The Cave
The hidden place of transformation, inside the earth.
The Cave: what does it mean in analytical psychology?
Whoever goes into the cave, Jung wrote, the cave that everyone has within, the darkness behind consciousness, finds himself drawn into a process of transformation of which he is at first unaware. He wrote it in his reading of the eighteenth sura of the Qur’an, “The Cave,” in which the Seven Sleepers wake after centuries and Moses meets the mysterious Khidr.
The cave is womb and grave, underworld and place of rebirth, the chamber of initiation and of hidden treasure.
The Cave: where does it appear in myth and tradition?
Plato’s cave of shadows, the cave of the Nativity in the Eastern tradition, the caves of the Mithraic mysteries, the painted caves of the Ice Age, the Sibyl’s cave at Cumae.
In the Press’s Books
Zarathustra lives in a cave in the mountains, with his eagle and his serpent.
From the Sources
Jung writes that the sun sets periodically but does not die: it hides in the womb of the sea or in a subterranean cave, and in the morning is born again, complete.
“The Sun sets periodically, but does not die. It hides in the womb of the sea or in a subterranean cave, and in the morning is “born again,” complete.”
Dr. C. G. Jung, Psychology of the Unconscious: A Study of the Transformations and Symbolisms of the Libido, Part II, Chapter IV, 'The Unconscious Origin of the Hero' (on the cave of the seven sleepers in the Koran). Authorized translation, with introduction, by Beatrice M. Hinkle, M.D.; New York: Moffat, Yard and Company, 1916 (Project Gutenberg eBook #65903). The text, read in part
Jung quotes Seneca: a cave at the foot of a mountain, hollowed to great depths by nature and not by human hands, fills the mind with a religious fear.
“…when we see some cave at the foot of a mountain penetrating the rocks, not made by human hands, but hollowed out to great depths by nature; it fills the mind with a religious fear”
Dr. C. G. Jung, Psychology of the Unconscious: A Study of the Transformations and Symbolisms of the Libido, Part I, Chapter III, 'The Hymn of Creation' (quoting Seneca). Authorized translation, with introduction, by Beatrice M. Hinkle, M.D.; New York: Moffat, Yard and Company, 1916 (Project Gutenberg eBook #65903). The text, read in part
Each passage is quoted from the text named, which the press fetched and read, and was checked word for word against a fresh copy of it; the link opens that copy. Passages are given as printed, without the editors’ footnote numbers, and with words broken across lines joined.
Where to Read
- “Concerning Rebirth” (1940/1950), CW 9i
Jung’s writings are cited by the volume of the Collected Works (CW), Bollingen Series / Princeton, 1953–79.
Related Symbols
Also among The Land
“Learn as much as you can about symbolism; then forget it all when you are analysing a dream.”
Cite This Entry
“The Cave.” In Symbols of the Psyche, the Symbolarium. The Thinking Press, 2026. https://thethinkingpress.org/symbolarium/psyche/cave.
Nearby in the alphabet: The Castle: The fortress of the treasure, hard to find and harder to enter. The Cat: Independent, nocturnal, and never quite tame. The Centre: The still point around which everything turns. The Chariot: The vehicle drawn by forces the driver must master.