The Secret of the Golden Flower: A Chinese Book of Life

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a b c d e f g h i j k l m Zhu, Caifang Jeremy (September 2009). "Analytical psychology and Daoist inner alchemy: a response to C.G. Jung's 'Commentary on The Secret of the Golden Flower' " (PDF). Journal of Analytical Psychology. 54 (4): 493–511. doi: 10.1111/j.1468-5922.2009.01799.x. PMID 19765138. S2CID 30771486 . Retrieved 2022-09-10. In Memories, Dreams, Reflections Jung states that “light on the nature of alchemy began to come to me only after I had read the text of the Golden Flower.”

Less abstract than yin and yang are the concepts of the creative and the receptive (Ch’ien and K’un) that originate in the Book of Changes [I Ching], and are symbolized by Heaven and Earth. My physiology changed. My blood pressure dropped. I slept through the night. I was no longer hungry all the time. I started eating better. I was motivated to be more physically active.At this point, many of our readers may have questions. What kind of alchemy/meditation should I do to achieve that Light described in The Secret of the Golden Flower? The answer is simple, but requires great dedication, practice, and willpower: we must learn how to calm our mind to open our heart. The version that Wilhelm used for his German translation had eight chapters. According to Catherine Despeux and Livia Kohn, this edition was that of a "Supplement to the Taoist Canon" from 1834. Thomas Cleary (1991) used a different 13-chapter version, which he translated into English directly from Chinese. The five chapters missing from Wilhelm's translation are very short. According to Mori Yuria, it is possible that the prototype had 20 chapters, which would have been reduced to 13 by Shao Zhilin because they were considered redundant or less organized. [1] Instead of these being dissipated, they have made within the inner rotation of monad a center of life which is independent of bodily existence. That which remains as a substratum when no feelings are being expressed, but which lingers, so to speak, in a transcendental super-consciousness condition, is essence (hsing). From this tension or paradox, the golden light is created. This is a precious commodity; one might say it is our very life force. Typically, it is spent in pursuit of the want or what the Buddhists call the ten thousand things.

Although Jung credited The Secret of the Golden Flower with having clarified his own work on the unconscious, he maintained serious reservations about the practice taught in the book. What Jung did not know was that the text he was reading in fact was a garbled translation of a truncated version of a corrupted recension of the original work. Well bear in mind that any answer is reductive, it is a truth that needs to be experienced rather than spoken about. However, I would put it this way- from the fire that is your desire, when properly contained, a phoenix rises. A new you is born: stronger and more refined. Your subtle body is created. Despite the varieties of impressions, interpretations and opinions expressed by translators, the meditation technique described by The Secret of the Golden Flower is a straightforward, silent method; the book's description of meditation has been characterized as " Zen with details". The meditation technique, set forth in poetic language, reduces to a formula of sitting, breathing, and contemplating. [10] Thus the illusion is robbed of its strength. An inner, ascending circulation of forces takes place. And even for those that the fire burns very brightly an intelligence is required to see the process through that God or nature does not seem to bestow in equal measure to all.It is difficult to put into words what I learnt. I am going to try though, but I ask you to bear in mind that the map is not the territory. It is really my purpose to push aside without mercy the metaphysical claims of all esoteric teaching; the secret objective of gaining power through words ill accords with our profound ignorance - which we should have the modesty to confess. It is my firm intention to bring things which have a metaphysical sound into the daylight of psychological understanding, and to do my best to prevent the public from believing in obscure words of power.” pg. 128

Taoist alchemical text attributed to Lü Dongbin of the late Tang dynasty. The publication referred to in this post is the version translated from the Chinese by Richard Wilhelm with commentary by C. G. Jung, translated into English by C. F. Baynes, published in 1931, revised and republished in 1962. And here was Jung suggesting that this whole process could and possibly should be understood psychologically and symbolically! God damn-it that was irritating! I want to share a story with you about The Secret of the Golden Flower. [1] How I came across it, the journey it took me on and something of what I learnt along the way. Chang, Chung-Yuan (1956). "Self-Realization and the Inner Process of Peace". In Fröbe-Kapteyn (ed.). Eranos Annales (in German) (Olgaed.). Rhein-Verlag. p.429. During this time, at a point where my training was at its zenith, I had occasion to visit an antiquarian book store in the centre of Johannesburg. The bookstore was spellbinding. Small and hidden away with towering shelves, placed too close to one another, laden with the most fascinating books. Well fascinating that is, if your interests were of a Gnostic and mystical bent. Mine were, and I spent hours going through books I had not come across before.At least the anima will do this to the extent that the intellect directs itself outward, whereby the powers both of animus and anima leak away and life consumes itself.