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Rubedo
Rubedo is a Latin word meaning "redness" that was adopted by alchemists to define the fourth and final major stage in their magnum opus. Both gold and the philosopher's stone were associated with the color red, as rubedo signaled alchemical success, and the end of the great work. Rubedo is also known by the Greek word ''iosis''. Interpretation The three alchemical stages preceding rubedo were nigredo (blackness), which represented putrefaction and spiritual death; albedo (whiteness), which represented purification; and citrinitas (yellowness), the solar dawn or awakening. Some sources describe the alchemical process as three-phased with citrinitas serving as mere extension and takes place between albedo and rubedo. The rubedo stage entails the attempt of the alchemist to integrate the psychospiritual outcomes of the process into a coherent sense of self before its re-entry to the world. The stage can take some time or years to complete due to the required synthesis and substantia ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Alchemists
Alchemy (from Arabic: ''al-kīmiyā''; from Ancient Greek: χυμεία, ''khumeía'') is an ancient branch of natural philosophy, a philosophical and protoscientific tradition that was historically practiced in China, India, the Muslim world, and Europe. In its Western form, alchemy is first attested in a number of pseudepigraphical texts written in Greco-Roman Egypt during the first few centuries AD.Principe, Lawrence M. The secrets of alchemy'. University of Chicago Press, 2012, pp. 9–14. Alchemists attempted to purify, mature, and perfect certain materials. Common aims were chrysopoeia, the transmutation of "base metals" (e.g., lead) into "noble metals" (particularly gold); the creation of an elixir of immortality; and the creation of panaceas able to cure any disease. The perfection of the human body and soul was thought to result from the alchemical ''magnum opus'' ("Great Work"). The concept of creating the philosophers' stone was variously connected with all of th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Magnum Opus (alchemy)
The Great Work (Latin: ''Magnum opus'') is an alchemical term for the process of working with the prima materia to create the philosopher's stone. It has been used to describe personal and spiritual transmutation in the Hermetic tradition, attached to laboratory processes and chemical color changes, used as a model for the individuation process, and as a device in art and literature. The magnum opus has been carried forward in New Age and neo-Hermetic movements which sometimes attached new symbolism and significance to the processes. The original process philosophy has four stages: *'' nigredo'', the blackening or melanosis *''albedo'', the whitening or leucosis *'' citrinitas'', the yellowing or xanthosis *'' rubedo'', the reddening, purpling, or iosis The origin of these four phases can be traced at least as far back as the first century. Zosimus of Panopolis wrote that it was known to Mary the Jewess. The development of black, white, yellow, and red can also be found in ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Albedo (alchemy)
In alchemy, albedo is the second of the four major stages of the Magnum Opus, along with nigredo, citrinitas and rubedo. It is a Latinicized term meaning "whiteness". Following the chaos or ''massa confusa'' of the nigredo stage, the alchemist undertakes a purification in albedo, which is literally referred to as ''ablutio'' – the washing away of impurities. This phase is concerned with "bringing light and clarity to the prima materia (the First Matter)". In this process, the subject is divided into two opposing principles to be later coagulated to form a unity of opposites or ''coincidentia oppositorum'' during rubedo. Alchemists also applied it to an individual's soul after the first phase is completed, which entailed the decay of matter. In Medieval literature, which developed an intricate system of images and symbols for alchemy, the dove often represented this stage while the raven symbolized nigredo. Titus Burckhardt interprets the albedo as the end of the lesser w ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Citrinitas
Citrinitas, or sometimes xanthosis,Joseph Needham. ''Science & Civilisation in China: Chemistry and chemical technology. Spagyrical discovery and invention : magisteries of gold and immortality.'' Cambridge. 1974. p.23 is a term given by alchemists to "yellowness." It is one of the four major stages of the alchemical magnum opus. In alchemical philosophy, citrinitas stood for the dawning of the "solar light" inherent in one's being, and that the reflective "lunar or soul light" was no longer necessary. The other three alchemical stages were nigredo (blackness), albedo (whiteness), and rubedo (redness). Psychologist Carl Jung is credited with interpreting the alchemical process as analogous to modern-day psychoanalysis. In the Jungian archetypal schema, nigredo is the Shadow; albedo refers to the anima and animus (contrasexual soul images); citrinitas is the wise old man (or woman) archetype; and rubedo is the Self archetype which has achieved wholeness. References *Nigel Hamil ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Philosopher's Stone
The philosopher's stone or more properly philosophers' stone (Arabic: حجر الفلاسفة, , la, lapis philosophorum), is a mythic alchemical substance capable of turning base metals such as mercury into gold (, from the Greek , "gold", and , "to make") or silver. It is also called the elixir of life, useful for rejuvenation and for achieving immortality; for many centuries, it was the most sought-after goal in alchemy. The philosopher's stone was the central symbol of the mystical terminology of alchemy, symbolizing perfection at its finest, enlightenment, and heavenly bliss. Efforts to discover the philosopher's stone were known as the Magnum Opus ("Great Work"). History Antiquity The earliest known written mention of the philosopher's stone is in the ''Cheirokmeta'' by Zosimos of Panopolis (c. 300 AD). Alchemical writers assign a longer history. Elias Ashmole and the anonymous author of ''Gloria Mundi'' (1620) claim that its history goes back to Adam, who acquired ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Nigredo
In alchemy, nigredo, or blackness, means putrefaction or decomposition. Many alchemists believed that as a first step in the pathway to the philosopher's stone, all alchemical ingredients had to be cleansed and cooked extensively to a uniform black matter. In analytical psychology, the term became a metaphor for "the dark night of the soul, when an individual confronts the shadow within." Jung For Carl Jung, "the rediscovery of the principles of alchemy came to be an important part of my work as a pioneer of psychology". As a student of alchemy, he (and his followers) "compared the 'black work' of the alchemists (the nigredo) with the often highly critical involvement experienced by the ego, until it accepts the new equilibrium brought about by the creation of the self." Jungians interpreted nigredo in two main psychological senses. The first sense represented a subject's initial state of undifferentiated unawareness, "the first nigredo, that of the ''unio naturalis'', is an obje ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Latin
Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the Roman Republic it became the dominant language in the Italian region and subsequently throughout the Roman Empire. Even after the fall of Western Rome, Latin remained the common language of international communication, science, scholarship and academia in Europe until well into the 18th century, when other regional vernaculars (including its own descendants, the Romance languages) supplanted it in common academic and political usage, and it eventually became a dead language in the modern linguistic definition. Latin is a highly inflected language, with three distinct genders (masculine, feminine, and neuter), six or seven noun cases (nominative, accusative, genitive, dative, ablative, and vocative), five declensions, four ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Individuation
The principle of individuation, or ', describes the manner in which a thing is identified as distinct from other things. The concept appears in numerous fields and is encountered in works of Leibniz, Carl Gustav Jung, Gunther Anders, Gilbert Simondon, Bernard Stiegler, Friedrich Nietzsche, Arthur Schopenhauer, David Bohm, Henri Bergson, Gilles Deleuze, and Manuel De Landa. Usage The word ''individuation'' occurs with different meanings and connotations in different fields. In philosophy Philosophically, "individuation" expresses the general idea of how a thing is identified as an individual thing that "is not something else". This includes how an individual person is held to be different from other elements in the world and how a person is distinct from other persons. By the seventeenth century, philosophers began to associate the question of individuation or what brings about individuality at any one time with the question of identity or what constitutes sameness at differ ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Psychology And Alchemy
''Psychology and Alchemy'', volume 12 in ''The Collected Works of C. G. Jung'', is Carl Jung's study of the analogies between alchemy, Christian dogma, and psychological symbolism. Alchemy is central to Jung's hypothesis of the collective unconscious. This book begins with an outline of the process and aims of psychotherapy as seen by Jung. It then moves on to work out the analogies mentioned above and his own understanding of the analytic process. Jung reminds us of the dual nature of alchemy, comprising both the chemical process and a parallel mystical component. He also discusses the seemingly deliberate mystification of the alchemists. Finally, in using the alchemical process to provide insights into individuation, Jung emphasises the importance of alchemy in relating to us the transcendent nature of the psyche. Detailed abstracts of each chapter are available online. Overview In this book, Jung argues for a reevaluation of the symbolism of Alchemy as being intimately r ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Archetype
The concept of an archetype (; ) appears in areas relating to behavior, historical psychology, and literary analysis. An archetype can be any of the following: # a statement, pattern of behavior, prototype, "first" form, or a main model that other statements, patterns of behavior, and objects copy, emulate, or "merge" into. Informal synonyms frequently used for this definition include "standard example", "basic example", and the longer-form "archetypal example"; mathematical archetypes often appear as " canonical examples". # the Platonic concept of ''pure form'', believed to embody the fundamental characteristics of a thing. # a collectively-inherited unconscious idea, a pattern of thought, image, etc., that is universally present, in individual psyches, as in Jungian psychology # a constantly-recurring symbol or motif in literature, painting, or mythology. This definition refers to the recurrence of characters or ideas sharing similar traits throughout various, seemingly ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Self In Jungian Psychology
The Self in Jungian psychology is a dynamic concept which has undergone numerous modifications since it was first conceptualised as one of the '' Jungian archetypes''. Historically, the Self, according to Carl Jung, signifies the unification of consciousness and unconsciousness in a person, and representing the psyche as a whole. It is realized as the product of individuation, which in his view is the process of integrating various aspects of one's personality. For Jung, the Self is an encompassing whole which acts as a container. It could be symbolized by a circle, a square, or a mandala. Two center hypothesis The idea that there are two centers of the personality distinguished Jungian psychology at one time. The ego has been seen as the center of consciousness, whereas the Self is defined as the center of the total personality, which includes consciousness, the unconscious, and the ego; the Self is both the whole and the center. While the ego is a self-contained center of t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Rose
A rose is either a woody perennial flowering plant of the genus ''Rosa'' (), in the family Rosaceae (), or the flower it bears. There are over three hundred species and tens of thousands of cultivars. They form a group of plants that can be erect shrubs, climbing, or trailing, with stems that are often armed with sharp prickles. Their flowers vary in size and shape and are usually large and showy, in colours ranging from white through yellows and reds. Most species are native to Asia, with smaller numbers native to Europe, North America, and northwestern Africa. Species, cultivars and hybrids are all widely grown for their beauty and often are fragrant. Roses have acquired cultural significance in many societies. Rose plants range in size from compact, miniature roses, to climbers that can reach seven meters in height. Different species hybridize easily, and this has been used in the development of the wide range of garden roses. Etymology The name ''rose'' comes from ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
