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Aryeh Maidenbaum's book, Jung and the Jewish Experience: Reflections of a Jungian Analyst, succeeds beautifully on a number of levels. This is the well told story of a mature analyst's individuation journey as he developed from a Brooklyn born yeshiva bucher (a boy who attends a school of Jewish learning) through his discovery of Jungian psychology working with first generation Jungian analysts in Israel and Zurich, to integration of his Jewish roots as part of his individuation journey. It is a narrative illustrating how Jung's psychology provides a lens through which the living spirit embedded within religious dogma may be brought back to life through a symbolic attitude. It is a story about the relationship and tensions between individual and group consciousness. And finally, it is a legacy story, told by a man in his late 70's who is creatively leaving a record of some of the most essential parts of his own life journey for future generations of his family and others on the path.
Throughout the book Maidenbaum weaves together his personal narrative and experience as a Jungian analyst with history, myth, and interpretations of scripture gleaned from thousands of years of Jewish culture. As he writes, “My hope is that by applying a Jungian understanding of selected Jewish topics and stories, interspersed with experiences of my own, I will be adding insight to both the Jungian and Jewish realms” (p. 2). His individuation journey led him out of the world of orthodoxy to the discovery of ways to integrate community, learning, and tradition with the grounded presence of the individual voice of the Self. As he states, “Like Odysseus, I needed to leave home and discover myself through my ten years of travels and studies in Israel and Zurich, to return with a greater understanding of my own Jewish roots. It has been through my analytic work, studies of Jung's psychology and ideas, and immersion in Jewish history, culture, and myth, that I have been able to find meaning an