White Bird, Black Serpent, Red Book

Stuart Douglas has had a life-long interest in the mysterious and the unknown and completed his PhD in transpersonal psychology after an earlier career as a systems analyst. His specialist areas of interest include the intersection of Jungian psychology and Gnosticism and, more generally, ancient wisdom and contemplative traditions. When not pursuing these interests, or rendering unto Caesar, he spends his time hiking in the mountains somewhere or plotting his escape from the matrix. Born in Scotland, he now lives in Australia.

'This is a rich, remarkable, startling and courageous book connecting Gnosticism with lesser-known aspects of Jung's work. Because Gnosticism is inherently informed by the direct experience of the spiritual practitioner rather than by scholarship or rational inquiry it can seem a conceptually dense, overly complex and wilfully obscure tradition. Jung, particularly in his later, bolder, more personal work presents similar difficulties to academic analysis. Only a very subtle scholar like Dr Douglas, both deeply rooted in his own rigorous spiritual practice and grounded in this literature, could succeed in the profound, inspiring synthesis presented in this book.'- The Most Reverend Timothy Mansfield, PhD, Ep. Gn., Bishop of New South Wales, Apostolic Johannite Church, Australia

• Preface -- Introduction -- The transpersonal approach -- The Gnostics -- The Seven Sermons to the Dead -- The transcendent function -- Conclusions