Carl Jung on Prayer. Anthology
Divine grace is not, so to speak, conjured up, the priest does not make a sort of magic incantation in the prayer of consecration to compel the intervention of divine grace; but the Mass itself is a divine intervention, of which man should become aware. ~Carl Jung, ETH, Lecture XIII, Page 110.
The well-known sentence in the Lord’s Prayer, “Deliver us from evil”, meant, as it was first understood, deliver us from the evil principle of the Heimarmene. ~Carl Jung, ETH, Alchemy, Page 225.
The prayer or mantra which is repeated while they walk round these stupas is “om mani padme hum”. Om is a primeval sound, you find it in every culture which is still growing on its original foundations, and we ourselves make the same sound to express natural pleasure, we m-m about food , for instance. ~Carl Jung, ETH Lecture 2Dec1938, Page 36.
Great is the need of the dead. But the God needs no sacrificial prayer. He has neither goodwill nor ill will. He is kind and fearful, though not actually so, but only seems to you thus. But the dead hear your prayers since they are still of human nature and not free of goodwill and ill will. ~Unknown woman to Carl Jung, Liber Novus, Page 339.
Man’s relationship to God probably has to undergo a certain important change: Instead of the propitiating praise to an unpredictable king or the child’s prayer to a loving father, the responsible living and fulfilling of the divine love in us will be our form of worship of, and commerce with, God.
We continually pray that “this cup may pass from us” and not harm us. Even Christ did so, but without success. . . . We might. . . discover, among other things, that in every feature Christ’s life is a prototype of individuation and hence cannot be imitated: one can only live one’s own life totally in the same way with all the consequences this entails. ~Carl Jung, Letters Vol. II, Pages 76-77.
Misery does not always teach prayer by any means but far more often cursing, violence, and criminality. ~Carl Jung, Letters Vol. 1, Pages 216-217.
The universal hero myth always refers to a powerful man or god-man who vanquishes evil in the form of dragons, serpents, monsters, demons, and so on, and who liberates his people from destruction and death. The narration or ritual repetition of sacred texts and ceremonies, and the worship of such a figure with dances, music, hymns, prayers, and sacrifices, grip the audience with numinous emotions and exalt the individual to an identification with the hero. ~Carl Jung; Man and His Symbols; Page 68.
Letters of C. G. Jung: Volume I, 1906-1950 (Vol 1)
Anonymous
Dear N., Bollingen, 3 August 1953
Hearty thanks for your kind birthday wishes!
Unfortunately I can’t remember here in Bollingen what you sent me.
There was such a flood of letters, flowers, and things pouring in on me that I can remember absolutely nothing except your letter with its main point, the question of prayer.
This was and still is a problem for me.
Some years ago I felt that all demands which go beyond what is are unjustified and infantile, so that we shouldn’t ask for anything that is not granted.
We can’t remind God of anything or prescribe anything for him, except when he tries to force something on us that our human limitation cannot endure.
The question is, of course, whether such things happen.
I think the answer is yes, for if God needs us as regulators of his incarnation and his coming to consciousness, it is because in his boundlessness he exceeds all the bounds that are necessary for becoming conscious.
Becoming conscious means continual renunciation because it is an ever-deepening concentration.
If this is right, then it may be that God has to be “reminded.”
The innermost self of every man and animal, of plants and crystals, is God, but infinitely diminished and approximated to his ultimate individual form.
In approximating to man he is also “personal,” like an antique god, and hence “in the likeness of a man”
(as Yahweh appeared to Ezekiel).
An old alchemist formulated the relation to God thus: “Help me, that I may help you! ”
With cordial greetings,
C.G. Jung ~Carl Jung, Letters Vol. II, Page 120.