Aurora Consurgens

In the supplementary volume to the two volumes of "Mysterium Coniunctionis" Jung's student Marie-Louise von Franz edits and comments on a rare alchemical text from the Middle Ages, which conveys a vivid view of the processes described by C.G. Jung and at the same time shows how the alchemical symbol tradition serves to express more unconsciously seen than consciously thought soul contents. Alchemy offered a man, who did not know the unconscious as a concept, but experienced its reality, a possibility to deal with this mysterious inner power. The text is less significant in the history of chemistry than "philosophically" and shows how the images of Christian mysticism interpenetrate with those of alchemy. The analysis of the text, starting from its content, revealed that it depicts a break-in experience of the unconscious, which led to a delirious state of the author, which can be compared with states as they are empirically observable in people who are close to death. Since history records that Thomas Aquinas died in a trance state and interpreted the Song of Songs in this state beforehand, and since the Aurora ends with a Song of Songs paraphrase, the handwritten attribution of the text to St. Thomas had to be examined more closely. The not uninteresting results were presented at the end of the book. Apart from this, the commentary on the text shows how C.G. Jung's psychology can serve as a key to unlocking the meaning of a chaotically incomprehensible text. What is probably most significant about this text is the gradual emergence of a God-human anthropos figure, which symbolizes the becoming whole of the soul and the goal of the individuation process.