"As it gradually dawns on people, one by one, that the transformation of God is not just an interesting idea but is a living reality, it may begin to function as a new myth. Whoever recognizes this myth as his own personal reality will put his life in the service of this process. Such an individual offers himself as a vessel for the [continuing] incarnation of deity and thereby promotes the on-going transformation of God by giving Him human manifestation." -- Edward F. Edinger (The Creation of Consciousness, page 113.)

But what, exactly, did Jung mean by this? What is this "transformation of God" he speaks of? To begin with we need to understand that for Jung -- as for Hinduism and Kabbalah as well -- God is "unchanging" only in the sense that He is eternal and not in the sense that He and His divine personality are fixed in place for all time. As I'll discuss later in more detail, the Bible itself -- beginning with the Old Testament and concluding with the Gospels -- is, among other things, a record of this gradual evolution in the mind and personality of God from the "angry" and "punitive" Yahweh to the "loving" and "forgiving" Abba, or Father of Christ. This is not to suggest that Yahweh doesn't display qualities of loving forgiveness, or that Abba isn't at times angry and punitive; it's only that the emphasis given to these qualities gradually shifts within God as He evolves as a result of his continuing encounter with mankind. And in that we find what Jung means by the "transformation" of God.

By His very nature, God is the "whole" of many "parts." In Him are all things, and out of Him all things come. For Jung, He is the 'archetype of wholeness," the "center of totality," and finally, "a quantity that is superordinate to the conscious ego . . . a personality we also are." ("Two Essays on Analytical Psychology", Collected Works 7, par. 274)

By the "transformation" of God, therefore, Jung is referring to that process by which the potential in the Divine Nature becomes actual through its continuing encounter with man. This means that when God created man, He "diminished" his own storehouse of Divine Qualities, such as loving kindness, by sharing them with his creation through the process of "Psychic Mitosis" that I described in earlier lectures. Therefore, God "re-owns" those aspects of Himself that He shared with His creation by incarnating in the latter "part" in order to restore Himself to His former "whole."

I've already mentioned that the Bible can be seen as the record of God's gradual transformation from the angry and punitive Yahweh of the Old Testament to the loving and compassionate Abba (or Father) of the Gospels. In Answer to Job, Jung describes and makes ready for our own adoption and use the intra-psychic process by which that transformation takes place through the continuing incarnation of the Self in man.

Evidence From the Bible

In the Old Testament we see the Divine Personality evolving from the undifferentiated Elohim (literally "Gods") of Genesis to the differentiated Ehyeh Asher Ehyeh, (or "I Am Who I Am") of Exodus, with several steps between as shown in the table below:

Thus, we see that as man's consciousness of himself evolves, so too does that of God as He introduces Himself to His creation and comes away from each encounter with increasing degrees of self-reflective awareness.

Evidence From the Kabbalah

In the Ten Sephiroth of Kabbalah we find the same gradual transformation of God from the undifferentiated Ein-Sof to the highly differentiated Ten Sephiroth. In fact, in a letter to my mentor, James Kirsch, dated 18 November 1952, Jung says of this Kabbalistic model of divine transformation,

"Your question [regarding the role which Christ and the Christian mystery play in the Jewish psyche] is a very important one and I think I can understand its full import. I would not be able to give you a satisfactory answer, yet having studied the question as far as possible, I can call your attention to the extraordinary development of the Kabbalah. I am rather certain that the Sefiroth tree contains the whole symbolism of Jewish development parallel to the Christian idea." (Collected Letters, Vol. 2, pages 91-92.)

Thus, we see here that Jung draws a parallel between his idea of the transformation of God, vis-a-vis His continuing incarnation in man, and the differentiation of Ein-Sof through the Ten Sephiroth.

BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES:
| Sabbatai Zevi | Jacob Frank | Reb Yakov Leib HaKohain |
| A Critical Re-Assessment of Sabbatai Zevi |
| Reb Yakov Leib HaKohain's Professions of a Holy Sinner |

AUDIO LECTURES ON KABBALAH BY REB YAKOV LEIB HAKOHAIN:
| The Zohar |

ESSENTIAL PRINCIPLES OF "YALHAKIAN" NEO-SABBATIAN KABBALAH:
| Knowing the Unknowable |
| A Brief Note on Enlightenment |
| A Neo-Sabbatian Discourse on the Son of God |
| A Primer of "Yalhakian" Neo-Sabbatian Kabbalah |
| Participating in the Continuing Incarnation of God |
| Sabbatai Zevi's 'God of the Faith' | Evolution of the Ego |
| Two Torahs of Kabbalah: Torah D'Atziluth & Torah D'Beriah |
| On the Limits of Antinomianism | The Transformation of God |
| Commentary on the 13th Century "Treatise on the Left Emanation" |
| A Selection of Neo-Sabbatian Quotations Culled from Various Sources |

KABBALISTIC WRITINGS OF REB YAKOV LEIB HAKOHAIN:
| Commentaries on Rabbi Azriel of Gerona's 12th Century Text, "Explanation of the Ten Sefirot" |
| Kabbalistic Genetics of the Holy Seed & Reclaiming the Lost Sheep of the House of Israel |
| A Commentary on the Book of Job | Kabbalah and the Interpretation of Dreams |
| To Die for the People: A Kabbalistic Reinterpretation of the Crucifixion of Jesus |
| The Shemot Shel Katzar Tikkunim: Revealing the Concealed Names of God |
| The Christian Myth of Melchizedek vs. Hereditary Jewish Priesthood |
| The Apocrypha of Jacob Frank | The Tikkun of Raising Animals |
| Appointment in Smyrna: A Neo-Sabbatian Odyssey |
| Sabbatai Zevi and the Mystery of the Red Heifer |
| The Kabbalah of the Hindu Mantra "OM" |
| The Mystery of the Middle Column |
| The Hidden Structures of Water |
| Exegesis on the Rod of Aaron |
| Book of Silence |

ROADMAPS TO GOD:
| Ten Sefirot of Jewish Kabbalah | Sufi Lion of Bektashi Islam |
| Mandala of Tibetian Buddhism | Seven Chakras of Tantric Hinduism |
| Ox-Herding Pictures of Zen Buddhism | Rosarium Pictures of Christian Alchemy |

GENERAL INFORMATION:
| Donmeh West Home Page |
| Schedule of Live Online Classes | Links |
| Join Donmeh West |