Navaho Symbols of Healing: A Jungian Exploration of Ritual, Image, and Medicine »

Donald Sandner, M.D. is a San Francisco psychiatrist with a private practice in Jungian analysis. He is a former president of the C.G. Jung Institute of San Francisco.

In this original and superbly researched work, a Jungian-trained psychiatrist explores ancient Navaho methods of healing--methods that use ritual and vibrant imagery to bring the psyche into harmony with the natural forces that surround it. Through his interactions with Navaho medicine men, Sandner conveys the rigors of their training and the complexities of their purification and evocation rites, including the use of sand paintings as healing mandalas and the esoteric meaning of the pollen path.

Presents the basic principles of Navaho healing:
Return to the origins Confrontation and manipulation of evil Death and rebirth Restoration of the universe

Challenges Western medicine in its search for a more holistic and humane healing art.

Cloth edition of this title was published by Harcourt Brace Jovanovich.

Donald Sandner, M.D. is a San Francisco psychiatrist with a private practice in Jungian analysis. He is a former president of the C.G. Jung Institute of San Francisco.

The Book Reader

"In this well-researched volume the reader gets an authentic look at the combined power of Navajo religion, medicine and art."

Navaho Symbols of Healing
A Jungian Exploration of Ritual, Image, & Medicine

Note Acknowledgments Introduction
1. Symbolic Healing
2. Guardians of the Symbol
3. Navaho Religion: The Constituent Parts
4. Navaho Religion: The Whole in Action
5. Fear of Possession
6. Return to the Origins
7. The Ritual Control of Evil
8. Death and Rebirth: Process of Renewal
9. Mandalas of Healing and the Pollen Path
10. The Navaho Synthesis
11. Symbolic Healing: Ancient and Modern

Bibliography