Jung's Aion

Carl Jung wrote:AION



RESEARCHES INTO THE PHENOMENOLOGY
OF THE SELF



These things came to pass, they say, that Jesus
might be made the first sacrifice in the discrim-
ination of composite natures.

Hippolytus, Elenchos, VII, 27, 8



THE EGO

Investigation of the psychology of the unconscious con-
fronted me with facts which required the formulation of new
concepts. One of these concepts is the self. The entity so denoted
is not meant to take the place of the one that has always been
known as the ego, but includes it in a supraordinate concept.
We understand the ego as the complex factor to which all con-
scious contents are related. It forms, as it were, the centre of the
field of consciousness; and, in so far as this comprises the em-
pirical personality, the ego is the subject of all personal acts of
consciousness. The relation of a psychic content to the ego forms
the criterion of its consciousness, for no content can be con-
scious unless it is represented to a subject.

With this definition we have described and delimited the
scope of the subject. Theoretically, no limits can be set to the
field of consciousness, since it is capable of indefinite extension.
Empirically, however, it always finds its limit when it comes up
against the unknown. This consists of everything we do not
know, which, therefore, is not related to the ego as the centre
of the field of consciousness. The unknown falls into two groups
of objects: those which are outside and can be experienced by
the senses, and those which are inside and are experienced im-
mediately. The first group comprises the unknown in the outer
world; the second the unknown in the inner world. We call this
latter territory the unconscious.