I have often, among people in our culture, heard the ancient practice of human sacrifice deemed horrific: the product of people closer to animals than the civilized beings we are now. But the truth is, we're still doing it today.
In The Scapegoat Complex, the second book from Sylvia Brinton Perera, Jungian Analyst and C.G. Jung professor, we see it is so. The practice of Scapegoating, or sacrificing a being as a symbol of casting out sin, has not been left behind. Rather it has evolved along with our species into a more sophisticated, less conspicuous, perhaps far more dangerous practice. Rather than carrying out acknowledged rituals among and for the public, we have begun subconsciously attaching our shadows to those we then hold far from us, thus cleansing ourselves of the sin. We may worship different gods these days, and in some different ways, but the act of ridding is still alive and still hurts many of those among us.
In The Scapegoat Complex, the second book from Sylvia Brinton Perera, Jungian Analyst and C.G. Jung professor, we see it is so. The practice of Scapegoating, or sacrificing a being as a symbol of casting out sin, has not been left behind. Rather it has evolved along with our species into a more sophisticated, less conspicuous, perhaps far more dangerous practice. Rather than carrying out acknowledged rituals among and for the public, we have begun subconsciously attaching our shadows to those we then hold far from us, thus cleansing ourselves of the sin. We may worship different gods these days, and in some different ways, but the act of ridding is still alive and still hurts many of those among us.
