Alchemical Active Imagination

<b>A leading Jungian psychologist reveals the relationship between alchemy and analytical psychology delving into the visionary work of a sixteenth-century alchemist</b><br>&#160;<br>Although alchemy is popularly regarded as the science that sought to transmute base physical matter many of the medieval alchemists were more interested in developing a discipline that would lead to the psychological and spiritual transformation of the individual. C. G. Jung discovered in his study of&#160;alchemical&#160;texts a symbolic and&#160;imaginal&#160;language that expressed many of his own insights into psychological processes.<br>&#160;<br>In this book Marie-Louise&#160;von&#160;Franz examines a text by the sixteenth-century alchemist and physician&#160;Gerhard&#160;Dorn&#160;in order to show the relationship of alchemy to the concepts and techniques of&#160;analytical&#160;psychology. In particular she shows that the alchemists practiced a kind of meditation similar to Jung's technique of active imagination which enables one to dialogue with the unconscious archetypal elements in the psyche.<br>&#160;<br>Originally delivered as a series of lectures at the C. G. Jung Institute in Zurich the book opens therapeutic insights into the relations among spirit soul and body in the practice of active imagination.