The final stage of the alchemical magnum opus, rubedo (“reddening”) represents the culmination of the Great Work - the creation of the Philosopher’s Stone or, in psychological terms, the achievement of individuation. Following the darkness of nigredo and the purification of albedo, rubedo signals the reunion of opposites into a unified, vital whole.
In Carl Jung’s interpretation of alchemy as a symbolic map of psychic transformation, rubedo corresponds to the integration of Consciousness with the unconscious - not a victory of one over the other, but a marriage. The redness evokes blood, passion, and embodied life; where albedo risks becoming too ethereal or abstract, rubedo demands that insight be lived. The Self emerges not as an escape from earthly existence but as full participation in it.
The imagery of rubedo often involves the coniunctio - the sacred marriage of Sol and Luna, masculine and feminine principles - producing the lapis philosophorum. This union transcends the dualities that characterize ordinary consciousness: spirit and matter, thought and feeling, personal and transpersonal. The colour red also connects to the heart in many traditions, suggesting that the endpoint of transformation is not mere knowledge but something closer to wisdom embodied through Love.
See also gold symbolism, wholeness.