Synopsis of The Idea of the Numinous
Questions of soul and spirit are increasingly being raised in connection with the scientific exploration of the psyche, and especially in the context of psychotherapy. The contributors to this volume are interested in exploring the numinous in the human psyche, in clinical work, world events, anthropology, sociology, philosophy and the humanities. They originate from multi-disciplinary and multi-cultural backgrounds, bringing a variety of approaches to subjects including: Witchcraft: the numinous power of humans; Jung and Derrida: the numinous, deconstruction and myth; Accessing the numinous: Apolline and Dionysian pathways; The role of the numinous in the reception of Jung. "The Idea of the Numinous" will fascinate all analytical psychologists, psychoanalysts and psychotherapists interested in investigating the overlap between therapeutic and religious interests.
The idea of the numinous is often raised in psychoanalytic and psychodynamic contexts, but it is rarely itself subjected to close scrutiny. This volume examines how the numinous has gained currency in the post-modern world, demonstrating how the numinous is no longer confined to religious discourses but is included in humanist, secular and scientific views of the world.
Contents
Foreword by James Grotstein
- Sonu Shamdasani, Psychologies as Ontology-making practices: William James and the Pluralities of Psychological Experience.
- Ann Casement, Witchcraft: The numinous Power of Humans.
- Murray Stein, On the Importance of Numinous Experience in the Alchemy of Individuation.
- Lionel Corbett, Varieties of Numinous Experience: the Experience of the Sacred in the Therapeutic Process.
- Mark Kuras, Numinosity/Femininity.
- Jorge L. Ahumada, Vagaries of Numinous Experience: Two Questions to George Steiner.
- Susan Rowland, Jung and Derrida: The Numinous, Deconstruction and Myth.
- Paul Bishop, The Idea of the Numinous in Goethe and Jung.
- Giorgio Giaccardi, Accessing the Numinous: Apolline and Dionysian Pathways.
- Roderick Main, Numinosity and Terror: Jung’s Psychological Revision of Otto as an Aid to Engaging Religious Fundamentalism.
- John Dourley, Rerooting in the Mother: The Numinosity of the Night. Kawai,
- The Experience of the Numinous Today: From the Novels of Haruki Murakami.
- Lucy Huskinson, Holy, Holy, Holy: The Misappropriation of the Numinous in Jung.
- David Tacey, The Role of the Numinous in the Reception of Jung.