The sacrifice ritual and process of individuation: analysis of a model

ABSTRACT

This paper aims to discuss a relation between the theme of sacrifice in Ancient Greece and in the Jungian understanding of the process of individuation and other similar models of personality/self-development. My argument claims that models such as the process of individuation, Post-Traumatic Growth or Positive Disintegration share features on a structural level with a specific model of sacrifice. A special focus will be on eniautos daimon, the Year-King or a spirit of the year, a concept popularized in anthropology at the beginning of the twentieth century which I claim had influence on developing Jung’s theory of individuation. In this paper, I will apply a philosophical analysis to models of psychotherapy, and especially Jungian psychology. The philosophical analysis of models allows to indicate structural similarities between them without claiming anything about their accuracy.

KEYWORDS:

• Sacrifice
• individuation
• post-traumatic growth
• eniautos daimon
• initiation
• ancient Greece

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes on contributor

Martyna Chrzescijanska a PhD student at the Centre for Psychoanalytic Studies, University of Essex.