War vs. Peace

War vs. Peace = EROS vs AGAPE love and the powerlessness of the Church

After apparently being donated to Goodwill, I made a discovery for a little over a dollar. A book by Bruno Bettelheim (Freud’s Vienna and other Essays), gave me insight to a long puzzling riddle of myself and of Carl Jung.

Carl Jung had my interest and or disdain for some time due to 1. His spiritual view of the psyche 2. His spiritual view to the control of addictions 3. His Aryan views which I thought led despots to their Aryan superiority myths. The book was actually like a little key to a large room that housed many interesting people including myself. It was with the writings of Bettelheim that Carl Jung was made human and therefore could be prayed for.

First of all I never understood why he and Freud could ever have altercations. How could anyone disagree with a theory that made so much sense. In the chapter “a Secret Asymmetry” there appears to be a little lady named Sabrina Spielrien that had seen Jung as his first psychoanalytic patient. In the course of her treatment she was cured of her unusual behavior but fell in love with Jung. In the process, Jung rejected her and this is how Freud got involved. His common bond of Jewish ancestry put him at odds to Jung’s Aryan views which were once thought to be a potential panacea by Freud. Letters, dissertations to and with the help of Freud and Jung helped to develop modern psychoanalytic theory. We have much to owe to this lady and the pain that she went through because of her reaction to Jung’s rejection and how she handled it.

Ms. Speilrien delivered much insight into destructiveness verses creativity in the subconscious in her writings according to Freud and the author. Just the consideration of them being a part of a single consciousness is quite a feat. I would like to read her writings or in my imaginative power write a screenplay about her. There appears to be a hint of the consumption of the forbidden fruit and subsequent duality of thought which leads to aberrant behavior which is unmasked by a variety of conditions including alcoholism, infections, convulsions , hypertension and stress.

Nevertheless, what is certain is that there is a connection to what I would consider the wars that take place internally and externally mentioned in Galations 5:16-17 and respectively in Ephesians 6:12. These wars are between instinctually driven motives for self verses Spiritual pursuits such as love of self , neighbor and love of God and law. Without the Word of God and the constant self discipline of reading and submission to His will, there is no possibility of this higher cortical function of love. The individual will have a tendency to destruct self, neighbor and anything that represents God.

The writings of Paul including the 4th chapter of I Thessalonians give us insight into Paul’s concern for this dichotomy as he states.

3 It is God's will that you should be sanctified: that you should avoid sexual immorality; 4that each of you should learn to control his own body in a way that is holy and honorable, 5not in passionate lust like the heathen, who do not know God; 6 and that in this matter no one should wrong his brother or take advantage of him. The Lord will punish men for all such sins, as we have already told you and warned you. 7 For God did not call us to be impure, but to live a holy life. 8 Therefore, he who rejects this instruction does not reject man but God, who gives you his Holy Spirit.
9 Now about brotherly love we do not need to write to you, for you yourselves have been taught by God to love each other. 10 And in fact, you do love all the brothers throughout Macedonia. Yet we urge you, brothers, to do so more and more.
And in the book of James chapter 4
1 What causes fights and quarrels among you? Don't they come from your desires that battle within you? 2 You want something but don't get it. You kill and covet, but you cannot have what you want. You quarrel and fight. You do not have, because you do not ask God. 3 When you ask, you do not receive, because you ask with wrong motives, that you may spend what you get on your pleasures.
4 You adulterous people, don't you know that friendship with the world is hatred toward God? Anyone who chooses to be a friend of the world becomes an enemy of God. 5 Or do you think Scripture says without reason that the spirit he caused to live in us envies intensely? 6 But he gives us more grace. That is why Scripture says:
"God opposes the proud
but gives grace to the humble."
Whether saved or not the ability to fulfill the Great Commission is directly contingent upon the individual commitment to the Lord and daily inventories of self as to whether there is a passing vs. failing grade in loving others and not hating them and warring against them.