The commission of C. G. Jung

During an interview by John Freeman of Carl Jung, which later aired on the BBC televison series "Face to Face" in 1959, he asked him about whether he believed a third world war was imminent. Keep in mind that this was during the climate of the then ongoing Cold War. Jung replied, in part:

"We need more understanding of human nature, because the only real danger that exists is man himself. He is the great danger, and we are pitifully unaware of it. We know nothing of man, far too little. His psyche should be studied, because we are the origin of all coming evil."

What did Jung mean when he used the word evil? According to Genesis, evil was brought into the world when Adam and Eve ate the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. Christianity agrees that man is the source of evil in the world. But here the similarity begins to break. Christianity has a list of sins that I doubt Jung is as concerned about, especially when we consider the context of this statement. I like how Jung indicts all of man. It isn't just one segment of the population, or a few nations. In like manner, Christianity assents that all are guilty under the law. But, whereas Christianity provides a simple solution to the problem of evil freely available to anyone, Jung, however, leaves us with the problem and says the solution is to study human nature, and particularly the psyche of man, presumably to understand how to prevent the evil that may come from a lack of knowledge. In the final analysis, there isn't a simple solution, but Jung did recognize the problem.