Black Books
Elijah was one of the prophets of the Old Testament.
He first appears in l Kings 17, bearing a message from God to Ahab, the King of Israel.
In 1953, the Carmelite Pere Bruno wrote to Jung asking how one established the existence of an archetype.
Jung replied by taking Elijah as an example, describing him as a highly mythical personage, which did not prevent him from probably being a historical figure.
Drawing together descriptions of him throughout history, Jung described him as a “living archetype” who represented the collective unconscious and the self.
He noted that such a constellated archetype gave rise to new forms of assimilation and represented a compensation on the part of the unconscious ~The Black Books, Page 180 , fn 164
Salome was the daughter of Herodias and the stepdaughter of King Herod.
In Matthew 14 and Mark 6, John the Baptist tells King Herod that it is unlawful for him to be married to his brother’s wife, and Herod puts him in prison.
Salome (who is not named but simply called the daughter of Herodias) dances before Herod on his birthday, and he promises to give her anything she wishes for.
She requests the head of John the Baptist, who is then beheaded.
In the late nineteenth century, the figure of Salome fascinated painters and writers, including Guillaume Apollinaire, Gustave Flaubert, Stephane Mallarme, Gustave Moreau, Oscar Wilde, and Franz von Stuck, featuring in many works.
See Bram Dijkstra, Idols of Perversity: Fantasies of Feminine Evil in fin-de-Siecle Culture (New York: Oxford University Press, 1986), pp. 379 – 98. ~The Black Books, Vol. II, Page 180
