Synopsis: When Quark believes he is dying, he decides to follow the Ferengi tradition of selling off his desiccated remains for profit.
This episode can be seen as an illustration of what depth psychologist Erich Neumann would call the tension between an old ethic and a new ethic. This is also the psychic tension that exists between the Logos-driven rational conscious ego and the Eros-driven irrational unconscious.
In “Body Parts” Quark returns to Deep Space Nine after learning from a doctor on Ferenginar that he is dying of Dorek Syndrome and has only a few days to live. He decides to follow in the Ferengi tradition of selling off his desiccated remains so that his family will be taken care of after his death. Then Quark learns that the prognosis was in error. However, one individual has already bought his entire offering of remains, Brunt, an agent from the Ferengi Commerce Authority. Brunt wants Quark to kill himself to honor their contract. Quark then has a dream, that he has gone to the Divine Treasury, the Ferengi version of heaven. In the dream the First Nagus Gint tells him that the Rules of Acquisition, that Quark has lived his by whole life, where just made up. Quark wakes and reneges on the contract, meaning that all his possessions are taken from him. However, at the end of the episode, residents from Deep Space Nine bring him all the things he needs to reopen his bar.
In this episode we see Quark being accused of going Starfleet by Brunt, who is displeased by some of the decidedly un-Ferengi-like choices that Quark has made. Brunt goes so far as to call Quark a philanthropist for some of his actions. But the disdain projected onto Quark is what occurs when one perception of the world is in the process of being changed by someone who does not necessarily fit in with everyone else in society. This shift from a one-sided attitude into something more balanced is what Neumann wrote about in Depth Psychology and a New Ethic (1969/1990), and he also compares that to when the conscious ego starts accepting bits of material from the unconscious, the shadow, into itself, so that the psyche becomes more whole.
Reference:
Neumann, E. (1990). Depth psychology and a new ethic. Shambala. (Original work published in 1969)
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