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Persecution has existed since known history. In the Bible ‘the Lord of hosts’, God, says through the prophet Jeremiah (29, 18): ‘And I will pursue after them…’ In our days we experienced the persecution of the Jews culminating in the Holocaust, and the persecution of minorities all over the world: blacks, Arabs, Jews, Catholics, Protestants.
There are many reasons why certain groups persecute others: scapegoating, power drive, lack of tolerance—that is, lack of Eros, of love.
The motif of persecution is often found in dreams. Jung (5, para. 477) mentions persecution by dangerous people or animals. And in mythology it appears for instance as Wotan persecuting Brunnhilde (JUNG 3, para. 559). In the Old Testament, according to Jeremiah, God himself can be the persecutor.
When speaking about persecution, there are always two parts: an active part—the persecutor; and a passive part—the persecuted (ENGEL 2). We are used to seeing these parts in two different persons or groups. From a psychological point of view we have to ask ourselves: what part is it in the other person that releases aggressive feelings in us and makes us persecutors? Or: do we have parts in ourselves that may provoke others to persecute us? Are we identified with being the eternal victim, persecuted, despised? (STONE 7).
This means essentially that we have to become conscious of repressed parts in our psyche that appear projected on to other people. We can call this a scapegoating factor in our psyche, a complex or subpersonality not connected or integrated in our psychic system (PERERA 6).
Persecutor and persecuted can also be looked upon from a purely subjective point of view, namely as being two parts of our own psyche. The interaction of these parts can then be studied from an energetic point of view and also symbolically.