- Kundalini — serpent as spiritual force; ascent through chakras; awakening and enlightenment; transcendence of lower to higher
| Sources | The Snake as Paradox Symbol (Jung) — serpent as living paradox (poison AND medicine); Agathodaimon/Cacodaimon; cannot be moralized; demonstrates symbol's capacity to hold contradiction Kundalini — serpent as spiritual force; ascent through chakras; awakening and enlightenment; transcendence of lower to higher |
| Tension | Jung's snake is a paradox container — it holds good-and-bad simultaneously without resolution. The task is not to transcend the paradox but to consciously contain it. Kundalini framework describes the snake as a hierarchical energy — ascending from root to crown, moving consciousness from lower (instinctual) to higher (transcendent) states. Core tension: Is the snake a symbol teaching us to hold paradox (Jungian) o… |
| Candidate | These represent different ontologies: Jung: paradox is final (cannot be resolved, only held consciously) Kundalini: hierarchy is final (lower resolves into higher; transcendence is the goal) Can both be true? Does one supersede the other? |