Emma Jung

After his near-death experience, Jung was able to reflect on his visions, and also use his insights to inform his understanding of mystical states. A good many of his main works were written after this. He writes: ‘the vision of the end of all things, gave me the courage to undertake new formulations’.

Jung says that another change after this religious experience was an affirmation of all things as they are. He describes this as an:

‘unconditional “yes” to that which is, without subjective protests – acceptance of the conditions of existence as I see them and understand them, acceptance of my own nature, as I happen to be.’

Before the religious near-death experience he writes that he might have blamed himself for the accident with his foot, and the heart attack, as if he were responsible, but, instead, he came to the realization that in following the path of individuation – becoming the person one is meant to be – then mistakes have to be taken as part of this process; life wouldn’t be complete without them.

‘There is no guarantee – not for a single moment – that we will not fall into error or stumble into deadly peril. We may think there is a sure road. But that would be the road of death. Then nothing happens any longer – at any rate, not the right things. Anyone who takes the sure road is as good as dead.

It was only after the illness that I understood how important it is to affirm one’s own destiny. In this way we forge an ego that does not break down when incomprehensible things happen; an ego that endures, that endures the truth, and that is capable of coping with the world and with fate. Then, to experience defeat is also to experience victory … one’s own continuity has withstood the current of life and of time.’

Jung also describes a transcendent vision following the death of his wife Emma:

‘She stood at some distance from me, looking at me squarely. She was in her prime, perhaps about thirty, and wearing the dress which had been made for her by my cousin the medium. It was perhaps the most beautiful thing she had ever worn. Her expression was neither joyful nor sad, but rather objectively wise and understanding, without the slightest emotional reaction, as though she were beyond the mists of affects. I knew that it was not she, but a portrait she had made or commissioned for me. It contained the beginning of our relationship, the events of fifty-three years of marriage, and the end of her life also. Face to face with such wholeness one remains speechless, for it can scarcely be comprehended.’

About a year after Emma’s  death, Jung dreamt of his wife – an experience he describes as giving him insight into the evolution of the soul after death.

He awoke and knew that he had been with Emma in the South of France and had spent an entire day with her. She was engaged on studies of the Grail. This seemed significant to Jung, as Emma had died before completing her work on this subject. Self-analysis he says revealed nothing of interest to do with himself, so he felt that the message that Emma ‘was continuing after death to work on her further spiritual development – however that may be conceived – struck me as meaningful and held a measure of reassurance for me.’