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has been the subject of two books, The Jung Cult (1994) and The Aryan Christ (1997), which assert that Jung formed a cult and deified himself to the selfsame cult members in the process. In the role of scholar and historian, Mr Richard Noll has demonstrated his evidence to the public in the books, suggesting that Jung is ‘the most influential liar of the twentieth century’ (The Aryan Christ, p. 172).
The centrepiece of his case against Jung is an untitled typewritten five-page document in English about which Mr Noll states: ‘we have what appears to be a summary of the talk’, ostensibly the talk that Jung gave at the inaugural meeting of the Psychological Club in Zürich. He asserts that this document is ‘probably an original English transcription typed by (Sister Maria) Moltzer in Zürich and, it is assumed, mailed to Fanny Bowditch Katz in America’ (The Jung Cult, p. 250).
Mr Noll actually brings the reader to the scene of the crime depicting Jung's inaugural address for the Club: ‘Jung spoke slowly, deliberately, and with great solemnity … The applause Jung received after this last line was well earned’ (The Aryan Christ, p. 149).
So Mr Noll presents the drama of the inaugural meeting imparting a sense that you are there. Or are you? Now comes Sonu Shamdasani who, in a treatise entitled Cult Fictions, presents the case against writer Richard Noll.
Shamdasani begins his brief by pointing out that Mr Noll merely asserts his belief that the five-page document, upon which he relies, is ‘thought to be by Jung’. But Mr Noll does not say who thinks it to be by Jung or why. Shamdasani scrutinizes Mr Noll's core piece of evidence: he investigates the five-page typescript, as well as the arguments together with selected quotations upon which Mr Noll depends to support his accusations of Jung as a cult leader who deified himself. With the help of Shamdasani's investigation and careful cross-examination of the historical evidence, Mr Noll's case comes under intense scrut