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Roderick Main is a synthetic thinker, bridging various worlds. Here we are fortunate to have his guidance in constructing a viable linkage between Jungian concepts and sociological studies in an area that is attracting growing scholarly interest, “reenchantment”. Main's professorship in the Department of Psychosocial and Psychoanalytic Studies, as well as Director of the Centre for Myth Studies at University of Essex, along with his previous publications (especially on various aspects of synchronicity), uniquely position him to address his subject, the title of this book.
Chapter 1 (Disenchantment) begins in the autumn of 1917, in the midst of World War I, when the chief protagonists of this study, C. G. Jung and the eminent sociologist Max Weber, were each intensely engaged in projects which would interrelate without their being in direct correspondence. In a defining presentation and subsequent paper, Weber spoke of the modern scientific age as one of disenchantment, marked by loss of meaning, without access to divine, spiritual, or metaphysical realities. This state caused him significant distress and a longing for mystical experiences (Weber, 1946/1919). Following this line, Main draws some close parallels between Jung and Weber. For instance, he uses the The Red Book (2009) together with Shamdasani's commentary to highlight Jung's stated need to regain his soul and overcome the contemporary malaise of spiritual alienation he suffered along with many of his contemporaries. Further evidence of Jung's struggle with loss of meaning is shown by Main to recur at various other times and places, such as the Terry Lectures of 1937, where Jung speaks of “world despiritualization” (1937, para. 141) and later goes on to say, “we have stripped all things of their mystery and numinosity: nothing is holy any longer” (Jung, 1976, para. 582). Main proceeds to provide a solid literature review citing responses to disenchantment that have arisen since Weber's time, especially the