Annick de Souzenelle
Annick de Souzenelle dedicated her life to research and the unveiling of the profound and subtle meaning of sacred texts, especially those of the Bible.
She is the author of many works, including her bestseller entitled Le symbolisme du corps humain [The Symbolism of the Human Body]. For more than 50 years she has pursued a spiritual, essentially Judeo-Christian path with a sensibility for the Orthodox tradition and an open mind for other faiths.
Annick de Souzenelle was born in 1922 in Brittany.
Her early childhood was marked by a broken home, which for some time caused her to lose all of her emotional and geographical bearings. Because external reality had become absurd in her eyes, she turned to “the Heavenly Father” as a child, and her inner world became even more real to her than the outside world.
At a very early age, she developed a passion for books about the Great Deeds of the Middle Ages, as well as the stories and legends from all around the world.
She studied at the Notre Dame des Champs Institute in Paris, and her faith was anchored in the Catholic Church, but she already felt that the message of Christ and the Biblical myths hid a deeper meaning than that conveyed.
After high school, she studied mathematics, to which, in her opinion, she owes her intellectual rigor, all the while continuing to look for answers in her spiritual quest.
In 1945, she decided to study nursing, and after two years of training, she became a nurse anesthetist, a profession she exercised for 15 years, five of which were spent in Morocco. It was during this period that she began focusing on her spiritual quest again. She was confronted with suffering and, according to her, learned a great deal from her patients and from psychology.
In 1958, it was by chance that she met Father Eugraph Kovalevski, the founder of the Orthodox Church of France, who would subsequently become her spiritual guide. From that point on, she identified with the Orthodox Christian faith. She began to study theology with Father Eugraph Kovalevski (who became Bishop John (Jean) of St. Denis in 1964) and discovered the greatness of our faith, but always with an open mindset toward others.
At the same time, she took two years of Hebrew with Kabbalist Emmanuel Lévyne. These two teachings – Orthodox Christianity and Hebrew – would transform her life and worldview. She then received what Chinese tradition calls her “Mandate from Heaven,” and with the profound psychology of Carl Gustav Jung, she entered into the depths of the Earth. Through her meeting with Dr. Vittoz, she added a physical dimension, and she received training from Graf Durchheim.
From these different teachings she then discovered the beginnings of an anthropology “yet unborn,” like Bishop John of St. Denis had told her, but also that desired by the great Russian Christian philosopher, Nicolas Berdiaev, which would inspire her to create the Institute of Spiritual Anthropology with Agnès Desange in Angers in 2010.
Through a renewed, invigorating interpretation, Annick de Souzenelle lets us discover our sacred texts and foundational myths via the inner path.
Here is her view on the times we are living in today.
Annick de Souzenelle – Biography – February 2021