Reddit reviews The Archetypes and The Collective Unconscious (Collected Works of C.G. Jung Vol.9 Part 1) (Collected Works of C.G. Jung (48))

Probably this one. The Routledge/Princeton University Collected Works volumes are legit.

Amazon link

It's probably best to start with an overview by someone other than Jung himself. In that case maybe start with Jung: A Very Short Introduction.

If you want to read the man himself but aren't too familiar with him, try this in order:

• Two Essays on Analytical Psychology
  
  
• The Archetypes and The Collective Unconscious
  
  
• Psychological Types
  
  I started with Man and His Symbols which is branded as a good introduction. But I found it little more than a series of anecdotes and disconnected case studies, and also only one of the five(?) sections was written by Jung himself. I wouldn't recommend it.

Still looking for recommendations, but since posting, I've pulled together a list of books that seemed interesting. Wondering if anyone has any opinions?

MBTI Manual

Jung: A Very Short Introduction

Psychological Types

The Archetypes and The Collective Unconscious

Jung's Map of the Soul: An Introduction

https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0691018332/ref=mp_s_a_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1467751084&sr=8-2&pi=SY200_QL40&keywords=jung+9&dpPl=1&dpID=41tw8iylR9L&ref=plSrch

What you're talking about is more or less in line with a psychoanalytic / Jungian interpretation. There's a lot of history and some disagreement^1, but generally the idea is that religion was instituted to codify morality into an easy-to-digest way (ie, making up stories that teach us how to behave morally) and to give a general model of human behavior and interaction, a sort of primitive social science.

I'm coming mostly from Carl Jung (Text 1 / Text 2 / Wiki), Jacques Lacan (Text / Wiki), Joseph Campbell (Text / Wiki), and Erich Fromm (Text / Wiki), but these anthologies give a decent scope of study: Ways of Being Religious and Religion, Society and Psychoanalysis.

There's also an entire sub-genre of what amount to self-help books based on mythology, interpreting myths to teach you how to be a better person: Myths to Live By, Iron John.


^1 One of the big disagreements between Freud and Jung was the role of religion in the mind of a subject. Freud believed it was a fantasy we use to bolster our own sense of importance and impart some sense of order onto the world that isn't there. Jung believed, while that may be true of fundamentalists or the neurotic/pathological, generally speaking it was a positive thing, that it created or strengthened social bonds, that it taught us things about ourselves and humanity.

>plus Prometheus Rising and Chrono Trigger should be read by all.

Especially Prometeus Rising...such a great book.

And also The Archetypes and The Collective Unconscious by Jung.

From The Archetypes and The Collective Unconscious par. 64

"Although she [anima] may be the chaotic urge to life, something strangely meaningful clings to her, a secret knowledge or hidden wisdom, which contrasts most curiously with her irrational elfin nature. Here I would like refer again to the authors already cited. Rider Haggard calls She "Wisdom's Daughter"; Benoit's Queen of Atlantis has an excellent library that even contains a lost book of Plato. Helen of Troy, in her reincarnation, is rescued from a Tyrian brother by the wise Simon Magus and accompanies him on his travels. I purposely refrained from mentioning this thoroughly characteristic aspect of the anima earlier, because the first encounter with her usually leads one to infer anything rather then wisdom. This aspect appears only to the person who gets to grips with her seriously. Only then, when this hard task has been faced does he come to realize more and more that behind all her cruel sporting with human fate there lies something like a hidden purpose which seems to reflect a superior knowledge of life's laws. It is just the most unexpected, the most terrifyingly chaotic things which reveal a deeper meaning. And the more this meaning is recognized, the more the anima loses her impetous and compulsive character. Gradually breakwaters are built against the surging of chaos, and the meaningful divides itself from the meaningless. When sense and nonsense are no longer identical, the force of chaos is weakened by their subtraction; sense is then endued with the force of meaning, and nonsense with the force of meaninglessness. In this way a new cosmos arises. This is not a new discovery in the realm of medical psychology, but the age-old truth that out of the richness of a man's experience there comes a teaching which the father can pass on tho the son."

Archetypes and the Collective Unconscious is probably your best bet.

Well some of the books I read where King Warrior Magician Lover, Iron John, and The Archetypes and the Collective Unconscious.

This series on The Art of Manliness in a decent summary of King Warrior Magician Lover and gives brief description of Jungian psychology. Danger & Play wrote some thought provoking posts about it as well, here and here.

This stuff will give you a better intro than I could. And I 100% recommend buying Iron John. The author is professional poet, and as a result it's very easy to read while still touching on some deep stuff.

I'm a pretty well-confirmed athiest at this point. I tend to view the current manifestations of religion as following in a long tradition of mythmaking by human cultures.

With that in mind, you might look into some psychology in addition to your religious research. I'm a writer, which is how I came by Jung and Campbell and Booker -- but I think the idea of underlying patterns of thought that guide our own mythmaking is of broader use than simply helping me understand storytelling better.

I've read the following, and suggest you do as well!

Jung

The Basic Writings of CG Jung

Man and His Symbols

The Archetypes and the Collective Unconscious

Psychology and Religion

Campbell

The Hero With A Thousand Faces

The Masks of God (Vols. 1 - 3)

Myths to Live By

Booker

The Seven Basic Plots

There are a lot more, but those are the ones I'd start with. As an undergrad, I majored in English and Rhetoric, and minored in both Religion and Poetry -- this cultural storytelling stuff is important to me.

As a library science graduate student, I'd be remiss if I didn't point out that you can get all of these books from your local library -- and can enlist the aid of the reference desk in finding more material for your research. Believe me, there's nothing a reference worker likes more than an interesting topic -- i.e. something that doesn't involve directing people to the bathroom, or helping people find books on filing their taxes. We're trained to help with real research! Use us!

Coming from a writer, gamedesigner, story-designer kind of background I found that most religions, like mere fairytales, behave similar ion their stories.
Two very good books on this topic are:
The Hero with a thousand Faces by Joseph Campbell
http://www.amazon.com/Thousand-Faces-Collected-Joseph-Campbell/dp/1577315936/ref=pd_sim_b_1
and
Archetypes by Carl Gustav Jung.
http://www.amazon.com/Archetypes-Collective-Unconscious-Collected-Works/dp/0691018332

What it basically says it that humans, no matter where they live, follow a rough pattern of storytelling. This leads to the conclusion that our biology and following our psychology works in similar patterns. Therefore we developed similar myths and as you asked, religions.
This of course is additional to what others were writting but it gave me a completely different look on what religion is and what it does with our brain and culture.