Phanes: Completion is poverty. But poverty is means gratitude.
This way shall lead out into the land of men, an assignment.
The mystery of the summer morning, the happy day, the completion of the moment, the fullness of the possible, born from suffering and joy, the treasure of eternal beauty, the goal of the 4 paths, the spring and the ocean of the 4 streams, the fulfilment of the 4 sufferings and of the 4 joys, father and mother of the Gods of the 4 winds, crucifixion, burial, resurrection, and man’s divine enhancement, highest effect and non-being, world and seed,
eternity and rime instance, poverty and abundance, expansion, death and the rebirth of God, borne by eternally creative force, resplendent in eternal effect, loved by the two mothers and sisterly wives, ineffable pain-ridden bliss, unknowable, unrecognizable, a hair’s breadth between life and death, a river of worlds, canopying the heavens-I give you the love of men, the opal jug of water; he pours water and wine and milk and blood, food for men and Gods.
I give you the joy of suffering and suffering of joy. I give you what has been found: the constancy in change and the change in constancy. The jug made of stone, the vessel of completion.
Water flowed in, wine flowed in, milk flowed in, blood flowed in.
The four winds precipitated into the precious vessel.
The Gods of the four heavenly realms hold its curvature, both the mothers and both the two fathers guard it, the fire of the North burns above its mouth, the serpent of the South encircles its bottom, the spirit of the East holds one of its sides and the spirit of the West its other side.
Forever denied, it exists forever.
Recurring in all forms, forever the same, this one precious vessel, surrounded by the circle of animals, denying itself, and arising in new splendor through its self-denial.
The heart of God and of man. It is the One and Many.
A path leading across mountains and valleys, a guiding star on the ocean, in you and always ahead of you.
Completed, indeed truly completed is he who knows this. Completion is poverty. But poverty is means gratitude. Gratitude is love. ~Phanes, The Black Books, Vol. VII, Page 192-193
It is not easy to reach utmost poverty and simplicity.
To the Mother Prioress of a Contemplative Order
Rev. Mother Prioress, September 1959
I hope you will forgive the long delay of my answer to your kind letter of July 24.
It came at a time when I was very tired and ever since I was waiting for a propitious moment.
I am very old and there are too many people who want to see me.
I am very grateful for the spiritual help you extend to me.
I am in need of it with this gigantic misunderstanding which surrounds me.
All the riches I seem to possess are also my poverty, my Lonesomeness in the world. The more I seem to possess, the more I stand to lose, when I get ready to approach the dark gate.
I did not seek my life with its failures and accomplishments.
It came on me with a power not my own.
Whatever I have acquired serves a purpose I have not foreseen.
Everything has to be shed and nothing remains my own.
I quite agree with you: it is not easy to reach utmost poverty and simplicity.
But it meets you, unbidden, on the way to the end of this existence.
I am glad that you gave me some news about Father White’s activity.
Thus I know that he does not fully disapprove of my work.
I have heard of his terrible accident.
But I have no news since and I would be very grateful if I had some further information of his state of health.
I thank you for the unasked-for kindness of your letter.
There is so much evil and bitterness in this world that one cannot be too grateful for the one good thing which happens from time to time.
Yours devotedly,
C.G. Jung Carl Jung, Leers Vol. II, Page 516
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