ABSTRACT
We need to consider moral injury at the ethological level, a dimension that we might refer to as that of anthropic constants, or, in Jungian terms, of archetypes. A dimension, indeed, that proves to be deeper and more stable than the attempts to override it – attempts made, via cultural and ritual induction, to override processes aimed at inhibiting any behaviours that violate the phylogenetic tendency to regulate violence among members of the same species.
Analysis of this persistent resistance to engaging in acts of destructive violence leads me to formulate the hypothesis that it is in the nature of the species to oppose the operational tactics of cultures and their ability to influence and transform. The retroactive consequences suffered by those who treat others with violence are the paradigmatic illustration of the fact that it is human nature itself that has been violated: the equivalent and origin, within our nature, of the moral law that commands us not to kill, and which has progressively, throughout history, made this law into a universal commandment reaching far beyond the confines of a particular people or collective. I thus contend that the universality of this moral law has developed across history but is solidly founded on our phylogenetic heredity. This is why transgression of the law often gives rise to a backlash against the aggressors – a backlash that we may term “counterpoise”, to draw on a notion developed by Dante in “The Divine Comedy”. What takes place in the poetic and symbolic universe of Dante’s “Inferno” is a good metaphor for what happens beneath the surface, in the deep and dark psyche of those who violate this fundamental law based on common membership of the human race.
I will present examples from clinical practice that this circularity of injury to the human person appears to bear out our shared belonging to the species, which is psychically present as the archetypal dimension of the bond and, therefore, as a field that contains and influences the individuals who are situated and move within it. This leads us straight to the anthropological foundation of the golden rule: “Do not do unto others what you would not wish them to do unto you” is a principle rooted in the interdependence of human beings. Whether in terms of acting out self-punishment, projective acting out, or inner conflict, the evil inflicted on another demands that a price be paid by the one inflicting it. But, finally, it is my conviction that we may escape the enantiodromic implications of the opposition between victim and perpetrator by postulating the mercy principle as a dynamic dialectic, both external and internal, which continuously offers us the possibility of forgiveness.
