrenamiento anal ı́tico.

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A Reapraissal of Archetype Theory

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