tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-59678810255253841202024-03-14T01:15:43.263-07:00Creative Reading"As academics we are expected to write and publish, but we are not supposed to waste our time reading". This remark by a colleague - as absurd as it is true - inspired me to start this blog. As an academic in the field of the Humanities I spend much of my time reading, and on this blog you can see how that works. If scholarly writing has any value at all, then the reading that precedes it deserves respect as an integral part of the creative process that leads to knowledge and understanding.wouterjhanegraaff.blogspot.comhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15519965611425366178noreply@blogger.comBlogger45125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5967881025525384120.post-46108181765048804922023-12-04T02:14:00.000-08:002023-12-04T02:14:19.721-08:00A Poem at the Edge of Reality<p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLYT-PHl3V-7ZrNuf97-d9gFhoYiZdWBryTdQo1zfPxOgBdI2jaIuUHBudom7tk3Nqdv4niIqqqlwDWucMIDoexqC2Hoaulbnr_nlVFs92eO7oAOAaZNniJVLvJ6Eeoe-fFSNKs9f-zqH04LSwAah20WC4-aiMNtZbp72sJaNf6DAaN_z34oo_4Bkwpvrx/s1504/322398020_2327563790758735_7209035434759643872_n.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="640" data-original-width="1504" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgLYT-PHl3V-7ZrNuf97-d9gFhoYiZdWBryTdQo1zfPxOgBdI2jaIuUHBudom7tk3Nqdv4niIqqqlwDWucMIDoexqC2Hoaulbnr_nlVFs92eO7oAOAaZNniJVLvJ6Eeoe-fFSNKs9f-zqH04LSwAah20WC4-aiMNtZbp72sJaNf6DAaN_z34oo_4Bkwpvrx/s16000/322398020_2327563790758735_7209035434759643872_n.jpg" /></a></div><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 16pt; line-height: 32px;"><br /></span><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 16pt; line-height: 32px;">In the beginning an immortal goddess explained reality to a mortal man. Or at least, she tried. She told him to be silent and just listen to her words, and so that’s what he did. All we know about her message comes from a poem that he wrote and that has been a source of deep fascination for intellectuals ever since. It attempts to describe an experience and a blinding insight at the very limit of what words can express – he met the goddess in a strange place at the edge of reality where he heard things that seemed impossible to refute and yet impossible to accept. His name was Parmenides. He lived around twenty-five centuries ago and came from a town called Elea on the coast of southern Italy. As for the goddess, she never gave him her name.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 16pt; line-height: 32px;"> Western culture begins with deities and their messages to human beings. Often enough, what they had to say just reflected what people already knew or believed, but in a few rare and precious cases there is something strikingly original about it – something unheard-of, something that’s profoundly puzzling and amazing, because it challenges our common assumptions about the world and how it works. Parmenides’ poem is a major example. Strangely enough, but very significantly too, nobody agrees about what it means. The parts that we know (for some of it is lost) consist of just about 160 lines of metric Greek, and yet an enormous number of incredibly learned studies have been written about those few pages of text. Why? Because when we read them, we feel that they are important. Something is being said here that had never been said before but could perhaps be true. And yet every reader, without a single exception, has found it extremely hard to say exactly what it is.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 16pt; line-height: 32px;">Therefore please don’t expect me to solve the riddle either, by simply telling you in plain words what the goddess meant. I may not even be able to tell you what she <i>said</i> – or what Parmenides claims he had heard from her – for it is far from certain, to say the least, that her words can survive translation into modern English. To show you what I mean by this, I will focus on her most important opening statement, right at the beginning of the speech that Parmenides wrote down. What follows is just a small sample of how specialists have tried to express those Greek words in English. Prepare yourself to be surprised or perhaps disappointed, at least initially, for it may not be what you expect. The goddess is telling Parmenides that if we want to find the truth about reality, there is just one route that will lead us towards it, namely<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 16pt; line-height: 32px;"> </span></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 16pt; line-height: 32px;">that it is or it is not<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 16pt; line-height: 32px;">that either a thing is or it is not<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 16pt; line-height: 32px;">that IT IS and … IT ISN’T cannot be<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 16pt; line-height: 32px;">that [<i>it</i>] <i>is</i>, and that [<i>it</i>] <i>cannot not be</i><o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 16pt; line-height: 32px;">that it is and it cannot not be<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 16pt; line-height: 32px;">that <i>is, and is not possible not to be</i><o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 16pt; line-height: 32px;">[to think] that “is,” and that it is not possible not to be<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 16pt; line-height: 32px;">that It Is, and it is not possible for Is not to be<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 16pt; line-height: 32px;">that [it] is and that [it] is not not to be<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 16pt; line-height: 32px;">that a thing is, and that it is not for not being<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 16pt; line-height: 32px;">both that “is” and that “it is not the case that ‘is not’”<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 16pt; line-height: 32px;">that it is and that it is impossible for it not to be<o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 16pt; line-height: 32px;">this, that it-is and that not-to-be is not<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 16pt; line-height: 32px;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 16pt; line-height: 32px;">That’s it! (or would you say that it isn’t?!). The Greek of fragment 3.2 says </span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 16pt; line-height: 32px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 16pt;">ἡ μὲν ὅπως ἔστιν τε και ὡς οὐκ ἔστι μὴ εἶναι. </span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 12pt;"></span><span style="font-family: -webkit-standard; font-size: medium;"></span>This enigmatic, frustrating, untranslatable sentence lies at the very heart of a poem about a mysterious divine encounter that has been presented, in standard philosophy textbooks, as the opening salvo of Western <i>logic</i>. Although Parmenides never claimed a single philosophical insight of his own, posterity gave him all the credit for his message from the goddess. Or all the blame, for in another famous text from antiquity (possibly intended as satire) he is portrayed as some kind of hyper-logical maniac who vanishes right before the reader’s gaze into a rabbit hole of abstractions from which there can be no return.</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 16pt; line-height: 32px;"><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 16pt; line-height: 32px;"> But was it really about logic? In spite of all those disagreements about what the goddess meant, there is no doubt that she was saying something truly extraordinary. She was asking Parmenides to dismiss everything he had ever taken for granted. Literally everything – all the evidence of his senses and all the ideas in his mind. She told him that mortal humans do not see reality the way it is because our minds can’t help imagining distinctions that in fact are not there. We think that some things exist while others do not, but that is false: <i>nothing unreal exists</i>. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 16pt; line-height: 32px;">Nothing unreal exists – give yourself a few moments to let that sink in. It means that there is no such thing as unreality. Anything we ever experience is real, without a single exception, and so that has to include even what we call our illusions. I just wrote that in our imagination we draw distinctions that in fact are not there – but if this is true, it means that there’s no distinction either between illusion and reality, so even this unreal distinction itself must actually be real!<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 16pt; line-height: 32px;">This is what she says, and the mind boggles. We can’t accept it. We think “that can’t be true, it’s such an obvious contradiction, there must be <i>some</i> way to resolve it!” – and so we embark on the path of logic. Without even noticing it, we take the very road that the goddess tells Parmenides to avoid. For it is precisely this path, she explains, that is taken by all those ignorant mortals who are so confused about reality that they find themselves very clever. In fact these people just wander in circles, like mindless zombies, thinking that it’s possible to have it both ways – that some things are real while some others are not, and yet that those that aren’t real are somehow real as well. Please note: the goddess doesn’t present Parmenides with a logical puzzle that he’s expected to solve (the same way that you, I’m pretty sure, are trying right now). She doesn’t engage him in dialogue. She isn’t teaching him philosophy. She is simply telling him what reality is. Strange as it might seem, the whole of Western philosophy is based on a stubborn refusal to accept her message.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 16pt; line-height: 32px;">The reason for those two-and-a-half thousand years of mental resistance is that the goddess’s argument could not possibly be ignored, because it made perfect rational sense. And yet it could not be accepted either, because it seemed to make no sense at all. Consider the following. Does the past exist, somewhere, somehow? Clearly it doesn’t, for it’s gone forever and we can’t go anywhere to retrieve it. Does the future exist, somewhere, somehow? Clearly it doesn’t either, for it hasn’t yet come to be. If so, then what <i>does</i> exist? Only this infinitesimal fleeting moment “right now” – all else will have to be just memory and expectation, mere images in our minds. And yet that cannot be true either, for if nothing unreal exists, then both what we can remember or imagine and what we can’t, although it did happen or could happen (in fact, anything that ever happened or is yet going to happen), <i>is</i> exactly as real as whatever we are experiencing in this moment right here and now! This can only mean that time itself is an illusion but the illusion is real.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 16pt; line-height: 32px;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36pt;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg6LQLX-LzqEPm0uHEDs7MLgQ_iSrKaSQCgSz96md1bbgosKeNTTqyw_nPhlOjB6AoaJn76LgqjeVOzu8mDEQUs3kRffrznxN31LdNxhL-5emuLPPLpMJ9qL6uqshmfScNqsnKaKzlmqb5uXfurm9N6Koxlw3KSDsaaoi0fVxOAlLc2wkI8yPnrxbCaOCF-/s397/parmenides.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="281" data-original-width="397" height="283" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg6LQLX-LzqEPm0uHEDs7MLgQ_iSrKaSQCgSz96md1bbgosKeNTTqyw_nPhlOjB6AoaJn76LgqjeVOzu8mDEQUs3kRffrznxN31LdNxhL-5emuLPPLpMJ9qL6uqshmfScNqsnKaKzlmqb5uXfurm9N6Koxlw3KSDsaaoi0fVxOAlLc2wkI8yPnrxbCaOCF-/w400-h283/parmenides.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 16pt; line-height: 32px;">What kind of man was Parmenides, the first human being to ever write down such thoughts, and how did he get to meet the goddess? We are told that he came from a wealthy family and was involved in the making of laws for his town, Elea. After meeting an otherwise unknown “poor but noble” man called Ameinias, he appears to have decided to pursue a life of “stillness.” They were both followers of Pythagoras, a mysterious thinker and charismatic leader who had come from the island of Samos in the Eastern Aegean to southern Italy (then known as <i>Magna Graecia</i>, “Great Greece,” because there were so many Greek settlements there) and had founded a contemplative tradition that remained active after his death. Pythagoras was neither a philosopher nor a scientist or mathematician, and he didn’t invent the famous theorem that carries his name – those are all later projections. He and his followers did not believe in incorporeal realities or mathematical abstractions that lead away from our world of sensual experience towards some spiritual otherworld. Instead, they were convinced that it was possible for human beings to see beyond delusion and get to know the mysterious “unmoving heart of true reality.” But such knowledge could not be attained just by thinking or logical reasoning – it could only be seen or experienced directly, as an inner revelation that could dawn upon a person who had been searching for the truth. A person like Parmenides.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 16pt; line-height: 32px;">So how did it happen? How did he meet the goddess? The short answer is that we do not know, but the longer answer is that we can guess. In the thrilling opening scene of his poem, Parmenides writes how he found himself rushing down “through all things” along the crowded road of the daimon Atē, the unreliable goddess of mischief, delusion and blind folly – but then he was led right up towards the other goddess, the one who would open his eyes about reality. He writes that the mares that were carrying his wheeled chariot were being guided by young maidens, servants of the goddess, “daughters of the sun” who knew the way to the gates between night and day, darkness and light, mortal ignorance and divine knowledge. In soft whispers they persuaded the gatekeeper (another female deity, known as Dikē, Justice) to open the gates and let them through. And so it is that Parmenides was kindly received by the goddess in her own home, the place of true reality. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 16pt; line-height: 32px;">Unlike the busy road of those who follow logic, this was not a realm filled with “many voices.” It must have been a place of profound silence, perfectly suited to the Pythagorean practice of “stillness” and deep inward contemplation. It appears that the followers of Parmenides, who remained active in Elea for many centuries after his death, used to meet in a building of their own that had a subterranean chamber – a <i>phōleos</i> or “dark place.” Only in such an utterly secluded location, where the senses could not be reached by stimuli that came from the outside world, could the goddess’s presence be sensed and her voice be heard. Surrounded by the nothingness of utter darkness, Parmenides may even have seen her image appear in his mind. In this place where nothing seemed to <i>be</i>, in fact she <i>was</i> everything and everywhere. This underworld place was not the place of death, she pointed out to him, for nothing exists but omnipresent life. <i>This is reality</i>, she was telling him. <i>Now you know. This is it. </i><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 16pt; line-height: 32px;"> It has been said that humans cannot bear too much reality. Parmenides’ message from the goddess made an enormous impression on his contemporaries and on all those who came after. It was utterly new and revolutionary, impossible to ignore for anybody who heard of it and made a true effort to grasp its meaning, and yet so cryptic and impossibly weird that it forced you to keep thinking further and ever further in your attempts to figure it out. The goddess had set a ball rolling that has never stopped since. But of course, from the beginning there were those who just found it a blatant absurdity and were making fun of her One Reality. A younger Pythagorean and friend or follower of Parmenides, Zenon of Elea, responded by turning the tables on these critics: “Ah, you think that your logic is so superior? Well, watch me – what about this?” He would ask them, for instance, to consider what happens if you shoot an arrow. In order for it to reach the target, it wil first have to cover half of the distance (½), right? Right. But before getting there, it must first have covered half of <i>that</i> distance (¼), right? Sure thing. And yet, before ever getting there, it will first have to cover half of <i>that </i>distance (</span><span style="color: #202122; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 16pt; line-height: 32px;">⅛</span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #202122; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 16pt; line-height: 32px;">)</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 16pt; line-height: 32px;"> – </span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 16pt; line-height: 32px;">or would you say it won’t? You get the point – there’s just no end to dividing any distance from A to B, and so it’s logically impossible for any arrow to ever reach any target. All movement becomes logically impossible. There have been endless attempts to solve this riddle, but Zenon’s point was that you just cannot rely on pure logic. Arrows reach their targets – <i>that</i> is reality. “Of course you guys can’t figure out how such a thing is possible,” Zenon was telling the critics, “but that’s because you’re wandering in logical circles along the route of confusion that the goddess told you not to take!” <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 16pt; line-height: 32px;"> How do you argue with the words of a goddess? Ever since Parmenides, all those who wanted to understand the true core of reality have found that they couldn’t avoid his poem. Whatever paths their minds were taking throught the labyrinth of human thought, sooner or later they would all find themselves back at the same place where it all began. For how could anything else exist than reality itself? Even the smartest among all those seekers (or rather, <i>precisely</i> the smartest) felt that perhaps they couldn’t measure up to the man from Elea. “I fear that perhaps we do not understand what he was saying…,” the brightest of them all is said to have admitted to a friend, “and still less his reasons for saying it.” Perhaps indeed. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 16pt; line-height: 32px;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif;"><span style="font-size: 21.33333396911621px;"> <span> <span> <span> <span> <span> <span> <span> <span> <span> <span> <span> <span> <span> <span> <span> <span> </span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span></span> <span> <span> <span> <span> <span> <span> </span></span></span> <span> <span> </span></span></span></span></span>[in memory of Demetrius Waarsenburg, 1964-2021]</p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 16pt; line-height: 32px;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiesjxvk-hPlYpZHlkgc1cw9COUO05_Z_JoTNDzfjlwpJ7iN8t6K3MMltkLwkjHtst2VtcvdYW5ykUTQEnWSQxETycbU2ykVK_pVvyAUNyzn-LVykdJ28Pnba6aNgzj2UyT0893cWInZ692QztTNwcdL2Fx_NNn8LdZyW28bUZAq9barTbCyQD-i57ymIcG/s640/torre-velia.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="480" data-original-width="640" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiesjxvk-hPlYpZHlkgc1cw9COUO05_Z_JoTNDzfjlwpJ7iN8t6K3MMltkLwkjHtst2VtcvdYW5ykUTQEnWSQxETycbU2ykVK_pVvyAUNyzn-LVykdJ28Pnba6aNgzj2UyT0893cWInZ692QztTNwcdL2Fx_NNn8LdZyW28bUZAq9barTbCyQD-i57ymIcG/w640-h480/torre-velia.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: times;"><br />Torre Velia</span></td></tr></tbody></table><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><b><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><br /></span></b></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><b><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">1</span></b><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> She told him to be silent…: Parmenides frgm. 2.1. … at the edge of reality: Gallop, <i>Parmenides of Elea</i>, 7 (“a place where opposites are undivided … where all difference or contrast has disappeared”). <b>2</b> … nobody agrees …: for the two chief schools of interpretation, see Blank, “Faith and Persuasian in Parmenides,” 167-168; Martin, <i>Parmenides’ Vision</i>, 1. <b>4</b> Fragm. 2.3. In chronological order: Kirk & Raven, <i>The Presocratic Philosophers </i>(1960), 269 (“the usual translation” and K&R’s translation);<i> </i>Lombardo, <i>Parmenides and Empedocles</i> (1982), 13; Gallop, <i>Parmenides of Elea</i> (1984), 55; Waterfield, <i>The First Philosophers</i> (2000), 58;<i> </i> Kingsley, <i>Reality</i>(2003), 60; Cordero, <i>By Being, It Is</i> (2004), 191; Geldard, <i>Parmenides and the Way of Truth</i>(2007), 23; Palmer, <i>Parmenides and Presocratic Philosophy</i> (2009), 365; Coxon / McKirahan, <i>Fragments of Parmenides</i> (2009), 56; McKirahan, <i>Philosophy before Socrates</i> (2010), 146, 154; Blackson, <i>Ancient Greek Philosophy</i> (2011), 20; Martin, <i>Parmenides’ Vision</i> (2016), 19. <b>5 … </b>another famous text …: Plato, <i>Parmenides</i>. … a kind of hyper-logical maniac…: I’m reminded of Chesterton, <i>Orthodoxy</i>, 30 “The madman is not the man who has lost his reason. The madman is the man who has lost everything except his reason.” For Plato’s portrayal as a polemical satire, see e.g. Apelt, <i>Untersuchungen</i>; Cornford, <i>Plato and Parmenides</i>, v-x; Mario Molegraaf in Plato, <i>Verzameld werk</i>, vol. 3, 165-173; and especially Tabak, <i>Plato’s Parmenides Reconsidered</i>. <b>6 </b><i>Nothing unreal exists</i> (cf. Kingsley, <i>Reality</i>, 73-76 “nothing doesn’t exist”); the alternative “nothing real exists” is categorically rejected as an utter dead end (frgm. 2.5-7). … let that sink in: frgm. 6.2 (<i>phraxesthai</i>: Kingsley, o.c., 83 “You ponder that!”; Palmer, <i>Parmenides and Presocratic Philosophy</i>, 369 and McKirahan, <i>Philosophy Before Socrates</i>, 146 “these things I bid you ponder”). <b>8</b> … the very road …: frgm. 6.4-9. … very clever …: I accept Martin’s innovative argument about the <i>eidōs phōs</i> in frgm. 1.3 (<i>Parmenides’ Vision</i>, 33-37). … have it both ways: frgm. 6.5 (<i>dikranoi</i>). Stubborn refusal: e.g. Gallop, <i>Parmenides of Elea</i>, 3 (“footnotes to Plato … footnotes to Parmenides”). <b>9</b> Consider the following… : frgm. 8.5-6; cf. McKirahan, <i>Philosophy before Socrates</i>, 164-166. Only this infinitesimal fleeting moment: with personal thanks to Daniel Waterman. … exactly as real: this reading confirms Kingsley’s interpretation (<i>Reality</i>, 69-72) of the famous frgm. 3 <i>to gar auto noein estin te kai einai</i> as “what exists for thinking, and being, are one and the same” (against the background of frgm. 2.2). <b>10</b> Parmenides’ life: Kirk & Raven, <i>Presocratic Philosophers</i>, 263-264 (Diogenes Laertius). Stillness: <i>hēsuchia</i> (on <i>muēseis psuchēs</i>, “initiations of the soul” following Iamblichus biography of Pythagoras, see Montiglio, <i>Silence</i>, 27-28). … neither a philosopher nor a mathematician: decisive argumentation in Burkert, <i>Lore and Science</i>, 208, 215, 217 (with quotation from Rohde), 278, 298, 303, 406, 466, 476, 482; for Pythagorean number symbolism as distinct from mathematics, see Burkert, o.c., 401-482; Brach, <i>La symbolique des nombres</i>. Theorem: Burkert, <i>Lore and Science</i>, 462-465; Kahn, <i>Pythagoras</i>, 32. Later projections: Burkert, <i>Lore and Science</i>, <i>passim</i>; also e.g. Kahn, <i>Pythagoras</i>, 13-15, followed by various attempts at “rescuing” Pythagoras for science and mathematics, as most extensively in Zhmud, <i>Pythagoras</i>, 17-18, 60 (but see e.g. Netz, Review; Macris, Review). … did not believe …: Burkert, <i>Lore and Science</i>, 32, 73. … unmoving heart of true reality: Parmenides frgm. 1.29 (<i>Alētheiēs eupeitheos atremes etor</i>). <i>Eupeitheos</i> (persuasive) is more common (Diels & Kranz, <i>Fragmente</i>, vol. 1, 230) but many editors in the wake of Diels & Kranz have followed Simplicius’ <i>eukukleos</i> (well-rounded; Gallop, <i>Parmenides of Elea</i>, 52 note 1). For <i>alētheiēs</i> as “reality” rather than “truth” I follow e.g. Palmer, <i>Parmenides and Presocratic Philosophy</i>, 363, and Coxon (McKirahan), <i>Fragments of Parmenides</i>, 54. … seen or experienced directly …: Burkert, <i>Lore and Science</i>, 20-21, 424 about <i>noein</i> (with reference to the key discussion in von Fritz, “</span><span lang="EL" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Νοῦς</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">, </span><span lang="EL" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">νοεῖν</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">,” 236-242); cf. Hanegraaff, <i>Hermetic Spirituality</i>, 12-14 and <i>passim</i>. <b>11</b> “through all things”: frgm. 1.3 (<i>pant’</i>), and cf. 1.32 (<i>dia pantos panta perōnta</i>); see Martin, <i>Parmenides' Vision</i>, 44. I accept Martin’s ground-breaking argument in <i>Parmenides’ Vision</i>, 33-37: “many-voiced” must indicate that this is the noisy crowded road (the “third route” dismissed by the goddess, frgm. 6.4-9, see text) taken by all those who think they are clever but are actually under dominion of the goddess Atē, “she who blinds all” (Homer, <i>Iliad</i> 91.19). Diels & Kranz’ <i>pant’ astē</i> does not occur in any of the manuscripts (which instead have <i>pant atē</i>, <i>pantatē</i>, <i>panta tē</i>; Martin, <i>Parmenides' Vision</i>, 48). … the gates between …: concerning the much-debated question of on which side of the gates is light (day) and on which side is darkness (night) (e.g. Burkert, “Proömium,” 6-9), I suggest with Burkert that the answer must be both: the divine light of true knowledge is found in the darkness of night (e.g. Kingsley, <i>Dark Places of Wisdom</i>), whereas the realm of bright daylight is in fact the realm of ignorance, <i>but</i> the goddess’s nondualistic logic implies that true reality and human illusion (frgm. 8.50-52) are ultimately both real. See the perceptive remarks by Burkert, "Proömium," 15-16: “neither above nor below … No, Light and Night are both just superficial aspects of the one Being [<i>des einen Seienden</i>]; the thinker must go beyond their antagonism.” <b>12</b> … not a realm of “many voices”: ref. to frgm. 1.2., as opposed to the path of <i>hēsuchia</i>. … the followers of Parmenides: Ustinova, “Truth Lies at the Bottom,” 37-44; eadem, <i>Caves</i>, 191-209 (with further references in note 103; for <i>phōleos</i>, <i>pholarchos</i>: eadem, “Truth,” 28-33; eadem, <i>Caves</i>, 197-199). … the senses …: on the effects of sensory deprivation, see Sacks, <i>Hallucinations</i>, 34-44; for relevance to Greek antiquity, see Ustinova, <i>Caves</i>, 33 with note 108 and eadem, <i>Divine </i>Mania, 23-25. … not the place of death: frgm. 1.26 and Burkert, “Proömium,” 29: “For in Greek … the refusal of nonbeing, <i>ouk esti mē einai</i>, also means unambiguously: there is no death” (for the very strict Hermetic parallel, see Hanegraaff, <i>Hermetic Spirituality</i>, 271-275). <b>13</b> It has been said … : cf. T.S. Eliot, “Human kind / cannot bear very much reality” (<i>Four Quartets</i> I; in <i>Collected Poems</i>, 178). … impossible to ignore…: Kirk & Raven, <i>Presocratic Philosophers</i>, 319ff (“The Post-Parmidean Systems”). The arrow argument is part of several similar arguments concerned with motion: Kirk & Raven, o.c., 291-297. <b>14</b> “I fear that perhaps …”: Plato, <i>Theaetetus</i> 184a.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: -36pt;"><span lang="DE" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Apelt, Otto, <i>Untersuchungen über den Parmenides des Plato</i>, n.p.: Weimar 1879.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: -36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Blackson, Thomas A., <i>Ancient Greek Philosophy: From the Presocratics to the Hellenistic Philosophers</i>, Wiley-Blackwell: Malden / Oxford 2011.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: -36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Blank David L., “Faith and Persuasion in Parmenides,” <i>Classical Antiquity</i> 1:2 (1982), 167-177.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: -36pt;"><span lang="FR" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Brach, Jean-Pierre, <i>La symbolique des nombres</i>, Presses Universitaires de France: Paris 1994.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: -36pt;"><span lang="DE" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Burkert, Walter, “Das Proömium des Parmenides und die Katabasis des Pythagoras,” <i>Phronesis </i>14 (1969), 1-30. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: -36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">----, <i>Lore and Science in Ancient Pythagoreanism</i>, Harvard University Press: Cambridge Mass. 1972.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: -36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Chesterton, Gilbert K., <i>Orthodoxy</i>, John Lane: London / New York 1909.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: -36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Cordero, Néstor-Luis, <i>By Being, It Is: The Thesis of Parmenides</i>, Parmenides Publishing: 2004.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: -36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Cornford, Francis MacDonald, <i>Plato and Parmenides: Parmenides’ </i>Way of Truth <i>and Plato’s </i>Parmenides<i> translated with an Introduction and a Running Commentary</i>, Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner & Co: London 1939.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: -36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Coxon, A.H., <i>The Fragments of Parmenides: A Critical Text with Introduction and Translation, the Ancient </i>Testimonia<i> and a Commentary</i> (orig. 1986; revised edition with new translations by Richard McKirahan, new Preface by Malcolm Schofield), Parmenides Publishing: Las Vegas / Zurich / Athens 2009. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: -36pt;"><span lang="DE" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Diels, Hermann & Walther Kranz, <i>Die Fragmente der Vorsokratiker</i>, vol. 1, Weidmannsche Verlagsbuchhandlung: Berlin 1951.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: -36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Eliot, T.S., <i>Collected Poems 1909-1962</i>, Faber & Faber: London 1963.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: -36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Fritz, Kurt von, “</span><span lang="EL" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Νοῦς</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">, </span><span lang="EL" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">νοεῖν</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">, and their Derivatives in Pre-Socratic Philosophy (Excluding Anaxagoras): Part I: From the Beginnings to Parmenides,” <i>Classical Philology</i> 40:4 91945), 223-242.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: -36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Gallop, David, <i>Parmenides of Elea: </i>Fragments, University of Toronto Press: Toronto / Buffalo / London 1984.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: -36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Geldard, Richard G., <i>Parmenides and the Way of Truth</i>, Monkfish: Rhinebeck 2007.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: -36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Hanegraaff, Wouter J., <i>Hermetic Spirituality and the Historical Imagination: Altered States of Knowledge in Late Antiquity</i>, Cambridge University Press 2022.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: -36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Kahn, Charles H., <i>Pythagoras and the Pythagoreans: A Brief History</i>, Hackett: Indianapolis / Cambridge 2001.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: -36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Kingsley, Peter, <i>In the Dark Places of Wisdom</i>, Element: Shaftesbury / Boston / Melbourne 1999.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: -36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">----, <i>Reality</i>, The Golden Sufi Center: Point Reyes, California 2003.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: -36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Kirk, G.S. & J.E. Raven, <i>The Presocratic Philosophers: A Critical History with a Selection of Texts</i>, At the University Press: Cambridge 1960.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: -36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Lombardo, Stanley, <i>Parmenides and Empedocles</i>, Wipf & Stock: Eugene, Oregon 1982.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: -36pt;"><span lang="FR" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Macris, Constantinos, Review of Leonid Zhmud, <i>Pythagoras and the Early Pythagoreans</i>, <i>Revue de Métaphysique et de Morale </i>1 (2014), 142-146.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: -36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Martin, Stuart B., <i>Parmenides’ Vision: A Study of Parmenides’ Poem</i>, University Press of America: Lanham / Boulder / New York / Toronto / Plymouth 2016.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: -36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">McKirahan, Richard D., <i>Philosophy before Socrates: An Introduction with Texts and Commentary</i>, Hackett: Indianapolis / Cambridge 2010.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: -36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Montiglio, Silvia, <i>Silence in the Land of Logos</i>, Princeton University Press 2000. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: -36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Netz, Reviel, Review of Leonid Zhmud, <i>Pythagoras and the Early Pythagoreans</i>, <i>Isis </i>104:3 (2013), 606-607.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: -36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Palmer, John, <i>Parmenides and Presocratic Philosophy</i>, Oxford University Press 2009.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: -36pt;"><span lang="NL" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Plato, <i>Verzameld Werk</i> (Mario Molegraaf, transl.), Bert Bakker: Amsterdam 2012.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: -36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Sacks, Oliver, <i>Hallucinations</i>, Picador: London 2012.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: -36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Tabak, Mehmet, <i>Plato’s </i>Parmenides<i> Reconsidered</i>, Palgrave MacMillan: New York 2015.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: -36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Ustinova, Yulia, “Truth Lies at the Bottom of a Cave: Apollo Phōleutērios, the Pholarchs of the Eleats, and Subterranean Oracles,” <i>La Parola des Passato: Rivista di Studi Antichi</i> 59 (2004). 25-44.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: -36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">----, <i>Caves and the Ancient Greek Mind: Descending Underground in the Search for Ultimate Truth</i>, Oxford University Press 2009.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: -36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">----, <i>Divine </i>Mania<i>: Alterations of Consciousness in Ancient Greece</i>, Routledge: London / New York 2018.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: -36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Waterfield, Robin, <i>The First Philosophers: The Presocratics and the Sophists</i>, Oxford University Press 2000.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; text-align: justify; text-indent: -36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Zhmud, Leonid, <i>Pythagoras and the Early Pythagoreans</i>, Oxford University Press 2012.<o:p></o:p></span></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td></tr></tbody></table>wouterjhanegraaff.blogspot.comhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15519965611425366178noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5967881025525384120.post-82122032406118433092022-10-07T09:02:00.260-07:002022-12-10T02:04:57.052-08:00Esotericism and Democracy: Some Clarifications<p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"><span>At the invitation of the German <i>Bundeszentrale für Politische Bildung</i> (Federal Agency for Civic Education), on 5 September this year I gave the opening lecture for the conference <i>Esoterik und Democratie – Ein Spannungsverhältnis </i>(Esotericism and Democracy: A Tense Relation). As the lecture was meant for a general non-academic German audience, I gave a broad introduction to (the study of) esotericism, with special attention to political concerns about the relation between contemporary esotericism and far-right activism online and offline. In view of current debates about “the West,” this was a welcome opportunity to also clarify the relation, as I see it, between esotericism as “rejected knowledge” and the historical dynamics of what I refer to as “internal eurocentrism.” I have edited my text for online publication here, and added footnotes (but please note that due to some kind of technical issue that I have not been able to figure out, they are not clickable: to find them, you'll need to scroll down).</span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; text-align: center;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;"><i style="font-family: Cambria, serif;">Table of contents</i><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif;">: Listening First, Judging Later – Rejected Knowledge – Internal Eurocentrism – Critical Theory and Uncritical Fantasies – Rightwing Esotericism – Concluding Remarks</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; text-align: start;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Let me begin with the first question that the organizers of this conference asked me to address: <span style="color: black;"><i>what is esotericism</i></span>? My answer could seem a bit disappointing at first, and perhaps will even strike you as not entirely serious. But in fact it is meant entirely in earnest, for reasons I will try to explain. What is “esotericism”? Well – in a very real sense, <span style="color: black;"><i>there is no such thing</i></span><i style="color: black; font-style: normal;">!</i> By this, I mean that “esotericism” is not anything you will ever encounter in the world around us. You will only ever find it in our <i>discussions </i>about what is in fact going on in the world around us, so you will find it in our <i>discourse</i>, and you will find it in our collective <i>imagination</i>. So what is Esotericism? The first thing to emphasize is that it is just <i>a word</i> - no more than that.<a href="#1" name="top1"><sup>1</sup></a> Perhaps a bit more precisely, </span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 18.66666603088379px;">“esotericism” is <i>an umbrella term</i>, or <i>a label</i> - like a sticker you put on a box.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 18.66666603088379px;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEguDxiVmWx1WsAfDjHKi6mhs4EuZdTHSVqQd2GOzoZb3ZBbTX55sQGY93d16mq0-vGpq60Jz98yvmkBLFhdWevkpQc-qwNy_Colx4GKTo7bxf0qJwy4OvQnWULPA1ISWvwOIXWnau1mJlj5ix9KS9-BzyfhGmIWn5ylSrnLPKiRj7MGdosbSaQyN4CFpQ/s1460/Screenshot%202022-10-07%20at%2020.27.12.png" style="clear: left; display: inline; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1286" data-original-width="1460" height="354" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEguDxiVmWx1WsAfDjHKi6mhs4EuZdTHSVqQd2GOzoZb3ZBbTX55sQGY93d16mq0-vGpq60Jz98yvmkBLFhdWevkpQc-qwNy_Colx4GKTo7bxf0qJwy4OvQnWULPA1ISWvwOIXWnau1mJlj5ix9KS9-BzyfhGmIWn5ylSrnLPKiRj7MGdosbSaQyN4CFpQ/w400-h354/Screenshot%202022-10-07%20at%2020.27.12.png" width="400" /></a></p><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 36pt; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">If you open the box, inside it you will not find some mysterious entity called “esotericism” but a very large collection of historical traditions and contemporary practices, ideas, organizations, or social movements, many of which go under names that are not widely known either.<a href="#2" name="2"><sup>2</sup></a> Or more precisely, the “esotericism” box would appear to be filled with many smaller boxes, each of them with their own label too; and again, to find out what <i>those</i> labels mean, you will have to unpack them carefully, one by one, and examine the contents. Some of those boxes contain even smaller boxes, again with their own labels. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 36pt; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">It is significant that if you look at the most authoritative academic journal for the study of esotericism, <i>Aries</i>, you will find <i>no definition</i> of esotericism there – just a list of labels for all those smaller boxes that you may expect to find inside the large one:<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span style="background-color: white; color: black; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Esotericism is understood pragmatically as an umbrella term that covers a variety of historical currents, including but not limited to Gnosticism, Hermetism, theurgy, the Islamic science of letters, the “occult sciences” (magic, alchemy, astrology), kabbalah, Paracelsianism, Rosicrucianism, theosophy, illuminism, spiritualism and occultism, tantra and yoga, psychical research, traditionalism, neopaganism, alternative spiritualities, conspirituality, popular occulture, etc.<a href="#3" name="3"><sup>3</sup></a> </span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">The “etcetera” is significant, as are the words “including but not limited to”: the editors of <span><i>Aries</i></span><i style="font-style: normal;"> </i>are perfectly well aware that their list neither is nor ever can be complete, because the boundaries of this field are not precisely defined but blurry and contested among all specialists. It is clear that<span style="color: black; font-style: normal;"> </span>each of these smaller labels would need to be explained carefully in turn. Or to stick to my metaphor: you will need to unpack and examine the contents of the smaller boxes on which they have been pasted. If you take the trouble to do this, again, you will find nothing but <span><i>words</i></span> or <i>labels</i>. There is no “astrology” inside the “astrology” box, and there are no “Rosicrucians” inside the “Rosicrucianism” box! To gain any true precision and clarity (any reliable knowledge) about what is meant by all this terminology, in each and every case you will need to zoom in very precisely and look at the <i style="font-style: normal;">only</i> realities that are actually there: not those words, not some elusive entity called “esotericism,” but<span style="color: black; font-style: normal;"> </span><i style="font-style: normal;">people</i> (individuals or collectives) who are <i style="font-style: normal;">doing</i> certain things and are <i style="font-style: normal;">saying</i> certain things. Why? For exactly the same reasons all of us do. Because their personal experiences in their own lives have led them to feel, believe, or be convinced that certain things are true and important while others are not. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 36pt; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">So this is my<b> </b>first point, simple as it may be. It is meant to bring our topic from the realm of abstractions “down to earth.” If we study “esotericism,” it is very easy and always rather tempting to imagine we are studying some kind of reality that exists “out there” in the wide world. But in fact, “esotericism” is just that label in our minds. Still, this does not mean that the term is unimportant. The figments of our collective imagination <i>do</i> exert real influence in the real world: if we believe firmly enough that something exists, “it” becomes real for us.<a href="#4" name="4"><sup>4</sup></a> This is not just true for the beliefs of esoteric insiders but also for those of outsiders about “esotericism.”<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: center; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"><span style="color: #38761d; font-size: x-large;">Listening First, Judging Later</span><span style="color: black; font-size: medium;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Nevertheless, the basic point remains that if you try to find out about the realities of so-called “esotericism” (by examining the contents of all those boxes, carefully and patiently), then all you will ever find is flesh-and-blood people like yourselves, and the things they say and do. If we want to understand “esotericism,” therefore we need to understand <i>them</i>, what really drives them, what makes them tick. We need to listen first. The biggest temptation in studying “esotericism” consists in labeling and judging (not to mention condemning) its representatives and their ideas <i>before</i> we have understood them well enough. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 36pt; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">If I may use my own work in this field as an example, in 1995 I defended my dissertation <i>New Age Religion and Western Culture: Esotericism in the Mirror of Secular Thought</i>, which got published a year later.<a href="#5" name="5"><sup>5</sup></a> As you can see from the title, it was an attempt to understand the popular esotericism known as “New Age” by studying its basic ideas and where they came from. The New Age had been attracting a lot of interest since the 1960s/70s and especially since the 1980s, when it became hugely popular and commercially attractive. There was quite a lot of academic literature about the New Age as a social movement, and some scholars were expressing concerns or worries about its social or political implications as well. But the rather embarrassing fact is that literally<i> </i>nobody had found it necessary to go find out what those New Agers were actually thinking, what kinds of ideas they had or how they looked at the world, for instance by taking the trouble to read those countless books that were available in New Age bookstores. Scholars were quite good at telling their readers what they thought about the New Age, but they had hardly been listening to its representatives. That my book was the first attempt to do so is not a particular accomplishment on my part; but it does tell us something about the remarkable lack of interest, among scholars and the wider public, in taking esotericists and their ideas seriously at all.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 36pt; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">The modern study of Western esotericism as an academic pursuit began developing around this same period, the mid-1990s, and intended to do something about that situation. It has become quite a success. Today we have professional academic journals such as <i>Aries</i> or the online open-access journal <i>Correspondences</i>;<sup><a href="#6" name="6">6</a> </sup>we have academic book series published by prestigious publishers such as Brill or Oxford University Press;<a href="#7" name="7"><sup>7</sup></a> we have a vibrant academic community of scholars affiliated to the <i>European Society for the Study of Western Esotericism </i>(ESSWE, founded in 2005) that organizes large conferences every two years and is connected to a remarkable series of ESSWE networks focused on specific periods, cultural or linguistic regions, or themes;<a href="#8" name="8"><sup>8</sup></a> conferences or sessions about esoteric topics have become perfectly common in the wider field of religious studies and elsewhere in the humanities; and specialized teaching programs and courses about esotericism have been developing at different universities, beginning at the University of Amsterdam in 1999,<a href="#9" name="9"><sup>9</sup></a> resulting in a new generation of young scholars specialized in these fields. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><span> </span>This process of professionalization means that those who work in other contexts than the academy – such as many of you who are present here today – have much better opportunities for gaining solid and adequate information about “esotericism” today than was the case just three decades ago. Looking at the books and publications that are now available on the general book market, there can be no doubt that both the quantity and the quality have improved enormously. Roughly until the later 1990s, the book market for “esotericism” was dominated by the often unreliable publications of non-academic esoteric insiders or opponents, but nowadays it is easy to gain access to serious, well-researched, sophisticated information. Nevertheless, it must be admitted that a considerable gap still exists between the scholarly literature produced by specialists who have studied these topics in depth, and a wider reading public that tends to take the easier road of getting its information from popular books published for a mass market.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 36pt; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Of course, it is perfectly understandable that professionals in fields like yours, as well, cannot spend their working days making a systematic study of the extensive scholarly literature about esotericism; but I would very much like you at least to be aware of the fact that <span style="color: black;"></span>the knowledge and information you need to figure out what “esotericism” is all about is now readily available. It is all right there for you to use it, but you need to be critical and selective. So that is the second point I would like to make. Sadly, the popular book market for “esotericism” is still largely dominated by badly informed and unreliable disinformation; so please do take the trouble to search out solid and reliable literature written by qualified scholars. I might as well mention that attendance of the biannual ESSWE conferences is open not just for academics but for professionals in other contexts as well. Some of you may be working in fields (for instance law enforcement) where your assumptions and your knowledge about a field like “esotericism” can sometimes have a serious impact and touch the lives of real people. So please make sure that those assumptions are founded on solid information rather than on the countless questionable stereotypes and misperceptions that are still widely prevalent in contemporary society and the popular media.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 36pt; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: center; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"><span style="color: #38761d; font-size: x-large;">Rejected Knowledge</span><span style="font-size: medium;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">And this leads me to a third point that I consider essential. It will take me quite a bit more time to explain, but it will also bring us to the heart of what “esotericism” is all about. I began by making the point that this word is just a label, not something that “really exists out there.” I found it essential for you to grasp that there is no such thing as a hidden “essence” of esotericism, or some kind of checklist for determining what is esoteric. But when you heard me make that basic point at the beginning of this lecture, surely you must have been asking yourself the obvious question: “if this is true, then what is it that justifies <i>any</i> such ‘esotericism’ label in the first place? If we put all these heterogeneous movements, ideas, personalities, practices, or beliefs together in one conceptual box and paste the sticker ‘esotericism’ on it, surely this means that they must have <i>something</i> in common?” <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 36pt; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Indeed they do! <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 36pt; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">But how is that possible? Haven’t I just been telling you the opposite? Well – the essential point to grasp is that this commonality between “all things esoteric” has relatively little to do with the true characteristics of everything that is actually present inside that box. It does, however, have <i>very</i> much to do with <i>our own reasons</i> <i>for putting them together in a special box </i>in the first place. In other words, this perceived commonality exists first and foremost in our own minds. <i>We</i> feel that all this stuff somehow hangs together, even if we find it hard to explain to ourselves or others why we think so. So that is my third point: the label tells something about <i>us</i>.<span style="background-color: red; color: black;"></span><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 36pt; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Now please note that when I speak of “us” here, I do not mean you and me in particular. I mean a broad consensus that is typical of our modern <i>Western</i> cultural, societal, and intellectual mainstream. This consensus has deep historical roots because it has been developing over many centuries ever since the beginning of the Common Era about two thousand years ago. Whether we like it or not, and whether we are consciously aware of it or not, all those of us who have been born, raised, and educated in Western-European or North-American culture have been deeply influenced by most of the basic ideas, frameworks, and assumptions – including all the dark sides and deeply-ingrained prejudices – that are typical of the long and complicated cultural and intellectual history of “the West.” And now I come to the point, which I want to set apart here for special emphasis: <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Our very sense of a <i>Western cultural identity</i> has been built, over many centuries, on systematic patterns of <i>critique and polemical rejection</i> directed at a whole range of worldviews, intellectual traditions, or spiritual practices that were perceived and promoted as incompatible with the fundamental values and assumptions of Western civilization. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">So that is the reason why “we” put it all together in one box. The box is filled with all kinds of stuff that “we,” over long stretches of time, have decided we didn’t want to accept or take seriously – it is, in other words, a box filled with <i>rejected knowledge</i>. That is what the label “esotericism” actually means.<span> </span><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><span> </span>Now your first response might be: “well, ok, if so – then please just tell us clearly what kind of knowledge that is, so we’ll finally know what ‘esotericism’ is all about!” But that is not so easy, to say the least. Why? Because to understand what is really at stake in studying esotericism, you will need to question the very ground under your feet or the very air that you breathe! – by which I mean: the very core beliefs and worldviews that almost all of us have inherited from our education and our socialization in Western society. Instead of just taking for granted your most basic assumptions (about how the world works, what is true and what is not, what is good and what is bad, what is “serious” and what isn’t) you must be willing to take some steps back and consider some of your core beliefs and worldviews with much more critical distance than you may be used to. I cannot emphasize this point strongly enough, radical as it may be: to even begin understanding what “esotericism” is all about, you will need to consider at least the possibility that many of your taken-for-granted beliefs might not actually be self-evidently true. There is a simple reason why this is so: <i>all human ideas come from history</i>, and any history might just as well have happened entirely differently from how it has actually happened. All of us are constantly taking many things for granted on a daily basis, simply because we come from a particular culture and intellectual tradition that teaches us to consider certain beliefs as self-evidently true while telling us simultaneously that anything which conflicts with those beliefs is self-evidently false – and therefore belongs in that box of “rejected knowledge.”<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><span> </span>To impress this point on you, I want to give you two historical examples. At first, you will probably wonder what they have to do with “esotericism,” but if so, please bear with me. You will see that they have everything to do with it. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class="MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst" style="line-height: 150%; mso-list: l2 level1 lfo3; text-align: justify; text-indent: -18pt;"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Symbol; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 150%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-family: Symbol; mso-fareast-font-family: Symbol;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">·<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman"; line-height: normal;"> </span></span></span><!--[endif]--><span dir="LTR"></span><i><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">First example</span></i><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">. One particular day roughly around 450 before the birth of Christ, two young people from aristocratic families in Athens got married. The bride’s name was Perictione, and her new husband was called Ariston. You probably do not know their names. However, you have certainly heard the name of their youngest son: Plato! Now please just try for a moment to imagine what would have happened if Ariston and Perictione had never met – if, for some reason, they had ended up marrying someone else, or if perhaps one of them had gotten sick and died before marriage, or some other such contingent event. Countless very minor things could have happened just a tiny bit differently in their lives, that could have prevented Plato from ever being born. However, <i>if</i> this man had not been born two and a half thousand years ago, then I assure you that we would not be sitting here today discussing “esotericism.” Why? Because it is impossible to even begin imagining how the world would have developed without the presence of Plato’s writings. Just think about it. We would not have the Greek philosophy that has become a bedrock foundation of so-called Western intellectual culture. It would have been impossible for the followers of Jesus to develop what we now know as Christian theology, because so many of its most basic assumptions that have dominated European intellectual life are actually grounded not in the Bible but in the philosophy of Platonism and its successors. We wouldn’t have had Arabic philosophy in the Islamic world either, which means we also wouldn’t have had the intellectual culture of the later Christian Middle Ages that is deeply indebted to Arabic scholarship.<a href="#10" name="10"><sup>10</sup></a> There could have been no such thing as the Renaissance, as it was based in crucial respects on the rebirth of Platonism in the fifteenth century,<a href="#11" name="11"><sup>11</sup></a> and so on and so forth. In sum: if Perictione and Ariston had not married, so that Plato had not been born, <i>almost</i> <i>nothing</i> could possibly have happened the way it has happened. We cannot even begin imagining the world in which we would be living today. Last but not least: many of the most central ideas that we now see as “esoteric” are actually grounded directly in Platonism as well. No Plato, no esotericism. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="line-height: 150%; mso-list: l2 level1 lfo3; text-align: justify; text-indent: -18pt;"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Symbol; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 150%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-family: Symbol; mso-fareast-font-family: Symbol;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">·<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman"; line-height: normal;"> </span></span></span><!--[endif]--><span dir="LTR"></span><i><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Second example</span></i><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">. If you had been born in the fourth century of the common era, you might perhaps have been present in 363 CE at<span style="color: black;"> </span>the Battle of Samarra (now in Iraq). In the early morning of June 26 that year, the Emperor of the Roman Empire, Julian (331-363 CE), had to rush out of his tent in great haste, because of a sudden attack by the enemy. It so happened that a small leather strap of his breast armor was broken and there had been no time to repair it. Probably because his armor did not fit properly, Julian was killed<span style="color: black;"> </span>– by a spear that would otherwise have bounced off. His death put an abrupt end to a three-year period (361-363 CE) during which Julian had been working hard to stop the Christianization of the Roman Empire and lead it back to “paganism.” We will never know what would have happened if that tiny leather strap had not been broken or had been repaired in time. The fact is that although Julian was a philosopher at heart, he had been remarkably efficient as an Emperor, and it is entirely possible that he would have succeeded in re-paganizing the empire and putting a stop to the rise of Christianity. If he had been successful, then again I can assure you that we would not be sitting here today talking about “esotericism”! Instead of remembering the Emperor Constantine “the Great,” who created the foundations of what would become a Christian Europe, we might be remembering Julian “the Great” – as the world-renowned emperor who put a stop to that strange but now largely forgotten sectarian movement known as “Christians” and put our culture back on the right track…<a href="#12" name="12"><sup>12</sup></a> <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Why do I tell you these stories? What is my point? Firstly, I am trying to convince you that many of the basic ideas, worldviews, or values that you probably take for granted in your daily life are actually not self-evident at all. They are ultimately no more than the contingent products of specific <i>historical</i> developments that just happened to take place the way they did but could just as easily have taken entirely different directions. And secondly, what we nowadays refer to as “esotericism” can <i>only</i> be understood from that perspective. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 36pt; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">In other words, my point is that you cannot understand “esotericism” without placing it in a much wider context – that of the history of Western culture itself. At the most basic level,<span style="color: black;"></span>the box that we have labeled with that name contains more or less everything that you (and all of us) have been taught to perceive as “different,” “weird,” “problematic,” “questionable,” and even “dangerous” <i>because</i> it does not fit the dominant, mainstream intellectual paradigms on which our very society is built. Another way of saying this is that our perception of “esotericism” is the outcome of <i>a long process of polemical exclusion</i> in which “we” have been defining and defending “our” “Western” identity against everything that “we” reject as incompatible with who we are, or aspire to be. In the space of a single lecture, I cannot possibly sketch even just the general outlines of this long and complicated historical development; so if you want to know more, I must refer you to a book-length treatment.<a href="#13" name="13"><sup>13</sup></a> All I can do is sketch in the most general terms why it is that our concepts of “esotericism” cannot be understood unless we see them in terms of a continuous and never-ending <i>conflict</i> that has unfolded, over millennia now, between the most foundational components of Western culture. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 36pt; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: center; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"><span style="color: #38761d; font-size: x-large;">Internal Eurocentrism</span><span style="color: black; font-size: medium;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: center; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">The first of these components can be referred to as as<span style="color: black;"> </span><i>pagan-hellenistic</i><sup><a href="#14" name="14">14</a> </sup>and took shape after the fourth century before the Common Era as a result of the spectacular conquests of Alexander the Great. Here we are dealing with many of the great civilizations of the ancient world, and their incredibly rich religious and intellectual cultures, that<span style="color: black;"> </span>now came under the influence of Greek or “Hellenic” culture – a process that continued under the Roman Empire. The second component consists of the great <i>Abrahamic</i> <i>religions</i> grounded in a radical or exclusive form of <i>monotheism</i>: Judaism, Christianity, and (yes!) Islam.<a href="#15" name="15"><sup>15</sup></a><span style="color: black;"> </span>Judaism spread widely throughout the Empire before and after the destruction of the Second Temple in 70 CE, a process known as the Jewish diaspora. Christianity became dominant in the Roman Empire and its successors, the Byzantine Empire in the East and the Church of Rome in the West. And finally, Islam contested these territories and achieved dominance over an enormous domain that, eventually, became what is known as the Ottoman Empire.<span style="color: black;"> </span>Please note that popular ideas about Islam as “the enemy of the West” (quite common, of course, in conservative and right-wing circles) are really based on little more than traditional Christian prejudice. From a perpective of cultural and intellectual history, it is essential to see that Islam is not some kind of “outsider” to “Western culture” but an integral and essential part of it.<a href="#16" name="16"><sup>16</sup></a> Of course I’m aware that this idea clashes with many popular assumptions about Islam, the Orient, and so on; but what I’m trying to do here is ask you to reconsider those assumptions. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 36pt; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">The Abrahamic or radical-monotheistic religions had always defined their very identity <i>against</i> the “pagan” practices of the surrounding culture. Jews, Christians, and Muslims all agreed in their radical rejection of what they saw as the unacceptable practice of “pagan <i>idolatry</i>.”<span style="color: black;"><sup><a href="#17" name="17">17</a> </sup>But the problem was that,</span> in actual practice, it was simply not possible for monotheists to be consistent in rejecting the Hellenic culture of the “pagans.” The enormous influence and intellectual superiority of Platonism, Neo-Platonism, Aristotelianism, and various other “pagan” philosophical systems made them indispensable to Christian theology and to religious, philosophical and scientific speculation in the Islamic world. Contrary to popular assumptions, all those bodies of Greek-Hellenic philosophical literature, beginning with Plato himself, were concerned not just with strictly “rational” or “scientific” speculation as we think of it today – if you look more closely, you discover that they were full of religious or spiritual ideas as well. You could not just pick out the “rational” or “scientific” bits of Greek intellectual culture and leave out the rest, because all of it was deeply interconnected. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 36pt; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Nevertheless, that is precisely what Christian intellectuals tried to do. We might say that they basically split these “pagan-hellenistic” traditions up into two parts; and as a result, the complex development of “Western culture” from antiquity to the present has come to be based on the highly uncomfortable but unavoidable coexistence of not two but<span style="color: black;"> </span><i>three</i> different cultural components, each with their own internal logic and dynamics. First, we have the exclusive monotheism of the Abrahamic religions, as codified in the Books of Moses, the Christian Old and New Testament, and the Quran. Second, we have what came to be seen as the respectable “pagan” traditions of Greek rationalism and science. And third, we have “all the rest,” “whatever is left” – that is to say, anything that does not fit comfortably in the neat boxes of scriptural monotheism or science and rationalism. You guessed it: here we have precisely the origin of that box with leftovers, the<span style="color: black;"> </span>“rejected knowledge” to which we popularly refer as “esotericism” today. </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 36pt; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 36pt; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiaBlstORe1fFvabNPRtejm0RqcA_s2h0cLVVS4y1xnbUJID93pr6RxmNtN-v58jRexc5cc76dFq8UCJJD6QeLV3MVX7sWiFDmTVIxf3obXFnO_tKUXFqLvDYEINKh_Zq6tXqz9x1KiDKqcZD4IMVtUuGtoaugRSM4t19_DRlU9mSc7LLfv6pRy9A8nhQ/s1866/Screenshot%202022-10-07%20at%2017.47.20.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1398" data-original-width="1866" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiaBlstORe1fFvabNPRtejm0RqcA_s2h0cLVVS4y1xnbUJID93pr6RxmNtN-v58jRexc5cc76dFq8UCJJD6QeLV3MVX7sWiFDmTVIxf3obXFnO_tKUXFqLvDYEINKh_Zq6tXqz9x1KiDKqcZD4IMVtUuGtoaugRSM4t19_DRlU9mSc7LLfv6pRy9A8nhQ/w400-h300/Screenshot%202022-10-07%20at%2017.47.20.png" width="400" /></a></div><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 36pt; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 36pt; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Now my point is that the standard textbook narratives with which most of us have been raised would like to make you believe that Western culture can essentially be reduced to the first two: <i>religion</i> (read: monotheism) and <i>science & reason</i> (read: the Greeks). The “rest” is not supposed to be taken seriously. Moreover, especially after the Reformation and the Enlightenment, we are commonly presented with an even more reductive vision that basically deletes Islam from the picture, resulting in the popular but extremely problematic notion of a “Judeo-Christian tradition” (monotheism minus Islam) pitted against rationality and science.<a href="#18" name="18"><sup>18</sup></a> <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 36pt; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 36pt; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQRIND_ITKHzIKraimnqcIrr31VvJG7l8qDN1x2lwgbhTuCVezcLOxLNRJpogIolynYHsbMS5PXdtzihro8hR7BJWnH-R84ljmf-grlnx3rSYaAYScnXwzuYjx73Lcs3XXIuW6SC7l2bRZ9mGYgUa0Sg2pCdMgA417AOHskMRQc61Zgc2xvxD3Y5l1dQ/s1866/Screenshot%202022-10-07%20at%2017.49.15.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1396" data-original-width="1866" height="299" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjQRIND_ITKHzIKraimnqcIrr31VvJG7l8qDN1x2lwgbhTuCVezcLOxLNRJpogIolynYHsbMS5PXdtzihro8hR7BJWnH-R84ljmf-grlnx3rSYaAYScnXwzuYjx73Lcs3XXIuW6SC7l2bRZ9mGYgUa0Sg2pCdMgA417AOHskMRQc61Zgc2xvxD3Y5l1dQ/w400-h299/Screenshot%202022-10-07%20at%2017.49.15.png" width="400" /></a></div><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 36pt; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 36pt; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">What we see here is nothing less than<span style="color: black;"> </span>the deeply <i>eurocentric</i> or (to use an ugly but increasingly popular neologism) <i>western-centric</i> ideology of Christian and rational-scientific superiority – in this picture, everything above the horizontal line is supposed to be “good,” while everything below it is “bad.”<span style="color: black;"> </span>Ever since the rise of modernity, this normative ideology has become deeply ingrained in our educational systems and social institutions, and so we have all been profoundly influenced by it.<a href="#19" name="19"><sup>19</sup></a> <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 36pt; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">I hope you see my point. Ever since the early modern period, this eurocentric vision of Western superiority has been central to the imperialist-colonialist enterprise of transporting Christian and rational-scientific worldviews to the rest of the globe and seeking to impose them on non-Western people and cultures. The normative ideologies that sought to<span> </span>legitimize colonial conquest and domination have received enormous amounts of criticism in recent decades, and rightly so; but in spite of the obvious importance of these political debates, even the most vocal postcolonial critics of “the West” tend to overlook something crucial. This is that <i>the eurocentric ideology of Western superiority has much older roots</i>. It is based on a consistent and systematic effort to marginalize, exclude, and discredit even much more than its “external” Others (such as Islam or India and other non-European/north-American cultures). As it emerged and developed since Late Antiquity, it had already been targeting all those <i>internal</i> Others associated with “paganism” and “idolatry” that were routinely depicted, in highly dramatic terms, as an existential “demonic” threat.<a href="#20" name="20"><sup>20</sup></a> Eventually, all these forms of “rejected knowledge” ended up in a conceptual dustbin or box of leftovers, and these are known to the wider public today by such largely pejorative labels as “esotericism,” “magic,” “superstition,” “irrationality,” or “the occult.” In short: the “weird stuff” that we find hard to categorize. “We” have created this box because those practices and ideas just happen to exist and have always existed in our parts of the world and in our history; but we still feel troubled by their presence and do not really know what they are, what to make of them, or what to do with them.<sup><a href="#21" name="21">21</a> </sup>Our deep confusion about this entire domain is ultimately what has brought us together here today, to talk about “esotericism.” In sum: those well-known types of eurocentrism directed against non-Western cultures (including, of course, the entire discourse currently known as “Orientalism”) have emerged from an even broader, older, and more pervasive “grand polemical narrative” grounded in the discursive dynamics of an <i>internal eurocentrism</i> directed against the “rejected others” <i>in</i> Western culture itself. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 36pt; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">So if you ask me “what is esotericism?,” then this is my answer.<span style="color: black;"> </span>It may not be what you had expected, but I felt I owed you a serious response rather than just something easy but superficial. There are some far-reaching implications.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst" style="line-height: 150%; mso-list: l2 level1 lfo3; text-align: justify; text-indent: -18pt;"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Symbol; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 150%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-family: Symbol; mso-fareast-font-family: Symbol;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">·<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman"; line-height: normal;"> </span></span></span><!--[endif]--><span dir="LTR"></span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">First, and perhaps rather obviously after what I just said: you cannot understand “esotericism” at a deep level without questioning those hidden or explicit ideologies of Western superiority that have defined the very project of <i>modernity</i> as such, including its imperialist expansion and efforts to colonize the rest of the world. If you doubt this, then just think of the popular idea that “we over here” have <i>science</i>, but “they over there” have nothing but <i>primitive magic</i>.<a href="#22" name="22"><sup>22</sup></a> <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="line-height: 150%; mso-list: l2 level1 lfo3; text-align: justify; text-indent: -18pt;"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Symbol; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 150%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-family: Symbol; mso-fareast-font-family: Symbol;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">·<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman"; line-height: normal;"> </span></span></span><!--[endif]--><span dir="LTR"></span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">A second implication is that all the “weird stuff” that we used to put in the “esotericism” box, to keep it safely apart from what we thought “Western culture” should be <i>really</i> all about, will have to be taken <i>out</i> of that box again and brought back to the table. It must be studied seriously and without prejudice, like any other manifestation of Western culture, and must be restored to its legitimate place in our narratives about the complex history that has been unfolding in our parts of the world over the past two and a half thousand years. Essentially, that is what we are doing in the academic study of esotericism.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast" style="line-height: 150%; mso-list: l2 level1 lfo3; text-align: justify; text-indent: -18pt;"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Symbol; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 150%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-family: Symbol; mso-fareast-font-family: Symbol;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">·<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman"; line-height: normal;"> </span></span></span><!--[endif]--><span dir="LTR"></span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Once we take such a project seriously, a third implication is that we cannot keep thinking about “Western culture” the way we used to think about it. Our traditional stories or grand narratives about “the West” must be exposed for the ideological fictions that they really are and have always been. The well-known triumphalist storylines of Western superiority will have to be<span style="color: black;"> </span>replaced by extremely different but, hopefully, more fair and accurate historical narratives of “Western culture.” <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: center; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"><span style="color: #38761d; font-size: x-large;">Critical Theory and Uncritical Fantasies</span><span style="color: black; font-size: medium;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">You have seen that I am deeply critical of eurocentric ideologies <span> </span>that seek to present a narrow understanding of Western culture as superior, by pitting “Greek” scientific rationality and “monotheistic” (or rather, so-called “Judeo-Christian”) morality against the <span> </span>supposed “irrationality” and “immorality” of everything associated with “paganism,” “idolatry,” “magic,” “superstition,” “the occult,” or “the irrational” – in short, against everything that was placed in the “esotericism” box.<a href="#23" name="23"><sup>23</sup></a> Over and over again, the modern academic study of esotericism has demonstrated that such crude polemics are simply mistaken. As soon as you move past the stereotypes and look a bit more closely, you discover how impossible it is to keep “esotericism” neatly apart from acceptable mainstream culture by such simple yardsticks as “science,” “rationality,” “religion,” or “morality.” There is plenty of irrationality, immorality, or simple stupidity to be found on <i>both </i>sides of the fence (that is, above and below the horizontal line in the previous image). Conversely, of course, there is plenty of reasonable, moral, and intelligent stuff to be found on both sides as well.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><span> </span>Nevertheless, it remains extremely common in general society and the popular media, especially in Germany, to find countless variations on Theodor Adorno’s notorious thesis that <i>Okkultismus ist die Metaphysik der dummen Kerle</i> (Occultism is the Metaphysics of Dunces).<a href="#24" name="24"><sup>24</sup></a> I must be perfectly frank here. This quote is a quite typical reflection of the standard pattern of “internal” eurocentric prejudice discussed above. Particularly in the German-speaking world after World War II, the authority of what is known as Critical Theory associated with the Frankfurt School has played a powerful but, in my firm opinion, extremely questionable and largely negative role, by delegitimizing, discrediting, and throwing suspicion on the very attempt to make esotericism into a serious topic of critical and historical academic research. From my own experiences as an academic, I can testify that as the study of esotericism developed during the 1990s, it had to be built up, established, and professionalized largely <i>against</i> the standard type of prejudice that came from Critical Theory and the Frankfurt School. Therefore I need to say a few words about it. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 36pt; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">At the end of World War II, Max Horkheimer and Theodor Adorno published their famous <i>Dialektik der Aufklärung</i> (1944). The opening chapter “Begriff der Aufklärung,” dominated by Max Weber’s concept of <i>die</i> <i>Entzauberung der Welt</i>, is based on a truly extreme version of the standard stereotypes that I have been discussing and criticizing above: “Magic versus Reason,” “Mythos versus Logos,” “Paganism versus Monotheism,” and so on.<a href="#25" name="25"><sup>25</sup></a> <i>Dialektik der Aufklärung </i>is considered a classic, so it is still routinely assigned to new generations of students and remains widely read. But if you read it from a perspective of modern critical scholarship in the fields of magic, disenchantment, or Western esotericism, you find that even its most basic assumptions and lines of argumentation are so utterly outdated that, quite frankly, they cannot be taken seriously anymore. As formulated by Jason Ā. Josephson Storm, who does his best to be as kind as possible, it is little more than “a late expression of an old myth.”<a href="#26" name="26"><sup>26</sup></a><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 36pt; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Ten years later, another Marxist philosopher, Georg Lukács, published his book <i>Die Zerstörung der Vernunft</i> (1955), based on a very similar background logic with extreme political implications.<a href="#27" name="27"><sup>27</sup></a> The volume is based on a simple opposition. On the one hand, Lukács sketches a positive, healthy, progressive intellectual tradition based on <i>reason</i> (<i>die Vernunft</i>), that runs from Hegel through Marx towards the future ideal of the classless society. By sharp contrast, its counterpart is depicted as a wholly negative, unhealthy, reactionary tradition of <i>unreason</i> that runs from Schelling through Nietzsche and ends with Hitler. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 36pt; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 36pt; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgaalSasHkZ71r3hI9kK7y_RaFoX-RDbQ-Sh9Fwlq_wb5dqBY0KP0GUI-HeL2bZgUll8kcr7LKsAdNr3upNmH9L97aSIoNqtgIrlkdZZ5QgeHatHqhw6BTIofBA0perU_Z_JIS5AKEZvzg5VJm9WFh0hx2TJaoYAIlUmCindM5ofLLR0zHyTUVUnOquuw/s1868/Screenshot%202022-10-07%20at%2017.50.40.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1400" data-original-width="1868" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgaalSasHkZ71r3hI9kK7y_RaFoX-RDbQ-Sh9Fwlq_wb5dqBY0KP0GUI-HeL2bZgUll8kcr7LKsAdNr3upNmH9L97aSIoNqtgIrlkdZZ5QgeHatHqhw6BTIofBA0perU_Z_JIS5AKEZvzg5VJm9WFh0hx2TJaoYAIlUmCindM5ofLLR0zHyTUVUnOquuw/w400-h300/Screenshot%202022-10-07%20at%2017.50.40.png" width="400" /></a></div><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 36pt; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 36pt; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Lukács’ idea was not just that Marxism is rational while Fascism is irrational. His intention was more radical: he wanted to suggest that the progress of “reason” could only lead to Marxism while “unreason” in all its forms<span> </span>(whether philosophical or esoteric) must lead inevitably towards Fascism and Antisemitism. Again, and in spite of Lukács great erudition, the basic argument amounts to little more than political propaganda that reflects the core eurocentric ideology of Western superiority. It is always the same old background story: all true morality comes from Judaism and Christianity while all true science and rationality comes from Greece. Those two core traditions of Western culture are then depicted as facing their eternal (and supposedly not <i>really</i> Western, hence “Oriental”) enemy, the mother of all things irrational and immoral: paganism, magic, the occult, superstition – in short: esotericism. And just in case anybody might still doubt how bad it all is, Lukács states that this entire “genealogy of darkness” finally led to the ultimate horrors of Fascism, National Socialism, and Antisemitism. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 36pt; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Clear rational arguments for such a blanket demonization of “the irrational” (that is: of myth, magic, paganism, the occult, esotericism) are never given. The foundations of Lukács’ <span> </span>political ideology are simply considered beyond dispute. It is not hard to understand that in the shadow of the Shoah,<span style="color: black;"> </span>such dramatic narratives of a <i>reductio a hitlerum</i> (“it all leads to Hitler”) were bound to make a strong impression on popular consciousness.<a href="#28" name="28"><sup>28</sup></a> But there is a deep irony here: if they seemed so convincing and reassuring to many, that was precisely <i>because</i> they confirmed those deeper eurocentric assumptions (including their evolutionist underpinnings, see note 22) of what Western superiority was all about. This made the story easy to sell, and it has largely determined popular and media perceptions of “esotericism” up to the present day. In the absence of a serious academic research tradition focused on actually <i>studying</i> the history of “esotericism and the occult,” historically and critically, there were simply no scholars with sufficient factual expertise and intellectual authority to challenge it – or with the courage to do so. For if<i> </i>you dared to challenge the dominant narrative, you always risked getting attacked as an “apologist” defending questionable, sinister, even dangerous “irrational” traditions.<a href="#29" name="29"><sup>29</sup></a><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 36pt; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Even more unfortunately (and reaching far beyond the impact of Critical Theory now), such simple associations of fascism, nazism and antisemitism with “esotericism, magic, and the occult” were turned into a highly successful genre of popular conspiracy fiction since the 1960s. Here we find the sensational fantasy that Hitler and the Nazis were really occultists, members of sinister secret societies engaged in black magic and inspired by demonic forces. None of that has any historical basis,<a href="#30" name="30"><sup>30</sup></a> but it was sold to an international mass audience by<span style="color: black;"> </span>the French mega-bestseller <i>Le Matin des Magiciens</i> (The Morning of the Magicians) published by Louis Pauwels and Jacques Bergier in 1960.<a href="#31" name="31"><sup>31</sup></a> Out of this developed a never-ending series of further conspiracy theories, disseminated up to the present through popular culture in the form of novels, comics, movies, video games, and the internet. All of this has the effect of creating a cloud of vague but persistent sensationalism in popular consciousness, about unknown but no doubt very sinister “esoteric” (secret!) or “occult” (hidden!) organizations believed to be working behind the scenes and involved in such radical evils as satanism and nazism. We may be dealing with “just fiction” here, but its attraction lies precisely in the exciting subliminal suggestion that “surely there must be <i>something</i> true about it…” Unfortunately, such suspicions are given a certain degree of legitimacy and plausibility by the dominant intellectual traditions that I have been criticizing here. You can see this in the fact that similar patterns of ideologically-driven disinformation about “esotericism” are not limited just to the popular media but can be found even in the work of influential university professors who set themselves up as experts but seldom know the scholarship or care to get acquainted with it.<a href="#32" name="32"><sup>32</sup></a> The only effective antidote against all this confusion about “esotericism” consists in reliable factual information based on serious, non-partisan, critical and historical scholarship. So again, I warmly invite you to familiarize yourself with the abundant critical literature that is available today. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: center; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"><span style="color: #38761d; font-size: x-large;">Rightwing Esotericism</span><span style="color: black; font-size: medium;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">My argument does not imply, of course, that there is nothing problematic about the relation between esotericism and democracy. With this I reach my fifth point:<span style="color: black;"> </span>the importance of being specific – of always differentiating carefully and precisely, rather than painting everything with the same brush.<b> </b>In a liberal democracy, an open society that cherishes freedom of religion, there is no particular reason why the presence of “esoteric” movements or ideas as such should be seen as problematic. The true problem lies in widespread ignorance about esotericism and its history, to which the antidote consists of solid information based on legitimate scholarship. The first lesson that can be learned from the study of esotericism is to steer away from blanket generations and always narrow any inquiry down to <i>specific</i> esoteric trends, movements, or organizations. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 36pt; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Historically and sociologically, many phenomena that fall under the “esotericism” umbrella are hardly concerned with political questions. Many others, since the eighteenth century, have been aligned with left-wing, socialist or progressive agendas. For instance, there is a history of strong connections between esotericism and socialism in the nineteenth century;<a href="#33" name="33"><sup>33</sup></a><span> </span>and many forms of esotericism during that period were involved in such progressive causes as women’s emancipation and voting rights, anti-vivisectionism, gender reform, sexual liberation, and anti-colonialism.<a href="#34" name="34"><sup>34</sup></a> It is not insignificant that the most influential modern esoteric movement of the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, Theosophy, was promoting a world-wide program of social reform that should lay foundations for “the Universal Brotherhood of Humanity, without distinction of race, creed, sex, caste or colour.”<a href="#35" name="35"><sup>35</sup></a> That this was not just theory is shown by the very strong presence both of women and of South-Asian Theosophers in the leadership and the publications of this global organization.<a href="#36" name="36"><sup>36</sup></a> After World War II as well, much of the popular esotericism that flourished in the Counterculture since the sixties was leaning decidedly towards the left, for instance in its support for the civil rights movement, sexual liberation, and opposition against the Vietnam war and others manifestations of Western imperialism. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 36pt; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">But of course, in the contemporary context we see a number of specific esoteric trends that are undoubtedly problematic because they reject the basic values of liberal democracy. <span style="color: black;">Since esotericism takes its basic ideas from the Western reservoir of “rejected knowledge,” it always has a strong potential for countercultural critiques against the status quo. During the later eighteenth and the nineteenth centuries, many esoteric currents took the side of the Enlightenment and progressive social causes against the still-powerful influence of the churches and Christian dogmatism.<a href="#37" name="37"><sup>37</sup></a> But as this battle was decided increasingly in favour of modernization and secularization (or “rationality and science”), those who felt that “disenchantment” was emptying the world of spiritual meaning found it easy to perceive esotericism as an attractive reservoir of <i>non</i>- or <i>anti</i>-modern ideas and traditions.<a href="#38" name="38"><sup>38</sup></a> This could and did lead to various new forms of more or less conservative or reactionary “right-wing” esotericism, some of which are explicit in rejecting the very foundations of liberalism and democracy. </span>I will briefly mention the most important of them; but before doing so, I would like to emphasize my sixth and final point. Again, I want to highlight it for special emphasis:<span style="color: black;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 36pt; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">These increasingly visible and popular trends of right-wing esotericism must be seen not as <i>causal factors</i> that help explain the rise of<span> </span>far-right populism over the past two decades. Rather, they are <i>symptoms</i> of the general crisis of liberal democracy that we are currently experiencing.<span style="color: black;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Here I need to make short excursion to explain the background argument on which my analysis rests. The ascendancy of Neoliberalism based on the theories of Friedrich Hayek and his Mont Pelerin Society since the Reagan/Thatcher era of the 1980s, and the global spread of this ideology since the Clinton/Blair era after the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1989, has led to a deep transformation of what “liberalism” was supposed to mean. For reasons that I cannot possibly discuss here but have been analyzed by specialists in detail,<a href="#39" name="39"><sup>39</sup></a> the deep logic of neoliberalism is in fact <i>incompatible</i> with democracy and <i>undermines</i> the very principles of “freedom and equality” that liberalism was supposed to be all about.<a href="#40" name="40"><sup>40</sup></a> At present, we are seeing a widespread popular revolt against the fact that the global push towards radical neoliberalization has clearly <i>not</i> brought us freedom, equality, social justice, democracy and human flourishing, but rather their opposites: authoritarianism, impersonal technological systems of bureaucratic surveillance and control, widespread social injustice, extreme economic inequality, and an ever-deepening crisis of democracy. The tragedy is that neoliberals have always presented themselves as defending “liberalism” and “democracy,” whereas in fact (as specialists and insiders have always known) they were doing the opposite. Because this somewhat subtle but all-important distinction is lost on the wider public, “liberal democracy” gets blamed for the sicknesses that are actually caused by the surrogate that took its place: neoliberalism.<a href="#41" name="41"><sup>41</sup></a><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 36pt; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">A certain number of specific esoteric trends have been responding to this situation, or profited from it, by presenting themselves as alternatives. Some of them have taken a clear turn towards the right or the far right. Without going into any detail here, I would suggest the most important ones are the following. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 36pt; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class="MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst" style="line-height: 150%; mso-list: l2 level1 lfo3; text-align: justify; text-indent: -18pt;"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Symbol; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 150%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-family: Symbol; mso-fareast-font-family: Symbol;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">·<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman"; line-height: normal;"> </span></span></span><!--[endif]--><span dir="LTR"></span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">First, there is the so-called <i>Traditionalist current</i>,<a href="#42" name="42"><sup>42</sup></a> defined by its virulent opposition against “modernity” in all its forms. For this very reason it has, of course, always tended to be extremely critical of democracy and liberal values as well. Traditionalism was born from the work of the French esotericist René Guénon (1886-1951), and it must be said that many of its sympathizers are much more focused on spiritual concerns than on political ones. Its contemporary anti-democratic far-right manifestations are inspired most specifically by the Italian Traditionalist Julius Evola (1898-1974), who tried to align himself to Mussolini and Hitler and was perfectly explicit about his racist and antisemitic opinions.<a href="#43" name="43"><sup>43</sup></a> Today, this kind of Traditionalism is coalescing around “spiritual” New Right publishers such as Arktos Media or influential “white-nationalist” websites and networks with explicit racist and antisemitic agendas such as Greg Johnson’s Counter-Currents.<a href="#44" name="44"><sup>44</sup></a> Not surprisingly, in the same milieus we find a fascination with specific esoteric traditions such as the well known racist/antisemitic mutation of Theosophy known as Ariosophy, or Neonazi icons like<span style="color: black;"> </span>Savitri Devi (Maximiani Julia Portas, 1905-1982), who believed that Hitler was a divine avatar;<a href="#45" name="45"><sup>45</sup></a> and with various more or less “pagan” forms of esotericism aligned to<span style="color: black;"> </span>Alain de Benoist’s <i>Nouvelle Droite </i>or<i> </i>the Russian philosopher Aleksandr Dugin, both of whom have a rather large international following.<a href="#46" name="46"><sup>46</sup></a><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="line-height: 150%; mso-list: l2 level1 lfo3; text-align: justify; text-indent: -18pt;"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Symbol; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 150%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-family: Symbol; mso-fareast-font-family: Symbol;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">·<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman"; line-height: normal;"> </span></span></span><!--[endif]--><span dir="LTR"></span><i><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Modern paganism</span></i><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> (also known as Neopaganism) is indeed the second main field where, these days at least, you will find quite some interest in conservative-traditionalist ideas leaning towards the right or the far-right. Predictably, this has led to internal controversies in the pagan community, because many pagans are liberal, left-leaning, and deeply concerned with such progressive issues as women’s emancipation and protecting the environment. But other trends in contemporary paganism place a strong emphasis on the Northern and Germanic pagan deities or “masculine” warrior values; and this may easily, although not necessarily,<a href="#47" name="47"><sup>47</sup></a> lead to an endorsement of <i>Blut und Boden</i> ideologies.<a href="#48" name="48"><sup>48</sup></a> Furthermore, a Nietzschean critique of the “soft” so-called “Judeo-Christian” values of Western society, held responsible for the desacralization of the world that has culminated in a spiritually empty neoliberal consumer society, may easily give food to right-wing forms of paganism (although, since it is quite natural for pagans to be critical of Christianity, somewhat similar arguments can also be made from left-wing pagan perspectives).<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast" style="line-height: 150%; mso-list: l2 level1 lfo3; text-align: justify; text-indent: -18pt;"><!--[if !supportLists]--><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Symbol; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 150%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-family: Symbol; mso-fareast-font-family: Symbol;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">·<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman"; line-height: normal;"> </span></span></span><!--[endif]--><span dir="LTR"></span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">The third and final main trend that I would highlight is of a rather different kind. As everybody knows who has read Umberto Eco’s novel <i>Foucault’s Pendulum</i> (1988), a very important dimension of modern and contemporary esotericism consists of conspiracy theories; and their wide adoption in contemporary spiritual milieus has led to a popular new term, <i>Conspirituality</i>.<a href="#49" name="49"><sup>49</sup></a> Historically, these trends first developed toward the end of the eighteenth century among deeply conservative<span style="color: black;"> </span>Roman Catholics who believed that the Freemasons and the German Order of the <i>Illuminaten</i> were inspired by the devil and responsible for the French Revolution.<a href="#50" name="50"><sup>50</sup></a> They further developed in many ways throughout the nineteenth century, resulting in countless extremely popular conspiracy fantasies with a central role for Freemasons, Occultists, Satanists, Jesuits, and Jews.<a href="#51" name="51"><sup>51</sup></a> I already mentioned the popular conspirational genre of “Nazi occultism”; but quite some other similar narratives are themselves implicitly or explicitly antisemitic, as they follow the example of the notorious <i>Protocols of the Elders of Zion</i><sup><a href="#52" name="52">52</a> </sup>in suggesting that the neoliberal “elites” that seek to control the world are dominated by a sinister conspiracy of wealthy Jews (the Rothschilds, George Soros, and so on). It is extremely disturbing to see how all these long-refuted stories keep being revived and disseminated online, and keep finding new converts, in the wider context of a “post-truth” culture that erases any distinction between fiction and fact.<a href="#53" name="53"><sup>53</sup></a> <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Traditionalism, Right-wing Paganism, and Conspirituality are certainly important phenomena, and it is understandable that they attract much attention from the popular media. But we should not forget that, in the end, they are just three specific dimensions of the much wider and extremely complex field known as “contemporary esotericism.”<a href="#54" name="54"><sup>54</sup></a><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: center; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"><span style="color: #38761d; font-size: x-large;">Concluding Remarks</span><span style="color: black; font-size: medium;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">In the wake of such phenomena as the Covid crisis, the popular anti-vaccination movement, the attack on the Capitol, and now the Ukraine war, many recent commentators have been shocked and surprised to see how incredibly popular conspiracy narratives have become, on the internet and social media and among protesters who take to the streets. What to make of the fact that, nowadays, Hippie-like spiritual movements that supposedly preach “love and peace” seem to find it no problem to stand shoulder to shoulder with neofascists and other radical activists on the far right, including pagans and traditionalists?<a href="#55" name="55"><sup>55</sup></a><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 36pt; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">I have been arguing that these phenomena are not <i>caused</i> by anything that could be considered “intrinsically esoteric.” In other words, it is not “because of their esoteric ideas” that these people are turning towards the right and against “the elites.” Rather, these protest movements should be seen as <i>symptoms</i> of a deep crisis of liberal democracy. I have suggested that this crisis is caused, essentially, by the historical process of neoliberalization (and neoliberal globalization) that has unfolded since the 1980s and has been spinning out of control increasingly since the financial crisis of 2009. Let me return here to my point at the beginning of this lecture: never forget that in studying esotericism, we are ultimately studying <i>people</i>. It is perfectly normal that average citizens today are struggling with feelings of deep sadness or depression, fear and uncertainty, or alarm and moral outrage about what is currently happening to our world. Many of us feel helpless, afraid and angry, seeing how powerless we are to do anything about the steady accumulation of crises (environmental, social, political, economic, democratic, military, medical, mental-psychological, and so on) that seem to be tearing the fabric of our society apart. Given this situation, it is not just easy but perfectly <i>natural</i> for many individuals to start searching for possible sources of hope and inspiration in the rich historical reservoir of “esoteric” beliefs, concepts, symbols, language, myths, or narratives. After all, those materials have at least one thing in common: the fact that they have been discarded and marginalized by the Western mainstream and intellectual elites, so that they ended up in that box of “rejected knowledge.” This makes them obviously attractive.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: medium; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 36pt; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">In other words, if you feel deeply disappointed, frustrated, or betrayed by “the system,” “the mainstream media,” or “the elites” who have been making such a mess of our world, to a point where you conclude that those who are in charge must be utterly corrupt, then <i>of course </i>you no longer believe any of the “official stories” that “those elites” are trying to sell you, or their claims about what is “true” and what is not! You no longer trust anything they say. But you are still looking for answers, for <i>some</i> kind of meaningful knowledge, <i>some</i> larger story that makes sense, <i>something </i>that might help you understand what is happening and why. The result is that you have plenty of reasons now to take a special interest in whatever “they” <i>reject</i> and have always been trying so hard to discredit, as ridiculous or dangerous and false. In short, you will be inclined to reject whatever they accept (possibly even <i>because</i> they accept it) <span> </span>and to accept whatever they reject (possibly even <i>because</i> they reject it). <o:p></o:p></span></p><p><style class="WebKit-mso-list-quirks-style">
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</style></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-size: medium; line-height: 24px; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">This logic is perfectly easy to understand. It explains the special attraction of esotericism as “rejected knowledge” to a society in crisis. I believe there is reason for us to be deeply concerned about the future of liberal democracy, its most fundamental values, and its basic institutions; for they are seriously weakened and under continous attack, and I’m afraid it is by no means certain that they will survive the next decades. To be effective in meeting this enormous challenge, we should not allow an obsession with <i>symptoms</i> to distract us from diagnosing the deep <i>causes</i> of what is going on in society. Our task is to find out what is really wrong with the patient and what we can do to heal her. Otherwise the symptoms will not go away. </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-size: medium; line-height: 24px; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><br /></span></p><p><span class="Apple-style-span">
<a name="1"><b>1 </b></a>For the history of the word “esotericism,” see Monika Neugebauer-Wölk, “Historische Esoterikforschung, oder: Der lange Weg der Esoterik zur Moderne,” in: Monika Neugebauer-Wölk, Renko Geffarth & Markus Meumann (eds.), <i>Aufklärung und Esoterik: Wege in die Moderne</i>, De Gruyter: Berlin/Boston 2013, 37-72.<a href="#top1" style="font-size: small;"><sup>↩</sup></a><br />
</span>
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<a name="2"><b>2 </b></a>For descriptions of these traditions, practices, ideas, movements and organizations, see Wouter J. Hanegraaff (ed.), in collaboration with Antoine Faivre, Roelof van den Broek & Jean-Pierre Brach, <i>Dictionary of Gnosis and Western Esotericism</i>, Brill: Leiden / Boston 2005. For a short overview, see Wouter J. Hanegraaff, <i>Western Esotericism: A Guide for the Perplexed,</i> Bloomsbury: London / New York 2013, 18-44.<sup><a href="#2">↩</a></sup><div><a name="3"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="3"><b>3 </b></a>A<i>ries: Journal for the Study of Western Esotericism</i> (Brill: Leiden / Boston 2001-present); colofon new version 2022.<sup><a href="#3">↩</a></sup></div><div><br /></div>
<a name="4"><b>4 </b></a>Imaginal formations such as “esotericism” (or others such as “religion,” “the economy,” and so on) can play an extremely important role because they get reified in our collective imagination. For discussion, see Hanegraaff, “<a href="https://www.academia.edu/28891053/Reconstructing_Religion_from_the_Bottom_Up_2016_">Reconstructing ‘Religion’ from the Bottom Up</a>,” <i>Numen</i> 63:5/6 (2016), 578-581.<a href="#4"><sup>↩</sup></a> <div><a name="5"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="5"><b>5 </b></a>Wouter J. Hanegraaff, <i>New Age Religion and Western Culture: Esotericism in the Mirror of Secular Thought</i>, Brill: Leiden / Boston 1996 & State University of New York Press: Albany 1998.<a href="#5"><sup>↩</sup></a> </div><div><a name="6"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="6"><b>6 </b></a><i>Correspondences</i> (open access: <a href="https://correspondencesjournal.com">https://correspondencesjournal.com</a>, 2013-present).<a href="#6"><sup>↩</sup></a> </div><div><a name="7"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="7"><b>7 </b></a>“Aries Book Series: Texts and Studies in Western Esotericism,” edited by Marco Pasi (<a href="https://brill.com/view/serial/ARBS">https://brill.com/view/serial/ARBS</a>); “<a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/content/series/o/oxford-studies-in-western-esotericism-oswe/?cc=nl&lang=en&">Oxford Studies in Western Esotericism</a>,” edited by Henrik Bogdan.<a href="#7"><sup>↩</sup></a> </div><div><a name="8"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="8"><b>8 </b></a>See website <a href="https://www.esswe.org">https://www.esswe.org</a>. The ESSWE has been organizing biannual conferences in Europe since 2007: Tübingen 2007, Strasbourg 2009, Szeged 2011, Gothenburg 2013, Riga 2015, Erfurt 2017, Amsterdam 2019, Cork 2022 (postponed from 2021 because of Covid). Upcoming conference: Malmö 2023. For the many ESSWE networks, see <a href="https://www.esswe.org/Networks">https://www.esswe.org/Networks</a>.<a href="#8">
<sup>↩</sup></a> </div><div><a name="9"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="9"><b>9 </b></a>See www.amsterdamhermetica.nl. For the origins and history of this unique program, see the anniversary volume Wouter J. Hanegraaff & Joyce Pijnenburg (ed.), <i>Hermes in the Academy: Ten Years’ Study of Western Esotericism at the University of Amsterdam</i>, Amsterdam University Press 2009 (free download <a href="https://www.amsterdamhermetica.nl/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/Hermes-in-the-Academy.pdf">here</a>). A second anniversary volume was published ten years later as Wouter J. Hanegraaff, Peter J. Forshaw & Marco Pasi (eds.), <i>Hermes Explains: Thirty Questions about Western Esotericism</i>, Amsterdam University Press 2019.<a href="#9"><sup>↩</sup></a> </div><div><a name="10"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="10"><b>10 </b></a>The point is that the Arabic philosophy that flourished in the so-called “Golden Age” of Islam was deeply indebted to philosophical traditions originally written in Greek. See for instance Peter Adamson & Richard C. Taylor (eds.), <i>The Cambridge Companion to Arabic Philosophy</i>, Cambridge University Press 2005.<sup><a href="#10">↩</a></sup></div><div><br /></div>
<a name="11"><b>11 </b></a>Here a crucial role was played by the Florentine Humanist philosopher Marsilio Ficino (1433-1499), a key figure in the history of esotericism and in the general history of early modern culture. Ficino translated the complete works of Plato (and many other Platonists) into Latin, which now became available to intellectuals on a large scale due to the recent invention of printing.<a href="#11"><sup>↩</sup></a> <div><a name="12"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="12"><b>12 </b></a>For a very readable account, see Jonathan Kirsch, <i>God against the Gods: The History of the War between Monotheism and Polytheism</i>, Viking Compass: New York 2004, 213-267.<a href="#12"><sup>↩</sup></a> </div><div><a name="13"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="13"><b>13 </b></a>Wouter J. Hanegraaff, <i>Esotericism and the Academy: Rejected Knowledge in Western Culture</i>, Cambridge University Press 2012. For a short summary of this history of polemical inclusion, see Hanegraaff, <i>Western Esotericism</i>, 45-68.<a href="#13"><sup>↩</sup></a> </div><div><a name="14"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="14"><b>14 </b></a>In contemporary academic discourse, almost all generic terms tend to be contested and deconstructed as reflecting some kind of ethnocentric bias or ideological prejudice, and “pagan-hellenistic” is no exception. For my use of paganism as a perfectly neutral, non-pejorative term, I am on board with the authoritative argument in Alan Cameron, <i>The Last Pagans of Rome</i>, Oxford University Press 2011, 14-32. Hellenism, too, I use as a purely descriptive category, including an explicit rejection of “philhellenist” bias (see Hanegraaff, <i>Hermetic Spirituality and the Historical Imagination: Altered States of Knowledge in Late Antiquity</i>, Cambridge University Press 2022, 16-19 & 360-362).<a href="#14"><sup>↩</sup></a> </div><div><a name="15"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="15"><b>15 </b></a>Again, the terminology of “Abrahamic Religions” is far from uncontested; see e.g. Adam J. Silverstein & Guy G. Stroumsa (eds.), <i>The Oxford Handbook of the Abrahamic Religions</i>, Oxford University Press 2015. <a href="#15"><sup>↩</sup></a> </div><div><a name="16"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="16"><b>16 </b></a>E.g. Richard W. Bulliet, <i>The Case of Islamo-Christian Civilization</i>, Columbia University Press: New York 2004; Hanegraaff, <i>Hermetic Spirituality</i> (above, see note 14), 360-363.<a href="#16"><sup>↩</sup></a> </div><div><a name="17"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="17"><b>17 </b></a>Jan Assmann, M<i>oses the Egyptian: The Memory of Egypt in Western Monotheism</i>, Harvard University Press: Cambridge Mass. / London 1997; idem, <i>Die Mosaische Unterscheidung, oder Der Preis des Monotheismus</i>, Carl Hanser Verlag: München / Vienna 2003; Moshe Halbertal & Avishai Margolit, <i>Idolatry</i>, Harvard University Press: Cambridge Mass. / London 1992.<a href="#17"><sup>↩</sup></a> </div><div><a name="18"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="18"><b>18 </b></a>The concept of a “Judeo-Christian” tradition is meant to exclude Islam both from monotheism and from European culture. Furthermore, it reflects a Christian-hegemonic agenda of reducing Judaism to the subordinate role of merely “preceding” or “paving the way” for the advent of Christianity. <a href="#18"><sup>↩</sup></a> </div><div><a name="19"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="19"><b>19 </b></a>For a more detailed argument concerning this point, see Hanegraaff, <a href="https://www.academia.edu/28891053/Reconstructing_Religion_from_the_Bottom_Up_2016_">“Reconstructing ‘Religion’ from the Bottom Up.”</a><a href="#19"><sup>↩</sup></a> </div><div><a name="20"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="20"><b>20 </b></a>For a classic study with a title that captured exactly the point I am trying to make here, see Norman Cohn, <i>Europe’s Inner Demons</i>, Sussex University Press 1975. For the “demonization” of these traditions, see Hanegraaff, <i>Esotericism and the Academy</i>, 77-152.<sup><a href="#20">↩</a></sup>
</div><div><br /></div>
<a name="21"><b>21 </b></a>See Hanegraaff, <i>Esotericism and the Academy</i>, 1-4.<a href="#21"><sup>↩</sup></a> <div><a name="22"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="22"><b>22 </b></a>This idea is grounded in deeply-rooted ideas of cultural evolution that became extremely popular during the nineteenth century and suggested that civilization advances from primitive “magic” to the more sophisticated phenomenon of “religion” (with liberal Protestantism as its highest manifestation) and from there to the even more superior level of “rationality and science.” Classical formulations can be found for instance in the work of Edward Burnett Tylor, the founder of cultural anthropology, and his famous successor James Frazer. The implications of evolutionist theory were deeply <i>racist</i> (the history of humanity was depicted as a movement of progress from the inferior “primitive magic” of black people in Africa to the superior religion and science of white Europeans/Americans) and explicitly <i>genocidal</i>, as can be see for instance in the work of highly influential “social darwinists” such as Herbert Spencer, who was capable of writing sentences like these: “Imperialism has served civilization by clearing the inferior races off the earth. … The forces which are working out the great scheme of perfect happiness, taking no account of incidental suffering, exterminate such sections of mankind as stand in their way … Be he human or be he brute – the hindrance must be got rid of” (Spencer, <i>Social Statistics: or, The Conditions Essential to Human Happiness specified, and the First of Them Developed</i>, John Chapman: London 1850, 416; cf. Wouter J. Hanegraaff, “<a href="http://wouterjhanegraaff.blogspot.com/2014/03/exterminate-all-idols.html">Exterminate all the Idols</a>”.<a href="#22"><sup>↩</sup></a> </div><div><a name="23"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="23"><b>23 </b></a>This point is central to my argument in Wouter J. Hanegraaff, “<a href="https://correspondencesjournal.com/14303-2/">The Globalization of Esotericism</a>,” <i>Correspondences</i> 3 (2015), 55-91; and for an even more critical discussion of “spiritual imperialism” that I published already at a time when “globalization” was still widely regarded as a positive or benevolent phenomenon, see Wouter J. Hanegraaff, “<a href="https://www.academia.edu/3461630/Prospects_for_the_Globalization_of_New_Age_Spiritual_Imperialism_versus_Cultural_Diversity_2001_">Prospects for the Globalization of New Age: Spiritual Imperialism versus Cultural Diversity</a>,” in: Mikael Rothstein (ed.), <i>New Age Religion and Globalization</i>, Aarhus University Press 2001, 15-30. In a bizarre misinterpretation of my work and its agendas, the 2015 article has led some authors to suspect me of somehow supporting and legitimizing precisely the imperialist/colonialist ideologies of Western superiority that in fact I criticize and reject so explicitly! (see notably the Introduction and a contribution by Julian Strube in Egil Asprem & Julian Strube [eds.], <i>New Approaches to the Study of Esotericism</i>, Brill: Leiden / Boston 2021). For my true perspective, see the general argument of <i>Esotericism and the Academy</i>; and more recently, see the short discussion in <i>Hermetic Spirituality</i>, 360-363. <a href="#23"><sup>↩</sup></a> </div><div><a name="24"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="24"><b>24 </b></a>Theodor W. Adorno, Thesen gegen den Okkultismus VI (in: <i>Minima Moralia: Reflexionen aus den beschädigten Leben</i>, orig. 1951, Suhrkamp: Frankfurt a.M. 2003). See the critical analysis by Andreas Kilcher, “Is Occultism a Product of Capitalism?,” in: Wouter J. Hanegraaff, Peter J. Forshaw & Marco Pasi (eds.), <i>Hermes Explains: Thirty Questions about Western Esotericism</i>, Amsterdam University Press 2019, 168-176).<a href="#24"><sup>↩</sup></a> </div><div><a name="25"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="25"><b>25 </b></a>Max Horkheimer & Theodor W. Adorno, <i>Dialektik der Aufklärung</i> (orig. 1944), Fischer Taschenbuch Verlag: Frankfurt a.M. 1988, 9-49.<a href="#25"><sup>↩</sup></a> </div><div><a name="26"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="26"><b>26 </b></a>Jason Ānanda Josephson Storm, <i>The Myth of Disenchantment: Magic, Modernity, and the Birth of the Human Sciences</i>, The University of Chicago Press: Chicago / London 2017, 10; see also my critical discussion in Hanegraaff, <i>Esotericism and the Academy</i>, 312-314, 302-303 note 160. <a href="#26"><sup>↩</sup></a> </div><div><a name="27"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="27"><b>27 </b></a>Georg Lukács, <i>Die Zerstörung der Vernunft: Der Weg des Irrationalismus von Schelling zu Hitler</i>, Aufbau-Verlag: Berlin / Weimar 1988.<sup><a href="#27">↩</a></sup></div><div><a name="28"><b><br /></b></a></div><div>
<a name="28"><b>28 </b></a>For an excellent critique of this type of reasoning, see Elaine Fisher, “Fascist Scholars, Fascist Scholarship: The Quest for Ur-Fascism and the Study of Religion,” in: Christian K. Wedemeyer & Wendy Doniger (eds.), <i>Hermeneutics, Politics, and the History of Religions: The Contested Legacies of Joachim Wach and Mircea Eliade</i>, Oxford University Press 2010, 261-284.<a href="#28"><sup>↩</sup></a> </div><div><a name="29"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="29"><b>29 </b></a>In 2009, I discussed this popular type of “guilt by association” in an unpublished lecture “Politics and the Study of Western Esotericism” that is <a href="https://www.academia.edu/30576084/Politics_and_the_Study_of_Western_Esotericism_2009_unpublished_">available online</a>. The lecture reflected my deep worries about the surge of right-wing populism in the wake of 9/11. As this trend has obviously continued over the past decade, to a point where far-right perspectives have now become a real and present danger to the survival of liberal democracy, I believe my argument has lost none of its relevance. <a href="#29"><sup>↩</sup></a> </div><div><a name="30"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="30"><b>30 </b></a>For “the modern mythology of Nazi occultism,” see the excellent and still relevant appendix to Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke, <i>The Occult Roots of Nazism: Secret Aryan Cults and their Influence on Nazi Ideology</i>, I.B. Tauris: London / New York 1985, 217-225. Unfortunately, the mythology keeps influencing even the work of academics who should know better, but whose books make large sales by playing into sensationalist stereotypes. See e.g. Eric Kurlander, <i>Hitler’s Monsters: A Supernatural History of the Third Reich</i>, Yale University Press: New Haven / London 2017; critical discussions in Julian Strube (<a href="https://correspondencesjournal.com/volume-5/"><i>Correspondences</i> 5 [2017], 130-139</a>) and Eva Kingsepp (“<a href="https://brill.com/view/journals/arie/19/2/article-p265_5.xml">Scholarship as Simulacrum: The Case of Hitler’s Monsters</a>,” <i>Aries</i> 19 [2019], 265-281).<a href="#30"><sup>↩</sup></a> </div><div><a name="31"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="31"><b>31 </b></a>Louis Pauwels & Jacques Bergier, <i>Le matin des magiciens</i>, Gallimard : Paris 1960.<a href="#31"><sup>↩</sup></a> </div><div><a name="32"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="32"><b>32 </b></a>A particularly clear example is Hartmut Zinser, <i>Esoterik: Eine Einführung</i>, Wilhelm Fink: München 2009; critical review in Wouter J. Hanegraaff, “<a href="https://www.academia.edu/3883451/Textbooks_and_Introductions_to_Western_Esotericism_2013_">Textbooks and Introductions to Western Esotericism</a>,” <i>Religion</i> 43:2 (2013), 193-195. <a href="#32"><sup>↩</sup></a> </div><div><a name="33"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="33"><b>33 </b></a>Julian Strube, <i>Sozialismus, Katholizismus und Okkultismus im Frankreich des 19. Jahrhunderts: Die Genealogie der Schriften von Eliphas Lévi</i>, De Gruyter: Berlin / Boston 2016; idem, “Socialist Religion and the Emergence of Occultism: A Genealogical Approach to Socialism and Secularisation in 19th-century France,” <i>Religion</i> 46:3 (2016), 359-388. <a href="#33"><sup>↩</sup></a> </div><div><a name="34"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="34"><b>34 </b></a>E.g. Marco Pasi, “The Modernity of Occultism: Reflections on Some Crucial Aspects,” in: Hanegraaff & Pijnenburg, <i>Hermes in the Academy</i>, 59-74 (<a href="https://www.amsterdamhermetica.nl/wp-content/uploads/2013/05/Hermes-in-the-Academy.pdf">free download here</a>); Anne Braude, <i>Radical Spirits: Spiritualism and Women’s Rights in Nineteenth-Century America</i>, Beacon Press: Boston 1989; Joy Dixon, <i>Divine Feminine: Theosophy and Feminism in England</i>, Johns Hopkins University Press: Baltimore / London 2001; Martin Green, <i>Mountain of Truth: The Counterculture Begins. Ascona, 1900-1920</i>, Tufts University & University Press of New England: Hanover / London 1986; Alex Owen, <i>The Place of Enchantment: British Occultism and the Culture of the Modern</i>, The University of Chicago Press: Chicago / London 2004; Corinna Treitel, <i>A Science for the Soul: Occultism and the Genesis of the German Modern</i>, Johns Hopkins University Press: Baltimore / London 2004; <span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif;">Manon Hedenborg White, <i>The Eloquent Blood: The Goddess Babalon & the Construction of Femininities in Western Esotericism</i>, Oxford University Press 2020.</span><sup><a href="#34">↩</a></sup></div><div><a name="35"><b><br /></b></a></div><div>
<a name="35"><b>35 </b></a>1888 version (see Josephine Ransom, <i>A Short History of the Theosophical Society, 1875-1937</i>, Theosophical Publishing House: Adyar, Madras 1938, 545-553, here 549). Particularly in Germany, H.P. Blavatsky’s theory of “root races” is often conflated or confused with the racist/antisemitic Ariosophy of Lanz von Liebenfels, resulting in widespread misperceptions of Blavatsky’s Theosophy as a conservative or reactionary “right-wing” movement (while neglecting the fact that, far from being an esoteric specialty, racial theories were more or less omnipresent during the later nineteenth centur; see above, note 22 for the case of Herbert Spencer). For an excellent discussion in German that corrects such mistakes, see Jan Stottmeister, <i>Der George-Kreis und die Theosophie, mit einem Exkurs zum Swastika-Zeichen bei helena Blavatsky, Alfred Schuler und Stefan George</i>, Wallstein Verlag: Göttingen 2014 (see pp. 344-371 about Blavatsky’s Rassentheoretischer Antirassismus).<a href="#35"><sup>↩</sup></a> </div><div><a name="36"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="36"><b>36 </b></a>Tim Rudbøg & Erik Reenberg Sand (eds.), <i>Imagining the East: The Early Theosophical Society</i>, Oxford University Press 2020; Hans Martin Krämer & Julian Strube (eds.), <i>Theosophy Across Boundaries: Transcultural and Interdisciplinary Perspectives on a Modern Esoteric Movement</i>, State University of New York Press: Albany 2020.<a href="#36"><sup>↩</sup></a> </div><div><a name="37"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="37"><b>37 </b></a>The classic study of this key phenomenon is Joscelyn Godwin, <i>The Theosophical Enlightenment</i>, State University of New York Press: Albany 1992.<a href="#37"><sup>↩</sup></a> </div><div><a name="38"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="38"><b>38 </b></a>Egil Asprem, <i>The Problem of Disenchantment: Scientific Naturalism and Esoteric Discourse, 1900-1939</i>, Brill: Leiden / Boston 2014 & State University of New York Press: Albany 2018.<a href="#38"><sup>↩</sup></a> </div><div><a name="39"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="39"><b>39 </b></a>The literature on Neoliberalism as a historical phenomenon is growing fast. For my understanding of its nature and development, including its subversion of liberal democracy, I rely in particular on David Harvey, <i>A Brief History of Neoliberalism</i>, Oxford University Press 2005; Daniel Stedman Jones, <i>Masters of the Universe: Hayek, Friedman, and the Birth of Neoliberal Politics</i>, Princeton University Press: Princeton / Oxford 2012; Quinn Slobodian, <i>Globalists: The End of Empire and the Birth of Neoliberalism</i>, Harvard University Press: Cambridge Mass. / London 2018; Noreena Hertz, <i>The Silent Takeover: Global Capitalism and the Death of Democracy</i>, Arrow: London 2001; Wendy Brown, <i>Undoing the Demos: Neoliberalism’s Stealth Revolution</i>, Zone Books: New York 2015; Manfred B. Steger & Ravi K. Roy, <i>Neoliberalism: A Very Short Introduction</i>, Oxford University Press 2010; Shoshana Zuboff, <i>The Age of Surveillance Capitalism: The Fight for a Human Future at the New Frontier of Power</i>, Faber & Faber: London 2019. Bram Mellink & Merijn Oudenampsen, <i>Neoliberalisme: Een Nederlandse geschiedenis</i>, Boom: Amsterdam 2022.<a href="#39"><sup>↩</sup></a> </div><div><a name="40"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="40"><b>40 </b></a><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; text-align: justify;">For the original tradition of liberalism, as opposed to neoliberalism, I recommend Larry Siedentop,</span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; text-align: justify;"> </span><i style="font-family: Cambria, serif; text-align: justify;">Inventing the Individual: The Origins of Western Liberalism</i><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; text-align: justify;">, Penguin 2014. The incompatibility of “true” liberalism and neoliberalism would of course require a much longer discussion. For the argument that the neoliberal project in fact intended “to inoculate capitalism against the threat of democracy,” see e.g. Slobodian,</span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; text-align: justify;"> </span><i style="font-family: Cambria, serif; text-align: justify;">Globalists</i><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; text-align: justify;">, 2, and</span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; text-align: justify;"> </span><i style="font-family: Cambria, serif; text-align: justify;">passim</i><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; text-align: justify;">; or Brown,</span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; text-align: justify;"> </span><i style="font-family: Cambria, serif; text-align: justify;">Undoing</i><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; text-align: justify;">, 17-45. In his discussion of what happened to the central concept of “freedom” (</span><i style="font-family: Cambria, serif; text-align: justify;">Brief History</i><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; text-align: justify;">, 5-38), Harvey shows that neoliberalism always intended to “restore the power of economic elites” (o.c., 19), ensure freedom not for individuals but for “private property owners, multinational corporations, and financial capital</span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; text-align: justify;">” </span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; text-align: justify;">(o.c. 7, 21), and actively promotes economic inequality (o.c., 16-17, 26).</span><br /><p class="MsoFootnoteText" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 20px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 22px;"><o:p></o:p></span></p></div><div><a name="41"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="41"><b>41 </b></a>As formulated by George Monbiot in an excellent short summary, “what greater power can there be than to operate namelessly? So pervasive has neoliberalism become that we seldom even recognise it as an ideology” (see Monbiot, “<a href="https://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/apr/15/neoliberalism-ideology-problem-george-monbiot">Neoliberalism – The Ideology at the Root of All Our Problems</a>”).<a href="#41"><sup>↩</sup></a> </div><div><a name="42"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="42"><b>42 </b></a>For a solid and reliable general introduction, see Mark Sedgwick, <i>Against the Modern World: Traditionalism and the Secret Intellectual History of the Twentieth Century</i>, Oxford University Press 2004. For a broader historical overview, see Wouter J. Hanegraaff, “Tradition,” in: Hanegraaff, <i>Dictionary</i> (see above, note 2), 1125-1135.<a href="#42"><sup>↩</sup></a> </div><div><a name="43"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="43"><b>43 </b></a>The best historical overview of of Evola’s involvement in Fascism and National Socialism can be found in H.T. Hansen (Hans Thomas Hakl), “Julius Evolas politisches Wirken,” in: Julius Evola, <i>Menschen inmitten von Ruinen</i>, Hohenrain-Verlag: Tübingen / Zürich / Paris 1991 (for the specific reasons why this introduction appeared in a German translation published by a rightwing publisher, see Francesco Baroni, “The Philosophical Gold of Perennialism: Hans Thomas Hakl, Julius Evola and the Italian Esoteric Milieus,” <i>Religiographies</i> 1:2, forthcoming 2022 <a href="https://www.cini.it/pubblicazioni/religiographies">https://www.cini.it/pubblicazioni/religiographies</a>). The most detailed documentation of Evola’s virulent antisemitism is available only in Italian: Dana Lloyd Thomas, <i>Julius Evola e la tentazione razzista: L’inganno del pangermanesimo in Italia</i>, Giordano: Mesagne (Brindisi) 2006. For another important figure from the same milieus, see Christian Giudice, <i>Occult Imperium: Arturo Reghini, Roman Traditionalism, and the Anti-Modern Reaction in Fascist Italy</i>, Oxford University Press 2022.<a href="#43"><sup>↩</sup></a> </div><div><a name="44"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="44"><b>44 </b></a>See Graham Macklin, “Greg Johnson and Counter-Currents,” in: Mark Sedgwick (ed.), <i>Key Thinkers of the Radical Right: Behind the New Threat to Liberal Democracy</i>, Oxford University Press 2019, 204-223; Benjamin Teitelbaum, “Daniel Friberg and Metapolitics in Action,” in: ibid., 259-275 (including discussion of Arktos).<a href="#44"><sup>↩</sup></a> </div><div><a name="45"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="45"><b>45 </b></a>While Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke’s study of Ariosophy (<i>Occult Roots of National Socialism</i>; see above, note 30) is a well-deserved classic, his volume about Savitri Devi (<i>Hitler’s Priestess: Savitri Devi, the Hindu-Aryan Myth, and Neo Nazism</i>, New York University Press: New York / London 1998) should, unfortunately, be read with the greatest caution. It uncritically reproduces Savitri Devi’s own autobiography and generally falls short of the critical distance and historical/political contextualization that is so obviously required for such a topic. <a href="#45"><sup>↩</sup></a> </div><div><a name="46"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="46"><b>46 </b></a>See Jean-Yves Camus, “Alain de Benoist and the New Right,” in: Sedgwick, <i>Key Thinkers</i>, 73-90; Stéphane François, “Guillaume Faye and Archeofuturism,” in: ibid., 91-101; Marlène Laruelle, “Alexander Dugin and Eurasianism,” in: ibid., 155-169.<sup><a href="#46">↩</a></sup> </div><div><a name="47"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="47"><b>47 </b></a>E.g. Christopher McIntosh, <i>Beyond the North Wind: The Fall and Rise of the Mystic North</i>, Weiser Books: Newburyport 2019.<a href="#47"><sup>↩</sup></a> </div><div><a name="48"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="48"><b>48 </b></a>See e.g. Mattias Gardell, <i>Gods of the Blood: The Pagan Revival and White Separatism</i>, Duke University Press: Durham / London 2003.<a href="#48"><sup>↩</sup></a> </div><div><a name="49"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="49"><b>49 </b></a>Charlotte Ward & David Voas, “The Emergence of Conspirituality,” <i>Journal of Contemporary Religion</i> 26:1 (2011), 103-121.<a href="#49"><sup>↩</sup></a> </div><div><a name="50"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="50"><b>50 </b></a>See Johannes Rogalla von Bieberstein, <i>Der Mythos von der Verschwörung: Philosophen, Freimaurer, Juden, Liberale und Sozialisten als Verschwörer gegen die Sozialordnung</i>, Marix Verlag: Wiesbaden 2008. <a href="#50"><sup>↩</sup></a> </div><div><a name="51"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="51"><b>51 </b></a>For those who read French and are not afraid of large books, a particularly impressive analysis focused on France is Emmanuel Kreis, <i>Quis ut Deus? Antijudéo-maçonnisme et occultisme en France sous la IIIe République</i>, Les Belles Lettres : Paris 2017. <a href="#51"><sup>↩</sup></a> </div><div><a name="52"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="52"><b>52 </b></a>See the classic study by Norman Cohn, <i>Warrant for Genocide: The Myth of the Jewish World Conspiracy and the Protocols of the Elders of Zion</i>, Serif: London 2005.<a href="#52"><sup>↩</sup></a> </div><div><a name="53"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="53"><b>53 </b></a>Lee McIntyre, <i>Post-Truth</i>, The MIT Press: Cambridge Mass. / London 2018.<a href="#53"><sup>↩</sup></a> </div><div><a name="54"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="54"><b>54 </b></a>For a pioneering volume on that topic, see Egil Asprem & Kennet Granholm (eds.), <i>Contemporary Esotericism</i>, Equinox: Sheffield / Bristol 2013. Asprem is currently preparing an edited volume <i>Dictionary of Contemporary Esotericism</i>, Brill: Leiden forthcoming (<a href="https://contern.org/cresarch/cresarch-repository/dictionary-of-contemporary-esotericism-cresarch/">many article are already available as preprints here</a>).<a href="#54"><sup>↩</sup></a> </div><div><a name="55"><b><br /></b></a></div><div><a name="55"><b>55 </b></a>An accessible overview for the German context is Matthias Pöhlmann, <i>Rechte Esoterik: Wenn sich alternatives Denken und Extremismus gefährlich vermischen</i>, Herder: Freiburg / Basel / Wien 2021. This book can be recommended as a rich mine of factual information about the many dimensions of the popular esoteric scene; but it must be said that, unfortunately, the author’s familiarity with modern academic and anglophone scholarship is less than minimal, resulting in patterns of interpretation that are deeply indebted to all the standard Frankfurt School stereotypes. As a result (and against my argument in the present article) right-wing esotericism is presented as a potentially dangerous causal factor (co)responsible for turning people against democracy, rather than diagnosing it as a symptom of societal crisis.<a href="#55"><sup>↩</sup></a></div>wouterjhanegraaff.blogspot.comhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15519965611425366178noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5967881025525384120.post-14527975357214969052022-08-19T05:54:00.013-07:002022-08-28T02:10:46.051-07:00Butterflies of Freedom: in support of Salman Rushdie<p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgEqgAJwEh6PCIC4oZ18beBogXDXVuUnnAhTxAIDrflnp9jtZeCzD2gw3DmQVtFefUv6Z2GAl8W382WhV8FN_XNJ_zN_dvmvalu1bg73FW1dGRiOk73eCEUMl8PvWhYhnsjTTG9hb42l6CgntBg-z528l5WB08epiVVb4-BFmCE-9sP48rPa5DchoJ0yw/s1280/butterfly_thumbnail_16x9.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="720" data-original-width="1280" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgEqgAJwEh6PCIC4oZ18beBogXDXVuUnnAhTxAIDrflnp9jtZeCzD2gw3DmQVtFefUv6Z2GAl8W382WhV8FN_XNJ_zN_dvmvalu1bg73FW1dGRiOk73eCEUMl8PvWhYhnsjTTG9hb42l6CgntBg-z528l5WB08epiVVb4-BFmCE-9sP48rPa5DchoJ0yw/w640-h360/butterfly_thumbnail_16x9.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif;">Writers from across the globe are showing their solidarity with Salman Rushdie and their support of the freedom to write, by <a href="https://pen.org/event/stand-with-salman/?fbclid=IwAR2ny_tcNaOIaSbp24K5XcUQVTMAqg4VAtRKLSAcbD1hQ2GSIRkcX76PUcU">reading selected texts from his work in public and online</a>. I would very much like to join this effort by recording my own reading of a Rushdie passage, for although I’m not a literary writer but an academic one, writing is my life and so I know what it means. But instead of reading the passage I have selected, I will simply put it here in its written form. The honest reason is that I wouldn’t be able to read it aloud in front of a camera – the writing is so beautiful and powerful that I would not be able to control my breath and my emotions. To all of you out there who think you have the right to tell others what they can or cannot write: look at what it actually is that you are trying to kill. You have already lost, for it is much stronger than you will ever be. It will easily survive you, it will survive Rushdie as well -</span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif;"> in fact, it will survive each and every person alive who may be reading it today. You will never stop it. </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif;"> </span></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">From <i>The Satanic Verses</i>, ch. 8: “The Parting of the Arabian Sea”</span><o:p></o:p></span></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">On the last night of his life he heard a noise like a giant crushing a forest beneath his feet, and smelled a stench like the giant’s fart, and he realized that the tree was burning. He got out of his chair and staggered dizzily down to the garden to watch the fire, whose flames were consuming histories, memories, genealogies, purifying the earth, and coming towards him to set him free; – because the wind was blowing the fire towards the grounds of the mansion, so soon enough, soon enough, it would be his turn. He saw the tree explode into a thousand fragments, and the trunk crack, like a heart; then he turned away and reeled towards the place in the garden where Ayesha had first caught his eye; – and now he felt a slowness come upon him, a great heaviness, and he lay down on the withered dust. Before his eyes closed he felt something brushing at his lips, and saw the little cluster of butterflies struggling to enter his mouth. Then the sea poured over him, and he was in the water beside Ayesha, who had stepped miraculously out of his wife’s body … ‘Open,’ she was crying. ‘Open wide!’ Tentacles of light were flowing from her navel and he chopped at them, chopped, using the side of his hand. ‘Open,’ she screamed. ‘You’ve come this far, now do the rest.’ – How could he hear her voice? – They were under water, lost in the roaring of the sea, but he could hear her clearly, they could all hear her, that voice like a bell. ‘Open,’ she said. He closed.<o:p></o:p></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"> He was a fortress with clanging gates. – He was drowning. – She was drowning too. He saw the water fill her mouth, heard it begin to gurgle into her lungs. Then something within him refused that, made a different choice, and at the instance that his heart broke, he opened.<o:p></o:p></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif;"><span style="font-size: large;"> His body split apart from his adam’s apple to his groin, so that she could reach deep within him, and now she was open, they all were, and at the moment of their opening the waters parted, and they walked to Mecca across the bed of the Arabian sea.</span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br /><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif;"><br /></span><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif;"> </span></p><hr width="80%" /><p><span class="Apple-style-span"><br /><br /></span></p>wouterjhanegraaff.blogspot.comhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15519965611425366178noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5967881025525384120.post-15288258719471224112022-03-09T04:04:00.045-08:002022-08-19T10:53:40.461-07:00Ukrainian Diary (22 February-19 April)<p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br />As the Ukraine crisis began to unfold, I found myself composing messages on my Facebook page, in an effort to gain a bit of clarity in my own mind while staying in contact with my international network of friends. We are experiencing the biggest international security crisis that I can remember from my own lifetime, and one that resonates in various somewhat complicated ways with other concerns about recent cultural and political developments about which I have been writing on this blog. It is perfectly clear to me that the geopolitical map is being redrawn at this very moment (I'm writing this introduction on 9 March), with consequences for all of us that are impossible to predict but will certainly reach very far. <a href="https://www.nrc.nl/nieuws/2022/03/04/deze-oorlog-is-een-keerpunt-voor-europa-een-omwenteling-van-het-kaliber-val-van-de-muur-a4096787">As correctly noted by a Dutch specialist, Caroline de Gruyter</a>, 24 February 2022 will go down in history as the beginning of a historical transition comparable to the end of the Cold War with the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989. As I feel sure that these are times of world-historical importance, I've decided to copy my Facebook messages in this blog, so as to create a record of developments in the form of an ongoing diary. </span><p></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">I do this mainly because in the future I want to create a record of what I was thinking at this time, on a day-to-day basis without the benefit of knowing what was about to happen next. This will be an unedited diary, so it will record any mistake or misjudgment I might commit, along with any assessments that, with hindsight, might turn out to be correct. Because that's what history is all about: you don't know what's going to happen until it does.</span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">PS. End of August 2022. It's sad but true...: gradually the Ukraine War began to make ever less headlines, as everybody was somehow "getting used" to it. One should never get used to war, but there it is...: we do, although we know very well that Ukrainians don't have that luxury. In any case, I found myself posting less and less about this topic as well, and there came a point where I decided it wasn't much use to keep updating this blogpost. In other words, although I have mixed feelings about this: it stops in April. </span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><br /></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #38761d; font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">Ukraine and the NATO (19 April)</span></p><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; font-family: system-ui, -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, ".SFNSText-Regular", sans-serif; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><a href="https://bitterwinter.org/myth-of-the-american-coups-in-ukraine-4-the-nato/?fbclid=IwAR0cG5O4Zco5A5AO8DfMS4Rr03Fipl0kzGiSq1AgdLCNZSRVPiJNAQB11uU">Final part of <span style="font-family: inherit;"><span class="rse6dlih" color="var(--accent)" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; cursor: pointer; display: inline; font-family: inherit; list-style: none; margin: 0px; outline: none; padding: 0px; text-align: inherit; text-decoration: none; touch-action: manipulation;">Massimo Introvigne</span></span>’s overview of Russian propaganda myths</a>, this time about “the mother of all lies” concerning alleged promises that the NATO would not move “one inch eastward.” As always, Introvigne does not just repeat secondary literature but goes straight to the primary sources, and places them in their historical context instead of reasoning anachronistically. Facts matter.</div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; font-family: system-ui, -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, ".SFNSText-Regular", sans-serif; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;">[of course, I warmly recommend the entire 4-part series; and if you haven’t seen it <span style="font-family: inherit;"><a style="color: #385898; cursor: pointer; font-family: inherit;" tabindex="-1"></a></span>yet, please also check out the series about the “Nazism” allegations against Ukraine]</div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; font-family: system-ui, -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, ".SFNSText-Regular", sans-serif; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="color: #38761d; font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">Warrant for Genocide (8 April)</span></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="color: #38761d; font-family: inherit; font-size: large;"><br /></span></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); white-space: pre-wrap;"><span face="system-ui, -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, ".SFNSText-Regular", sans-serif" style="color: #050505; font-size: 15px;"><a class="qi72231t nu7423ey n3hqoq4p r86q59rh b3qcqh3k fq87ekyn bdao358l fsf7x5fv rse6dlih s5oniofx m8h3af8h l7ghb35v kjdc1dyq kmwttqpk srn514ro oxkhqvkx rl78xhln nch0832m cr00lzj9 rn8ck1ys s3jn8y49 icdlwmnq cxfqmxzd d1w2l3lo tes86rjd" href="https://www.facebook.com/massimo.introvigne.900?__cft__[0]=AZXFrHmornRCQXtivPt4Aby_Wcd--VfqH8kAgmmdmWieEsTRwXLbvHdrcRYFi1YSxys1TfXJUeVUiraO16E46S6J9Fbpo_HwjpBeje7sGMuFRrBt1fvmUq47bH89_jCOV2pHbiSa9bJvs-rjd92-nBAplo83R1lTJvBrqu6cQZLfJm-VDUMtFj_jgaROLks2upQ&__tn__=-]K-R" role="link" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: var(--accent); cursor: pointer; display: inline; font-family: inherit; list-style: none; margin: 0px; outline: none; padding: 0px; text-align: inherit; text-decoration: none; touch-action: manipulation;" tabindex="0"><span class="rse6dlih" style="display: inline; font-family: inherit;">Massimo Introvigne</span></a></span><span face="system-ui, -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, ".SFNSText-Regular", sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-size: 15px;">’s Bitter Winter keeps playing an extremely important role in exposing and responding to the mass disinformation campaigns of the new totalitarian regimes on the global stage, from China to Russia, that want to destroy the liberal and democratic core values associated with ”the West.” After an excellent article series explaining in historical detail how Putin’s regime has been able to build up a narrative of “alternative facts” about Nazism in Ukraine, the </span><span face="system-ui, -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, ".SFNSText-Regular", sans-serif" style="color: #050505; font-size: 15px;"><a style="color: #385898; cursor: pointer; font-family: inherit;" tabindex="-1"></a></span><span face="system-ui, -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, ".SFNSText-Regular", sans-serif" style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-size: 15px;">present article is about a recent and truly shocking “warrant for genocide” (a deliberate reference to Norman Cohn’s study of the Protocols) comparable to Goebbels’ war propaganda. This stuff comes from the country whose leaders have been pioneering the ”post truth society” for several decades now, while exporting it to the US and the rest of the Western world, with utterly destructive results (Brexit, Trump, etc.). While in the midst of committing Nazi-style genocide in Ukraine, they have the audacity to argue that it’s actually those Western defenders of “freedom, democracy, and human rights” who are Nazis or Nazi supporters. Hence, the global process of “decolonization” is supposed to be actually a process of “denazification” in which Western liberalism is framed as the evil oppressor and Russian authoritarianism as the champion of freedom. In short, the grass is blue and the sky is green - who cares about truth if you can replace it by a discourse that simply reverses all values, and get away with it? The logic of this argument reflects a chilling convergence of far-right and far-left rhetoric, as both extremes find themselves in agreement about their common enemy: the liberal-democratic “middle.”</span></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="color: #38761d; font-size: large;">No comment (3 April).</span></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhovZ4dA-EZN89fENUD0IbZhd6ZMrxhSH3Zzjr8TgzhvHcA5Y58JiKCAM03iDq_ysluu1SARRWE9lwa8CakbdwB27M96CD9XA2rdLdy625or671Jxds2P_0kMge845iL5OkZALWsxPh05EcZ1Kv-6tO5fWqWESSo2-sMRjUKBR-FZla9M7P2Zxm1a8wLw/s2048/277349596_10159978647177154_9136585329560901419_n.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2048" data-original-width="1534" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhovZ4dA-EZN89fENUD0IbZhd6ZMrxhSH3Zzjr8TgzhvHcA5Y58JiKCAM03iDq_ysluu1SARRWE9lwa8CakbdwB27M96CD9XA2rdLdy625or671Jxds2P_0kMge845iL5OkZALWsxPh05EcZ1Kv-6tO5fWqWESSo2-sMRjUKBR-FZla9M7P2Zxm1a8wLw/s320/277349596_10159978647177154_9136585329560901419_n.jpg" width="240" /></a></div><br /><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="color: #38761d; font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">Kremlin Disinformation (23 March)</span></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Useful warnings about the <a href="https://www.politico.com/news/magazine/2022/03/22/putin-disinformation-apathy-00018974?fbclid=IwAR1RwmqWIYw2I9qIZcAKeJtWQE0OKrZXhGhctSzikLgltqBYqGJDcInD6Ao">Russian Disinformation Playbook</a>: </span></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">* Tu quoque</span></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">* Retconning</span></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">* Predictive Projection</span></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">* Outrage Manipulation</span></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="color: #050505;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">* Conspiracy Feeding</span></span></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #38761d; font-family: inherit; font-size: x-large;"><br /></span></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #38761d; font-family: inherit; font-size: x-large;">Nazism in Ukraine (21 March)</span></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #050505; font-size: 15px;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></span></div><div dir="auto"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: white; caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;">So what are the facts? Excellent to see a 7-article devoted to this topic. </span><span style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><a class="oajrlxb2 g5ia77u1 qu0x051f esr5mh6w e9989ue4 r7d6kgcz rq0escxv nhd2j8a9 nc684nl6 p7hjln8o kvgmc6g5 cxmmr5t8 oygrvhab hcukyx3x jb3vyjys rz4wbd8a qt6c0cv9 a8nywdso i1ao9s8h esuyzwwr f1sip0of lzcic4wl gpro0wi8 q66pz984 b1v8xokw" href="https://www.facebook.com/massimo.introvigne.900?__cft__[0]=AZUM4LJZYL5AYavfD8gIXxhpPybWXMIGEKZ5okLWp1tvIUVy2TGhNrYIUIoFwu5ahfwBs26qwrUBH8iRKS1kJQBfOPVl7dATvh3zkJrkcLhX3Iz_23-gwU3ZoADNYyCVikT_0K2iJA93DV91VbNShx8_EuxLC_UABA5sl6fZ_3WndG1OypGkHscPIN25CeozMLw&__tn__=-]K-R" role="link" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: var(--accent); cursor: pointer; display: inline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; outline: none; padding: 0px; text-align: inherit; text-decoration: none; touch-action: manipulation;" tabindex="0"><span class="nc684nl6" style="display: inline;">Massimo Introvigne</span></a></span><span style="background-color: white; caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"> and Bitter Winter have a reputation for being extremely well-informed. See the series <a href="https://bitterwinter.org/nazism-in-ukraine-separating-facts-from-fiction/#Ukrainian_Nationalism_and_Antisemitism?fbclid=IwAR0wfi4GkMe_bOYaSta4_59q0vdQ4dJ-FKykNJOUriz9fi7PSUYo5_zyYD0">Nazism in </a></span><span style="color: #050505;"><span style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><a href="https://bitterwinter.org/nazism-in-ukraine-separating-facts-from-fiction/#Ukrainian_Nationalism_and_Antisemitism?fbclid=IwAR0wfi4GkMe_bOYaSta4_59q0vdQ4dJ-FKykNJOUriz9fi7PSUYo5_zyYD0">Ukraine - Separating Facts from Fiction</a> in his journal Bitter Winter.</span></span></span></div><div dir="auto"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="color: #050505;"><span style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></span></span></span></div><div dir="auto"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="color: #050505;"><span style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjefaQBKveLQErnLxlXVN7W24d8u0hEGhkfp6hlyfNJAdMJ3LcMfYzslW59BrqdjHHNNqVQo7eK2tPvdaxOR_JY3lT0_2pa-VY4BiZeqFJMMMao0B-ba9XinWXIpp7JKCNa4AQsmWMmpVxtsbDZbFHBcXD-k9h9wnAAcZ_wa4ePaVMkEhUvZEyQkn2XaA" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="360" data-original-width="640" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjefaQBKveLQErnLxlXVN7W24d8u0hEGhkfp6hlyfNJAdMJ3LcMfYzslW59BrqdjHHNNqVQo7eK2tPvdaxOR_JY3lT0_2pa-VY4BiZeqFJMMMao0B-ba9XinWXIpp7JKCNa4AQsmWMmpVxtsbDZbFHBcXD-k9h9wnAAcZ_wa4ePaVMkEhUvZEyQkn2XaA=w400-h225" width="400" /></a></div><br /><br /></span></span></span></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="color: #38761d; font-size: large;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Who i</span>s to blame for the Ukrainian Anschluss? (20 March)</span></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="color: #38761d; font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div><div dir="auto"><div class="kvgmc6g5 cxmmr5t8 oygrvhab hcukyx3x c1et5uql ii04i59q" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; font-size: 15px; margin: 0px; white-space: pre-wrap; word-wrap: break-word;"><div dir="auto"><span style="font-family: inherit;">And still we are being flooded by articles and commentaries to the effect that not Putin but “we” are really to blame for this crisis… </span></div></div><div class="cxmmr5t8 oygrvhab hcukyx3x c1et5uql o9v6fnle ii04i59q" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; font-size: 15px; margin: 0.5em 0px 0px; white-space: pre-wrap; word-wrap: break-word;"><div dir="auto"><span style="font-family: inherit;">It’s true that we are watching not just a horrific war but a big geostrategic game in which the big powers are all busy calculating their risks and chances. It’s also true that “the West” has accumulated many sins and hypocrisies to which it should answer before the tribunal of history. We know that. If we don’t know it, we haven’t been paying attention. There will (hopefully) be plenty of time for academic and historical discussions about how we ever got to this point and where “we” could have acted differently.</span></div></div><div class="cxmmr5t8 oygrvhab hcukyx3x c1et5uql o9v6fnle ii04i59q" style="margin: 0.5em 0px 0px; word-wrap: break-word;"><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">BUT please get this. There’s a very clear difference between a country that’s on its way towards embracing freedom and democracy and human rights, imperfect as the realities may often be, and a brutal dictatorship that tramples on freedom, democracy and human rights. All those self-blaming articles are exactly what Putin needs (and by now, we should really know that he has been actively promoting them for many years), because they sow doubt and division among his enemies by tempting us into thinking that perhaps the aggressor is really the victim and it’s really “us” who are to blame.</span></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div><div dir="auto"><span><div class="separator" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); clear: both; color: #050505; font-family: inherit; font-size: 15px; text-align: center; white-space: pre-wrap;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEg-PafbTf9Y-8TKV9kp15iiU1T8qrEKHqUJxBUZGkgAGSpP_SpVpBxzHmFvaOF-P6sCnI7TW-5ipkhYWeBDZVK2UN7jvUuj6q8HpTCAriNEIDLbO_5KP5JZR9QbUEyOkNt60jkPWFCQ0qZUPVUdfkyMiqjXmUUZ6T65Acu0y714EkYtI_VylwkpsgG5kA" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="504" data-original-width="720" height="448" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEg-PafbTf9Y-8TKV9kp15iiU1T8qrEKHqUJxBUZGkgAGSpP_SpVpBxzHmFvaOF-P6sCnI7TW-5ipkhYWeBDZVK2UN7jvUuj6q8HpTCAriNEIDLbO_5KP5JZR9QbUEyOkNt60jkPWFCQ0qZUPVUdfkyMiqjXmUUZ6T65Acu0y714EkYtI_VylwkpsgG5kA=w640-h448" width="640" /></a></div><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;">Austria after the Anschluss. "[Those of the] same blood belong in one and the same empire."</span></div><br /></span></div></div><div class="cxmmr5t8 oygrvhab hcukyx3x c1et5uql o9v6fnle ii04i59q" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; font-size: 15px; margin: 0.5em 0px 0px; white-space: pre-wrap; word-wrap: break-word;"><div dir="auto"><span style="font-family: inherit;">At the time when Hitler invaded Austria in 1938, and then invaded Poland two years later, it was technically correct to say that the countries that won WWI should not have humiliated Germany through the Versailles treaty. Sure thing. But all those self-blaming articles we’re reading now are the exact equivalent of arguing “it’s really the fault of France, England and their allies that Hitler started WWII”.</span></div></div><div class="cxmmr5t8 oygrvhab hcukyx3x c1et5uql o9v6fnle ii04i59q" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; font-size: 15px; margin: 0.5em 0px 0px; white-space: pre-wrap; word-wrap: break-word;"><div dir="auto"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Why is that so hard to get? History will judge us.</span></div></div></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="color: #38761d; font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="color: #38761d; font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">Hiroshima Paper Cranes (19 March)</span></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgQjNhZI8-FkjYxJmEB-b9KpL8MOj1ymf9Nr22Yf-l0BMzrumDBiuPaLVl0yW8mrVYKUFVEtR_XFph1CmPDZ_jJ0rfVUGeVpJ8xCJJ5tLrsg2dsNxHEJd5SKcURj8q6HswphmaBtKkQtOSt3BgosMiYwqD5g7AHvJoTb3S_OlKKPf7BtZdG1LOgJN-uTA" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="261" data-original-width="500" height="334" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgQjNhZI8-FkjYxJmEB-b9KpL8MOj1ymf9Nr22Yf-l0BMzrumDBiuPaLVl0yW8mrVYKUFVEtR_XFph1CmPDZ_jJ0rfVUGeVpJ8xCJJ5tLrsg2dsNxHEJd5SKcURj8q6HswphmaBtKkQtOSt3BgosMiYwqD5g7AHvJoTb3S_OlKKPf7BtZdG1LOgJN-uTA=w640-h334" width="640" /></a></div><br /></span></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">In 2005 I visited the memorial museum in Hiroshima, near the epicenter of the first atomic bomb. It left an indelible impression. Among many other things, I learned about the story of Sadako Sasaki, who was two years old in 1945 and decided to fold a thousand paper cranes before her death by leukemia caused by the nuclear radiation. <a href="https://www.nippon.com/en/currents/d00424/?fbclid=IwAR3_cKG1nxfOrHZtF-U39vGs_213MyZTlu9LGdFyPyqmwjwsmIBoGsA1E8k">Here's an article about.</a></span></div><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; font-size: 15px; text-align: left; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">This powerful symbol of peace is quasi-omnipresent in Hiroshima, around the place where the bomb was dropped. We’re now in 2022, and I cannot think of a better time to bring it back to memory.</span></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #38761d; font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;">Ukrainians are fighting for Liberalism, not Neoliberalism (15 March)</span></span></p><div class="kvgmc6g5 cxmmr5t8 oygrvhab hcukyx3x c1et5uql ii04i59q" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; margin: 0px; white-space: pre-wrap; word-wrap: break-word;"><div dir="auto"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-family: inherit; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgwfI1UQmaVTaIVly5X5PvqpXaj_JQ9lp7oBPJvnzpvBq5k6juFzuPZxomcgkcjM_Itfe_kVVHJ41NwO_jPtnpLxkoq2ggh9CLaDSij8S20_SG4tlBL_gTtWB4pZJk8N_XKi3mtgbzoCbK2h5I5oHfuuhL6RiwngthrpAKhL99jL2Vkx767bzRAyqkXFw=s484" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="467" data-original-width="484" height="309" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgwfI1UQmaVTaIVly5X5PvqpXaj_JQ9lp7oBPJvnzpvBq5k6juFzuPZxomcgkcjM_Itfe_kVVHJ41NwO_jPtnpLxkoq2ggh9CLaDSij8S20_SG4tlBL_gTtWB4pZJk8N_XKi3mtgbzoCbK2h5I5oHfuuhL6RiwngthrpAKhL99jL2Vkx767bzRAyqkXFw=s320" width="320" /></a></div><span style="font-family: inherit;">It’s clear by now that many people respond to the Ukrainian war with observations to the effect that “Western” liberalism isn’t exactly so benevolent either. That it’s politically sensitive to make that point in the middle of a brutal war is rather obvious; and all the more so if one sees how busy pro-Putin ideologists like Aleksandr Dugin are (right now - I’ve been following him over the past days) in presenting “liberalism” quite literally as a satanic evil that must be eliminated from the planet by all possible means, “conventional” or even nuclear. These manichaean fantasies of total apocalyptic warfare against “liberalism” are sickening to read, as these people are enthusiastically cheering genocidal atrocities at the largest scale and call it a fight of “good” against “evil.” Hard to believe perhaps? But it’s true.</span></div></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><div class="cxmmr5t8 oygrvhab hcukyx3x c1et5uql o9v6fnle ii04i59q" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; margin: 0.5em 0px 0px; text-align: left; white-space: pre-wrap; word-wrap: break-word;"><div dir="auto"><span style="font-family: inherit;">So what’s my view? I have always been deeply critical (as anybody can see on <a href="https://wouterjhanegraaff.blogspot.com/?fbclid=IwAR2HOB7d60R0BhmcLTC8Vm6HCQw78GJCYvVgI6CuJf213-BVGkQP8RD27bg">my blog, various items from 2015 on</a>) of the “Hayekian” neoliberal/global system that I saw emerging in Western society since the 1980s (Thatcher/Reagan) and that definitely took over since the 1990s (Blair/Clinton), at the expense of the moderate “Keynesian” liberalism grounded in a balance of state and market. As I was born in the Netherlands in 1961, I’ve had the advantage (contrary to younger generations, and also contrary to Americans) of consciously experiencing at least a few decades of such “embedded liberalism,” a moderate-leftleaning liberalism sometimes referred to as “social democracy.” So I can tell the difference. It was not ideal, but much better than anything that came after. </span></div><div dir="auto"><span style="font-family: inherit;">I have been arguing for many years now that the neoliberal "<a href="https://www.amazon.com/Silent-Takeover-Global-Capitalism-Democracy-ebook/dp/B000FC0UCG/ref=sr_1_1?crid=2X088DIW3J3PW&keywords=the+silent+takeover&qid=1647345039&s=books&sprefix=the+silent+takeove%2Cstripbooks-intl-ship%2C159&sr=1-1">silent takeover</a>" of the 1990s is at the heart of most of our problems, as it actually corrupts freedom, equal rights, humanitarian values, and democracy (not to mention the environment). Among other things, the “shock neoliberalization” of the former Soviet countries was supposed to “bring freedom and democracy” but actually brought neoliberalism, and had profoundly destructive effects (for instance, just last week I read <a href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/Free-Coming-Age-End-History/dp/0241481856/ref=sr_1_1?crid=32KRJ2E13OUB2&keywords=Lea%20ypi&qid=1647339659&s=books&sprefix=lea%20ypi%2Cstripbooks%2C71&sr=1-1&fbclid=IwAR3P3U1d9Rf8yRsBikCWi2ArMyC9BH1Uv7iliZwVNLaZtafaEvIeO9jxbJM">Lea Ypri’s excellent first-hand account of what happened to her country Albania</a>). The ever-repeated article of blind faith according to which “capitalism equals democracy” (and hence radical capitalism/neoliberalism should equal democracy even more) has been proven utterly false. Much of the deep social unrest and grassroots protests that we have seen emerging over the past twenty years is grounded in that realization. General populations feel in their guts how freedom has been taken away from them and democracy has been corrupted (but unfortunately, this makes them vulnerable to manipulation and propaganda by rightwing populists, who mislead them into thinking that “leftwing liberalism” is the enemy, whereas the true enemy is neoliberal capitalism - an entirely differen animal).</span></div><div dir="auto"><span style="font-family: inherit;">So in my opinion, we need to wake up from the neoliberal delusion and rediscover what liberalism was really all about. It’s not what its enemies make it out to be; it’s a profound moral tradition with long and deep historical roots (e.g. I recommend <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Inventing-Individual-Origins-Western-Liberalism/dp/0674417534?fbclid=IwAR0xlfrDbsItE_7XGP8G23CpfpRX0DYQ9JOA2mvNlbXZgxlSl4d6r_6U-AQ">Larry Siedentop’s classic study</a>), but we have largely lost touch with what it is or was supposed to be. </span></div></div><div class="cxmmr5t8 oygrvhab hcukyx3x c1et5uql o9v6fnle ii04i59q" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; margin: 0.5em 0px 0px; text-align: left; white-space: pre-wrap; word-wrap: break-word;"><div dir="auto"><span style="font-family: inherit;">I hardly dare to say it, but there’s perhaps just that tiny shimmer of hope right now that this horrible conflict we’re experiencing might help waking “the West” up from its self-delusions in this regard. Seeing the courage with which the Ukrainians are fighting for their country and for their lives, this should make us realize that “liberalism” for them is clearly not about “markets and business” but about freedom and the sanctity of human values and human lives. What I’m saying is that the genuinely liberal values and traditions of “Western society” that give them inspiration are wholly incompatible with the neoliberalism that has been taking over for about 3-4 decades now; but needless to add, they are utterly incompatible also with the brutal authoritarianism represented by Putin - along with so many other bullies (from Xi or Erdogan or Orbán to Trump or Bolsonaro, and the list goes on) that took power over the past years by riding a wave of “anti-liberal” sentiments that should actually be directed, as I argued above, not against liberalism but against neoliberalism. The difference is that dictatorship is utterly unredeemable: no road leads from there towards a humane society. By contrast, neoliberalism is a perversion of liberalism (<i>corruptio optimi pessima</i>: the corruption of the best is the worst), and this means that it should still be able to cure and reform itself. I'm not ready to give up hopes that it might.</span></div></div></div><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="color: #38761d; font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">Another message from Garry Kasparov (15 March)</span><br /><br /></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhFeUMefEZpbJWOppHLBlGKHxm6V4xkl9GQUq9y9vJP5YRu2or9WSesWPI0qDFHmmrxfwbbJOgK9JCyCXJIbr2hJQTP2LZvimkgpRGaqw3zX02twAPJkADU2uF7-bVElgR7BJ3uheprqT7seteolryzi2KduECoeCpPLDtsINpBAEjYH-Y0XhU0KQgnhQ=s612" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="407" data-original-width="612" height="426" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhFeUMefEZpbJWOppHLBlGKHxm6V4xkl9GQUq9y9vJP5YRu2or9WSesWPI0qDFHmmrxfwbbJOgK9JCyCXJIbr2hJQTP2LZvimkgpRGaqw3zX02twAPJkADU2uF7-bVElgR7BJ3uheprqT7seteolryzi2KduECoeCpPLDtsINpBAEjYH-Y0XhU0KQgnhQ=w640-h426" width="640" /></a></div><p></p><div class="kvgmc6g5 cxmmr5t8 oygrvhab hcukyx3x c1et5uql ii04i59q" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; margin: 0px; white-space: pre-wrap; word-wrap: break-word;"><div dir="auto"><span style="font-family: inherit;">A Message from Garry</span></div><div dir="auto"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Dear Friends,</span></div></div><div class="cxmmr5t8 oygrvhab hcukyx3x c1et5uql o9v6fnle ii04i59q" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; margin: 0.5em 0px 0px; white-space: pre-wrap; word-wrap: break-word;"><div dir="auto"><span style="font-family: inherit;">For years, I’ve darkly joked that if I ever wrote a sequel to my 2015 book on Putin, Winter is Coming, I’d have to subtitle it: “I f—ing told you so.” Now, winter is here and war has come. Most authors want their books to be popular, but it’s bad news when I see Winter Is Coming quoted everywhere and zooming up the sales charts. I had hoped it would be a history book by now, but thanks to Putin’s bloody, second invasion of Ukraine, it’s still current events. </span></div></div><div class="cxmmr5t8 oygrvhab hcukyx3x c1et5uql o9v6fnle ii04i59q" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; margin: 0.5em 0px 0px; white-space: pre-wrap; word-wrap: break-word;"><div dir="auto"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The most cited parts of the book are those predicting that Putin would not stop with occupying Eastern Ukraine and Crimea because, as I tire of saying, dictators do not stop until they are stopped. Show strength and Putin stops. Show weakness and he advances. After paying no serious consequences for his 2014 invasion of Ukraine––even being rewarded with new pipeline deals and summits––Putin was ready for more conflict. Now he is razing Ukraine to the ground, as he did Grozny and Aleppo, with no regard for civilian casualties. Russian military incompetence and Ukrainian heroism don’t refute the deadly physics of tons of high explosives applied to buildings and flesh.</span></div></div><div class="cxmmr5t8 oygrvhab hcukyx3x c1et5uql o9v6fnle ii04i59q" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; margin: 0.5em 0px 0px; white-space: pre-wrap; word-wrap: break-word;"><div dir="auto"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Since Putin’s launched his new war, I have made probably over a hundred media appearances all over the world, from every major news show in the US to beleaguered Kyiv radio stations and all over Europe in between. My message is that Ukraine must be defended, its people saved, that it is the front line of a war Putin declared a decade ago while the West pretended it didn’t exist. The heroes of Ukraine bleed and die for a war they did not choose, fighting a villain they did not create. They are being sacrificed by the wealthy nations that funded Putin’s war machine for years with their energy purchases. Kyiv and Kharkiv burn today because Brussels and Washington spent too long cozying up to the criminal in the Kremlin, instead of arming those willing to fight and die for democracy.</span></div></div><div class="cxmmr5t8 oygrvhab hcukyx3x c1et5uql o9v6fnle ii04i59q" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; margin: 0.5em 0px 0px; white-space: pre-wrap; word-wrap: break-word;"><div dir="auto"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy shows more courage today than any Western politician did for the last 20 years when they told us, over and over, that there was nothing to be done. Now they are finally acting, with strong sanctions that might have deterred Putin eight years ago, or even eight weeks ago, but that cannot stop missiles and tanks. The price for stopping a dictator always goes up, and now the price must be paid in risk and action. NATO is not obliged by treaty to defend Ukraine, as people do not cease to remind us, although the US and UK agreed in principle to protect Ukraine’s sovereignty when it gave up its nuclear weapons according to the Budapest Memorandum in 1994. But a lack of obligation is not a prohibition. If saving a besieged democracy from a murderous dictator isn’t worthy of action by NATO or any of its individual member states, the greatest military force in history may as well not exist.</span></div></div><div class="cxmmr5t8 oygrvhab hcukyx3x c1et5uql o9v6fnle ii04i59q" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; margin: 0.5em 0px 0px; white-space: pre-wrap; word-wrap: break-word;"><div dir="auto"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Given the events of the world today, the newsletter will look a little different this month, focusing exclusively on what we can do to stop the Russian war against Ukraine. There is one story in the world, and it is the fight between the free world and the forces of authoritarianism. Ukraine is the front line today. If we do not support Ukraine today, we may pay the price in Taiwan tomorrow, and then what next after that?</span></div></div><div class="cxmmr5t8 oygrvhab hcukyx3x c1et5uql o9v6fnle ii04i59q" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; margin: 0.5em 0px 0px; white-space: pre-wrap; word-wrap: break-word;"><div dir="auto"><span style="font-family: inherit;">We are in a fight for the survival of democracy and the modern world order. The people of Ukraine show us what consequences we face when we allow authoritarianism to spread undeterred. It’s time to pick a side, and stand with the Ukrainian people as they stand in the line of fire.</span></div></div><div class="cxmmr5t8 oygrvhab hcukyx3x c1et5uql o9v6fnle ii04i59q" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; margin: 0.5em 0px 0px; white-space: pre-wrap; word-wrap: break-word;"><div dir="auto"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Slava Ukraini. Glory to the heroes.</span></div></div><div class="cxmmr5t8 oygrvhab hcukyx3x c1et5uql o9v6fnle ii04i59q" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; margin: 0.5em 0px 0px; white-space: pre-wrap; word-wrap: break-word;"><div dir="auto"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Sincerely,</span></div></div><div class="cxmmr5t8 oygrvhab hcukyx3x c1et5uql o9v6fnle ii04i59q" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; margin: 0.5em 0px 0px; white-space: pre-wrap; word-wrap: break-word;"><div dir="auto"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Garry Kasparov</span></div></div><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #38761d; font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">Was it inevitable? (12 March)</span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="background-color: white; caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; text-align: left; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/mar/11/was-it-inevitable-a-short-history-of-russias-war-on-ukraine?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other&fbclid=IwAR1iIAHeIw64WGv5764Zwm0_ALg2_rKfZq5j6YQ5knnaz0zUgVjULFWPU_0">This</a> looks like a solid longer article about how we got to this tragedy. Opinions?</span></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #38761d;"><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">The economic side of Putin's invasion (11 March)</span></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="background-color: white; caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; text-align: start; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Putin's invasion of Ukraine explained from the perspective of political-economic strategy considerations. I learned a lot, and have to say that this was a very sobering experience. </span></span></p><p style="text-align: start;"><span style="color: #050505;"><span style="background-color: white; caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); font-family: inherit; white-space: pre-wrap;"><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=If61baWF4GE">See the video here</a>.</span></span></p><p style="text-align: start;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEivvelSZtJRB_9uVbWOZdHaiwXB83hIUAH2xcRa763shUn7ysxDcZBWdrb9azh34gGL3Pn02CRQFYFNbTHG9i_N-pFgMYPU06uaM84R4WdDgI38BjimvXIzWjS74QH5hFToJZ4bfZ-SKG6WB4kogWataLKo5VTNDcJ0iIpZdEyo-PxERJhLzc4njsCm0A" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="722" data-original-width="1326" height="348" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEivvelSZtJRB_9uVbWOZdHaiwXB83hIUAH2xcRa763shUn7ysxDcZBWdrb9azh34gGL3Pn02CRQFYFNbTHG9i_N-pFgMYPU06uaM84R4WdDgI38BjimvXIzWjS74QH5hFToJZ4bfZ-SKG6WB4kogWataLKo5VTNDcJ0iIpZdEyo-PxERJhLzc4njsCm0A=w640-h348" width="640" /></a></div><p></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #38761d; font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">More about Kirill (10 March)</span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="background-color: white; caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; font-size: 15px; text-align: left; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Following up on my previous message, <a href="https://bitterwinter.org/ukraine-why-the-moscow-patriarch-supports-putins-war/?fbclid=IwAR0ygm3CLNQ7RtGDIdth_410A2VKfW7K847QWm_q6lF4mT1E-W0BEGZ4tEM">here on Bitter Winter </a>please find some very useful background information about Patriarch Kirill and his “terrible sermon.”</span></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #38761d; font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;">Dehumanization (10 March)</span></span></p><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><a href="https://bitterwinter.org/patriarch-of-moscow-blesses-war-against-gay-prides/?fbclid=IwAR2K_7nbTM2C-7kA6jDCOCQZ3HvzqZYiwG2dCQyQXgMvjwqNfi7AKYy0ixo">Reference: Bitter Winter's article about a recent sermon by the Patriarch of Moscow.</a></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjDaJjUtRvsG5QEp6u454AxMHONHhkMKiau1cYJopdp7_6znBfZek-3knxxJWGttfvqagZ4Vh0n2_GSSQExJ2KXp3LuHDYnjuB3o3U1bg37izhQ57vW6h6kshx_pGydZlzb5Iwiws-T9Z1KAaDXQ-kqyztcTCui7AbqmD0h5eD0SGIGKfntQvD9DZnr_w" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="360" data-original-width="640" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjDaJjUtRvsG5QEp6u454AxMHONHhkMKiau1cYJopdp7_6znBfZek-3knxxJWGttfvqagZ4Vh0n2_GSSQExJ2KXp3LuHDYnjuB3o3U1bg37izhQ57vW6h6kshx_pGydZlzb5Iwiws-T9Z1KAaDXQ-kqyztcTCui7AbqmD0h5eD0SGIGKfntQvD9DZnr_w=w640-h360" width="640" /></a></div><br /></div><div dir="auto"><span><span style="color: #050505; font-family: inherit;"><span style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;">This is a follow-up to yesterday’s posting (Corruptio </span></span><span style="color: #050505;"><span style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;">optimi pessima)</span></span><span style="color: #050505; font-family: inherit;"><span style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"> and my earlier one from 24 February (about Ilya Glazunov’s paintings). The common thread is how “the West” and all its “liberal” traditions are being demonized as a satanic perversion pitted against an idealized image of “true” religion, with Putin as the heroic God-sent defender of all that is sacred. As a result, the Ukrainian war is imagined not as a political conflict but as a metaphysical battle. Once you really think in such terms, there is no limit to what you are allowed to do, because you’re not fighting a human battle against human enemies but imagine that you’re on the side of God, the angels, or the Light against satan, demons, and darkness. This is no different from how, just a few years ago, ISIS was picturing “the West”: the same heroic story-telling, the same litany of Western perversions, the same argument that even the worst atrocities are justified in light of the greater good. The logic is no different either from how Catholics and Protestants were justifying the burning of witches and magicians just a few centuries ago. It’s no different from how the Nazis were waging their own “holy war” against “cosmopolitan, rootless, money-grabbing Jews”. It’s also no different from how QAnon believers imagine they are waging a battle against satanic pedophiles (while using those same antisemitic tropes about Soros, the Rothschilds etc). It’s always the same perverse attraction of imagining yourself as being involved in a manichaean battle of light against darkness, with a storyline that allows you to dehumanize your opponents while casting yourself in the role of the hero with a god-given license to kill. </span></span></span></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Let’s not fool ourselves though: we are by no means immune from falling into the same trap. This conflict is not metaphysical, it is human, all too human, and these temptations are human too. We are all vulnerable to the temptation of demonizing those on “the other side,” instead of remembering that they are human beings like ourselves, whose imagination has been poisoned by dangerous stories. By dehumanizing our enemies we dehumanize ourselves. By imagining them as monsters we become monsters ourselves.</span></div><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #38761d; font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">Sleep (9 March)</span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="background-color: white; caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; text-align: left; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Fortunately, there's music on the other side too (with many thanks to Kateryna Zorya).</span></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="background-color: white; caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; text-align: left; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40WD9RDAMVc">Please listen to this clip</a>.</span></span></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="background-color: white; caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; text-align: left; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"></span></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEh03mQu8mQGpTj6PiEUBtyJXiD0WsVKum0fBazgwBwAjyAj8g32oKV4n8RrerNmsT8RV5-uxn8Xia93W0ZEW287ZgrDWQVUUyd9ORJ2XLfK2e_Hr_rdKpqt53EpvdNrZOIuewG1iPuZoQnOYC0npAaQ1GpDY_MRL0tCJCL9HyudbmnsFcqZySXhXmQKlQ" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="492" data-original-width="998" height="316" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEh03mQu8mQGpTj6PiEUBtyJXiD0WsVKum0fBazgwBwAjyAj8g32oKV4n8RrerNmsT8RV5-uxn8Xia93W0ZEW287ZgrDWQVUUyd9ORJ2XLfK2e_Hr_rdKpqt53EpvdNrZOIuewG1iPuZoQnOYC0npAaQ1GpDY_MRL0tCJCL9HyudbmnsFcqZySXhXmQKlQ=w640-h316" width="640" /></a></span></div><p></p><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #38761d;"><span style="font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">Corruptio Optimi Pessima (9 March)</span></span></p><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhe3_3Ae5V2Y1ExZH-bLqyPNQ4ispjmSwlMA90UODdv1phz5njXDbYoAUYJ4mIEk1C8WNSw6-ukWQMIHYO1l6UpEKb1h_S14rl2i5wx5praga1QY3qwrc40eunwIBzA1Wi73tWXqjsUmV8pPTAtPyEtcTwAAMxDHHoddaQJrYGm5m6qWCGf3hmFxZEG3Q" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="1362" data-original-width="1364" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhe3_3Ae5V2Y1ExZH-bLqyPNQ4ispjmSwlMA90UODdv1phz5njXDbYoAUYJ4mIEk1C8WNSw6-ukWQMIHYO1l6UpEKb1h_S14rl2i5wx5praga1QY3qwrc40eunwIBzA1Wi73tWXqjsUmV8pPTAtPyEtcTwAAMxDHHoddaQJrYGm5m6qWCGf3hmFxZEG3Q=w640-h640" width="640" /></a></div><br /></span></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">See this description, by Rüdiger Sünner, and <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jjkuti_HmFU">this link to a Youtube video</a>. </span></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; text-align: left; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="background-color: white; font-size: 15px;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">In addition to his "spiritual" forethought, Putin also had a huge temple built for his great power fantasies: the "main church of the armed forces of Russia" west of Moscow. It consists of tarnish green facades decorated with military orders, for its steps melted parts of German tanks and fighter jets were used. The main icon inside shows the face of Jesus Christ and was painted on the wood of a cannon car from 1710. Giant archangel are decorating the doors that frame their swords into the heart of "vengeance". Actually thought to commemorate the victory over nazi - Germany in the Second World War, in which the USSR lost 24 million people, the cathedral became increasingly a religious sanctuary of Russian imperialism. Originally, a mosaic of Putin and Stalin should also be hung in it, as well as a praise song on the annexion of Crimea ("The Crime is ours") but after all, it didn't happen after protests of the Orthodox Church. The church also embodies the idea of a sacred Russia ("Russkij Mir") in a form, the conscription of one of the God's chosen "volumous spirits", who bring the Western world back to value such as homeland, family and Christianity. ll. When you see the young soldiers, who are now being heated in Ukraine, caught in the cult building, you can know which religiously-inspired propaganda they are exposed to: </span></span></div></blockquote><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">I find this heart-wrenchingly painful to watch and listen to, precisely because of the incredible beauty of the Russian-Orthodox music that is being used here for mass manipulation in the service of imperialist dreams (or nightmares). On February 24, I wrote something about Ilya Glazunov's paintings about "Holy Russia," pitted against the so-called "perversions of Western liberalism," and here we see a ritualization of the same idea. This is all about the incredible power that myth and symbolism can be made to exert over the human emotions. In "the West" we have largely forgotten how this works, but Putin knows it very well. </span></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">On a personal level I'm reminded of how, when I was a child, my father took me on a visit to the Orthodox monastery in Chevetogne. We spent hours sitting in its church during the service, and the incredible beauty of the music (those low voices coming out of the mysterious darkness next to the altar) made an indelible impression. I still remember how it was to sit there, to listen, and to watch. It was a thoroughly positive "spiritual" experience, one of the strongest of my childhood.</span></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">And then to watch this. The same music, the same visual im<span style="font-family: inherit;">agery, the same kind of ritual. And to know what it is doing to the minds of those young people in their uniforms. Because it is so effective.</span></span></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">PS. Just to avoid any misunderstanding among hasty FB readers: this is obviously not an attack on Orthodoxy. On the contrary, one point I'm trying to make here concerns the profound beauty and the thoroughly positive dimensions of Orthodoxy as religion, which impressed me deeply when I first came into contact with it. It's precisely this that makes the nationalistic appropriation and perversion of it (and, one might add, any active support of such by its spiritual leaders) so painful: corruptio optimi pessima. Furthermore, never forget that Orthodoxy is anything but monolithic. It's an extremely complex phenomenon that takes many different shapes in different countries and cultural contexts: Russian, Greek, etcetera.</span></span></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="background-color: white;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></span></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #38761d; font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: large;">The Terror of History (9 March)</span></span></div><p style="text-align: justify;"><span style="background-color: white; caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; text-align: start; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">I’ve decided to collect my FB messages about the Ukraine crisis on my blog, so as to create a diary of what I’m thinking on a day-to-day basis. I will not edit it, so it will keep a record of my mistakes and misjudgments along with anything that might turn out to be correct. I’m doing this partly as a personal experiment concerned with historicity and contingency as opposed to story-telling. A large part of “the terror of history” lies in our ignorance: we simply do not know what will happen and how it will end, but are perfectly able to imagine (or rather: cannot help ourselves imagining) what might be about to happen and how it could possibly end. Our attempts to understand what’s happening are attempts to gain some kind of grip on things that are actually beyond our control; but the truth is that whatever we are thinking right now, and anything we claim to “understand,” could turn out to be perfectly mistaken.</span></span></p><p><span style="color: #38761d; font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">Jan van Eijck about the Ukraine Crisis (9 March)</span></p><p><span style="font-family: inherit;"><a href="https://www.vaneijck.org/posts/2022-03-07-werkelijkheid48.html?fbclid=IwAR0HZlEZj8dep62RZ0XoZy3qJMeA4KV69dVffd0dXtH1y17IY4T087yUDFE">Another article worth reading</a> from Jan van Eijck's excellent Dutch blog "Twijfelen aan de Werkelijkheid" ("Doubting Reality"), this time about the Ukraine crisis. Again and again, Jan puts his finger at the right spot, and he also provides some very good tips for further reading.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: inherit;">[Dutch original:] Weer een bijzonder lezenswaardige aflevering van Jan van Eijck's onvolprezen blog "Twijfelen aan de Werkelijkheid," ditmaal natuurlijk over de Oekraïne-crisis. Jan legt de vinger steeds weer op de juiste plaats en geeft ook zeer goede tips </span>voor<span style="font-family: inherit;"> verder lezen.</span></p><p><span style="font-family: inherit;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEix0d6FFkEAmYmiqM_scPHOCq7Ur0WZ3bpglp2b-s_y9MPQhMuHZuAQZeaf53TG8BmZhw3gy8kdNNqUq8NeJA55ZPkWDiHZsqHqhE2q8XXbJinKGVqjzNC008ncBIP94bTBQ5Mj9kTal12sP2w_yDosLLMm6GSiUFcpl06PEp4nTd0KMrUmaSd_Cu2zZA" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="647" data-original-width="870" height="476" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEix0d6FFkEAmYmiqM_scPHOCq7Ur0WZ3bpglp2b-s_y9MPQhMuHZuAQZeaf53TG8BmZhw3gy8kdNNqUq8NeJA55ZPkWDiHZsqHqhE2q8XXbJinKGVqjzNC008ncBIP94bTBQ5Mj9kTal12sP2w_yDosLLMm6GSiUFcpl06PEp4nTd0KMrUmaSd_Cu2zZA=w640-h476" width="640" /></a></span></div><p></p><p><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="color: #38761d; font-size: large;">Shame on Aleksandr Dugin (8 March)</span></span></p><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Chilling words by Aleksandr Dugin, who is busily cheering Putin on and clearly believes that all means are justified. This is what he writes on his FB page:</span></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">"There is a little misunderstanding in US analysis of possible Russian answer to eventual direct participation of NATO in conflict - through Poland or elsewhere. US most clever experts exclude preventive nuclear strike being sure that Russia uses this ultimate weapon only in the response to previous nuclear strike of the West. They are wrong in that. We are already in different stage of conflict. For Russia it means to be or not to be. For the US certainly it is highly important but not existential. So be not so sure. We’ve crossed the border.</span></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">I remind: I am (almost) always right in my analysis. Don’t try to find how. You’ll never know."</span></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Dugin has certainly crossed the border - of sanity and of humanity. This is what ideological blindness looks like. Shame on him.</span></div><p><span style="color: #38761d; font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">Footage from Charkov (7 March)</span></p><p><span style="background-color: white; caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">A Ukrainian friend who comes from Charkov asked me to share these photos and clips: this is what it looks like when your city is under fire. People are being killed on the streets trying to buy groceries. I know that FB and Twitter don’t work in Russia anymore, but her request to anybody who knows other ways to reach people in Russia: please share this information, so that they know what Putin’s government is doing.</span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: white; caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span>[PS. This is just a small selection from the photos I posted on FB; </span></span><span style="color: #050505;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">unfortunately, the video footage cannot be shown in this blog]</span></span></span></p><p><span style="background-color: white; caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"></span></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjKVuqae2k5vqdWcoY9UkVV0gWRSgaYjesKzCOD9AVF5a1sU1ZRdJl9U81L3e0zMXSJQSHEebRbrOU8aa6bU_zBZTFL0TuCQmJUXavu27lDXhFEzYSWZBiW1MyPP0YArgn_oQVnVrDUaZY46i2RQCfK3U5s2iqnLvI9Yhp4lGPfWmcRCBi5uMNZAa1A8A" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><br /></a></span></div><span style="font-family: inherit;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiZIZyc8Tp81qTLxpSDZEGBicSAlUPYTiZbFQf4f8DzqI5znx4DsbiWFC1LAjxiIVYbGP_zhQxJLmCzHQKDzsJoyu5bsZM8vOH_OgsidP0Xso3MPEoEPnJtRkIqEJ1shUI4ksmRGh18dLsGcqqDWDaB7Kd9sH64kKA_CdErQn_q-POvdyV3kq7iFwTd9Q" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="1668" data-original-width="1668" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiZIZyc8Tp81qTLxpSDZEGBicSAlUPYTiZbFQf4f8DzqI5znx4DsbiWFC1LAjxiIVYbGP_zhQxJLmCzHQKDzsJoyu5bsZM8vOH_OgsidP0Xso3MPEoEPnJtRkIqEJ1shUI4ksmRGh18dLsGcqqDWDaB7Kd9sH64kKA_CdErQn_q-POvdyV3kq7iFwTd9Q" width="240" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEh6oTX_maOrsv5shfwvRB-ompoQuYCdf3EkdE-QvwmjpfZ0QfexfO-n_OWKZzqmbOI0_V0TM3EL4JNIlNh8ds3Ah47ifiFPG2Kra9dhLnJE4qYmiZ5pOXnmqlgDuqRgk2ccbxBGfWyyxGWvpOpC7rYiLGgT8-BIga7ilXXDaAe8tVRDjo2sTouSRjSxNA" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="1668" data-original-width="1249" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEh6oTX_maOrsv5shfwvRB-ompoQuYCdf3EkdE-QvwmjpfZ0QfexfO-n_OWKZzqmbOI0_V0TM3EL4JNIlNh8ds3Ah47ifiFPG2Kra9dhLnJE4qYmiZ5pOXnmqlgDuqRgk2ccbxBGfWyyxGWvpOpC7rYiLGgT8-BIga7ilXXDaAe8tVRDjo2sTouSRjSxNA" width="180" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgnlzmp8x60F0PQ4GWDsll1GkQGG6yui0eSVLBULTucFgPQhWy3T4EMqKLgCv7oUNKvUjr-5AbgM1Mf0h4_y6_HMKUCa62pJPJrKEA_4UJFnMToW5jiEVoACQ5e3GZ5XIbaxUAgcYf2OnKnj1W33PX1ATsowBs0mPj9Y0tCXChYqBQ6QJRk_ccPVuF_bg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="1668" data-original-width="1384" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgnlzmp8x60F0PQ4GWDsll1GkQGG6yui0eSVLBULTucFgPQhWy3T4EMqKLgCv7oUNKvUjr-5AbgM1Mf0h4_y6_HMKUCa62pJPJrKEA_4UJFnMToW5jiEVoACQ5e3GZ5XIbaxUAgcYf2OnKnj1W33PX1ATsowBs0mPj9Y0tCXChYqBQ6QJRk_ccPVuF_bg" width="199" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhsQP1YPyDXaxbpL8DaZuB9wPIaV5rDyUh4Xk1eEnSz3qc5bHlwW3s7IYPDvcBXeDPf-MmTCDEVnoNQDcX1NOhghqj5jNYgU-VQ6_DYLRPPPX4fJmsYMqbaMhqMYA1BqcmooscRKqqP1Zx23m52k3oAbWdeNPMjc35qGw6M1bFNzK92cZO-33eyjmM7-g" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="1668" data-original-width="1668" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhsQP1YPyDXaxbpL8DaZuB9wPIaV5rDyUh4Xk1eEnSz3qc5bHlwW3s7IYPDvcBXeDPf-MmTCDEVnoNQDcX1NOhghqj5jNYgU-VQ6_DYLRPPPX4fJmsYMqbaMhqMYA1BqcmooscRKqqP1Zx23m52k3oAbWdeNPMjc35qGw6M1bFNzK92cZO-33eyjmM7-g=w320-h320" width="320" /></a></div><br /></span><p><span style="color: #38761d; font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">So what was "the West" all about? (7 March)</span></p><p><span style="background-color: white; caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"></span></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjKPW50dVIbqYZ9LYLnk9NXDt1tQEQmdAhTvvYqS5EdR7_hwBbJbcIlL59L3fgHMdUvAFzscAQV0_RftosQeXirpA9j1ICgZMWMQigBo8MnqV6dVhjMpJ5k81vUIlbVt9nvCSc0ZNCDtbPZqRZiv9Wns8Ye7PKhW8sZ2UcaZfBl1OzyFzJa-uV2jCzV1w" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="999" data-original-width="800" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjKPW50dVIbqYZ9LYLnk9NXDt1tQEQmdAhTvvYqS5EdR7_hwBbJbcIlL59L3fgHMdUvAFzscAQV0_RftosQeXirpA9j1ICgZMWMQigBo8MnqV6dVhjMpJ5k81vUIlbVt9nvCSc0ZNCDtbPZqRZiv9Wns8Ye7PKhW8sZ2UcaZfBl1OzyFzJa-uV2jCzV1w=w256-h320" width="256" /></a><span style="font-family: inherit;"></span></div><p></p><p><span style="background-color: white; caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">I hope that this crisis will lead us to reconsider or rediscover what “the West” was supposed to be all about. It’s deeply depressing to see how many people are presently responding to Putin’s blatant aggression with litanies of all the well-known crimes and hypocrisies of which the West is guilty, suggesting that he is somehow right and his dictatorship is somehow to be preferred. Yes, the West is guilty of all those crimes - I know it all too well, there’s no need to convince me. But think about it: these feelings of disgust about “hypocrisy” come precisely from the fact that those crimes conflict so painfully with the deeply admirable and inspiring dreams and ideals that we know we should be defending but have neglected. We should have every reason to be proud of our traditions of liberalism (*not* its malicious perversion known as neoliberalism) and humanism, the dream of individual and societal freedom, the belief that all human beings without any exception are equally valuable and should have the same basic rights and opportunities, our commitment to the emancipation of minorities, our principled rejection of discrimination of any kind (whether by race, gender, or sexual orientation), the conviction that we should be able to share what is good for the benefit of all. The undeniable fact that we’ve kept making a horrible mess of these ideals should not be a reason for us to keep betraying them now, by cultivating attitudes of tolerance and understanding towards a brutal tyranny that tramples on all of them: such cynicism merely shows that we never took our own ideals seriously in the first place, or even understood what they meant. On the contrary, the fact that we’ve been messing up should inspire us to make a turnaround, to rediscover and embrace all those ideals and values that are the true heart of Western culture, to try what we can to correct the countless mistakes we have made, and make another serious attempt to finally get it right. If there has ever been an opportunity, this is it.</span></span></p><p><span style="background-color: white; caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span>[PS. In the comments, one of my friends expressed some reservations about formulations like "the true heart of Western culture." I understand this reaction, for such language does confl</span><span style="font-family: inherit;">ict with the deconstructionist instincts that have become quite standard in academic discourse; and yet I stand by my words, because I believe we need to move on from deconstruction towards re-construction and some form of <a href="https://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/M/bo90478773.html">metamodernism</a>. I explained my formulation as follows: "</span></span></span><span style="background-color: #f0f2f5; caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">What I meant to say is that every culture has a heart, or a soul, in the metaphorical sense of its most positive source of life and energy, the force that keeps it going. I’m not making any metaphysical statement about “essences,” as I don’t believe that any culture has an essence; so this is not about any belief in “souls” either. But to continue the metaphor: the deep tragedy of Putin’s offensive is that for all his rhetorics about the “soul” of “holy Russia” and so on, what he is actually doing is killing the soul of his own culture and his own people by perverting what is actually a deeply positive force of inspiration into a instrument of aggression and domination."]</span></span></p><p><span style="color: #38761d; font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">Garry Kasparov (6 March)</span></p><div class="kvgmc6g5 cxmmr5t8 oygrvhab hcukyx3x c1et5uql ii04i59q" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; font-size: 15px; margin: 0px; white-space: pre-wrap; word-wrap: break-word;"><div dir="auto"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiCpAOIWv3zVEcFS6o4va_jEA4Kg0w94sEUyf7XoaB94AnySVFexoXpxEpR1vhEKsahaQN0XIZjmvrlukt4zAOuNnzX5zQcNQko3mECUtoAEVIAzbfKY6YIv6ghXIIj8oRW0hlRLdGQnBnFEIR1kp5nZXz1J0n5IuXGGxrUjkBCkOusC0fxb855Z-PpGg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="1080" data-original-width="1920" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEiCpAOIWv3zVEcFS6o4va_jEA4Kg0w94sEUyf7XoaB94AnySVFexoXpxEpR1vhEKsahaQN0XIZjmvrlukt4zAOuNnzX5zQcNQko3mECUtoAEVIAzbfKY6YIv6ghXIIj8oRW0hlRLdGQnBnFEIR1kp5nZXz1J0n5IuXGGxrUjkBCkOusC0fxb855Z-PpGg=w640-h360" width="640" /></a></div><br /></span></div><div dir="auto"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Garry Kasparov op Twitter. Don’t forget: he’s a chess champion.</span></div></div><div class="cxmmr5t8 oygrvhab hcukyx3x c1et5uql o9v6fnle ii04i59q" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; font-size: 15px; margin: 0.5em 0px 0px; white-space: pre-wrap; word-wrap: break-word;"><div dir="auto"><span style="font-family: inherit;">“Putin's war on Ukraine has entered its next phase, one of destruction and slaughter of civilians. It is also a part of Putin's World War, a war on the civilized world of international law, democracy, and any threat to his power, which he declared long ago. </span></div><div dir="auto"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The free world's denial of this war and decades of appeasement allowed Putin to threaten and conquer abroad while turning Russia into a police state. The price to stop him has gone up every time he has advanced unchallenged. Ukrainians are paying that price in blood. </span></div><div dir="auto"><span style="font-family: inherit;">If Putin is not stopped now, not prevented from destroying Ukraine and committing genocide against its people, there will be a next time and it will be in NATO, with an unprecedented nuclear threat. Do not let Putin escalate again in a time and place of his choosing. </span></div><div dir="auto"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Everyone is quoting my 2015 book Winter Is Coming and saying I was right & "listen to Kasparov". But will you still listen when I say this will take sacrifice and risk? Not just wheat and gas prices, not just empty chalets and unemployed lobbyists. Easy is over.</span></div><div dir="auto"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Or will you say that I am irrational, blinded by hate, as I heard in 2015? I hope not. Putin must be stopped because the unthinkable is now the possible. The world has awoken, at long last, and many steps I recommended last week are happening. It's not enough. </span></div></div><div class="cxmmr5t8 oygrvhab hcukyx3x c1et5uql o9v6fnle ii04i59q" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; font-size: 15px; margin: 0.5em 0px 0px; white-space: pre-wrap; word-wrap: break-word;"><div dir="auto"><span style="font-family: inherit;">My recommendations:</span></div></div><div class="cxmmr5t8 oygrvhab hcukyx3x c1et5uql o9v6fnle ii04i59q" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; font-size: 15px; margin: 0.5em 0px 0px; white-space: pre-wrap; word-wrap: break-word;"><div dir="auto"><span style="font-family: inherit;">1 I cannot demand NATO attack Russian forces directly, but I can speak from history & knowledge of Putin. A dictator who has already crossed every line cannot be prevented from escalating with restraint. If he destroys Ukraine, he won't stop. </span></div><div dir="auto"><span style="font-family: inherit;">2 We are not trying to appeal to the murderer in his bunker in the Urals. The message is to those who carry out his orders. Will they? Do they all wish to die? Putin will escalate anyway if he is not stopped now. He will, as he always has before, & the price will be higher. </span></div><div dir="auto"><span style="font-family: inherit;">3 Send Russia to the technological stone age. No support, no parts, no services. Oil boycotts aren't necessary if oil tech is unavailable. The industry will grind to a halt. This means a war footing in sacrificing, retooling & increasing production to substitute. It's war. </span></div><div dir="auto"><span style="font-family: inherit;">4 It's always tragic that ordinary people suffer, but they are not being bombed in their homes like Ukrainians. Every element of Russian society that can pressure Putin must know they have to choose between him & everything else. Some will cling to him, but for how long? </span></div><div dir="auto"><span style="font-family: inherit;">5 Clear message to Russian generals that they will suffer annihilation if one inch of NATO is touched. Send UKR every weapon, including the jets that have been blocked, as if Putin cares about the difference. Stop guessing about his thoughts and do what is needed. </span></div><div dir="auto"><span style="font-family: inherit;">6 Every day Ukraine endures gives opportunity to communicate this catastrophe to the only people who can really stop Putin, the Russian people, from oligarchs to commanders to protestors. Let all in the power vertical know they will be treated as war criminals. They are. </span></div><div dir="auto"><span style="font-family: inherit;">7 Leave nothing in reserve. Speed is of the essence to stop payments and catch them and their assets before they hide. Threats like "he doesn't know what's coming" don't work if Putin doesn't believe you. Show him. And show Russians there is no way back with Putin. Never. </span></div><div dir="auto"><span style="font-family: inherit;">8 Root out the corrupt politicians, businessmen & dark money that corrupted a generation to turn a blind eye or serve authoritarian regimes. Follow the donations, payments, gifts, influence. Hold them accountable. Down with Putin & his appeasers, glory to Ukraine.”</span></div></div><p><span style="color: #38761d; font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">"Westsplaining" Ukraine (5 March)</span></p><p><span style="background-color: white; caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Please ignore the title of <a href="https://newrepublic.com/article/165603/carlson-russia-ukraine-imperialism-nato?fbclid=IwAR1BgTyB5gktFvXjMNykmSpyHhHUO_eFs-mp6fKK5UR_SeN057cFZv-BM-o">this article</a> ("The American Pundits Who Can't Resist 'Westsplaining' Ukraine"). This is not just a cheap attack on those American “pundits” but a thought-provoking analysis neither from a “Western” nor from a Russian but from an Eastern-European perspective. That’s the point. See also the links at the very end of the article, including <a href="https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/odr/a-letter-to-the-western-left-from-kyiv/?fbclid=IwAR3afCo8guBUmGWm20DQQen4o-CgsM8hkl_WwVdzH_zTYOclCryq-mB_rDs">a passionate article about “the anti-Imperialism of Idiots”</a>, by a Ukrainian author who somehow (I can’t understand how) manages to remain sharp and analytic while actually writing from Kyiv under artillery attack.</span></span></p><p><span style="color: #38761d; font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">On Waking Up from having Woken Up (4 March)</span></p><div class="kvgmc6g5 cxmmr5t8 oygrvhab hcukyx3x c1et5uql ii04i59q" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; font-size: 15px; margin: 0px; white-space: pre-wrap; word-wrap: break-word;"><div dir="auto"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Again <a class="oajrlxb2 g5ia77u1 qu0x051f esr5mh6w e9989ue4 r7d6kgcz rq0escxv nhd2j8a9 nc684nl6 p7hjln8o kvgmc6g5 cxmmr5t8 oygrvhab hcukyx3x jb3vyjys rz4wbd8a qt6c0cv9 a8nywdso i1ao9s8h esuyzwwr f1sip0of lzcic4wl gpro0wi8 q66pz984 b1v8xokw" href="https://www.facebook.com/adam.malone.520?__cft__[0]=AZUX5op3e6mhEcjo2UEjbyH4utroCavREg27bbafg4xkfkT4P-cEpaQn_9leKpIIIDZtuHILjztxNG4lGCn7kjz-2aHChxjYP-2zNeI5byc7_89s8w_mhQst2vcoHPfa00A&__tn__=-]K-R" role="link" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: var(--accent); cursor: pointer; display: inline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; outline: none; padding: 0px; text-align: inherit; text-decoration: none; touch-action: manipulation;" tabindex="0"><span class="nc684nl6" style="display: inline;">DAdam J Malone</span></a> formulates it perfectly. I quote:</span></div></div><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><div class="cxmmr5t8 oygrvhab hcukyx3x c1et5uql o9v6fnle ii04i59q" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; font-size: 15px; margin: 0.5em 0px 0px; white-space: pre-wrap; word-wrap: break-word;"><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Seems pretty obvious to me that the alternative / spiritual / conspiracy communities have been infiltrated and exposed to the exact same anti-West, anti-liberal, anti-democratic and anti-global fundamentalism of Vladimir Putin. Was this a successful seeding of just enough anti-West sentiment within our own society in order to paralyse our moral compass in the face of his aggression? These supposedly 'enlightened' circles are openly voicing support for what Putin is doing in the Ukraine. Their anti-establishment leanings and loss of faith in society have been fully turned and engaged against our (and their own) institutions... believing that the true force of evil in the world is here in the West, a belief that just so happens to be driving the tanks and missiles into the Ukraine as we speak. Instead of yelling at everyone else to 'wake up'... why don't YOU 'wake up' to the likely possibility that an enemy of your government has successfully turned you against your own society, freeing him to pursue his own agenda while your bought and paid for support cheers him on from the sidelines?</span></div></div></blockquote><p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEi4Z9nJUN0L0BQQ8hFQftxUKOtTl-cFKWbLwYrnOteP_oXOtj4zJJwxKA9r6K0ckPF1tKBIcM4NC0tuHcZTh-tLUs3GM-vKdJmCFLnHJ57yYk6uPvJRC6FfHRn3TUSarETsabWgtcupy8ig0SeLardLPj92dUGvZ-j-jxrZ3J2MRHGstOr0YDNzevboAA" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="665" data-original-width="900" height="472" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEi4Z9nJUN0L0BQQ8hFQftxUKOtTl-cFKWbLwYrnOteP_oXOtj4zJJwxKA9r6K0ckPF1tKBIcM4NC0tuHcZTh-tLUs3GM-vKdJmCFLnHJ57yYk6uPvJRC6FfHRn3TUSarETsabWgtcupy8ig0SeLardLPj92dUGvZ-j-jxrZ3J2MRHGstOr0YDNzevboAA=w640-h472" width="640" /></a></div> <p></p><div class="cxmmr5t8 oygrvhab hcukyx3x c1et5uql o9v6fnle ii04i59q" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; font-size: 15px; margin: 0.5em 0px 0px; white-space: pre-wrap; word-wrap: break-word;"><div dir="auto"><span style="font-family: inherit;">I’m afraid that the same people and communities who were shouting so loudly that our governments were using vaccines and QR codes to “take away our freedom” are now cheering the dictator who has been taking away the freedom of his own people over the past twenty years and is trying to expand his reign of suppression to the Ukraine, Belarus, and as much farther as he possibly can, including our own societies. I have many friends in the alternative / spiritual communities, and it’s heartbreaking to see how many of them have become the victims of systematic campaigns of conspirational disinformation and propaganda, so that they honestly believe now that they are defending freedom while in fact they are doing everything to undermine it. </span></div></div><div class="cxmmr5t8 oygrvhab hcukyx3x c1et5uql o9v6fnle ii04i59q" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; font-size: 15px; margin: 0.5em 0px 0px; white-space: pre-wrap; word-wrap: break-word;"><div dir="auto"><span style="font-family: inherit;">To prevent any misunderstandings: I take it that everybody in their right mind and with a bit of historical knowledge should be aware of the many hypocrisies of “the West.” But those who immediately jump to that Whataboutist argument don’t seem to realize or appreciate that they are living in a society in which they can give free expression to those critiques without being punished for it, contrary to what happens to anyone who dares to criticize anti-liberal and anti-democratic regimes such as Putin’s. The problem is partly generational and partly educational: this anti-liberal/anti-democracy movement that confuses its own sentiments with a defense of freedom is dominated by people who have never experienced war and whose parents haven’t experienced it either, so that they couldn’t pass the memories on; and this is combined with the fact that our educational systems have neglected the teaching of history for decades now, leading to widespread ignorance and blissful naïvety about how wars happen and how propaganda works. My friends in the alternative / spiritual communities have been telling us for decades now to “wake up,” and it’s time to return the advice: wake up, friends, you have been fooled and you’re being played.</span></div></div><p><span style="color: #38761d; font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">On understanding what's happening (1 March)</span></p><p><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: white; caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;">I was impressed by these short remarks by </span><span style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><a class="oajrlxb2 g5ia77u1 qu0x051f esr5mh6w e9989ue4 r7d6kgcz rq0escxv nhd2j8a9 nc684nl6 p7hjln8o kvgmc6g5 cxmmr5t8 oygrvhab hcukyx3x jb3vyjys rz4wbd8a qt6c0cv9 a8nywdso i1ao9s8h esuyzwwr f1sip0of lzcic4wl gpro0wi8 q66pz984 b1v8xokw" href="https://www.facebook.com/adam.malone.520?__cft__[0]=AZW3CBBiszgSLH9qR5CyFAVnXcj0Csi35OXrxSiOn-TRiviBkEF4XnujW9TS3loI6xFxQl9JaNdBywh31UnJFxdW_6PpQ8gSFkc5DBxysS8SxxT3-ueZIhUweMk8-7L7K1kXFiwBWJZEIkLCIQWuoQ3M81u9jNW3HpXd79Sj-fKD1w&__tn__=-]K-R" role="link" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: var(--accent); cursor: pointer; display: inline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; outline: none; padding: 0px; text-align: inherit; text-decoration: none; touch-action: manipulation;" tabindex="0"><span class="nc684nl6" style="display: inline;">DAdam J Malone</span></a></span><span style="background-color: white; caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;">, a person on my FB friends list whom I don’t personally know (as far as I’m aware) but whose words ring true to me. </span></span></p><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px;"><p style="text-align: left;"><span style="background-color: white; caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Noticing a number of people saying "the war is not what it seems" or "it's just staged theatre" or "part of the plan". The arrogance and ego defence in this position should be clear for everyone to see. It protects whoever claims this from having any emotional engagement with what's happening, whilst maintaining some kind of superior and illusory belief of "I know what's really going on". This position saves a person from truly comprehending the pain of what's happening, the pain of war... protecting them from feeling the call to stand up for peace. This is not a Netflix series that you've worked out the plot for. If the Ukrainians cannot have peace neither can you. Have the courage to face the shadow of the human condition and own it, not pretend it's all part of someone or something else's great plan that you've discovered on Rumble. This belief makes you inhumane and complacent whilst creating the perfect vacuum for such atrocities to occur unhindered as they have throughout history. This is the time to stand up for peace, to own and confront the shadow, not arrogantly say "I told you so".</span></span></p></blockquote><p><span style="background-color: white; caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">I recognize the attitudes he criticizes. It is very important that we try to understand what is presently happening in all its depth and complexity, but that is not the same thing as taking the arrogant (and lazy) high ground of claiming that we already know and already have understood. On the contrary, that’s a perfect recipe for delusion. “Understanding” is not some fixed ideological position but always an ongoing learning process (and a painful one, for learning means letting go of what you held to be certainties until you discover that they weren’t), and it’s never narrowly intellectual and distant but always bound up with deep emotion and existential engagement. If we don’t allow ourselves to feel the pain and terror and confusion of what’s happening right now, we will not even begin to understand. And let’s not expect understanding of the world situation to come to us like some flash of certainty either - that’s not going to happen. All we can ever hope to gain from our attempts at understanding the present moment is a bit more wisdom, a bit more humility, a bit more humanity.</span></span></p><p><span style="color: #38761d; font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">An article by Daniel Pinchbeck (28 February)</span></p><p><span style="background-color: white; caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">I recommend <a href="https://danielpinchbeck.substack.com/p/from-russia-with-hate?r=1mhh1&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&utm_source=url&fbclid=IwAR0r63Rsewk7-EezCu6E_cdCp7Grt3p4R4qR973L1XIE7dFje7q_2Hv4B9I&s=r">this article by Daniel Pinchbeck</a>. Putin’s invasion of the Ukraine should be a huge wake-up call for all those in “the West” who have been falling asleep and have gotten confused, over the past years and decades, about what it really means if your freedom of self-determination is taken away from you. Pinchbeck also has some useful discussion of the partly spiritual-intellectual background traditions that help explain Putin’s view of the world; some of them have to do with right-wing esoteric-Traditionalist currents of thought, with Aleksandr Dugin as probably the most well-known representative. </span></span></p><p><span style="background-color: white; caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhaLoqiBCEaCNmUCjIjXAYBQywawDO1dVMH0HSujzaCOUQ8EVegVt5U1cBxDOlFynMHwSpH4gXvTEjhaIwp8H8TLOTy2EBAoM7u3LamM2QmowQmEeErE4C3xhcRQ-oK2B2aq2ytnTLAzwGtmWHYyd2PSnUTFLvfl5OVs7s7jIWpuT3nzTSsZOzKyeqasQ" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="762" data-original-width="1456" height="334" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhaLoqiBCEaCNmUCjIjXAYBQywawDO1dVMH0HSujzaCOUQ8EVegVt5U1cBxDOlFynMHwSpH4gXvTEjhaIwp8H8TLOTy2EBAoM7u3LamM2QmowQmEeErE4C3xhcRQ-oK2B2aq2ytnTLAzwGtmWHYyd2PSnUTFLvfl5OVs7s7jIWpuT3nzTSsZOzKyeqasQ=w640-h334" width="640" /></a></div><span face="system-ui, -apple-system, BlinkMacSystemFont, .SFNSText-Regular, sans-serif"><br /></span><p><span style="color: #38761d; font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">Putin's health (27 February)</span></p><p><span style="background-color: white; caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; font-size: 15px; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Any input on Putin’s health? He looks like a sick, exhausted man. Of course that could be just stress and lack of sleep, but he’s seventy years old and there have been reports about cancer, Parkinson’s disease and surgery; and during that long one-hour ”history lesson” last week, again and again he seemed out of breath. I was struck by the fact that even on camera in front of the whole world, he didn’t seem to bother trying to conceal it, or perhaps simply wasn’t able to. Dictators who invade another country would typically try to project an image of pure strength, energy and determination, but he was just sitting there slumped back behind the table. How do I read this? Or do I read too much in it?</span></span></p><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="color: #38761d; font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">Saint Vladimir the Great II (25 February)</span></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">I find this <a href="https://religionnews.com/2022/02/24/next-year-in-kyiv/?fbclid=IwAR3OqQdep8xI3wIbtjJVpumxYVzbJd7Q173t0krWZu5llH_7Ohw8Iscbrl8">a thought-provoking piece</a>, as it looks at the Ukraine crisis from the point of view of religion. It shows a dimension that is seldom highlighted, because it seems too alien and bizarre to secular audiences and intellectuals who have been trained to think that ultimately everything is about economics, and not about deeply-felt ideas and spiritual convictions. But in fact there are deeper reasons for the alliance, which is now becoming more evident than ever, between the Trumpian revolution in the US and Putin’s Russian expansionism: with Steve Bannon as a key figure, an important part of what is going on here has to do with the geopolitical dream of a grand global Christian-traditionalist alliance of Evangelicalism, Roman Catholicism (but <i>not</i> the one promoted by Pope Francis - see the article) and Orthodoxy against their enemies: the “soulless secularism” of the West, neo-communist/atheist China, and Islam. Just look at my post of yesterday (Ilya Glazunov), read or watch Steven Bannon (I recommend Errol Morris’s documentary American Dharma), and connect the dots. </span></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">This is not a fantasy. We need to understand the incredible power of myth and imagination. I found it deeply annoying yesterday to hear so many commentators express their sheer puzzlement over Putin’s “madness” or “irrationality” - it’s extremely ignorant and irresponsible to dismiss him in those terms, as just another crazy man hungry for power, instead of realizing that what drives these people is never just pure economic or military calculation (the only dimension that most secular critics are able to see at all), but grand dreams of a world-historical mission that are painted on the screen of the geopolitical imagination. </span></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; white-space: pre-wrap;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgzoTs_ybbgHNRV8p9VPDnQetOlaU4IuqUwdMJEbh3xxSKiXGHhmOI404eGf_bn4CmoIizYSP5j9YM-Nq8724zI8M4SN6Fa8XpNAYKv_BMblqh4jEbuG057XtyPjVgB_K4kHP1KRonYmUphaSZK55H0s1vu7yOxD8YvM9-9ST-MiMLDzTSdxWcYWu5qbw" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="463" data-original-width="768" height="386" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgzoTs_ybbgHNRV8p9VPDnQetOlaU4IuqUwdMJEbh3xxSKiXGHhmOI404eGf_bn4CmoIizYSP5j9YM-Nq8724zI8M4SN6Fa8XpNAYKv_BMblqh4jEbuG057XtyPjVgB_K4kHP1KRonYmUphaSZK55H0s1vu7yOxD8YvM9-9ST-MiMLDzTSdxWcYWu5qbw=w640-h386" width="640" /></a></div><br /></div><p><span style="color: #38761d; font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">And So It Begins (24 February)</span></p><p><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: white; caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; white-space: pre-wrap;">Years ago, my friends </span><span style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; white-space: pre-wrap;"><a class="oajrlxb2 g5ia77u1 qu0x051f esr5mh6w e9989ue4 r7d6kgcz rq0escxv nhd2j8a9 nc684nl6 p7hjln8o kvgmc6g5 cxmmr5t8 oygrvhab hcukyx3x jb3vyjys rz4wbd8a qt6c0cv9 a8nywdso i1ao9s8h esuyzwwr f1sip0of lzcic4wl gpro0wi8 q66pz984 b1v8xokw" href="https://www.facebook.com/kateryna.zorya?__cft__[0]=AZUTqi0B0uJYc5mlUSiqEzbrbL1j-dzwkBPKRwmMzQ_oLLSDpYJCAqCQL3zOVcqJV1lUVEd5Iz3zvTz3nCUo7hNWebdpRWLFii6BEjGf9Dx4BGW-U3qraD9CIyoHw6LFGcE&__tn__=-]K-R" role="link" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: var(--accent); cursor: pointer; display: inline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; outline: none; padding: 0px; text-align: inherit; text-decoration: none; touch-action: manipulation;" tabindex="0"><span class="nc684nl6" style="display: inline;">Kateryna Zorya</span></a></span><span style="background-color: white; caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; white-space: pre-wrap;"> and </span><span style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; white-space: pre-wrap;"><a class="oajrlxb2 g5ia77u1 qu0x051f esr5mh6w e9989ue4 r7d6kgcz rq0escxv nhd2j8a9 nc684nl6 p7hjln8o kvgmc6g5 cxmmr5t8 oygrvhab hcukyx3x jb3vyjys rz4wbd8a qt6c0cv9 a8nywdso i1ao9s8h esuyzwwr f1sip0of lzcic4wl gpro0wi8 q66pz984 b1v8xokw" href="https://www.facebook.com/birgit.menzel.94?__cft__[0]=AZUTqi0B0uJYc5mlUSiqEzbrbL1j-dzwkBPKRwmMzQ_oLLSDpYJCAqCQL3zOVcqJV1lUVEd5Iz3zvTz3nCUo7hNWebdpRWLFii6BEjGf9Dx4BGW-U3qraD9CIyoHw6LFGcE&__tn__=-]K-R" role="link" style="border: 0px; box-sizing: border-box; color: var(--accent); cursor: pointer; display: inline; list-style: none; margin: 0px; outline: none; padding: 0px; text-align: inherit; text-decoration: none; touch-action: manipulation;" tabindex="0"><span class="nc684nl6" style="display: inline;">Birgit Menzel</span></a></span><span style="background-color: white; caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; white-space: pre-wrap;"> showed me around Moscow and advised me to pay a visit to the Glazunov Museum, financed by Putin’s government, to get an idea of what Russian nationalism could look like. I spent hours in that museum, and it made a lasting impression on me. In a very large room in the midst of the museum, you find these enormous paintings that show how Glazunov pits an idealized “Holy Russia” (Tradition) against its demonized counterpart, “the perverse and decadent West” (Modernity). The large painting “The Market of Our Democracy” must of course be seen against the background of the 1990s’ “shock neoliberalization” of Russia, and really says it all. It’s worth studying the details. And then you have a third painting in which the two cultures confront one another. The representatives of conservative “Tradition” are on the right, with a priest who is stretching out his arms to ward off the danger, while on the left you see an unruly crowd of perverts and revolutionaries entering the holy space from a door that looks like the gate of hell. Believe me, when you’re actually there in that room, facing those enormous paintings, it’s much more impressive than an online picture can possibly show. What we’re seeing here is just one of the many examples of how potent imagery can be used for propaganda, by creating extremely simplified and therefore highly effective either-or oppositions. Dictators cannot accept complexity, nuance, ambivalence, ambiguity: to prepare for war, first you need to reduce reality in people’s minds to stark choices between “good” or “evil” that allow for nothing in between. And of course, you cannot deal with any in-between countries either: it always has to be either “us” or “them.” I’m deeply sad and worried to see how this false logic is once again throwing us into war, with unforeseeable global consequences for the coming years.</span></span></p><p><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="background-color: white; caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; white-space: pre-wrap;"></span></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgblRWKjtBZQ_M8jFikpX-GidVEb-v-D120tuUFlwitnPQRZe9yMBPc8NmjDf6M8Ct8R-HNeQaumjFlhSwx5An7XHYWptaw9TJlYFhnE3juqHYuRSu3x8xPC-cYa10R8qrAXkmdL8rWDpSoKpcFpbvmTS5OF-tJtF2wsZzcfJHKUSgcItDk1uPuNHbE5A" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="979" data-original-width="2000" height="314" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgblRWKjtBZQ_M8jFikpX-GidVEb-v-D120tuUFlwitnPQRZe9yMBPc8NmjDf6M8Ct8R-HNeQaumjFlhSwx5An7XHYWptaw9TJlYFhnE3juqHYuRSu3x8xPC-cYa10R8qrAXkmdL8rWDpSoKpcFpbvmTS5OF-tJtF2wsZzcfJHKUSgcItDk1uPuNHbE5A=w640-h314" width="640" /></a></span></div><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhjd8ogpIK_P1Kcw1Drmm5DaAfZDk1qREiQ0565haI--URvcHDTER98LmSZvtXgzF1uRpt168X1XH9XUh9VAErY0rrkPCBhFl5y30n2tPzyjkfd6yJ7Qx6yBtZECnenOiED70Py4WNsy5DuAvjfHA9BX74oAa3fSK3-5J8OaId4zapZg6Ude6gRHJAZ1Q" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="500" data-original-width="800" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEhjd8ogpIK_P1Kcw1Drmm5DaAfZDk1qREiQ0565haI--URvcHDTER98LmSZvtXgzF1uRpt168X1XH9XUh9VAErY0rrkPCBhFl5y30n2tPzyjkfd6yJ7Qx6yBtZECnenOiED70Py4WNsy5DuAvjfHA9BX74oAa3fSK3-5J8OaId4zapZg6Ude6gRHJAZ1Q=w640-h400" width="640" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEigPacaLJqb4VBnqn5xX4ZpJRGlxX3B4NTB5KUZLuo4LF8LU0gVcelOX6E_In7zj-Zn8drobs63TkP3zah1GRSEwKMc-Ccwy1vC_lHU6NICQtCQEsKixPhNE1xB_bXXlLccq4pP-G3FwzkWUPsvAmAVi2wqVRKB6F5Gql-DhHsXXcP7FFa8bof91kiDWw" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="680" data-original-width="1360" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEigPacaLJqb4VBnqn5xX4ZpJRGlxX3B4NTB5KUZLuo4LF8LU0gVcelOX6E_In7zj-Zn8drobs63TkP3zah1GRSEwKMc-Ccwy1vC_lHU6NICQtCQEsKixPhNE1xB_bXXlLccq4pP-G3FwzkWUPsvAmAVi2wqVRKB6F5Gql-DhHsXXcP7FFa8bof91kiDWw=w640-h320" width="640" /></a></div><br /></span><p></p><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="color: #38761d; font-family: inherit; font-size: large;">Don't Look Up to Putin? (22 February)</span></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">It seems that my friends on FB are perfectly at peace about the Ukraine at this moment, as though this is not really of our concern and we do have more important things to get upset about. QR codes for instance, or Ajax and <i>The Voice of Holland</i>. Perhaps the term "boundary-crossing behaviour" should make us think rather about Putin. The speech he just give makes it perfectly clear that we are very close to the biggest war in Europe since 1945, and this is going to affect all of us. Have we really lost touch with reality? Look up.</span></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br /></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; white-space: pre-wrap;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjyhk3U_a79hfp-N1zWYlFC7jxpSUz9rv0zt5_zML1WFkpd0NO4V1AT19O-u4N34JSn2yNYZ7g4ElWRpVhFq-x9HfqgqrbKoLPnZEF61uPzgBWQiSuyDIM1IaDPrdH0Nt--qSoWAaxsBX504nz2pNnhmAOTFqg8bQyCfjlTaQ1J6iN8MrwZFlvTAqFeXA" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="1281" data-original-width="1920" height="214" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjyhk3U_a79hfp-N1zWYlFC7jxpSUz9rv0zt5_zML1WFkpd0NO4V1AT19O-u4N34JSn2yNYZ7g4ElWRpVhFq-x9HfqgqrbKoLPnZEF61uPzgBWQiSuyDIM1IaDPrdH0Nt--qSoWAaxsBX504nz2pNnhmAOTFqg8bQyCfjlTaQ1J6iN8MrwZFlvTAqFeXA" width="320" /></a></div></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">[Dutch original, with some explanations below] Onder mijn vrienden op FB lijkt grote rust te heersen over de Oekraïne, alsof het ons niet echt aangaat en we toch echt wel belangrijkere dingen hebben om druk over te maken. QR codes bijvoorbeeld, of Ajax en The Voice. Misschien zouden we er goed aan doen bij "grensoverschrijdend gedrag" toch eerst eens aan Poetin te denken. De toespraak van zojuist maakt geheel duidelijk dat we echt aan de rand staan van de grootste oorlog in Europa sinds 1945, en dat gaat ons allemaal raken. Zijn we het contact met de werkelijkheid echt kwijt aan het raken? Look Up.</span></div><div dir="auto" style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); color: #050505; white-space: pre-wrap;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div><div dir="auto"><span style="color: #050505; font-family: inherit;"><span style="caret-color: rgb(5, 5, 5); white-space: pre-wrap;">* <i>The Voice of Holland</i> is the Dutch equivalent of shows like "Britain's Got Talent." In the previous week, the Dutch media were dominated by sexual misconduct accusations </span></span><span style="color: #050505;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">against some well-known artists who played a leading role in the show. Soon afterwards, a no less well-known ex-soccer-player connected to Ajax became the focus of a similar media storm. All of this, of course, came right after all the turmoil among anti-vaccin activists about mandatory QR codes and so on. "Boundary-crossing behaviour" is the literal translation of the standard Dutch expression for sexual misconduct, i.e. </span></span><i style="font-family: inherit; white-space: pre-wrap;">grensoverschrijdend gedrag</i><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">. Of course, I was drawing a parallel with Putin's threat of boundary-crossing. Finally, of course I'm also drawing a parallel here with the recent Netflix movie </span></span><i style="font-family: inherit; white-space: pre-wrap;">Don't Look Up</i><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">: a brilliant satire about how we seem to be losing touch with reality in our </span></span><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;">mediated</span><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="white-space: pre-wrap;"> world, even if it threatens our very existence.</span></span></span></div>wouterjhanegraaff.blogspot.comhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15519965611425366178noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5967881025525384120.post-3355600095782868302021-08-13T08:10:00.014-07:002021-08-14T01:27:52.395-07:00History is the Mystery (Justinus Kerner and the Seeress)<p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">As the Corona virus was dominating the media and everybody’s daily lives, many of my friends on Facebook began launching “book challenges” to entertain themselves and the members of their networks. I accepted a challenge to list “10 books that changed your life,” and soon discovered that it was not just great fun to select ten titles and write about them, but that the exercise triggered a process of self-reflection. It made me conscious of some deep and long-term motivations and obsessions that have very much determined my personal life and my career as a scholar as well (or the other way around?). After some delay, here is nr. 6 on my list. <span style="font-size: medium;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"></span></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhHbcL9YM38zJfnq_KH8b0yDisxtyy89PEpUKe30_UusadmlLJ5mrkIqK6dK4Q5C6i317zDOnAQyvCg53RxubeImzGK7GBHpxDXPx9_5XPYSb-Dl4lz6d9oKA7G9v7l2FvNNQxGo9jWl0oP/s956/Hauffe+Gabriel+von+Max.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="640" data-original-width="956" height="430" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhHbcL9YM38zJfnq_KH8b0yDisxtyy89PEpUKe30_UusadmlLJ5mrkIqK6dK4Q5C6i317zDOnAQyvCg53RxubeImzGK7GBHpxDXPx9_5XPYSb-Dl4lz6d9oKA7G9v7l2FvNNQxGo9jWl0oP/w640-h430/Hauffe+Gabriel+von+Max.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Friederike Hauffe (1801-1829), the "Seeress of Prevorst</td></tr></tbody></table><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">Around the time I was finishing my dissertation</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> <span lang="EN-US">during the mid-1990s</span></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">, a colleague of mine organized a small discussion group about the topic “women and miracle stories,” which eventually led to <a href="https://brill.com/view/title/8866">a</a></span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"><a href="https://brill.com/view/title/8866">n interesting</a></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"><a href="https://brill.com/view/title/8866"> collective volume</a>. </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">As </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">I had to pick a topic for my contribution, </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">I</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> grabbed the occasion to</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> get away from the New Age for a while and</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> satisfy my curiosity about </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">a</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> book that I had heard about but never read. The author was Justinus Kerner</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> (1786-1862),</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> a minor Romantic poet who worked as a town physician in Weinsberg. He belonged to the second generation of Romantics </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">during</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> the so-called <i>Vormärz</i> period</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">,</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">a time </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">of political restauration and conservatism</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> that began</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> after the Napoleonic wars</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> and ended with the March Revolution of 1848. Typical of these decades was</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> a general resurgence</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> not just</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> of religion but also of fascination with </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">“</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">the occult</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">” – ghosts, spirits, after-life visions, and strange unexplained phenomena of all kinds.</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> All of this was</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> very much</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> part of the</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> cultural</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> legacy of German Idealism, which took</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> its</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> inspiration</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> not only from philosophy but also, </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> among many other things</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">,</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> from Christian </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">T</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">heosophy in the tradition of Jacob Böhme and </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">Immanuel Swedenborg’s</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> explorations of the <i>Geisterwelt</i></span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">, the w</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">orld of spirits</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">. Most important of all, in the wake of Franz Anton Mesmer and the Marquis de Puységur, this was a time of widespread experimentation with techniques for consciousness alterations that could result in spectacular phenomena known as visionary somnambulism</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">. <o:p></o:p></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><br /></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDt4WP_hVRaa_WLJAJcenjjQ0vy2F2J9TXXTxiNfF7tFp5YwH92vxWNsJwfCOujiCOa4_meV4jvzdVQFv8h48-RIxaOcOZksOswEHjwOS4yuAooUqw2HgiSIIuaeBZ-ZvnW-PD5A1itJ37/s1647/Weinsberg-Kernerhaus-Doerr-1826.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1171" data-original-width="1647" height="228" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhDt4WP_hVRaa_WLJAJcenjjQ0vy2F2J9TXXTxiNfF7tFp5YwH92vxWNsJwfCOujiCOa4_meV4jvzdVQFv8h48-RIxaOcOZksOswEHjwOS4yuAooUqw2HgiSIIuaeBZ-ZvnW-PD5A1itJ37/s320/Weinsberg-Kernerhaus-Doerr-1826.jpg" width="320" /></a></div><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 28px;"><span style="color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif;">One day in the mid-1820s, a very sick young woman was brought to Kerner’s house in Weinsberg, which functioned as a kind of small hospital (you see it to the right here in this picture <span style="caret-color: rgb(29, 33, 41);">from the same period, with on the hilltop in the background the ruins of <i>Weibertreu</i>, a favourite meeting place of the Romantics). The patient's name</span> was Friedrike Hauffe. She was born in 1801 and would die just a few years later at the age of only 29. She was suffering from a horrible combination of symptoms</span></span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> that is rather difficult to diagnose even today.</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">The condition</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> included fevers, severe cramps and bleedings, and she kept slipping in and out of strange incontrollable </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">altered states</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">. As nobody knew what to do with her, and her family was frankly desperate</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> <span lang="EN-US">(“she became an image of martyrdom but did not die”),</span></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> Kerner took her in as his patient. In his bestsell</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">er</span><span class="apple-converted-space" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> </span></span><i style="caret-color: rgb(29, 33, 41); font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"><a href="https://archive.org/details/dieseherinvonpre121kern">Die Seherin von Prevorst</a><span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span></i><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">(The Seeress of Prevorst, 1829), he gives meticulous descriptions of his treatment methods. <span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 28px;">The</span><span style="line-height: 28px;"> book is known</span><span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 28px;"> today</span><span style="line-height: 28px;"> as one of the earliest attempts at an empirical clinical study of what</span><span style="line-height: 28px;"> <span lang="EN-US">would be called paranormal phenomena today</span></span><span style="line-height: 28px;">, and</span><span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 28px;"> it is</span><span style="line-height: 28px;"> certainly the very best first-hand account of what Mesmeric somnambulism was all about. As the treatment continued, Kerner and his wife built up a close personal relationship with Friederike. </span><span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 28px;">The three of them</span><span style="line-height: 28px;"> established</span><span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 28px;"> a type of intimate connection</span><span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 28px;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 28px;">that would come to be known in Mesmeric contexts as a</span><span style="line-height: 28px;"> strong magnetic<span class="apple-converted-space"> </span></span></span><i style="caret-color: rgb(29, 33, 41); font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><span style="color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">rapport</span></i><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; line-height: 28px;"><span style="color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif;">. In this diagram made in a trance state, the so-called <i>Sonnenkreis</i> (Solar <span style="caret-color: rgb(29, 33, 41);">Circle</span>), the two waving lines just within the periphery indicate Kerner and his wife, who functioned like a kind of protection between Friederike's inner world and the threatening intrusions from outside (left side, beyond the periphery).</span></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; line-height: 28px;"><span style="color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif;"><br /></span></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-size: large;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVyCLqgi9P8ssN7vjUSGLBv0VgeCypXIgMlHfu6iblaHJczZtt2Kp6xD0WRoWWUvksVldoxvf66KeRRYj7TTV-Dpq0zQDk1SpHAF-bafXJ7uc2tCX5hhdFEhwhVSWM0SfY1xn5IC1GbVvT/s1002/Sonnenkreis.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="976" data-original-width="1002" height="626" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVyCLqgi9P8ssN7vjUSGLBv0VgeCypXIgMlHfu6iblaHJczZtt2Kp6xD0WRoWWUvksVldoxvf66KeRRYj7TTV-Dpq0zQDk1SpHAF-bafXJ7uc2tCX5hhdFEhwhVSWM0SfY1xn5IC1GbVvT/w640-h626/Sonnenkreis.jpg" width="640" /></a></span></div><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">Most of all, t<span style="line-height: 28px;">he physician fell under the spell,</span><span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 28px;"> not only</span><span style="line-height: 28px;"> of </span><span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 28px;">his patient's</span><span style="line-height: 28px;"> spectacular visionary and paranormal abilities, which made her famous all over Germany already during her lifetime;</span><span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 28px;"> but also of</span><span style="line-height: 28px;"> her spiritual attitude</span><span style="line-height: 28px;"> towards suffering</span><span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 28px;">, </span><span style="line-height: 28px;">very much influenced by </span><span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 28px;">a kind of “occultist Christianity”</span><span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 28px;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 28px;">that was typical of Württembergian</span><span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 28px;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 28px;">P</span><span style="line-height: 28px;">ietis</span><span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 28px;">m. Among the various perspectives from which </span><i><span style="line-height: 28px;">Die Seherin von Prevorst</span></i><span style="line-height: 28px;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 28px;">can be approached (for instance as a source for German Romantic medicine and psychiatry, or for the prehistory of parapsychology), it can certainly be read as an account of</span><span style="line-height: 28px;"> Kerner’s </span><span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 28px;">personal spiritual</span><span style="line-height: 28px;"> conversion to</span><span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 28px;"> a</span><span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 28px;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 28px;">German-</span><span style="line-height: 28px;">Romantic</span><span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 28px;"> type of esoteric</span><span style="line-height: 28px;"> Christianity </span><span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 28px;">that responded to</span><span style="line-height: 28px;"> Enlightenment rationalism by taking its inspiration from</span><span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 28px;"> what came to be known as</span><span style="line-height: 28px;"> “the Nightside of Nature</span><span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 28px;">.” This terminology referred to the mysterious</span><span style="line-height: 28px;"> realm of deep symbolic meaning</span><span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 28px;"> that could be</span><span style="line-height: 28px;"> accessed through dreams and other altered states</span><span style="line-height: 28px;"> <span lang="EN-US">–</span></span><span style="line-height: 28px;"> the</span><span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 28px;"> direct historical </span><span style="line-height: 28px;"> predecessor of what</span><span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 28px;"> Carl Gustav Jung would later refer to</span><span style="line-height: 28px;"> as “the collective unconscious</span><span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 28px;">.</span><span style="line-height: 28px;">”</span><span lang="EN-US" style="line-height: 28px;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"><o:p><span style="font-size: large;"> </span></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">One has to read <i>Die Seherin</i> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">in the German original </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">to fully grasp its fascination. Kerner was a poet who knew how to write a gripping narrative in powerful Romantic prose</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">;</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> and because he was a </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">perceptive </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">observer and</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> a highly intelligent</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> commentator as well, this made his book far superior to the rather boring standard accounts of somnambulistic trance phenomena. It</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> was an immediate success</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">. Thanks to it,</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> Kerner is now considered a central figure </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">for our understanding of esotericism in </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">German Romantic</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">ism, but it also made him into</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> a favourite target of</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> contempt and</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> ridicule by rationalist critics. </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">For the more theoretical parts of his volume, by the way, Kerner depended on his friend and medical colleague Karl August von Eschenmayer (1768-1852), a fascinating character and author in his own right who deserves much more attention than he has received (as I have tried to make clear in <a href="https://www.academia.edu/45163733/Carl_August_von_Eschenmayer_and_the_Somnambulic_Soul_2021_">an article that happens to be the very first one ever written about him in English</a>). Together, Kerner and Eschenmayer found themselves lampooned as a comical duo (Kernbeisser & Eschenmichel) in Immermann’s hugely popular <i>Münchausen</i> novels. For historians of esotericism, it is important to be aware of <i>Die Seherin</i> as a crucial link between German Romantic Mesmerism and the wave of Spiritualism and Occultism in the anglophone world during the second half of the nineteenth century.<o:p></o:p></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"><br /></span></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhzRPGBDT-pr1ZRR_wLrPVY1cxwByTfPJ30oqEJmlqw4kzoEnElpMbyW5iwzg5MZN5XgdfqN7WucRh1_SR45IeCYasS4ZzmXGYkzIJqJAPcHAN0YJZtJAimTR_0_XjYifZy2BZc12eaFry_/s2048/Screenshot+2021-08-13+at+16.14.10.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1248" data-original-width="2048" height="392" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhzRPGBDT-pr1ZRR_wLrPVY1cxwByTfPJ30oqEJmlqw4kzoEnElpMbyW5iwzg5MZN5XgdfqN7WucRh1_SR45IeCYasS4ZzmXGYkzIJqJAPcHAN0YJZtJAimTR_0_XjYifZy2BZc12eaFry_/w640-h392/Screenshot+2021-08-13+at+16.14.10.png" width="640" /></a></div><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">Kerner</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> and the Seeress have played an important role in my own early development as a scholar. In 1996</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> I traveled to Weinsberg, </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">where </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">together with the president of the local “Justinus Kerner Society</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">,</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">”</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> Mr. Ostertag, I</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> made</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> memorable</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> tours by car to</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> visit</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> all the highy </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">R</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">omantic localities where the events described by Kerner had taken place</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">.</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">These had to do</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> not only </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">with</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> </span><i><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">Die Seherin</span></i><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">, but also </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">with Kerner’s</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> other books about </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">S</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">omnambulism a</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">nd a different though related phenomenon that became a topic of fascination for Eschenmayer and himself,</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> demonic possession. I</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> wi</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">ll never forget our visit to</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> the tiny hamlet</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> Orlach, the place where a young girl had be</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">come </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">possessed by the spirit of a “black man</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">,</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">”</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> as described by Kerner in his book <i><a href="https://www.deutschestextarchiv.de/book/show/kerner_besessene_1834">Geschichten Besessener neuerer Zeit</a></i> (Histories of Possessed Persons in Recent Times, 1834). As she was working in the fields, Magdalena Grombach was approached by a sinister dark man who eventually turned out to be a ghost: he</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> claimed to have lived as a monk in a</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> nearby</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> monastery</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">, </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">where</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> during his lifetime</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> he had seduced and killed a whole series of women</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">.</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">Now their </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">bodies lay buried under </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">Magdalena’s</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> family house</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">, and he wanted them to be</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> given a Christian burial so that his soul might find rest. Magdalena’s possession by this spirit </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">took</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> s</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">uch</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> horrible</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> forms </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">that</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> finally,</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> her family </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">in fact decided to demolish</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> the house</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">. Lo and behold, they did</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> find skeletons</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> and gave them</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> a proper burial</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> <span lang="EN-US">–</span></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> after which Magdalena was cured! </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">Even today, this gripping story</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">remains </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">the stuff of local legend and folklore theatre performances in the neigborhoo</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">d, <a href="https://www.pressreader.com/germany/hohenloher-tagblatt/20180728/281500752051855">as you can see</a></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"><a href="https://www.pressreader.com/germany/hohenloher-tagblatt/20180728/281500752051855"> here</a>.</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> As Mr. Ostertag and I visited Orlach, we actually</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> found the</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> very</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> house</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> in question,</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> which still carri</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">ed</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> an inscription above the door</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">:</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> “this house was broken down and reconstructed due to well-known events etc.” </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">A</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">fter several drinks and</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> random</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> conversation <span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">(</span><span style="color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">in heavy Souabian dialect</span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">)</span> with the present owner</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">, a Mr. Schumm,</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> he went down into the cellar and came </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">back – </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">with a</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> whole</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> box full of early-nineteenth century manuscripts and objects </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">related to Magdalena Grombach’s</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> possession</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> by the “black man”!</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> It’s at such a moment that one knows </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">how it feels</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> to be a historian.</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"><o:p><span style="font-size: large;"> </span></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">I ended up writing <a href="https://www.academia.edu/3461587/Versuch_über_Friederike_Hauffe_Zum_Verhältnis_zwischen_Lebensgeschichte_und_Mythos_der_Seherin_von_Prevorst_2_pts_1999_2000_and_2004_">a very long article (available only in German</a>, with an <a href="https://www.academia.edu/3461620/A_Woman_Alone_The_Beatification_of_Friederike_Hauffe_née_Wanner_1801_1829_2001_">abridged version in English</a>) about the story of Justinus Kerner and Friederike Hauffe</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">.</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> I still consider</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> it</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> to be among the best things I’ve</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> ever</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> written. This</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> particular</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> research</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> project</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> has been one of the chief reasons (although not the only one) for my</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">interest in alterations of consciousness as a key factor in Western esotericism. But studying Kerner did something else for me too</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">. I</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">t</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> <span lang="EN-US">made something clear to me</span></span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">about the nature of historical research</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">, an insight</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> that has stayed with me ever since and has had a</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> very</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> strong impact on</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> all</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> my</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> later</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> work.</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> It concerns</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> a common</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> <span lang="EN-US">and often barely conscious</span></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> assumption</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> that informs the work of many</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> scholars</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> <span lang="EN-US">– the idea that</span></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> in studying a fantastic narrative</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">,</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> such as that of Kerner and his Seeress, our task is to clean away </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">all those </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">bizarre accretions and embellishments</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> that have been</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> added by "the mythical imagination," so at to uncover the much simpler historical truth that lies underneath. </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">While working on Kerner and the Seeress,</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> I</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> suddenly</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> realized that this assumption, with its disenchanting implications, was wrong</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> <span lang="EN-US">–</span></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> it was exactly the other was around</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">! </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"></span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">A</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> “mythical” narrative</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> such as</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> Kerner’s story</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">, no matter how fantastic,</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> is </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">always (and necessarily)</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> much more streamlined</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> and simple</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> than the</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> literally</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> infinite complexity of the <i>historical</i> realities that lie underneath</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> and on which it is based.</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> In other words, </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">our task as scholars does <i>not</i> actually consist in reducing complexity to simplicity. On the contrary, it lies in showing the true complexity of what might initially seem simple. The secrets do not lie in these supposedly</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> “esoteric” narrative</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">s – on the contrary, they always lie ultimately where one might not expect them:</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> in the enormously detailed</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> and dazzlingly complex real-life</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> events and intimate</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> personal</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> experiences</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> of</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> normal flesh-and-blood people in their</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> <span lang="EN-US">supposedly “normal”</span></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> lives. History is the</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> true</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"> mystery.</span></span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"><br /></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;">PS. Below I add some photos I made in 2018 in the <i>Kernerhaus</i> in Weinsberg, which has now been turned into a small museum (warmly recommended to visit whenever you are in the neighbourhood).</span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"><br /></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"></span></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhfW5ZG9jeHfTg7-YGQ4L5CD3SS6-jKNlv5MIKqExwU2EO7ZV5Ez9dR6X_YTZ38BrR8vbDODGM_GRU9_Zig_ttgumogc9or07n311XHVNuyKb4DJSecLaHOW8F9szcIquE71rjAIUwLMsE1/s2048/IMG_0048.jpeg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1536" data-original-width="2048" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhfW5ZG9jeHfTg7-YGQ4L5CD3SS6-jKNlv5MIKqExwU2EO7ZV5Ez9dR6X_YTZ38BrR8vbDODGM_GRU9_Zig_ttgumogc9or07n311XHVNuyKb4DJSecLaHOW8F9szcIquE71rjAIUwLMsE1/w640-h480/IMG_0048.jpeg" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The <i>Nervenstimmer</i> (a Mesmeric <i>baquet</i> built according to Friederike's instructions in trance), with in the background on the right Mesmer's original <i>banquet</i>)</td></tr></tbody></table><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"><br /></span></span><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"></span></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjvssSDw_AHYUOQtJxFte1xjxNu05Jc_VSnG0bzud6McjnZAGEDAaYBzHW8R2oNAdexAlZ8gasJP5BtiYnMdS2xMybXwIgHbotwVR_xpXKI__d0rj8ywwBR1_lC_Gakg7TGQur-HlhbG8JT/s2048/IMG_0062.jpeg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1536" data-original-width="2048" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjvssSDw_AHYUOQtJxFte1xjxNu05Jc_VSnG0bzud6McjnZAGEDAaYBzHW8R2oNAdexAlZ8gasJP5BtiYnMdS2xMybXwIgHbotwVR_xpXKI__d0rj8ywwBR1_lC_Gakg7TGQur-HlhbG8JT/w640-h480/IMG_0062.jpeg" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The original <i>Sonnenkreis</i> (Solar Circle) and other circular diagrams made by Friederike in trance.</td></tr></tbody></table><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"><br /></span></span><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: large;"></span></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh06XG3MJFmLHdTIARxbC-2BxhvNhXd9WJZkBb730o3sIT-1XhKnmdP8oQLisuuUrIEYU5vuMrXSDXbahW19lTngYaosQ8SXEveL9tLa6GpU83v345WfSOFyKnCI9Al9lxq2H4wI_dPM_-3/s2048/IMG_0085.jpeg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1536" data-original-width="2048" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh06XG3MJFmLHdTIARxbC-2BxhvNhXd9WJZkBb730o3sIT-1XhKnmdP8oQLisuuUrIEYU5vuMrXSDXbahW19lTngYaosQ8SXEveL9tLa6GpU83v345WfSOFyKnCI9Al9lxq2H4wI_dPM_-3/w640-h480/IMG_0085.jpeg" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">The <i>Geisterturm</i> (Spirits' Tower) in the garden behind the <i>Kernerhaus</i>.</td></tr></tbody></table><span style="font-size: large;"><br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjnw7QjlW4RjGUBQhbU_WJgA_Bf14vaBRTG0PQLeASuWXV4a6dfKVrHLCYoZTUmRel2O9Q50N46wVefoLaYztrWWKVv1q8UsbfhX6rwGIZqHcl2p3sLsQ9S2avQlEuFpuVuYfrlRaTrUfIe/s2702/Screenshot+2021-08-13+at+16.43.34.png" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1164" data-original-width="2702" height="278" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjnw7QjlW4RjGUBQhbU_WJgA_Bf14vaBRTG0PQLeASuWXV4a6dfKVrHLCYoZTUmRel2O9Q50N46wVefoLaYztrWWKVv1q8UsbfhX6rwGIZqHcl2p3sLsQ9S2avQlEuFpuVuYfrlRaTrUfIe/w640-h278/Screenshot+2021-08-13+at+16.43.34.png" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">From left to right: Franz Anton Mesmer, Friederike Hauffe, Justinus Kerner</td></tr></tbody></table><br /><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"><br /></span></span><p></p>wouterjhanegraaff.blogspot.comhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15519965611425366178noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5967881025525384120.post-38649775177635015412021-03-29T02:26:00.009-07:002021-10-23T02:30:23.314-07:00Nobody Wins unless Everybody Wins<p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">In a blogpost <a href="http://wouterjhanegraaff.blogspot.com/2018/06/">three years ago</a>, I responded to a public attack on my work and my scholarly agendas that showed how easy it is for theoretical and methodological debate to degenerate into negative polemics and personal invectives. At that time, my advocacy of empirical-historical methodologies was seen as proof of an “externalist fallacy,” and I was puzzled to see my work misinterpreted as an anti-religionist, heresiophobic, and even inquisitorial attempt to exclude the true meaning of esotericism along with the study of consciousness. I did my best not to take it all too personally, because these accusations were clearly based not on malicious intent but on a series of simple (although quite serious) misunderstandings. Today, unfortunately, I am forced to engage in a similar defense. In this case the pattern of misinterpretation and distortion is even more serious, but it comes from an entirely different direction. We are dealing with <a href="https://www.esswe.org/resources/pdf/newsletter/ESSWE-Newsletter-Vol-12-Winter-Spring-2021.pdf">an interview with Egil Asprem and Julian Strube in the most recent newsletter of the ESSWE</a>, which is disseminated among all our society’s members. It constitutes nothing less than a frontal attack on my work, my scholarly agendas, my personal motivations, and my very credibility. I have no choice but to set the record straight, because these accusations are set to inflict serious damage on my reputation, and it is all done with a display of aggression that I have frankly never experienced before. The tone is hard, impatient and authoritarian throughout. It is not easy to respond without getting carried away by emotion, but I will do my best. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"></span></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiEPq1iGCkjApeSddzlxr3OrsrFPZx4e4bLN66SV85ij23eMhYXg2LSe_BWchKvShubGyauW1PfpaRTpmukVpf8cBaBHU6vsDIK4BGw__oXoK8BOvBMQogsSZeAkRwMfSlSXm-IYfZ1_pa-/" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" data-original-height="850" data-original-width="850" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiEPq1iGCkjApeSddzlxr3OrsrFPZx4e4bLN66SV85ij23eMhYXg2LSe_BWchKvShubGyauW1PfpaRTpmukVpf8cBaBHU6vsDIK4BGw__oXoK8BOvBMQogsSZeAkRwMfSlSXm-IYfZ1_pa-/w400-h400/e98af51f7010bc43815932de2e94ea6f.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Eris (goddess of strife and discord)</td></tr></tbody></table><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">At that previous occasion three years ago, I wrote a “Platonic response” to a colleague whose love for Platonism I shared; but I finished by evoking Socrates as my model for healthy and constructive academic debate. So this time I will try to write a “Socratic response,” by which I mean an open invitation to dialogue. As in the previous case, my intention is not to make matters worse by engaging in counter-attacks but, on the contrary, to see whether anything can still be done to find a positive way out of a discourse that has clearly turned extremely sour and negative. I would like to begin by quoting a passage from that previous blogpost, because it is very much my personal credo not only as an academic but as a human being, and catches the essence of what I believe is going on here.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">I am very well aware of how far the modern Academy has drifted away from its original Socratic model, but this is still what I think it should be: not an arena for power play and ego gratification, not a school where professors tell their students what they should do or believe, but a community of the ignorant devoted to the search for knowledge. In such a context, the practice of criticism has nothing to do with one person attacking another, for it is not a game with winners and losers, but a method for learning in which everybody wins.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Not by any coincidence, this is almost literally the concluding sentence of <a href="https://www.academia.edu/39983944/Rejected_knowledge_So_you_mean_that_esotericists_are_the_losers_of_history_2019_">an article I published in 2019</a> and that plays a somewhat important role in the present debate, as will be seen: <i>Nobody wins unless everybody wins</i>. If we wage our discussions on the assumption that someone else will have to “lose” in order for ourselves to “win,” then the final result is that everybody loses. This is not what I want to see happening in our community of esotericism scholars. Therefore what follows is not an attempt to win any battles or score any points, but to do what I can from my side to restore the peace.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> </span></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"><span style="color: #6aa84f; font-size: x-large;">How Did We Get Here?</span><span style="font-size: medium;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">As in the previous case, a bit of background is needed. Egil Asprem was my student in the Western esotericism program at the university of Amsterdam and finished his Ph.D. dissertation under my supervision in 2013. He is now a professor of religion at the university of Stockholm. As for Julian Strube, I was the respondent to his Ph.D. dissertation at the University of Heidelberg in 2015, and I later invited him to spend a year teaching as a replacement professor at our program in Amsterdam (2016-2017). He has subsequently been working at the universities of Heidelberg, Münster, and now Vienna. Egil and Julian are both excellent scholars with an impressive publication record, representative of the “new generation” of esotericism researchers that has emerged over the past decade. We have been collaborating constructively in various contexts over the years, and I have always warmly endorsed their work (as can be seen for instance <a href="http://wouterjhanegraaff.blogspot.com/2013/05/the-next-generation.html">here</a> and <a href="http://wouterjhanegraaff.blogspot.com/2013/05/superpower.html">here</a>). I give this information to make clear that far from being distant strangers to one another, we have been working together for years as colleagues and friends. This is what makes the current breakdown of basic trust so painful.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">As Egil and Julian indicate in this interview, the trajectory that has brought us to our present impasse can be traced back to 2015 and <a href="https://www.esswe.org/Conference-2015">the ESSWE5 conference that was organized in Riga</a> that year. It is not generally known, but relevant for what follows, that the conference theme “Western Esotericism and the East” was actually suggested by me. Why did I propose it? Partly this had to do with the conference location. I had learned from colleagues like Birgit Menzel and Kateryna Zorya that to call Russia part of “Western culture” was by no means obvious and brought up important questions about how we think of “the West.” I had also been reading several recent publications that problematized the “Western” adjective in relation to esotericism: notably two articles by Marco Pasi (2009 and 2010), one by Kennet Granholm (2013; in a pioneering volume on <i><a href="https://www.routledge.com/Occultism-in-a-Global-Perspective/Bogdan-Djurdjevic/p/book/9781138951730">Occultism in a Global Perspective</a></i> edited by Henrik Bogdan and Goran Djurdjevic), and then there was a brandnew one by Egil Asprem (2014). In view of the present debate, it is worth mentioning that none of these articles – including Egil’s – paid any sustained attention to perspectives such as postcolonial theory or global history of religions. Since I had come up with the idea of discussing “Western Esotericism and the East,” the conference organizers must have assumed that I had some ideas of my own about the topic, and so they invited me to give a keynote. This I did, and it got published in <i>Correspondences</i> the same year, as <a href="https://correspondencesjournal.com/14303-2/">“The Globalization of Esotericism.”</a> Among other things, I discussed the question of whether the adjective “Western” should perhaps better be dropped in favour of simply “Esotericism,” as had been suggested by Granholm and Asprem. Having made clear that there are good arguments for either of the two positions, I finally came out (although cautiously and with qualifications) in favour of keeping the “Western,” not for theoretical but methodological reasons.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Four years later, our Centre for History of Hermetic Philosophy and Related Currents organized the <a href="https://www.esswe.org/conference-2019">ESSWE7 conference in Amsterdam</a>. Two events at this occasion must be mentioned in the present context. The first is that we brought out a volume to celebrate the 20-year anniversary of our Center, titled <i><a href="https://www.aup.nl/en/book/9789463720205/hermes-explains">Hermes Explains: Thirty Questions about Western Esotericism</a></i>, edited by Peter Forshaw, Marco Pasi, and myself. As the title suggests, it contains thirty contributions in which scholars respond to popular misconceptions about what the study of esotericism is all about. The second event was a closing panel session titled “Should we drop the ‘Western’ from Western Esotericism?” chaired by Karl Baier. Three panelists (Henrik Bogdan, Marco Pasi, and myself) spoke out in favour of keeping the “Western,” although with different arguments and various qualifications. The three panelists who proposed to drop the ‘Western” were Liana Saif, Egil Asprem, and Julian Strube. It became clear during the discussion that this entire issue was highly sensitive for many participants. With hindsight it may not have been a wise choice to place this panel discussion at the very end of a long and exhausting conference. Everybody was tired and the atmosphere was not positive, so that what should have been a friendly discussion felt rather like a confrontation between entrenched positions. As you can perhaps tell from the look on my face on the photo, as this realization began to sink in, I found myself looking around wondering “what is going on here?” Clearly something was clashing, but I think it’s fair to say that most participants were puzzled and confused about the reasons why. I certainly was.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg_LgZHYogfGemwbGkiYQ6KRGwn0sz6ULo8cVacYNxm-xluETMYLiNi_x4bnH0V6ZbDjFbqNQL_iDZg9LI7euYwmY0Eemi0HQveE41SOqafesV6LvukeoOmeZtRmLdkLBM0ZP1IhKiyk3SK/" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="1365" data-original-width="2048" height="426" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg_LgZHYogfGemwbGkiYQ6KRGwn0sz6ULo8cVacYNxm-xluETMYLiNi_x4bnH0V6ZbDjFbqNQL_iDZg9LI7euYwmY0Eemi0HQveE41SOqafesV6LvukeoOmeZtRmLdkLBM0ZP1IhKiyk3SK/w640-h426/IMG_0461.jpg" width="640" /></a></div></div><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">As it turns out, in the wake of the panel, Egil and Julian took the initiative for editing a collective volume that recently got published by Brill and is available in open access: <i><a href="https://brill.com/view/title/59442">New Approaches to the Study of Esotericism</a></i>. As this blogpost is not a book review, I will discuss the academic merits of this volume separately, but let me just say that with respect to almost all its chapters, I find the quality excellent and see it as a significant contribution to the theoretical and methodological debate. It puts a whole series of issues on the table that deserve to be discussed seriously, both on a general level pertaining to the study of esotericism as a whole and with respect to various specific topics. It is at the occasion of this book that the editors were interviewed for the ESSWE newletter.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">The claims that they make about me and my work may be summarized roughly as follows. They say that since 2015 and up to the present, I have been launching a series of unprovoked polemical attacks on “postmodern,” “poststructuralism,” and “critical theory”; a more minor accusation is that I am also responsible for “throwing out” sociological research from the study of esotericism</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">; I am suspected of pushing a “political” agenda with the intention of influencing current cultural/political discourse in the interest of “what Western culture should be truly about”; I am blamed for an “escalating” Eurocentric/diffusionist “reaction” against postcolonial and global history perspectives; I allegedly took advantage of the 2019 anniversary volume to promote these agendas; I am accused of “painting opponents as enemies” instead of engaging in dialogue with them; I am blamed for refusing to follow the current mainstream discursive and de/constructionist paradigm; supposedly I keep lapsing into “cultural essentialism,” attempts at canonization of “Western esotericism,” and strange as it may seem, even “religionism”; my empical-historical approach is alluded to as methodologically naïve and ignorant of the relevant theoretical literature; and my “Globalization” article of 2015 is merely “self-referential” and full of “obvious” self-contradictions and inconsistencies. What to make of all this?<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> </span></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"><span style="color: #6aa84f; font-size: x-large;">The Postmodern Thing</span><span style="font-size: medium;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">While some of these allegations are more serious than others, the first one seems to be at the bottom of most of them. Readers of the interview who are not familiar with my work will get a picture planted in their head of Wouter Hanegraaff as a fanatical culture warrior who relies not on serious discussion but on polemical “boo-words” or “fighting words” like “postmodernism” in his relentless attacks on what is in fact a caricature of the fields in question. In this war of “identity politics” directed at a “strawman of ‘radicals’,” I allegedly have been doing everything in my power to discredit, “alienate” and “downright exclude” important fields such as global history, postcolonial studies, gender studies, and critical theory.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> Wow. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">The first question to be asked about any attack like this is obvious: “where is your evidence?” And this is where the story begins to fall apart immediately. <a href="https://ad6bb612-a8f0-4cc6-b8ef-4a0da3bfe61d.filesusr.com/ugd/3cb226_23375655a3774877b9271e7b56d3c1cb.pdf">My list of publications</a> is available online, and so are <a href="https://uva.academia.edu/WouterHanegraaff/Papers">all my articles and book chapters published over the past five or six years</a>. With the exception of two short and strictly academic discussions in <a href="https://www.wouterjhanegraaff.net/esotericism-and-the-academy">my 2012 monograph (pp. 312-313, 361-367)</a> and my personal contribution to the anniversary volume (to which I will return), readers will find no sustained discussions of “postmodern” or allied perspectives, and they will find no “attacks” at all on any of the academic trends and perspectives that I allegedly hate so much. The same goes for all the public lectures I have been giving in this period: readers are invited to <a href="https://ad6bb612-a8f0-4cc6-b8ef-4a0da3bfe61d.filesusr.com/ugd/3cb226_e526f715121a4240a429a7b3e8345a65.pdf">check them out</a>, or watch the <a href="https://www.wouterjhanegraaff.net/media">online lectures collected on my website</a>. Could it be <a href="https://www.wouterjhanegraaff.net/blog">this personal blog</a> then? Readers are welcome to browse. When it comes to politically sensitive issues, they will find that I have been writing critically and with deep concern about such issues as the horrors of Islamic State, Neoliberalism, Trumpism, the European New Right, and the poisons of racism and antisemitism. But they will find no attacks on “postmodernism,” “poststructuralism,” “deconstruction,” or allied perspectives such a gender studies, race studies, postcolonial studies, or global history.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">The reason for all this is simple. I have not been waging any such culture war; and even assuming that I had the power to do so, it would never occur to me to attempt “excluding” such new approaches from the study of esotericism. To give a few random examples (all concerning younger scholars with whom I am on excellent terms and who thankfully play no part in this present attack), in 2015 in Riga I sat down with Manon Hedenborg-White and Per Faxneld to talk about their plans for a volume about gender and esotericism. I gave them my best advice because I fully support this project and the scholars involved in it, and Manon is now organizing a <a href="https://www.amsterdamhermetica.nl/6801-2/">workshop on Gender and Esotericism</a> at our Center in Amsterdam. In 2013, Justine Bakker’s excellent Research Master thesis about the Nation of Islam opened my eyes about the neglect of Black esotericism in the study of esotericism (including my own work, as I realized with some embarrassment); so I was happy to respond to her request for feedback on <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/0048721X.2019.1642262">an article she published about race and esotericism</a> and invited her to write a contribution specifically on that topic for our 2019 anniversary volume. As a final example, I was very happy with the opportunity to appoint Mriganka Mukhopadhyay as a Ph.D candidate in Amsterdam, precisely because his project on <a href="https://www.amsterdamhermetica.nl/research/individual-research-projects/research-mriganka-mukhopadhyay-ma/">Theosophy in Bengal</a> would make it possible to move away from the dominant Eurocentric perspectives on Theosophy and explore what it meant from the perspective of Indian members. I realized that as a Bengali native speaker with excellent backgrounds in postcolonial theory, Mriganka would be able to contribute to a global history approach in the study of esotericism. <o:p></o:p></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36pt;"><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">If all this is the case (more examples could be added), then where did Egil and Julian get their ideas about my war against “postmodernism” and against these specialized fields of research? I</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">’m afraid it must have something to do with Facebook. Over the past years, roughly coinciding with the rise of Trumpism, I have felt deep concern about the phenomenon of </span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">vicious radicalization towards the outer extremes of the political spectrum</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">. This is </span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">certainly reflected in my Facebook posts, which basically document my ongoing attempts as a private person to gain some clarity about what is going on in the world around me. FB is not a scholarly forum on which I operate as a professor or push any academic agendas; it is a friends-only online platform on which I express myself as a concerned citizen, sharing information with my FB friends and engaging in dialogue about current events or debates and what to make of them. What are my chief concerns here? On the one hand, I worry deeply about the alarming rise of rightwing populism, racism, xenophobia, and hatred against groups and individuals because of their gender or sexual orientation. Having been raised in a country that used to pride itself on its traditions of diversity and tolerance (alas, those days are gone), the daily deluge of online hate and intolerance disturbs me and offends my deepest moral values. On the other hand, I have been shocked to see how many people who are on the left like myself, and of whom I had assumed (naïvely) that they would hold themselves to a higher standard, keep lapsing into very similar patterns of vicious hatred and intolerance online and offline.</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> I would like to understand why this happens.</span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> I am not just a professor, I am a citizen and a private person as well. I hope that Egil and Julian will allow me to express my feelings</span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> about pressing social issues and </span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">disturbing trends in the general culture, or participate in discussions about their possible intellectual backgrounds</span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">.</span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> I worry about</span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> escalating attempts at policing free expression and open debate, and about self-righteous attitudes of intimidating or “punishing” those who do not toe some line of political correctness or simply have a different point of view. I know</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> far</span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> too much about the history of heresy persecutions</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> and witch-hunt dynamics</span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> to have</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> even</span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> the slightest sympathy for dogmatic mentalities and the</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> authoritarian impulse</span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> to suppress dissenting voices</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">. </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36pt;"><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">None of that has to do with “postmodernism” per se. It is all about</span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> </span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">intolerance</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> and hate, and this is the exact point that Egil and Julian miss entirely.</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">I</span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">n</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> <a href="https://www.academia.edu/39983944/Rejected_knowledge_So_you_mean_that_esotericists_are_the_losers_of_history_2019_">an</a></span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><a href="https://www.academia.edu/39983944/Rejected_knowledge_So_you_mean_that_esotericists_are_the_losers_of_history_2019_"> article that seems to have annoyed </a></span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><a href="https://www.academia.edu/39983944/Rejected_knowledge_So_you_mean_that_esotericists_are_the_losers_of_history_2019_">them</a> (see below)</span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">, I distinguished between an intolerant and authoritarian type of Enlightenment ideology (“Enlightenment 1”) and a non-authoritarian type</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> on liberal-humanist foundations</span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> to which I</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> warmly</span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> subscribe (“Enlightenment 2”)</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">.</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">I define it in terms of </span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">“respect for empirical evidence no matter where it may lead, rejection of ideological prejudice of any kind, unrestricted freedom of inquiry, openness to all perspectives, and confidence in the emancipatory power of critical discussion and argumentation.” If I am being attacked for defending these</span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> </span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">values and ideals, then all I can say is “I rest my case.” </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><span> <span> </span></span>I think of myself to a large extent as an intellectual historian, and I’m acutely aware of <a href="https://www.academia.edu/3883475/The_Power_of_Ideas_Esotericism_Historicism_and_the_Limits_of_Discourse_2013_">the power of ideas</a> </span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">to influence people’s minds and imaginations. In this particular case, I want to understand the intellectual roots and foundations of the current rise of hateful intolerance and polarization towards the extreme left and right. It goes without saying that this is an issue of extreme complexity, and there can be no question of discussing it in any detail here. Let me just say that I’m interested in something similar to what the original founders of critical theory were doing: to analyze the pathologies of popular and political culture in terms of deeper intellectual dynamics that are not immediately visible but that actually lend them their legitimacy and their power to persuade. My primary focus here is on the humanities, because that is the professional world in which I work. That currently dominant discourse in this specific academic context owes much to a complicated set of “radical theories” often referred to as “French Theory” is <a href="https://www.upress.umn.edu/book-division/books/french-theory">not a matter of conjecture but of intellectual history</a>. To analyze these traditions critically and historically has nothing to do with “culture war polemics” and the like, but is a legitimate intellectual enterprise that should not be censured and discredited by anyone who is serious about freedom of inquiry as a fundamental academic value. As for myself, I can only hope I have earned sufficient scholarly credit to at least be taken seriously and given the benefit of the doubt, rather than getting caricatured as some kind of crazy cultural war fanatic with sinister agendas. I assure Egil and Julian that by the time I decide to write about these issues in a properly academic format, I will have done my homework.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36pt;"><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px; text-indent: 36pt;"><span style="font-size: 14pt;"> </span>As indicated by the very label “critical theories,” the academic schools</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px; text-indent: 36pt;"> in question</span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px; text-indent: 36pt;"> are themselves polemical in the extreme, and so their exponents should have no cause to complain if they receive their share of criticism in return. I have no problem with</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px; text-indent: 36pt;"> these highly sophisticated theories in and for themselves, as they are often fascinating and thought-provoking, but only with what happens when they get translated into</span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px; text-indent: 36pt;"> popular</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px; text-indent: 36pt;"> mentalities with considerable political impact. In this regard, I find plenty of support from </span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px; text-indent: 36pt;">central proponents of these academic cultures themselves. To give just a few examples, Bruno Latour notoriously expressed <a href="http://www.bruno-latour.fr/sites/default/files/89-CRITICAL-INQUIRY-GB.pdf">his second thoughts and feelings of alarm</a> (in 2003, long before the age of Trump) </span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px; text-indent: 36pt;">about how his own work</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px; text-indent: 36pt;"> seemed to have</span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px; text-indent: 36pt;"> contributed to “post-truth” culture and dangerous anti-science sentiments on the political right. The pioneering scholar of Queer Studies Eve Kossofsky Sedgwick has been disarmingly honest in diagnosing</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px; text-indent: 36pt;"> her own academic discourse (including much of her earlier work)</span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px; text-indent: 36pt;"> as grounded in <a href="https://read.dukeupress.edu/books/book/636/chapter/128566/Paranoid-Reading-and-Reparative-Reading-or-You-re">deep patterns of paranoia</a>.</span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px; text-indent: 36pt;"> And the literary scholar Rita Felski analyzes the intellectual milieu of Critique as grounded in a <a href="https://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/L/bo21386290.html">hermeneutics of suspicion</a> </span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px; text-indent: 36pt;">that she defines</span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px; text-indent: 36pt;"> </span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px; text-indent: 36pt;"> (among other things</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px; text-indent: 36pt;">, see for yourself</span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px; text-indent: 36pt;">) </span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px; text-indent: 36pt;">as</span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px; text-indent: 36pt;"> negative and intolerant, not for contingent reasons but structurally and intentionally</span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px; text-indent: 36pt;">: one of its five defining features</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px; text-indent: 36pt;">, she finds, is</span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px; text-indent: 36pt;"> that <a href="https://journal.media-culture.org.au/index.php/mcjournal/article/view/431">“Critique does not tolerate rivals.”</a> Coming from a prominent player in the field of Critique, t</span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px; text-indent: 36pt;">hat should give us some pause. These analyses do not come from hostile outsiders but from deep insiders who have spent their entire careers working with these theories. </span></p></div><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36pt;"><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; text-indent: 36pt;"> </span></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"><span style="color: #6aa84f; font-size: x-large;">The Western Thing</span><span style="font-size: medium;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">The second point of central importance concerns my approach to “Western culture.” The first clarification I have to make here is that, contrary to what some people think, I have no particularly strong objections against dropping the “Western” from “Western esotericism.” I made that point already during the 2019 panel discussion in Amsterdam. I broadly agree with Egil’s argument that “esotericism” without the adjective may function in our field just fine, and in fact I have often used that convention myself. Just look at the titles of my books: <a href="https://www.wouterjhanegraaff.net/newagereligion"><i>New Age Religion and Western Culture: Esotericism in the Mirror of Secular Thought</i> </a>(1996) and <i><a href="https://www.wouterjhanegraaff.net/esotericism-and-the-academy">Esotericism and the Academy: Rejected Knowledge in Western Culture</a></i> (2012). In both cases, the adjective “Western” is connected to “Culture,” not “Esotericism.” As anybody knows who has read my work with some attention, my concern is not with some essentialized notion of “Western esotericism” – such quasi-phenomenological approaches I have rejected in all my publications from the mid-1990s until the present – but with esotericism as an important dimension of “Western culture.” In other words, I’m fine with dropping the “Western” from “Western esotericism” as long as we keep the “Western” in “Western culture.” <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> The confusion about this issue is demonstrated by Julian’s remarks, in the ESSWE newsletter interview, about my alleged “cultural essentialism” and Eurocentric “diffusionism.” Apparently he is under the impression that when I speak of “Western esotericism,” I think of some kind of immutable cultural essence that may spread beyond the West but (as Egil puts it) “will always remain Western.” This completely misrepresents my argument. At countless occasions for two and a half decades now, I have insisted on the status of “Western esotericism” as strictly no more than <i>a scholarly</i> <i>construct</i> that we use in order to organize our historical materials. I have stressed this so often that there is really no excuse anymore for missing it. Also, I hardly need to be reminded about another fact that I have kept emphasizing at more occasions than I can count: that the terminology gained prominence only as recently as the later nineteenth century, while “esotericism” as a noun goes back no further than the eighteenth. At our present state of theoretical reflection about these issues, after several decades of discussion, it should no longer be necessary to point out the obvious: that whatever may spread or get diffused beyond the West (however defined) cannot possibly be “Western esotericism,” but only specific cultural materials or ideas that happen to have a historical origin in Western contexts <i>and </i>happen to be categorized as pertaining to “esotericism” according to current academic conventions. At least, that is my position, as anybody will see who checks my publications on the matter. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><br /></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjcScxSTgNTb-rVM_GNBHYaFllrZQYLPIXTiseOczGa-b14yRBy48D7LkSUxWgo76PfGpwOts1V0wy7AltlwNLbhyWMxtpGuTIOcXRYH8RYKt3I0QgVlvbw-DgPH3N5rBAHiai4AmCSySfJ/*81NDd8pqznmRzTs1BaJgpQ.jpg" style="font-family: -webkit-standard; margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em; text-align: center;"><img alt="" data-original-height="508" data-original-width="800" height="410" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjcScxSTgNTb-rVM_GNBHYaFllrZQYLPIXTiseOczGa-b14yRBy48D7LkSUxWgo76PfGpwOts1V0wy7AltlwNLbhyWMxtpGuTIOcXRYH8RYKt3I0QgVlvbw-DgPH3N5rBAHiai4AmCSySfJ/w640-h410/1*81NDd8pqznmRzTs1BaJgpQ.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> Instead of shooting at straw men, we should better confront the actual issues, which are serious and important enough. At the end of my “Globalization” article, I once again re-asserted my standard opinion of “Western esotericism” as no more than “a convenient label for the various beliefs, practices, and traditions of knowledge that the Enlightenment has rejected in its own backyard, so to speak.” Anybody who perceives a cultural or phenomenological “essence” in such formulations is welcome to point it out… I continued by calling attention to what I see as the actual problem in using “esotericism” as a generic concept in global comparative research:<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Why would people in Africa, Japan, India, Latin America, or Antarctica, feel any need to import this specifically Western category of “esotericism” to speak about <i>their</i> own traditional beliefs and practices – as if Western Europe were still the prototype to which everything else must be compared? In my opinion, it would be yet another form of terminological imperialism if we now tried to project this terminology on to the rest of the world.</span></p><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">While framing me as an enemy of global history or postcolonial approaches, Egil and Julian conveniently ignore this key passage. In making my point here, I did not mean to suggest that the comparative enterprise as such is necessarily imperialist or eurocentric (although such arguments have indeed be made for the similar case of “religion” as a concept in cultural comparison); but I do suggest that the project of studying esotericism as a global phenomenon will at least have a bit more explaining to do with respect to its own credentials and implications. A major concern in this context is that the heavy dominance of English terminology in international academic research has the effect of marginalizing if not erasing the linguistic worlds of non-English vernacular languages. As <a href="https://www.academia.edu/3461630/Prospects_for_the_Globalization_of_New_Age_Spiritual_Imperialism_versus_Cultural_Diversity_2001_">I criticized the effects of globalization as a form of Western imperialism already as early as 1999</a>, when the phenomenon was gathering steam, I’m actually excited by the ideal of a truly non-ethnocentric approach to global history; but I do not see how it can possibly succeed unless we confront the enormous problem of intercultural <i>translation</i>. How many non-Western languages even have an equivalent for “esotericism” suitable for scholarly research? If they don’t, then how do we avoid imposing a straightjacket of Western terminologies on non-Western scholars and cultures? At the invitation of <i>Correspondences </i>journal, Mriganka Mukhophadhyay and I have recently taken the initiative for a collaborative project focused precisely on this issue. You will be hearing from us in due time.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> As indicated above, my focus is not on “Western esotericism” but on esotericism as a dimension of “Western culture”; and that the latter would have some immutable “essence” that will “always remain Western” runs counter to all my work. The most seriously complicating factor in this regard has nothing to do with eurocentric agendas but with the basic theoretical paradigms that one accepts as normative. As Julian confirms in the interview, his perspective is closely modeled on that of Michael Bergunder, whose most detailed recent discussion appeared last year in a ninety-page article in German, <a href="https://ixtheo.de/Record/1741223865">“Umkämpfte Historisierung”</a> (Embattled Historicization). The argument is far too complex to summarize here, but I plan to discuss it in some detail in a separate review article, together with the <i>New Perspectives</i> volume. All I can say at this point is that Bergunder’s discussion of my work shows the same pattern of structural misinterpretation to which Julian gives voice in the interview, but the article also makes clear where the problem really lies. Bergunder and Strube work within a theoretical paradigm that is grounded in poststructuralist discourse theory and deconstructionism. These intellectual frameworks have a specific internal logic of their own that <i>does</i> actually conflict in some crucial respects with <a href="https://www.academia.edu/3883475/The_Power_of_Ideas_Esotericism_Historicism_and_the_Limits_of_Discourse_2013_">the theoretical assumptions and methodologies on which my own work is based</a>. I am perfectly aware of that fact, and addressed some part of it already in my discussion of Kocku von Stuckrad’s discursive approach in 2012 (<a href="https://www.wouterjhanegraaff.net/esotericism-and-the-academy">361-367 here</a>). <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">The essential point is that what Egil and Julian frame as a politically-inspired “polemics” against a “postmodern enemy” is actually nothing more than a basic scholarly disagreement about crucial theoretical issues and their methodological implications. This is of course a perfectly normal phenomenon in academic discussion. There is plenty of room in the humanities for very different perspectives and methodologies, and it should be possible to discuss them critically but respectfully. Unfortunately that does not happen here. In Bergunder’s article as in the interview with Egil and Julian (and in the latter’s article for the <i>New Approaches</i> volume) the tone is aggressive to the point of hostility. The authors’ theoretical commitments are presented as though theirs is, or should be, the only game in town. Most disturbingly, their argumentative strategies send a message of moral superiority. Failure to agree with the “obvious” truth of the authors’ commitments becomes a cause for suspicion about the critic's hidden political agendas instead of an occasion for constructive dialogue and critical discussion about different ways of doing scholarly work. I will play no part in that kind of game. My argument about “Western culture” rests on theoretical assumptions about history and scholarship that are in fact different, in some crucial respects, from the discursive-deconstructionist logic of poststructuralist theory. I fully respect and endorse Bergunders’s and Strube’s right to promote their own type of research, but expect the same from them. I welcome any serious dialogue about these theoretical frameworks and their implications (see below), and there might of course come a point where we just have to agree to disagree. But there can be no question of imposing one’s own theories as morally superior while insinuating that those who do not share them are therefore uninformed, inconsistent, or politically suspect.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> </span></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"><span style="color: #6aa84f; font-size: x-large;">The Gatekeeper Thing</span><span style="font-size: medium;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm;"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjRUUCVYBnLj0XddkxtUYBS8zea5ylXGUr6j8ftU24rMVX8asZ4JdRFvAW5IrcM2W5EZ7YavJeeGeTqxU6sM2S9R_6v-ZMj9GtQJ2z2dovMfP62wCyP-CIPG4qcCIudQPpYGSI7Nm7F6BfO/" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="640" data-original-width="427" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjRUUCVYBnLj0XddkxtUYBS8zea5ylXGUr6j8ftU24rMVX8asZ4JdRFvAW5IrcM2W5EZ7YavJeeGeTqxU6sM2S9R_6v-ZMj9GtQJ2z2dovMfP62wCyP-CIPG4qcCIudQPpYGSI7Nm7F6BfO/w214-h320/abb075bd4750259afaffdfcb90690e4c.jpg" width="214" /></a></span></div><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">I am aware that Egil and Julian do not use this term, but it may be appropriate for capturing an assumption which runs through the interview: that I am somehow using my academic position or my influence to impose my own agendas on our community of esotericism scholars, while denigrating and trying to “exclude” or “throw out” approaches that I do not like, to the detriment especially of the younger generation of scholars. I will say honestly that no other suggestion in the interview is more hurtful to me than this one.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">For the record, all my work since the 1990s has been motivated by one central concern: <i>to open doors</i> for the study of esotericism in the academy, not to close any doors to anyone. This is not about me and my ego or my personal interests, but about the field as a whole, and most of all about the many scholars for whom there was simply no place in the academy that would allow them to devote their lives and careers to this type of research. It is natural for younger scholars to take the fact for granted that it is, of course!, possible nowadays to study or publish about esotericism in various academic venues and be taken perfectly seriously as a scholar in this field (if you can manage to get a job or a research grant, terribly hard as that may be these days). But I’d like to remind my readers that this was not the situation thirty years ago. When Antoine Faivre and I wanted to organize our (now historical) <a href="https://www.wouterjhanegraaff.net/kopie-van-faivre-festschrift">first sessions on esotericism at the 1995 IAHR world congress in Mexico City</a>, we needed to get special letters of recommendation from senior scholars just to convince the organization that we were legitimate scholars and not some bunch of new agers who might embarrass them; and still, we would probably not have succeeded if Antoine had not been able to use the full weight of his unique position as a professor at the Sorbonne. Most academics looked at us with suspicion at first, and not entirely without good reasons either, for it is true that far too many “scholars of esotericism” at that time hardly seemed to see the point of differentiating between scholarly work and advocacy for esoteric beliefs. This is why we needed to work hard on establishing standards of scholarly quality and insist on central questions of method and theory. The very basics still had to be established, more or less from scratch; and even so, it is only thanks to the incredible break of a new chair/department in Amsterdam financed by a private maecenas, Rosalie Basten, that it became possible to establish a foothold for esotericism in the academy at all. If she had not opened that crucial door for all of us, the ESSWE would not have been established in 2005 (at her residence) either, and countless young scholars who are now able to study esotericism (including most contributors to the <i>New Approaches </i>volume) would not be doing what they are doing today. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> Our field owes its very existence to a dedicated collaborative effort. Its successes are due to the tireless work and devotion of countless colleagues who have been labouring towards a common goal in a spirit of friendship and shared enthusiasm. This has been an exciting and thoroughly positive development, thankfully dominated not by negative polemics or power-games but by attitudes of open-mindedness and generosity. For me personally, too, the project of establishing the study of esotericism has never been about anything else than opening doors that were closed and creating structures and opportunities that simply did not exist. The suggestion that I try to use my position now to <i>exclude</i> instead of include, to push just my own preferences while refusing to recognize or make room for new approaches, is deeply unfair and painful. I obviously have my own preferences in terms of theories, methods, definitions, themes, or areas of research. I obviously argue in their favour because I am convinced of their merits. I do express criticism of positions with which I do not agree, and I do so not <i>ad hominem</i> but by presenting arguments that may or may not convince my readers. Am I any different in these regards from any other scholars? Yet Egil and Julian seem to be suggesting not just that I would try to prevent new and different perspectives to be given room in our community, but even seem to think that I wield some kind of magical dictatorial power to suppress what I don’t like.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">These are total fantasies. Egil seems to suggest that my influence since “thirty years ago” has prevented a dialogue with sociological approaches and has caused the entire relevant body of literature to be “thrown out” so that he and others are now forced to “re-invent the wheel.” How should I have accomplished such a thing? And why would I? The truth is, of course, that I shared this emphasis on historical approaches with a whole series of colleagues who have been working on esotericism since the 1990s. In any case, did I ever try to prevent Egil or anyone else from exploring these avenues? And when or how did I ever try to “alienate” or “outright exclude” younger scholars for focusing on topics such as global history, postcolonial studies, gender studies, or critical theories? I gave a few counter-examples above, and could give many others. All of this rests on the baseless assumption that if I express my own theoretical and methodological preferences in my work, this means I am trying to dictate what others scholars can or should do, or that I demand from them that they share my critical perspectives - or else!! Such behaviour runs counter to my character and my basic ethics. The truth is that I am happy to see others do very different things from what I am doing myself, because all of that contributes to the richness and diversity of our field, and allows all of us (myself included) to learn new things that might otherwise remain beyond our horizons.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36pt;"><br /></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; margin: 0cm; text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif;"><span style="color: #6aa84f; font-size: x-large;">The Anniversary Volume Thing</span><span style="font-size: medium;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: center; text-indent: 36pt;"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhiUt50L98RysB8Kd5bYBnwkR2gZeLQ2j2jBo27VrRDTZvN73YJ7tr_jtl4qdFT4zu_7tR7U9CYoMQeGrH1KshkEOYp97LXzHZWAU_AKoGcmmL0-ca-R2upziU9rRo0_tZrOm9N6NdaP_LZ/" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="735" data-original-width="495" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhiUt50L98RysB8Kd5bYBnwkR2gZeLQ2j2jBo27VrRDTZvN73YJ7tr_jtl4qdFT4zu_7tR7U9CYoMQeGrH1KshkEOYp97LXzHZWAU_AKoGcmmL0-ca-R2upziU9rRo0_tZrOm9N6NdaP_LZ/w273-h400/Screenshot+2021-03-25+at+16.10.29.png" width="273" /></a></div><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">A particularly problematic fantasy concerns the 2019 anniversary volume. Having accused me of engaging in identity politics against “an unspecified opponent” (whoever that may be), Julian claims that I placed my polemical agendas “at the center of key academic publications,” and notably used them “to unilaterally frame the entire anniversary volume,” with the result that each contribution “was thus associated with Wouter’s political statements.” These allegations made my head spin. First of all, the anniversary volume was obviously not edited by me alone but together with Peter Forshaw and Marco Pasi, and likewise<a href="https://www.academia.edu/42970301/Introduction_Thirty_Red_Pills_from_Hermes_Trismegistus_2019_"> the Introduction</a> is signed by all three of us. This means that there are two possibilities: either Marco and Peter must have been accomplices in my sinister manipulations (“the severity of which,” we are told in dramatic tones, “can hardly be overstated”) or otherwise I must have been wielding such dictatorial powers that they can just be dismissed as nonentities that do not even come into account. Either of these two alternatives is frankly insulting to my colleagues. Secondly, as anybody is welcome to check, the Introduction contains no “political statements” of any kind, let alone any attempt to “frame” the volume in any way. Just read it and you will see for yourself.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">If so, where on earth does this accusation come from? Could it possibly have something to do with our playful reference to <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_pill_and_blue_pill">the “red pill”</a> that was made famous by <i>The Matrix</i>, an oft-quoted <a href="https://digitalcommons.unomaha.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1779&context=jrf">neo-gnostic metaphor</a> for “having one’s eyes opened” to new knowledge? This is of course what we had in mind and how we presented it explicitly, as the text of our Introduction makes perfectly clear. However, after the book had already come out in print, it was pointed out to us that some readers thought of the “red pill” as a misogynic dogwhistle because some “manosphere” circles of rightwingers had apparently been adopting it for their own hateful purposes. Do I seriously have to assure our readers that such associations never occurred to us? It would require a deeply paranoid hermeneutics of suspicion, with extremely troublesome implications, to think that there was some hidden message here. Therefore I cannot reasonably suspect Egil and Julian of actually making such assumptions. But by the same token, since this cannot be what they have in mind, the idea of this Introduction as an attempt at “framing” the volume for unspecified political ends is utterly groundless.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><span> <span> </span></span></span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> </span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">What else then? From some scattered remarks in the <i>New Approaches</i> volume, I suspect that it must rather have been</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> <a href="https://www.academia.edu/39983944/Rejected_knowledge_So_you_mean_that_esotericists_are_the_losers_of_history_2019_">my own personal contribution to <i>Hermes Explains</i></a></span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> that triggered their ideas. First of all, mine is obviously just one out of thirty individual contributions, and by no stretch of the imagination can it be seen as “at the center” of the volume or as “framing” the whole of it. What makes Egil and Julian think that my mere presence in a volume with thirty authors would somehow dominate that entire volume? In any case, what is so offensive about this short piece? It is not directed against anyone in particular, least of all Egil or Julian or any other of my colleagues</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">, nor is it a critique of “postmodernism” and related approaches. What is my actual argument in a nutshell?</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">First of all, I suggest that</span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> if the study of esotericism has succeeded in establishing itself as a respected field of modern academic research, this is largely by distancing itself from perspectives that rely on identity politics. I obviously use that term in a broad and inclusive sense, referring for instance to how the Enlightenment created its own identity by construing a counter-identity of “esotericism” as rejected knowledge. That's the basic argument of <i>Esotericism and the Academy</i>. I then discuss Eranos as an example of pro-esoteric identity politics in academia, and the Frankfurt School as a prominent anti-esoteric counterpart. </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Having laid those foundations, </span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">I</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> continue by</span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> arguing that although the study of esotericism has profited from the new “postmodern<span style="text-indent: 0px;">”</span> incredulity toward metanarratives (not a <span style="text-indent: 0px;">“boo-word”</span> but a simple reference to Lyotard's <i>La condition post-moderne</i>)</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> as it began developing during the 1990s</span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">, we might ask ourselves why</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> it is that</span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> our field has not</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> really</span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> been taken up as a focus of study by the new wave of poststructuralist scholarship </span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">that focuses so much of its attention on suppressed or neglected voices in Western culture. For all I can see, or intended, this is not an argument for <i>excluding</i> poststructuralist and related approaches but an open invitation to <i>include</i> more of them! How can Egil and Julian have gotten that so wrong? To quote a sentence that seems to have particularly triggered them, I then argue that esotericism seems to be “the blind spot par excellence among those radical theorists who are so eager to deconstruct ‘Western culture’.” One reason for this oversight, I further suggest, may be a strong tendency in cultural studies to start top-down with “Theory” rather than bottom-up with historical sources. This then leads me to the sketch of an “Enlightenment 2” perspective as already discussed above, in which my advice is to take primary sources as our point of departure and approach them with a minimum of theoretical baggage to begin with. When I describe the “prime objective” in such research as “<i>listening</i> to what the sources have to tell us,” I really hope that nobody will be so silly as to think I remain stuck in nineteenth-century positivism and have never heard of the hermeneutical circle. In any case, I end the article with a very strong emphasis on openness to the voices and perspectives of Others, curiosity about the unknown, communication across boundaries of history and culture, listening and dialogue instead of negative polemics. The message is one of total inclusivity and a refusal to accept “narrow hegemonic agendas of power and domination.”</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Readers are of course welcome to disagree with any part of this argument, but I honestly do not see what is so objectionable about it. Still, it is of course always possible that I touched some sensitive spot somewhere without being aware of it. If so, I would like to hear what it is.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36pt;"><span style="font-size: 14pt;"> </span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; text-indent: 36pt;"> </span></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"><span style="font-size: medium;"> </span><span style="color: #6aa84f; font-size: x-large;">Back to Reality</span><span style="font-size: medium;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Early on in the interview, Egil makes some interesting remarks that I suspect might perhaps be at the bottom of this conflict. He objects to the agendas of Matt Melvin-Kouskhi (a fantastic specialist of the occult sciences in the early modern Islamic world) and myself of “writing better narratives” of the West. Melvin-Koushki conceptualizes the West in terms of what he calls <a href="https://www.academia.edu/31602610/Tahqiq_vs_Taqlid_in_the_Renaissances_of_Western_Early_Modernity">the “abrahamic-hellenic synthesis.”</a> Along very similar lines, I argue that we should not allow our views of the West to be dominated forever by nineteenth-century Orientalist and colonialist frameworks, but should try to (re)conceptualize it in terms of general cultural history over a period of circa two and a half thousand years. I briefly sketched this approach in <a href="https://www.esswe.org/resources/pdf/newsletter/ESSWE_Newsletter_2019_Vol_10_No_1_2_Summer_Winter_2019.pdf">an interview in a previous ESSWE newsletter that for some reason seems to have offended Egil and Julian as well</a>. Readers are invited to check out the complete argument there and make up their own minds. Let me just quote the conclusion:<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Such a new narrative will include and integrate not only all the different forms of esotericism in Western Christianity, but also such enormous areas as Jewish, Islamic, or Byzantine culture, including of course their “esoteric” dimensions. Morover, it will have to include and fully integrate the stories of traditionally marginalized groups such as women, non-dominant sexualities, or different races and ethnicities. This is obviously an enormous project, but I am convinced that it’s important to move beyond the negative enterprise of deconstructing “the West.” I hope we will start building a positive new narrative of what “Western culture” is <i>really</i> all about, demonstrating its factual and intellectual superiority over the narrow Christianity- / Protestantism- / Enlightenment-centered and colonialist narraties that we know are no longer credible. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">How much more inclusive do Egil and Julian want me to get? For the record: “<i>really</i>” obviously doesn’t imply some essentialist notion of Western culture’s “real essence,” but refers to the need for historically more adequate depictions (for instance, Western culture is <i>really</i> something different and far more complex than you would conclude from old-fashioned histories that marginalise its esoteric dimensions and distort what those are all about). Anyway, Egil responds that, contrary to Melvin-Koushki and myself, he and Julian are “not interested in influencing broader socio-political discourses of what the West is or ought to be, but rather to take the historical actors who’ve constructed and negotiated the term as part of our source material.” He concludes that we are dealing here with “clearly two very separate lines of reasoning.” </span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> Which is quite correct. As the interview suggests that Egil’s perspective here is basically similar to Julian’s, their approach clearly rests on the nowadays standard type of discursive study of religion associated with such great names as Michel Foucault or Edward Said and presently continued and of course further developed by Michael Bergunder. While I take on board much that I find valuable in that paradigm and its associated bodies of scholarship (including the practice of “taking the historical actors who've constructed and negotiated terms as part of our source material,” something I have practiced consistently in my own work and would apply to Asprem, Strube, and Bergunder as historical actors as well), I do not consider it sacrosanct, and <a href="https://www.academia.edu/3883475/The_Power_of_Ideas_Esotericism_Historicism_and_the_Limits_of_Discourse_2013_">my own perspective does indeed rest on different intellectual foundations</a>. It should go without saying that I fully respect my colleagues’ right to pursue their own interests and follow different lines of reasoning than Melvin-Koushki and myself. But I do hope that we may expect the same respect from them, rather than being told that these topics may only be discussed within the framework of their own paradigms or political agendas. As for the theoretical substance of the debate itself, this requires a somewhat detailed analysis of Bergunder’s theoretical framework and its implications, as compared to my own. As indicated above, I plan to provide one in a separate publication in a properly academic venue.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> What puzzles me a bit about Egil’s remark is his profession of disinterest in “influencing socio-political discourses of what the West is or ought to be.” I very much doubt whether such an abdication is realistic, as the agendas that he and Julian defend carry very clear political implications in that regard (as for Bergunder, he is perfectly explicit about the fact that history of religions for him is part of a “comprehensive ‘criticism of ideologies’,” <i><a href="https://books.google.nl/books?id=8XJ3DwAAQBAJ&pg=PA5&lpg=PA5&dq=michael+bergunder+richard+kings&source=bl&ots=P_jQ2ATwyX&sig=ACfU3U37Q7egJMBJcak6FP4UZEqbtL8gZA&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiytNCo8cvvAhVGPuwKHd7cB1AQ6AEwAnoECAIQAw#v=onepage&q=michael%20bergunder%20richard%20kings&f=false">umfassende ‘Ideologiekritik’</a></i>). In an academic climate that keeps pressing the need for constant “valorization” and requires scholars in the humanities to show their relevance to society, do we seriously want to respond “no thank you, we do happen to know an awful lot about religion and culture, but we do not wish for our scholarship to have any influence on socio-political discourses”?? I find it hard to believe that this is what they mean. Or is it just that they do not like my particular agenda, or rather what they think it is, and would prefer me to keep silent? I’m afraid I can’t help them with that. As for me, I do not hesitate to confirm that if I see any chance to bring my insights as a scholar to bear on important debates of broader societal relevance, I will certainly try not to miss it. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> For it is certainly true that I believe <a href="https://www.academia.edu/41320565/Imagining_the_future_study_of_religion_and_spirituality_2020_">the time has come for <i>re</i>construction, and for positive new ideas in academia and the larger culture</a>. Theoretical reflection is an ongoing thing, and I see no reason why scholars should be discouraged from moving beyond poststructuralist-deconstructionist paradigms or from contributing to wider discussions of general societal relevance. Things are not going so well in the world right now, and I increasingly get worrying signals of desillusionment and deep cynicism about the state of academia. These come from colleagues and especially from students who are raised on a steady diet of essentially negative and depressing theories of what the humanities are all about. The theoretical literature may be extremely subtle and complex on a strictly intellectual level, but the cumulative effect it has on students and the wider public is perhaps a bit more basic. At the risk of simplification, I'd say that the minimum they get from Foucault is that the academy is not about knowledge but about power. Not a great message when you aspire to become an academic. I’m afraid the minimum they get from deconstruction is that truth is a metaphysical notion that you should better avoid if you don’t want to look stupid. And from a wide range of brilliant and influential theorists, what they get is that everything “Western” (including academia itself) is infected to the core with such poisons as phallogocentrism, colonialism, </span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">racism, sexism, homophobia, transphobia, and patriarchal suppression. </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> <span> <span> </span></span>To which I respond: “by all means, I see those dimensions very clearly; but even so, could anything just a bit more positive perhaps be said about the West as well, or about academia for that matter?” Do I personally think that these critical perspectives on “the West” are without merit or should be rejected, as Egil and Julian seem to think? On the contrary. I think there are solid arguments for many of them; poststructuralist and allied lines of theory or critique call attention to very important dimensions that used to be neglected, and scholarship will only profit from taking them on board; therefore I would consider it silly for any modern academic to not want to consider them very seriously. But I also want to move on towards the future, beyond these lines of critical argument and these paths that are by now very well-trodden, to explore new and hopefully a bit more positive or inspirational directions of inquiry too. I have devoted my entire life as a scholar to studying the history and dynamics of “Western culture,” and while its many shadow sides are perfectly obvious to me, I want to call attention to its many positive dimensions in equal measure. I certainly do so in teaching my students, because I feel that especially in a grim neoliberal environment that is all about competition (who wins? who loses?), they need to be told things that will <i>inspire</i> their enthusiasm and assure them that there are countless topics worth studying because they have value in and for themselves. It's not all about critique for me, because human culture for me is not all about power. It's also about intrinsic meaning and content, and about appreciation for whatever is positive and wonderful in the things we study.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: "Times New Roman", serif;"><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> Again, Egil and Julian are of course under no obligation to share any such agendas and interests, or to agree with any of my analyses, agendas, or concerns. It would just be nice if they could at least respect them. They are welcome to challenge any of these views, or any other ones, as long as it is done in a professional and friendly manner. If they do not share my concerns, by all means they are free to focus on different agendas and pursue projects of their own. But what I cannot let them do is spread caricatures of my ideas, make false accusations, or tell me which theories I should embrace or which opinions I am allowed to express. Contrary to what they suggest (as they keep referring vaguely to multiple “debates” or “polemics” that, to the best of my knowledge, never took place), in fact this is more or less the first time I express myself so clearly on a general platform about these broader concerns. So I might as well use the opportunity to extend an open invitation to all members of the ESSWE. If anything I write here resonates with you (or, for that matter, if you think I got it all wrong), then let’s sit down and talk about these things! Let’s put an end to negativity and find ways of dialogue and constructive exchange. Let’s discuss how we see the present state of the humanities, the place of esotericism within that context, and the directions into which we would like to move. I’m open to any points of view, no matter how much they might differ from my own. This is not about winning battles but about listening and learning from one another.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> </span></p><p align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"><span style="color: #6aa84f; font-size: x-large;">Epilogue</span><span style="font-size: medium;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">It is funny to see that after about twenty-five years of publishing internationally in the field of Western esotericism, I have by now been suspected of almost everything and its opposite. I have been described as a reductionist guilty of the “externalist fallacy” but as a “religionist” as well; I have been branded as a fanatical enemy of “postmodernism,” while other colleagues seem to see me as a “postmodernist” of sorts whose work is deeply indebted to discursive and poststructuralist elements. The truth is that I do not belong to any theoretical school. I read widely in all these bodies of literature and then try to make up my own mind as well as I can. While there’s a “historical-empirical” core that has remained constant over the years, I keep expanding my theoretical and methodological toolbox and keep exploring new avenues. The freedom to do so, to express one’s opinions without fear of negative polemics or <i>ad hominem</i> attacks, is essential to what I believe the humanities should be all about. If we disagree, then we need to talk – hence my emphasis on Socratic dialogue. At this point, I cannot do more than try to explain what I actually mean, and correct the systemic pattern of misinterpretations and accusations in the ESSWE newsletter interview. To get out of this mess, what we need to do is put a stop to the hermeneutics of suspicion and begin cultivating a hermeneutics of basic trust. And by the way, a bit of humour would be welcome too.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> </span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Which leads me back to the ESSWE and our own community</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">, which has always been a shining example of such positive attitudes</span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">. In the previous newsletter, next to the interview with me there was one with Keith Cantú, a Ph.D student at the UC Santa Barbara and one of the contributors to the <i>New Approaches</i> volume. In response to the standard question of what he saw as the best thing about having this speciality, this is what he wrote:</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Honestly, I find that the people in this field are so incredibly amazing and supportive, and the general quirkiness is charming. In contrast to the personal tensions that I have seen arise in a field like, say, Yoga studies (although it fortunately seems to be getting better these days), I have found that the people deeply involved in Western esotericism have largely been able to transcend personal difference and academic affiliation in order to make meaningful, professional, and prolific (!) contributions to scholarship that continues to drive research forward. I have further been honored to share meals and drinks late into the night with some brilliant theorists and historians, and the set and setting of many of the conferences in European towns that still reverberate with echoes of medieval life simply cannot be beat.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">What a wonderful statement. That’s my ESSWE too. I know and recognize that atmosphere, that camaraderie, from many experiences and memories ever since our foundation in 2005. I don't want to see it destroyed. Let us find our way back to that positive spirit. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #e69138; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">[POSTSCRIPT 1. I am happy to report that a "<a href="https://www.esswe.org/resources/pdf/newsletter/ESSWE-Newsletter-Vol-12-Winter-Spring-2021.pdf">post-publication statement</a>" signed by Egil Asprem, Julian Strube and myself has been added above the interview in the ESSWE newsletter, p. 4]</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #e69138; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #e69138; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: medium;">[POSTSCRIPT 2. In this blogpost I mention my original plan to write a review article about the <i>New Approaches</i> volume as well as Michael Bergunder's 90-page article "Umkämpfte Historisierung." After due consideration I have decided to drop that project. Re-reading the Introduction and Conclusion to <i>New Approaches</i> as well as Strube's contribution, I realised that the pattern of structural misrepresentation was even more serious and went even deeper than I had concluded from my first and more cursory reading, but also that most of the general issues have already been addressed in the present text. In an academic review article I would be forced to repeat many of the points I already made above; I would inevitably be adding fresh fuel to a negative polemics that should better be left behind; and I would be lending academic legitimacy to a rhetoric that was clearly motivated by other concerns than strictly scholarly ones. I have now turned this page, and can only hope that others will do the same] </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #e69138; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #e69138; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"></span></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhqdg-aAxhxb2WEqCkUtprnEEhSWKSBksAcFKjZQRsCJ8LJRW8F3hJrIXW1Usk6_buZ5-hdW4i6HE_qbm9JTxWnHwuQjp_li3C7Xhl-aHxnMM4KLWhkZFsBdArZNNZp6FYN0wW-jH3pnDmf/" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" data-original-height="245" data-original-width="360" height="275" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhqdg-aAxhxb2WEqCkUtprnEEhSWKSBksAcFKjZQRsCJ8LJRW8F3hJrIXW1Usk6_buZ5-hdW4i6HE_qbm9JTxWnHwuQjp_li3C7Xhl-aHxnMM4KLWhkZFsBdArZNNZp6FYN0wW-jH3pnDmf/w400-h275/goddessofpeace.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Eirene (goddess of peace)</td></tr></tbody></table><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><br /><br /></span><p></p>wouterjhanegraaff.blogspot.comhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15519965611425366178noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5967881025525384120.post-36616737589231781922021-03-06T05:35:00.014-08:002022-01-10T05:03:49.119-08:00Protecting the Sacred after (Post)Modernity<p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">To understand the meaning of “the Sacred,” we need to explore what is meant by <i>modernity</i>. Although he did not coin the term, the French poet Charles Baudelaire gave it a specific meaning that is highly relevant to its later career, in an essay about modern art published in 1863. Baudelaire was discussing a contemporary painter whose work he admired, Constantin Guys (1802-1892), and it may be helpful to show an image here of one of his works.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"></span></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEij4Yf7ytn7sUen_Yn2tmS7Mx9GoTGU-4L2hl79EQjt5EMXE3wZV0O6YB9dxfGjoll_DBB3ngG3vNlxqITkSujIaATrmVLrRTzWzNa7jxfGagETWe8iM5CS51GhkPuPjUSrSSrv-HOmu6bI/" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" data-original-height="800" data-original-width="900" height="570" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEij4Yf7ytn7sUen_Yn2tmS7Mx9GoTGU-4L2hl79EQjt5EMXE3wZV0O6YB9dxfGjoll_DBB3ngG3vNlxqITkSujIaATrmVLrRTzWzNa7jxfGagETWe8iM5CS51GhkPuPjUSrSSrv-HOmu6bI/w640-h570/Guys.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Contantin Guys, "Reception" (1850-55)</td></tr></tbody></table><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><br /><span style="font-size: 14pt;">Baudelaire described Guys as a solitary man with a great gift of imagination who was always wandering through “the great desert of humanity” in pursuit of an elusive goal: </span></span><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">He is looking for that undefinable something we may be allowed to call <i>modernity</i>, for want of a better term to express the idea in question. The aim for him is to extract from fashion the poetry that resides in its historical envelope, to distil the eternal from the transitory. … Modernity is the transitory, the fugitive, the contingent: that one half of art of which the other half is the eternal and the immovable (Baudelaire, “Le Peintre de la Vie Moderne”).<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">The painting by Guys shows a fashionable coctail reception, with two elegant women surrounded by obviously interested men. On the strictly empirical level of the senses, that of positivist science, there is nothing else to be seen. And yet, if we watch this painting closely, we may realize that there is something faintly spectral or ghostly about it, as if the painter wants to make us wonder “is this really all there is?” That is in fact the essence of Baudelaire’s remark, when he defines modernity as “the transitory, the fugitive, the contingent” as opposed to “the eternal and the immovable.” <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Baudelaire was writing in the midst of the nineteenth century, when under the impact of radical scientific and political developments, the pace of human society was speeding up in an unprecedented frenzy of transformation. As a result, almost everything that had once been considered stable and permanent seemed to be giving way to a dazzling experience of continuous change, a never-ending succession of rapid transitions affecting all levels of society, resulting in a faintly hallucinatory sense that reality consisted not of any stable and reliable truths but of only fleeting and transitory impressions. The direct relevance of this phenomenon to the Sacred is explicit for instance in a famous passage</span><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; text-indent: 36pt;"> from Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels’ </span><i style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; text-indent: 36pt;">Communist Manifesto</i><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; text-indent: 36pt;"> (1848):</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><br /></span></p><blockquote style="border: none; margin: 0px 0px 0px 40px; padding: 0px; text-align: left;"><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">All that is solid melts into air, all that is sacred is profaned, and human beings are at last compelled to face with sober senses their real conditions of life and their relations to one another” </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="DE" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">[Alles Ständische und Stehende verdampft, alles Heilige wird entweiht, und die Menschen sind endlich gezwungen, ihre Lebensstellung, ihre gegenseitigen Beziehungen mit nüchternen Augen anzusehen”; Marx & Engels, <i>Manifest der Kommunistischen Partei</i>, 1848]</span></p></blockquote><p class="MsoFootnoteText" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; line-height: 20px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoFootnoteText" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 10pt; line-height: 20px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Therefore modernity implied an acute sense of conflict between the cherished <i>idea</i> of permanent stable values and the actual human <i>experience </i>of impermanence and instability. The opposition ultimately leads us back all the way to the origins of Greek philosophy and its central concern with how “that which really is” is related to “that which is merely passing,” Being and Becoming. Since the Middle Ages, Plato’s key distinction between the world of eternal forms or ideas and the ultimately illusory world of changing appearances led to classic concepts of the world as a “Great Chain of Being,” but this somewhat static picture of universal providential harmony began to break down under the impact of unprecedented processes of change and transformation since the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. The “temporalization of the chain of being” (A.O. Lovejoy, <i>The Great Chain of Being</i>, ch. IX) is also known as the rise of historical consciousness since the eighteenth century. It led to various forms of evolutionism that gained dominance during the nineteenth century and are best interpreted as responses to the spectre of complete historical relativism: history as nothing but “one damned thing after another” (<a href="https://quoteinvestigator.com/2015/09/16/history/" style="color: #954f72;">https://quoteinvestigator.com/2015/09/16/history/</a>), a mere succession of random events without any meaningful plot. They suggested that continuous change and transformation were parts of a forward movement of improvement or progress; hence the ideal of a stable and permanent truth might no longer reside in a metaphysical realm beyond the senses but might still be attained or at least approached at some point in the future.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">This confidence in modernization as a movement of progress began to weaken towards the final decades of the nineteenth century and suffered a fatal blow with the carnage of the two World Wars. Now it had become hard to imagine a reality of stable truth either spatially (as residing in some higher metaphysical realm) or temporally (as the <i>telos</i> of the historical or evolutionary process). It is against this background that influential scholars and intellectuals came to see modernity not as a positive phenomenon of evolution and progress but as a largely negative process grounded in the decline or eclipse of the Sacred. In this regard, Mircea Eliade is just the most famous representative of an important intellectual tradition that emerged in the context of the annual so-called Eranos meetings in Switzerland (1933 to 1988). The Eranos tradition and its central concern with the Sacred is utterly central to how the study of religion developed especially in the U.S.A. after World War II. It is crucial to see that both historically and in terms of its basic ideas, it was a typical product of high modernity. Its agenda consisted in finding ways to preserve or revive the Sacred (equivalent to what Baudelaire had called “the eternal and the immovable”) as a necessary antidote against the modern experience of “the terror of history” (Mirca Eliade’s equivalent for “the transitory, the fugitive, the contingent”). <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">The Eranos approach to religion is often referred to as “religionism” today, and has come under heavy criticism roughly since the 1980s, with the rise of a new style of academic scholarship that has gained ever more dominance in the humanities, including the study of religion in recent years. While the term “postmodernity” may be problematic (for reasons that do not need to concern us here), this new approach certainly takes a crucial step beyond “modernity” as defined above, with far-reaching consequences for how we think about “the Sacred.” In the most general terms, high modernity was marked by deep anxiety over what would happen to Western culture and society if “the eternal and the immovable” would vanish altogether and only “the transitory, the fugitive, the contingent” would remain. By contrast, the “post”modern condition may be defined in terms of full acceptance and even an enthusiastic embrace of the disappearance of any transcendent reference. Behind the surface of appearances there can no longer be any dimension of depth. </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"></span></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFD-whD0rU2tjyBA-3UIxTNcbINmyyB2Tqke8hoLpBxYDOJV7KaaPpDA6cbGlszXLIboMSufiVGaQ2_33_7hvVBe7gTVyNoqJVqUk53wbQSxIodqT9ugzd6D_5V0Z_jUgsK_YYnkpC_RpA/*2QhBckw4FsiXi-ALI03LzQ.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" data-original-height="475" data-original-width="614" height="495" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFD-whD0rU2tjyBA-3UIxTNcbINmyyB2Tqke8hoLpBxYDOJV7KaaPpDA6cbGlszXLIboMSufiVGaQ2_33_7hvVBe7gTVyNoqJVqUk53wbQSxIodqT9ugzd6D_5V0Z_jUgsK_YYnkpC_RpA/w640-h495/1*2QhBckw4FsiXi-ALI03LzQ.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Jeff Koons, "Michael Jackson and Bubbles" (1988)</td></tr></tbody></table><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">In terms of Derrida’s deconstruction, there can strictly be no room for a transcendental “signified” – obviously including “the Sacred” – because discourse consists exclusively of an infinite self-referential play of signifiers that never refer to anything else than to one another. In terms of Foucault’s perspective, the order of discourse is not ruled by the search for knowledge and truth but ultimately by the quest for power. The disappearance of the Sacred in contemporary scholarship as well as in popular culture is therefore not a contingency but something that follows with strict necessity from the inherent logic of these poststructuralist perspectives. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">In the current academic context, these developments have led to a complete disjunction between two approaches: (1) a “religionist” discourse of the Sacred understood as a real presence or transcendent Signified, and (2) a broadly poststructuralist approach, which also goes under such names as Theory or Critique, in which the Sacred cannot possibly be present except as yet another empty signifier. Against or in between both paradigms, I have always defended a third, intermediary perspective: (3) an empiricist bottom-up historicism on methodologically-agnostic foundations in which a transcendental Signified is <i>neither</i> affirmed or assumed <i>nor</i> denied or excluded. Like the poststructuralists I see references to “the Sacred” strictly as discursive claims that cannot be verified by scholarly methods; but unlike Derrida, I assume that a transcendent Presence or Signified <i>hors-texte</i> may well exist and might even possibly appear in our world of experience, whether we notice it or not; and unlike Foucault, I believe that the quest for knowledge and understanding cannot, need not, and should not be reduced to a game of hegemonic power strategies.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">If so, then what about the Sacred and what about its relevance to my field of specialization, the study of esotericism? That esotericism is grounded in experiences of the Sacred is a thesis that originated in the Eranos tradition but is rejected by most specialists today. In my opinion, too, there is no such thing as a hidden “esoteric” essence that might be linked to some notion of the Sacred or to any other Signified Presence, at least not from a scholarly point of view. In modern academic research, “esotericism” is no more than a convenient label to cover a large collection of claims of knowledge that have been rejected as illegitimate “nonsense” or “superstition” by academics since the period of the Enlightenment but deserve to be studied seriously and without prejudice. Whether any of them is true or not is wholly irrelevant to that project. Therefore if I suggested above that there could indeed be some kind of “meta-empirical” Presence or Signified <i>hors-texte</i>, this does not mean that I would ever dream of identifying it as “esotericism” or “the esoteric” – on the contrary, I agree with the poststructuralists that these words are ultimately just empty signifiers that derive their meaning from the larger discourses in which they play their role. Likewise, there is no privileged relation of any kind between “esotericism” as a field of research and the notion of a meta-empirical Presence, whether one wants to call it the Sacred or give it some other name. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Nevertheless, I do believe that the Eranos religionists were right in their profound anxiety about the decline of a transcendent reference in Western culture, and its negative effects on society. Belief in the Sacred really means belief in a foundation of ultimate <i>meaning </i>that is stable and permanent enough to endure in spite of radical contingency and continuous change. Furthermore, if we call something sacred, what we are really saying is that we feel it must be <i>protected</i>. Paradoxically, precisely that which is claimed to be most stable and permanent appears to be so vulnerable today that it must be carefully preserved from contamination and erosion by the forces of impermanence and change. Against these backgrounds, the suggestion I want to make is that the legitimate core of the religionists’ argument can actually be saved by asking more specifically <i>what</i> it is that human beings consider to be meaningful and in need of protection. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">The most consistent answer of Western metaphysics is that this “sacred” domain consists of three interrelated concerns, traditionally referred to as <i>the transcendentals</i>: the Good, the Beautiful, and the True. This triad is implicit already in Plato, was systematized during the Middle Ages, and forms the basis of Immanuel Kant’s three <i>Kritiken</i>: pure reason (truth), judgment (beauty), and practical reason (the good). As regards the search for human <i>meaning </i>under conditions of modernity and beyond modernity, my advice would therefore be to move the discussion away from the Sacred and towards the Transcendentals. The object of such a discussion should <i>not</i> be to decide what is good, what is beautiful, and what is true – interesting as such questions may be, they will lead us straight back into the never-ending discursive realm of mere opinions and claims. Rather, the object should be to delineate a core of basic human values that cannot be reduced to discourse and therefore cannot be deconstructed or even understood in terms of competition and power.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36pt;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh-BwvSSVVlF99CvXQfKyMKRerSnOAy_ppVDH07dYvOx_JrvCCBXrpFN2R9K_fFEU18eIbbywLve6wMqkY7UZ6ZgHQOErgOxNo1etU50VFsw4K-uh_va9Kjbp6e2cfYU3ud74B2iVM_vOm5/" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="1028" data-original-width="1200" height="549" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh-BwvSSVVlF99CvXQfKyMKRerSnOAy_ppVDH07dYvOx_JrvCCBXrpFN2R9K_fFEU18eIbbywLve6wMqkY7UZ6ZgHQOErgOxNo1etU50VFsw4K-uh_va9Kjbp6e2cfYU3ud74B2iVM_vOm5/w640-h549/seyyed-mosque.jpg" width="640" /></a></span></div><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><br /><br /></span><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif;"> </span></p>wouterjhanegraaff.blogspot.comhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15519965611425366178noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5967881025525384120.post-40456793963510941722020-10-24T05:56:00.006-07:002020-10-24T13:59:00.558-07:00The Real Hermetic Tradition (Lodovico Lazzarelli and Giovanni da Correggio)<p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span style="background-color: white; caret-color: rgb(28, 30, 33); color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif;">As the Corona virus was dominating the media and everybody’s daily lives, many of my friends on Facebook began launching “book challenges” to entertain themselves and the members of their networks. I accepted a challenge to list “10 books that changed your life,” and soon discovered that it was not just great fun to select ten titles and write about them, but that the exercise triggered a process of self-reflection. It made me conscious of some deep and long-term motivations and obsessions that have very much determined my personal life and my career as a scholar as well (or the other way around?). Here is nr. 5 on my list.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span style="background-color: white; caret-color: rgb(28, 30, 33); color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEife073RGBxmLcawXf3-CqjxVXp6yvJeQlldvfqUDShzPInxE0xB9zYvLE6bffUuJebAZDedEopTWoaFLn9AmLfi4952e2wOvwbnb1gkg2fts5iI0slJ91BPwbw3lXMOTDa7t2OMFIz22GG/s761/Screenshot+2020-10-24+at+14.13.13.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="761" data-original-width="483" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEife073RGBxmLcawXf3-CqjxVXp6yvJeQlldvfqUDShzPInxE0xB9zYvLE6bffUuJebAZDedEopTWoaFLn9AmLfi4952e2wOvwbnb1gkg2fts5iI0slJ91BPwbw3lXMOTDa7t2OMFIz22GG/w406-h640/Screenshot+2020-10-24+at+14.13.13.png" width="406" /></a></div><br /><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">In 1997 I was living in Paris,</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> working on a postdoc research project.</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">O</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">ne day I paid a visit to my friend Antoine Faivre in Meudon</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">.</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> He ha</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">s</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> a small collection of valuable antiquarian books in a glass case, and somehow my attention was caught by this small booklet. <i>T</i></span><i><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">wo</span></i><i><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> books of Mercurius Trismegistus</span></i><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">, </span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">translated by Gabriel du Preau, including a text called “Le baßin d’Hermès” by Loys Lazarel. Amazingly, Antoine allowed me to borrow</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> this very valuable volume. T</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">hat</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> same</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> night</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">,</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> in my room in the <i>Cité Universitaire</i></span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">, </span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">I tried to read it in bed.</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> I vividly remember that evening.</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> Sixteenth-century French... not easy! But somehow, something about th</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">is</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> text by “Loys Lazarel” fascinated me. </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">I cannot say that</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> I understood</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> very much</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> of it</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> at all – </span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">but </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">I realized</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> that it</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> <span lang="EN-US">was complicated, somehow unusual, original, and</span></span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">seemed to have</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> literary quality</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">. So</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> I got curious.</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> Who was this Lazarel, and why had I never heard of him before?</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"></span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">A</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> few weeks later I </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">traveled</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> to Amsterdam and </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">paid a visit to</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> the <i><a href="https://embassyofthefreemind.com/nl/">Bibliotheca Philosophica Hermetica</a></i>. In a corner behind a desk </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">sat</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> a man I had never met before</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">.</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">S</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">omeone introduced me to him, and he turned out to be a neolatinist working on Dutch translations of Hermetic texts</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">. His name was</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> Ruud Bouthoorn. “What are you working on right now?” I asked him. “</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Oh, a </span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">15th-century text, the <i>Crater Hermetis</i> by Lodovico Lazzarelli” he answered. Lazzarelli</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">? </span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Lazarel</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">!</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> What a coincidence... Was the Thrice-Greatest himself trying to give us a hint? Ruud and I got along well, and</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> so we</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> ended up working together</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">. From then on, most</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> sunday afternoon</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">s</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> he would come to my apartment</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">. F</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">irst</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> he would</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> show me the new books he had bought that week</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> (he is a bibliophile with a very unusual collection full of titles that nobody else reads)</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">, and </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">then</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> we would </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">sit down for hours of concentrated work,</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> translating Lazzarelli line by line. <a href="https://www.wouterjhanegraaff.net/lodovico-lazzarelli">We finally published a book together in 2005</a>, </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">with</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> new editions and English translations of all the Hermetic writings of Lodovico Lazzarelli and his spiritual master Giovanni “Mercurio” da Correggio.</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> It is out of print now, and the plan is to bring out a new, revised and greatly expanded edition.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2o2egPUtXM7xveCKBmI9LHU-mkT8BPIUCtb2tZcEGpx0pc1ovmi5lrAwpf4Zhc7_Hp3cZ2Od-ZH3k1lSqRepiUwsvO0p1eIqxJmX1gH4OMZih1zU3puMgOdxcEt_cEe165hfiVKXza606/s2048/Lazzarelli-muse-fasti-christianae-religionis-beinecke-391-f5r-c1494.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2048" data-original-width="1303" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi2o2egPUtXM7xveCKBmI9LHU-mkT8BPIUCtb2tZcEGpx0pc1ovmi5lrAwpf4Zhc7_Hp3cZ2Od-ZH3k1lSqRepiUwsvO0p1eIqxJmX1gH4OMZih1zU3puMgOdxcEt_cEe165hfiVKXza606/w408-h640/Lazzarelli-muse-fasti-christianae-religionis-beinecke-391-f5r-c1494.jpg" width="408" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Lazzarelli and his muse</td></tr></tbody></table><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Lazzarelli (1447-1500) was a poet from San Severino who traveled to Rome in search of fame and glory. He wrote a large work of poetry modeled on Ovid (<i>Fasti Christianae Religionis</i>) and joined the Roman Academy. But then, one fateful day in 1481, he happened to be present when an apocalyptic preacher was addressing the crowd on the steps of the Papal palace. He fell completely under the spell of this strange charismatic personality, a certain Giovanni da Correggio who was traveling all over Italy while announcing the end of time. Lazzarelli tells us that he decided, then and there, to turn away from the fountains of Helicon and set his sight towards Mount Zion – that is to say, he left profane poetry behind and went in search of divine wisdom. Sometime during the following years, Lazzarelli somehow gained access to one of the Greek manuscripts of the <i>Corpus Hermeticum</i> that had arrived from Byzantium – <a href="https://www.academia.edu/14142037/How_Hermetic_was_Renaissance_Hermetism_2015_">not the incomplete copy that Marsilio Ficino had used</a> for his famous translation published in 1471 but one that included the three final treatises (CH XVI-XVIII). Lazzarelli produced a beautiful manuscript of all the known Hermetica in Latin, including his own translation of these previously unknown “Hermetic Definitions,” with introductory prefaces by himself. He offered it to his master, as a sign of deep gratitude, because thanks to him he had been “reborn from spiritual seed.” Lazzarelli had in fact understood, better than any other reader of the Hermetica, that the process of “spiritual rebirth” described in CH XIII forms the true heart of the Hermetic mystery.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">It appears that the pupil Lazzarelli, with his superior humanistic culture, had a great impact on his master Correggio as well. A few years later, on Palm Sunday 11 April 1481, the prophet made a spectacular appearance in Rome. He entered the city gate seated on a white donkey, dressed like Jesus Christ with a crown of thorns on his head, in clear imitation of Jesus’ entrance of Jerusalem! On a disk fixed above his head was a text that identified Correggio as the <i>Hermetic</i> Christ who in his own person reconciled the ancient Egyptian wisdom with Biblical Christianity. More precisely, the text said that he was no one less than Poimandres (known as Pimander in the wake of Ficino’s translation), the great <a href="https://shwep.net/podcast/wouter-hanegraaff-on-the-poimandres/">Being of Light</a> who appears to Hermes Trismegistus in the first treatise of the <i>Corpus Hermeticum</i>:<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0cm 36pt; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">This is my Servant Pimander, whom I have chosen. This Pimander is my supreme and waxing child, in whom I am well pleased, to cast out demons and proclaim my judgment and truth to the heathen. Do not hinder him, but hear and obey him with all fear and veneration; thus speaks the Lord your God and Father of every talisman of all the world, Jesus of Nazareth.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">And so the Hermetic Christ entered Rome, riding through the streets on his donkey, preaching at every street corner and followed by a fastly growing crowd of curious followers. Since it was Palm Sunday, many of them came straight out of church with palm leaves in their hands, only to see this figure dressed like Jesus passing by in broad daylight… It is not clear how it all ended, although Lazzarelli claims that Correggio was admitted into the St. Peter and was allowed to make it all the way up to the altar. More likely he was thrown into prison, but he did get out and continued his wanderings through Italy. Much later, in 1501, Correggio managed to be received by King Louis XII of France; and it is at this occasion that Lazzarelli’s valuable manuscript of Hermetic writings seems to have passed into the hands of French humanists who were present at the court. In 1507, Symphorien Champier published Lazzarelli’s translation of the <i>Diffinitiones Asclepii</i>, thus making CH XVI-XVIII available in Latin for the first time.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEim4LQLSeBBcYoHq8QFFR81uxMTjlBOKrTZ-NiShlGF9Uoj04AcdUd2g-BxTiF9OKyCmjWTiMdmRdgH6o6WyVa1Ss78o0BNUqkEJLHNuo7qYuIF5cniYKUSFbsn1Usys9VE4NzkLA2kbXT1/s1598/Screenshot+2020-10-24+at+14.20.32.png" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1598" data-original-width="1014" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEim4LQLSeBBcYoHq8QFFR81uxMTjlBOKrTZ-NiShlGF9Uoj04AcdUd2g-BxTiF9OKyCmjWTiMdmRdgH6o6WyVa1Ss78o0BNUqkEJLHNuo7qYuIF5cniYKUSFbsn1Usys9VE4NzkLA2kbXT1/w406-h640/Screenshot+2020-10-24+at+14.20.32.png" width="406" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Lazzarelli and his muse presenting the <i>Crater</i> to Ferrante</td></tr></tbody></table><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Between 1492 and 1494 Lazzarelli was in Naples, trying unsuccesfully to be received at the court of the powerful monarch Ferdinand I of Aragon, king of Naples and Sicily, known as Ferrante. He wanted to give him the first copy of his <i>Crater Hermes</i> – the very treatise that I had encountered in that French translation by Gabriel du Preau. My initial impression had been right: this text is a true gem, both in terms of its contents and of its literary quality. Modeled very closely on the original Hermetic treatises (which he appears to have understood far more deeply than any of his contemporaries, Ficino not excluded), it casts Lazzarelli in the role of Hermes Trismegistus himself. He is teaching the way of wisdom and true felicity to two students, king Ferrante and his secretary of state, the important humanist poet and astrologer Giovanni Pontano. In doing so, he comes up with a complex and incredibly original interpretation of selected Biblical passages <i>and</i> the Hermetic treatises: he argues that Poimandres himself was no one else than the divine Logos, Christ the second person of the Trinity, appearing “incognito” to a pagan Egyptian sage far before he would be born as Jesus. The treatise ends with a cliffhanger, as Lazzarelli tells his eager pupils that the ultimate secret will be revealed to them at another occasion. We can guess what it will be: they will be told that Poimandres alias the Logos has in fact returned to earth, in the person of Giovanni da Correggio: the Hermetic Christ. Only he will be able to finish the instruction, by acting as Ferrante and Pontano’s “spiritual father” and giving them rebirth.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiDPU2InkWxCNHRrBr-N_m-VVV40OXY0v4rbD5imlQv5Zd8yvYq5sPGkpJIipASdV9tMhFxHuZ1d_Pwn9dksVMyUN9d8SkOSUhdBXqPdtSLppQdEI4YPLUAnlrUHxSzzMz5axOvl7oMd0K7/s2004/Yates001.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="2004" data-original-width="1343" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiDPU2InkWxCNHRrBr-N_m-VVV40OXY0v4rbD5imlQv5Zd8yvYq5sPGkpJIipASdV9tMhFxHuZ1d_Pwn9dksVMyUN9d8SkOSUhdBXqPdtSLppQdEI4YPLUAnlrUHxSzzMz5axOvl7oMd0K7/s320/Yates001.jpg" /></a></div><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Discovering and s</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">tudying Lazzarelli</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> has been very important to me. It </span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">made me</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> realize</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> that most of the standard assumptions about </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">“</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">the Hermetic Tradition</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">”</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> of the Renaissance were wrong. </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">They came from </span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Frances Yates</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> (picture)</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">, whose brilliant</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">ly written and</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> inspir</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">ational </span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">books had created a</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> powerful and extremely influential</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> </span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">grand narrative of</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> <span lang="EN-US">“the Hermetic Tradition.”</span></span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Yates’ heroes were</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Marsilio </span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Ficino, </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Giovanni </span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Pico</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> della Mirandola</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> and </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Giordano </span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Bruno</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> <span lang="EN-US">–</span></span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">but in actual fact, so I discovered,</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> the Hermetica were </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">rather</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> marginal</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> to the thinking of these famous figures. The true Renaissance Hermetists were this unknown figure, </span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Lazzarelli</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">, the “</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">other translator” of the Hermetica next to</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> </span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Ficino</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">, and his master Giovanni “Mercurio” da Correggio. Paul </span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Oskar Kristeller still knew</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> this,</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> and emphasized</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> it</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> in <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/24300321?seq=1#metadata_info_tab_contents">a classic article from </a></span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/24300321?seq=1#metadata_info_tab_contents">1938 that gave Yates her cue</a>. B</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">ut as Lazzarelli </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">and Correggio</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> had no relevance to magic or early modern science, </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">they</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> simply did not fit the story that</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> Frances</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> Yates wa</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">s so eager</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> to tell. </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">She </span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">couldn’t do anything useful with these figures, </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">and so </span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">she pushed </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">them to the margins</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> and put Bruno at center</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> stage.</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">He became the hero of her grand story about</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> “the Hermetic Tradition</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">.”</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"></span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">But as</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> I was reading Lazzarelli’s <i>Crater Hermetis</i>, </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">it dawned on me that <i>he</i> was the hero. I still cannot think of a more impressive example, anywhere in the Renaissance period, of a purely Hermetic-Christian text that (in spite of its obvious filtering through Christian theology) shows real and profound understanding of what the Hermetica were all about. </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBc6zhQNUuMq7wOVBjK9a8RDUa1wejDMV6rakumu6i4IDNwrQhIBhoqYAYu4XE-QxXkveRgZXVczu9j3iju7BgIul4IyfSkra7yC4OxdP-itVMJobBKJNA8c7SacuNG3HFR8-bwuyoHhsN/s372/agrippa.gif" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="372" data-original-width="225" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBc6zhQNUuMq7wOVBjK9a8RDUa1wejDMV6rakumu6i4IDNwrQhIBhoqYAYu4XE-QxXkveRgZXVczu9j3iju7BgIul4IyfSkra7yC4OxdP-itVMJobBKJNA8c7SacuNG3HFR8-bwuyoHhsN/s320/agrippa.gif" /></a></div><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">The implications were far-reaching, for I also discovered that</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> the</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> </span><i><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Crater Hermetis</span></i><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">provided a key – in fact I mean <a href="https://www.academia.edu/1170523/Better_than_Magic_Cornelius_Agrippa_and_Lazzarellian_Hermetism_2009_"><i>the </i>key</a> –</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> to Cornelius Agrippa’s famous compendium of magic, <i>De occulta philosophia libri tres </i></span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">(1533). In spite of all appearances to the contrary, Agrippa’s work</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> was ultimately not about “magic and science”</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> either,</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> but about the Lazzarellian message of spiritual rebirth and deification. </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Once again this has major</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> implications, for Agrippa was the other chief character sidelined by Yates</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">. In her eyes, he did not represent the</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> beautiful, elegant new magic of Ficino</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> and the Florentine Renaissance</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> but</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> was a somewhat embarrassing example of what she called</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> “that old dirty magic” of</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> the</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> medieval grimoires. I discovered that this was wrong too</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">.</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> Agrippa was in fact <a href="https://www.academia.edu/12529750/Heinrich_Cornelius_Agrippa_2015_">the </a></span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><a href="https://www.academia.edu/12529750/Heinrich_Cornelius_Agrippa_2015_">chief author who had sought to continue</a></span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> </span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Lazzarelli’s new Christian-Hermetic spirituality.</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> <span lang="EN-US">Of course he knew Ficino’s translation of the <i>Corpus Hermeticum</i>, but since that edition is <a href="http://wouterjhanegraaff.blogspot.com/2013/11/butchering-corpus-hermeticum-breaking.html">far from helpful in understanding what the Hermetica were all about</a>, he used the <i>Crater Hermetis </i>to make sense of the message.<o:p></o:p></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">My</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> chance encounter with “Loys Lazarel” in 1997</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> therefore</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> had a very strong impact on the development of my idea</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">s and much of my scholarly work</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">. My inauguration speech at the University of Amsterdam in 1999 was titled <i><a href="https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/9574648-het-einde-van-de-hermetische-traditie">The End of the Hermetic Tradition</a></i>, and what I actually meant was the end of Frances Yates’ grand narrative about that tradition. </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Ever since, I</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> have been arguing that our entire picture of Renaissance Hermeticism must be revised and reconceptualized completely. At present I am pushing </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">my project</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> further back in time, as I</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">’</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">m working on a book about</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> the original</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> Hermetic</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> treatises from Roman Egypt</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">.</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> Again I encounter major distortions of the original materials caused by the preconceived notions, ideological prejudices and intellectual agendas of modern scholars.</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> All of this comes ultimately from my discovery of Lazzarelli</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> and what happened to his legacy. It made me realize</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> how strongly our</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> perception</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> of </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">ancient and early-modern</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> texts </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">is often</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> determined by modern concerns</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> that have little to do with what the original</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> authors</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> <span lang="EN-US">were trying to say</span></span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">.</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> <span lang="EN-US"><a href="http://wouterjhanegraaff.blogspot.com/2020/07/yes-it-is-possible-rilkes-malte-laurids.html">As brilliantly formulated by Rainer Maria</a></span></span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><a href="http://wouterjhanegraaff.blogspot.com/2020/07/yes-it-is-possible-rilkes-malte-laurids.html"> Rilke</a></span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">, I keep discovering how</span><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1d2129; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> many scholars have very precise knowledge of a past that never existed.<o:p></o:p></span></p>wouterjhanegraaff.blogspot.comhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15519965611425366178noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5967881025525384120.post-72161976728005130622020-09-25T01:41:00.010-07:002020-09-26T08:25:20.923-07:00Enter: The Gods (interview)<p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="CS" style="color: black; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">On February 28 this year, just before the the Corona wave hit us, I gave a keynote lecture at the <a href="http://religiousdrugs.com" style="font-style: normal;">international workshop "Religious Drugs"</a> at the Department for the Study of Religions of Masaryk University, Brno. During the conference I was interviewed by Jana Nenadalova for the journal <i>Legalizace</i>, and <a href="https://magazin-legalizace.cz/wouter-hanegraaff-bohove-vstupuji-dovnitr" style="font-style: normal;">the interview was published in Czech translation</a>. Below you find the English version. </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="CS" style="color: black; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: center; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: medium;">* * * * *</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><i><span lang="CS" style="color: black; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">With a Dutch expert on alternative spirituality, we moved from ancient Egypt to the Amazon rainforests to discuss changes in consciousness, experiences of divinity and the meaning of life.</span></i><i><span style="color: black; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><o:p></o:p></span></i></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="CS" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">J: </span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Your speech yesterday was really interesting. Can you recap some of its main thoughts, and perhaps explain what you mean by entheogenic experience?<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">H: Well, basically I tried to connect two phenomena with each other. My speech was focused on Roman Egypt – Egypt under the dominion of the Romans, in the first centuries of the common era. This whole culture, and a lot of its practices, especially the religious ones, have often been interpreted by scholars as “magic.” And I’ve discussed some examples from the so-called “Greek Magical Papyri.” These were edited by a German scholar, Karl Preisendanz, who also gave them that title. He interpreted everything as “magic” because that’s how he looked at ancient Egyptian religion: it was all “magic” in his eyes, which for him was just another word for “superstition.” It’s quite important to realize that when a text just spoke of “visions,” he wrote “magical visions,” “plants” became “magical plants,” and so on. Why? Because the word “magic” had negative connotations that fit quite well with dominant stereotypes of Egypt, which stood for all that irrational, superstitious stuff that could be nicely opposed to Enlightenment rationality and science. I see this as an extremely biased way of looking at that type of Egyptian religious practice. Many of these texts describe strange visions, encounters with gods, and all kind of things that wouldn’t normally happen to people in their normal mind. As a result, many scholars have thought “well, doesn’t that prove then how irrational and superstitious these people were? They must either have made it all up, or if it really happened to them, then they must have been crazy, out of their minds.”<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhaHXDfRZcnsc3VG7q3-ny9nzhrkL-ExbO1bx8i4J8mO4d10MbYXV2N0nxrlwp5DTeyuu6H2aaOLq9zm42iEhPsK02TfQ0Y5tGxTy5c1ShOCo9ujpx6yTaxJC96VHjSN5CFaWIbHgc4VpYC/s717/OuroborosEdited.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="414" data-original-width="717" height="370" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhaHXDfRZcnsc3VG7q3-ny9nzhrkL-ExbO1bx8i4J8mO4d10MbYXV2N0nxrlwp5DTeyuu6H2aaOLq9zm42iEhPsK02TfQ0Y5tGxTy5c1ShOCo9ujpx6yTaxJC96VHjSN5CFaWIbHgc4VpYC/w640-h370/OuroborosEdited.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><div><br /></div><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><span style="font-size: 14pt;">So in my lecture I focused on a specific case, a famous text that is known as the “Mithras Liturgy.” If you look closely enough, then you have to conclude that the use of entheogenic substances played a rather important role in what is described there. And if that is the case, then you don’t have to assume that these people were crazy – quite the contrary, you have a perfectly rational explanation for what happened to them. After all, we know from clinical evidence that if you take a perfectly healthy individual and give him LSD, he will have very strange visions and experiences. He is not crazy, he is just having a hallucinogenic experience. Looking closely at the sources, for instance you find a specific kind of incense, <i>kyphi</i>, that had mild but well-attested narcotic properties and was used all over Egypt. But the specific case of the “Mithras Liturgy” goes much further, and may be considered one of the most important “trip reports” that we have from late antiquity. It describes a really spectacular visionary sequence</span><span style="font-size: 14pt; font-style: normal;"> </span><i style="font-size: 14pt; font-style: normal;">and</i><span style="font-size: 14pt; font-style: normal;"> </span><span style="font-size: 14pt; font-style: normal;">includes the detailed recipe for making an “eye paint” that you need to rub in or around your eyes to have such visions. It contains several components that are known to be psychoactive.</span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">J: Can you mention them?<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">H: Of course. It includes the blue lotus, which was common in Egypt, has been analyzed and turns out to have hallucinogenic properties; there is some reason to assume that the same goes for myrrh; and then there is a question about the Sun scarab, which also goes into the recipe. This part is more speculative so I wouldn’t insist on it; but sun scarabs live on dung heaps, which typically contain the mycelium of psilocybin mushrooms, so it is reasonable to assume that these scarab beetles may have been loaded with psilocybin. Whether or not there is something to that suggestion, a further important ingredient of the recipe is a plant called “Kentritis.” We cannot find out anymore which plant that was, but the Egyptians at the time must have known it. The text gives precise instructions about how to make an eye paint by combining these substances, which you then have to rub into or around the eyes, where the skin is thin. It will take some time to start working and then you will have those visionary experiences. It’s all very straightforward. I find it amazing that almost none of the major specialists has called attention to it.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">J: So why exactly can those experiences be explained through drug-induced states of consciousness better than in other ways?<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">H: First of all, the recipe is there, and the text says explicitly that it is “necessary” to make the ointment<span> </span>and apply it to your eyes. How much more evidence do we need, given the spectacular visions that follow? There have been great scholars studying this text in detail, but they have not provided any reasonable alternative explanation for the visions. For instance, one major specialist says “well, how does it work? You have to inhale rays of sunlight.” True: the text does say that. But then I would ask “OK, so try it out: find a sunny spot and start inhaling sunlight. Are you going to feel lifted up into the air and see visions of gods?” I don’t think so. It’s simply not sufficient as an explanation. It seems to me that this particular case of the “Mithras Liturgy” is perfectly straightforward, because you have the combination of spectacular visions and a detailed recipe that the text says you need to use if you want to experience them too. The other cases I talked about are more complex.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">J: Would you say that Altered States of Consciousness in general are an important factor in human culture, or in human experience throughout history?<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">H: Definitely. But then you have a broader concept of “altered states” that does not necessarily involve drugs or psychoactive substances. There are many ways to alter consciousness - it can be done by music, by drumming for instance, by sensory overload, but also by under-stimulating your senses.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">J: You mean sensory deprivation?<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">H: Sensory deprivation, exactly. For instance, there’s a fantastic book (<a href="https://www.academia.edu/41498285/Review_of_Yulia_Ustinova_Divine_Mania_2020_">I’ve reviewed it recently</a>) by Yulia Ustinova, a Russian/Israeli specialist of ancient Greece.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">J: I know her, she’s writing about shamanism -<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">H: And ancient Greece, yes. <a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/caves-and-the-ancient-greek-mind-9780199548569?cc=nl&lang=en&">She talks about people going into caves.</a> It’s interesting to see how many visionaries, people who have revelations (think of prophets such as the prophet Muhammad), are said to have retreated to a cave over long periods of time. There they meet a spiritual entity, for instance the angel Gabriel. So what Ustinova emphasized is very simple. Initially we might think “what’s the point? Why go into a cave to meet the gods?” But if you actually do enter a cave, you will discover what that must have meant in antiquity – when you didn’t have any of the media that we have today. A first thing: it’s <i>extremely</i> dark, there really is no light at all (we take artificial light for granted, but you wouldn’t have any of that). And secondly: it’s <i>completely</i> silent too (and again, in our world full of noise and background buzz it’s hard to imagine how intense that could be). Under such conditions, the brain will compensate for the lack of sensory input by producing hallucinations. These can be either visual or auditory, so you will hear voices and see visions. That is just what the brain does: it will happen to any of us under such circumstances. Of course, most of the rough material of the visions comes from culture: if you live in India you might see Indian gods, a Chinese Buddhist might see the Buddha, the Greeks might see the Olympian gods, and so on. I’m not saying that this is the universal key for everything, but I think that sensory deprivation may be a pretty major key for understanding some of the spectacular revelations that are reported by religious visionaries. If there is truth to this, it means for instance that a great world religion like Islam may have its ultimate origins in revelations of this kind, visions and auditions in the darkness and silence of a cave – I think that should be pretty big news. In this case, of course, we are not speaking about entheogenic substances: I’m not suggesting that prophet Muhammad was taking drugs! Not at all, but he did go into a cave. </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg7V4ncvzzX3OY3aZU357m8lzBlr7bORWfjJhsLGDlPcuXsr-qhc_w73YeU1htjPdtBAVDY69XmNS8gchyphenhypheneTOsoIm2yxbHIyCNXl1R3-jdXRcdejrbz7MeugIuR1PTVc9qaCRhD9Ee0oM3z/s1280/Picture+1.png" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="964" data-original-width="1280" height="482" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg7V4ncvzzX3OY3aZU357m8lzBlr7bORWfjJhsLGDlPcuXsr-qhc_w73YeU1htjPdtBAVDY69XmNS8gchyphenhypheneTOsoIm2yxbHIyCNXl1R3-jdXRcdejrbz7MeugIuR1PTVc9qaCRhD9Ee0oM3z/w640-h482/Picture+1.png" width="640" /></a></div><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Likewise, in <a href="https://www.routledge.com/Divine-Mania-Alteration-of-Consciousness-in-Ancient-Greece/Ustinova/p/book/9780367594268">a more recent book</a>, Yulia Ustinova talks in much broader terms about the great importance of alterations of consciousness in ancient Greece. She needs a pretty big book to simply lay down all the textual evidence, which is quite overwhelming. Of course, what make ancient Greece particularly interesting is the fact that we have all learned about the Greeks as the original rationalists, the founders of modern science, and all that. The reality is quite a bit more complex.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">J: Maybe we can skip to terminology for a while. If I understand it correctly, you distinguish between religion and spirituality. What is the difference?<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">H: Well, I’ve recently started to push the term “spirituality” as a scholarly term. One reason is strategic. <a href="https://www.academia.edu/41320565/Imagining_the_future_study_of_religion_and_spirituality_2020_">If you look at the academic study of religion at the moment, internationally, you can see that we are in trouble.</a> We are in the defensive, there is less and less money available, and we are outclassed by media personalities who are often very confident talking about religion although they are no specialists and often don’t know much about it. So you get famous physicists or psychologists talking about God, or about religion, unaware of how complex the issues really are. As historians of religion we seem to be missing the boat: we have failed to come up with a really convincing story about religion, and often it’s theologians who take our place. We have not succeeded in explaining to the public at large that study of religion is something very different from theology: that it’s not about your own beliefs but about trying to understand the phenomenon of religion from a scholarly perspective, historically, socially, etc. So I have come to the conclusion that “religion” has not served as a good brand: if you’re telling prospective students that you study religion, too many of them still think “oh, that’s about churches and doctrines and so on.” It just doesn’t work.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Now there has been empirical research by sociologists about what common people generally understand by “spirituality,” and they found that it’s essentially defined as focused on the individual, on personal experience, and on practice. If you image-google spirituality, you get meditating people and lots of candles – so it seems that people subconsciously associate spirituality with a light in the darkness.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">J: Nice metaphor!<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">H: Isn’t it? But anyway, <a href="https://webcolleges.uva.nl/Mediasite/Play/37bbc564c51545f68d41820ad6afe67e1d?fbclid=IwAR1bUOn7S3mDqfGsDwEqQMK3mxtieibiZWxrlgwH1NMHQUbjG255IbbIjaw">“spirituality” understood as individual, experiential practice is a specific type of religiosity that should be recognized as such and must be studied in its own right.</a> I am not saying it should take the place of religion in my discipline, of course not; but I think we must create a place for it.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">J: And what can we understand by the term of “entheogenic esotericism,” specifically?<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">H: Well the word comes from entheos </span><span lang="EN" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">ἔνθεος</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">, which means something like the divinity inside. Not a divinity that comes from within, but one that enters you, takes possession of you. It has to do with that experience of being overwhelmed by the gods, divinities or a divine force.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">J: From the outside they come inside.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">H: Yes. And consider our very common word “enthusiasm,” which we all use. It comes directly from <i>enthousiasmos</i>, which means very much the same thing. Being filled with a god.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><a href="https://www.academia.edu/3461770/Entheogenic_Esotericism_2012_">I define “entheogenic religion” in a double sense</a>: a broader and a narrower meaning. In a broader sense it covers forms of religion based on alterations of consciousness induced by any means – for instance music, drumming, dancing, sensory deprivation. In a narrow sense you’re dealing with those forms that are specifically induced by psychoactive substances. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">“Esotericism” is a different matter.<a href="https://www.wouterjhanegraaff.net/esotericism-and-the-academy"> I use it as an umbrella term that covers what I call “rejected knowledge”</a>: basically everything that has been rejected and put into the “waste basket of academia” since the 18<sup>th</sup> century. Everything that we used to think was beyond the pale for serious scholars, such as magic, astrology, alchemy, all this strange stuff that was considered “irrational” and was neglected by research. The study of “Western esotericism” is all about putting those ideas and tradititions and practices back on the table. So if you then combine the terms, “entheogenic esotericism” in the wider sense would be again all this kind of stuff in so far as alterations of consciousness are central in it, and in a narrow sense it would be specifically induced by drugs.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">J: Why is it that people don’t like the term “religion” but are more able to accept spiritualities? Can it be a consequence of secularization?<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">H: Yes, we live in a society where religious institutions are not dominant anymore. Christian churches used to be totally merged with state power, but they became essentially like private enterprises since the 18<sup>th</sup> century already, so what you see is the emergence of a kind of “religious supermarket.” That situation has become ever stronger, and nowadays you might say that most of us in secular societies are walking around in this supermarket of religion and spirituality. You stroll around there with your trolley and think “oh, I like meditation,” so you put some bits of Buddhism in it; “oh, but having been raised Catholic I do have that weak spot for Maria,” so you put her in too; and “oh, I’d like to try these drugs,” so let’s get a bit of that. And so on. You make your own mixture that fits to your personal taste as a consumer. </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYwKsiL7c7EZH1QntcptdQ5u1XyODBhFB-BX4rlTJWZP3yKcsUWm-X_tORv2fi62GJKwnEtaejrvx-YUd_e028KrjozdZ2Rq_HvM2ie_tktNm6zeFS_E_88cF1bCvFL1HPCZiXnXavVPKl/s1249/6339596.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1249" data-original-width="720" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhYwKsiL7c7EZH1QntcptdQ5u1XyODBhFB-BX4rlTJWZP3yKcsUWm-X_tORv2fi62GJKwnEtaejrvx-YUd_e028KrjozdZ2Rq_HvM2ie_tktNm6zeFS_E_88cF1bCvFL1HPCZiXnXavVPKl/s320/6339596.jpg" /></a></span></div><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><div style="text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: 14pt;">Religion is no longer part of the bedrock of society, as in the time when scholars like Durkheim could still define “religion” basically all part and parcel of society. For Durkheim, “magic” by contrast was something non-religious and hence asocial. I would say that situation pretty much belongs to the past, at least in Western secular societies. Nowadays religion takes many forms, it’s very much individualized, and so it becomes a consumerist thing. And of course with the internet and social media you get a kind of acceleration of such processes – you just look on your phone and you are linked from one thing to another, you may encounter bits and pieces of traditions, mixing them according to your own preferences and making something out of it that fits your personal tastes.</span></div><o:p></o:p></span><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">J: So how does using entheogens or other drugs like psychedelics fit this pattern? How can they answer people’s questions and people’s needs in this supermarket?<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">H: It’s actually a complex question. I’m talking about “entheogens” here, using a terminology that bestows a religious or spiritual meaning on psychedelics. We are not talking here about such substances as cocaine or alcohol. The “psychedelics” terminology, on the other hand, is more psychological than religious or spiritual: it means that something is done that allows the mind, or soul, or spirit to manifest itself. If you are raised in a certain kind of society, you will take certain things for granted; and our culture tends to suggest that psychedelics is just some kind of play, some kind of illusion: a “trip.” But what we know about psychedelics or entheogens is that in fact they often allow people at least temporarily to distance themselves from the default cultural conditioning that they are used to and see it for what it is. I think that’s one reason why users so often say that through psychedelics they have gotten in touch with what their true values are, what they really want in their life: “is it really just this all this consumer stuff that I want, or getting power or money? Or are such pursuits not ultimately so important and there are other, more important things to pursue?” This helps explain why psychedelics and entheogens are becoming quite successful and popular nowadays: it is because we are living in a society where the mainstream institutions no longer provide answers to questions about the meaning of life and those kinds of things. So most people in contemporary society feel like they are drifting – unless you are a solid member of a church or another religious community, of course. But if you are a typical individual consumer on the neoliberal market, then society isn’t telling you what the meaning of your life is. I do think, however, that people feel a need for those kinds of answers.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">J: They are searching for them.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">H: Yes, they are searching for those answers and they cannot find them. What you see with entheogens is that they often lead people to a level of their mind or consciousness where it’s easier for them to find what’s really meaningful to them. So yes, I think they respond to a need, in our current very much secularized and individualized society, for finding answers about the deeper meaning of your life.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">J: What about the current phenomenon of psychedelic or entheogenic shamanism? Can you describe how it emerged in recent decades?<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">H: Well, shamanism is originally a very specific term that comes from Siberia. It was Mircea Eliade, the famous scholar of religion, who came up with this idea of a <i>generic</i> shamanism that supposedly existed everywhere. That is a bit problematic, because those cultures are different, and what you find in Siberia is not the same as what you find in South America and so on. So I’m very skeptical about the shamanism terminology, but it has certainly become very popular. Eliade himself actually played down the importance of psychedelics and entheogens in shamanism, but after the sixties you see that his universal shamanism is often combined with the growing interest in psychedelics, see for instance Carlos Castaneda. What you see very clearly is that the “frontrunner” in contemporary entheogenic shamanism is ayahuasca, and South American forms of shamanism more generally. Because ayahuasca is a very powerful entheogen, it has been used in a ritual context for a generations and generations in the Amazon forest. It has taken on new ritual or ceremonial forms under the influence of modern psychology and therapeutic traditions, and spread to the West. So these workshop leaders are described often as shamans, although again, I’m not so sure whether that’s the right term. There is also a non-entheogenic and non-substance modern shamanism, of course, beginning with Michel Harner with his “core shamanism,” which induces altered states through drumming.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">J: What is his precise role in this approach?<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">H: Well, Michel Harner – that’s actually a good story. He began as an anthropologist doing research in the Amazon forest and drinking Ayahuasca with native cultures there. He had impressive experiences and began doing rituals himself, but then after the sixties he was not able to continue organizing those workshops due to prohibition of psychedelics. So then he developed an alternative form of shamanism based upon rhythmic drumming. Apparently this had a very strong effect as well, so he developed it as a legal alternative for using ayahuasca or other entheogens. It became very popular. You might say that the ayahuasca type of shamanism just took a bit longer to join popular culture again. Although of course, already in the fifties there were some famous people, like Alan Ginsberg and William Burroughs, who went looking for ayahuasca in the Amazon region.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEioqhKnqCMVFDfowoO-_O48qFJIepb7SJhFALaVPLeDH3irLG3Co-pbp5skk0QBzdCIaJIpx-A2Gm-L-UUzihYB4zQOiEnou68Uz0hNF5yGS4H3k2940n0IMYXUPMaRvbh8DQoHXv1-Iaew/s1724/Screenshot+2020-09-25+at+09.53.36.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1724" data-original-width="1188" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEioqhKnqCMVFDfowoO-_O48qFJIepb7SJhFALaVPLeDH3irLG3Co-pbp5skk0QBzdCIaJIpx-A2Gm-L-UUzihYB4zQOiEnou68Uz0hNF5yGS4H3k2940n0IMYXUPMaRvbh8DQoHXv1-Iaew/s320/Screenshot+2020-09-25+at+09.53.36.png" /></a></div><span style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt;">J: The beat generation.</span><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">H: Exactly. But ayahuasca didn’t really become mainstream until the nineties. So the bottom line is that Michel Harner was a kind of pioneer, and when finally prohibition became a little bit less strict so that it became easier to get access to the psychoactive substances of original forms of entheogenic shamanism, they merged together.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">J: And how is this connected to ayahuasca churches like Santo Daime from Brazil, and others?<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">H: Santo Daime, União do Vegetal, and Barquinha are Brazilian churches based upon Ayahuasca as a sacrament, so they are mixtures of Amazonian native religions and Christianity, mostly Catholicism. They use Ayahuasca – in the Santo Daime they call it Daime, which means “give me” – as their sacrament. Daime is a sacred substance to them, so you go to this church and get administered a glass just in the same way as Catholics who receive the eucharist. They are singing their own hymns and get into very powerful altered states under the influence of their sacrament. Santo Daime has spread from Brazil to other countries in America and Europe. There have been all kind of legal battles in my own country. These have been quite important, because in the Netherlands for about 18 years (since 2001) religious use of ayahuasca was legal: the court had decided that to ensure their freedom of religion, it must be permitted to the Santo Daime to be able to drink their sacrament. <a href="https://www.academia.edu/43614450/The_Santo_Daime_Church_in_the_Netherlands_Why_the_ECHR_Should_Consider_the_Case_2020_">So religious freedom in this case overruled drug legislation. I think this was correct,</a> for we know that ayahuasca is perfectly safe if used in a responsible manner under proper supervision in such a religious context. Unfortunately the decision was overruled by a higher court on the European level a few years ago. So for a long time in the Netherlands you could just go to the Santo Daime church, and after an intake you could drink Ayahuasca with them.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">J: So it’s basically because of European legislation that ayahuasca cannot be drunk legally in the Netherlands anymore?<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">H: As far as I know, what happened is that a member of the Santo Daime thought “OK, now that we have this freedom in the Netherlands, we should bring it to the European level.” Unfortunately this led to a court case without proper legal advice. When the original court decision took place in 2001, there was excellent legal assistance; but that was not the case now, and in such sensitive cases you really do need to know exactly how to proceed. So unfortunately, the result was the opposite of what had been intended.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: start; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">J: I read your<a href="https://www.academia.edu/1170528/And_end_history_And_go_to_the_stars_Terence_McKenna_and_2012_2010_"> article about Terence McKenna’s and his brother’s search for ayahuasca brew in 1971</a>, which resulted in their long-standing hallucinogenic visions about the nature of the time and the eschaton of the world. Can you explain what happened to them in the Amazon forest?<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: start; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">H: Oh right, you want me to tell that story…<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: start; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">J: It’s a great story!<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">H: I mean, this is going to be a long interview then! Well, as briefly as possible, Terence McKenna was a typical hippie of that generation. He with his brother and some friends were totally fed up with mainstream Western society and were looking for answers in entheogenic shamanism. They had heard about mysterious hallucinogens in the Amazon forest, and so they ended up in a place </span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">La Chorrera in Colombia, the Putumayo region. </span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">They actually didn’t find there what they were looking for, but they did find lots of mushrooms, s</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">o they made a brew from it. Terence’s brother Dennis (who is now a well known ethno-pharmacologist) had a kind of revelation under the influence of the mushroom trip, and was making a very strange sound. In trying to interpret that, these guys embarked on some <i>really</i> wild<i> </i>psychedelic speculation: if you could make that kind of sound under the right conditions, then they thought it should be possible to “break through” to a completely different dimension of reality. Then you would get a kind of rippling effect and finally, after the 24-hours sun cycle, the whole of humanity would be enlightened!<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; font-size: 11pt; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: normal; letter-spacing: normal; line-height: 22px; margin: 0cm 0cm 8pt; orphans: auto; text-align: justify; text-decoration: none; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgHv-dusuurUdagclWUiRQaxGPmYgnaWTsPwPLbIqJXFtn3z3p3jBsibFPXCvDUAzelfoeQys8yzYXYw-DDZYNdMvUngAvtNJnLTOjtjcrRQjTpIOymru_fKvmzXp9qVnncKrW6bjzgakPY/s640/Terence-McKenna-in-the-Amazon-in-1971.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="531" data-original-width="640" height="532" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgHv-dusuurUdagclWUiRQaxGPmYgnaWTsPwPLbIqJXFtn3z3p3jBsibFPXCvDUAzelfoeQys8yzYXYw-DDZYNdMvUngAvtNJnLTOjtjcrRQjTpIOymru_fKvmzXp9qVnncKrW6bjzgakPY/w640-h532/Terence-McKenna-in-the-Amazon-in-1971.jpg" width="640" /></a></div><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><span style="font-size: 14pt;">So to do this experiment, they tried to make ayahuasca. For that you needed the ayahuasca vine (banisteriopsis caapi) plus DMT-containing plants, because that combination is what ayahuasca is all about. But McKenna in a footnote of his book admits that they weren’t sure they picked the right plants… So nobody knows what they may have put in that brew! We will never find out. Believe me, it was far more dangerous than they realized. I’ve been to the Amazon, and our guide told us that if you pick</span><span style="font-size: 14pt;"> </span><i style="font-size: 14pt;">ten</i><span style="font-size: 14pt;"> </span><span style="font-size: 14pt;">plants at random, the result will always be a deadly poison. So I’d say they were lucky to escape with their life. Also, take into account that the ayahuasca vine is an MAOI inhibitor. If you put mushrooms in the mix, as they did, then the result will be that the psilocybin effect will get boosted enormously. Instead of couple of hours, you may get a trip of twenty-four hours that may be five or six times stronger than normal. That, plus those other plants that we don’t know about. So this brew, whatever was in it, must have been something quite spectacular. In the middle of this gigantic trip, Dennis actually started making that sound again, so everybody got excited: “now it’s happening! we are breaking through to the other side!” Of course, when they finally came out of the forest, they found to their disappointment that the world had not gotten enlightened. It seems that Terence McKenna could never really accept this. In the seventies he wrote this book together with his brother,</span><span style="font-size: 14pt;"> </span><i style="font-size: 14pt;">The Invisible Landscape</i><span style="font-size: 14pt;">, in which he develops a complete theory about the structure of time. It basically says that there are larger and smaller cycles of time and there’s a culmination point coming soon, in 2012.</span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><span style="font-size: 14pt;">J: Of course.</span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">H: At that moment a whole series of cycles would end and there would be a big transformation of everything. 2012. OK, to finish the story: at one point McKenna met up with José Argüelles, a spiritual author fascinated with Maya culture and the Mayan Calendar. They put their theories together and came up with specific a date: 21<sup>st</sup> December 2012</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">. That idea got disseminated through popular culture and everybody got very excited. I don’t know whether you remember this.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">J: I remember it very well – it was all over the news…<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">H: Yes. One of the major Dutch newspapers (<i>Het Parool</i>, based in Amsterdam) made a big joke of it by bringing out their very last issue on that day, special issue for the last day of the world. That was quite fantastic. I have some good friends who were totally convinced that the great transformation was going to happen on december 21 and nothing would ever be the same anymore. That all of us would move into a different state of consciousness on that day. So Terence McKenna is one of the main authors at the origin of this theory – and it all started with some absolutely weird entheogenic experiments in the Putumayo region in Colombia.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">J: That’s really a nice story, I love it.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">H: Yeah, me too! [smile]<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">J: Why do you think that those narratives about the changing of the times and the end of the world are so popular in these days?<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">H: I think they have always been popular, there has always been an attraction for these kinds of apocalyptic stories. However, today we are living in very difficult times indeed: I mean the climate crisis, the fear of animal extinction, the huge economic-social problems that we are dealing within a world-wide level, and so on. Also the fact that through social media and the internet we are constantly bombarded with information about everything. So we are overwhelmed by all this negative information as well, and I think many people are just very worried about where we are going. I am no exception. It’s natural for eschatological theories to come up in such times: the belief that we are moving toward a crisis, and perhaps it will end in disaster, but perhaps we will move through it towards something better. That’s very attractive, very understandable. So yes, I think we’re definitely experiencing a sense of crisis, a crisis of meaning, of what life is all about, of where are we going and so on.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">J: So people are creating stories about this change, about all of those things?<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">H: Yes, we are creating stories. That is what religion does. Telling stories.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">J: You wrote <a href="https://www.academia.edu/31610387/The_First_Psychonaut_Louis_Alphonse_Cahagnets_Experiments_with_Narcotics_2016_">an article about </a></span><span lang="CS" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><a href="https://www.academia.edu/31610387/The_First_Psychonaut_Louis_Alphonse_Cahagnets_Experiments_with_Narcotics_2016_">Louis-</a></span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><a href="https://www.academia.edu/31610387/The_First_Psychonaut_Louis_Alphonse_Cahagnets_Experiments_with_Narcotics_2016_">Alphonse Cahagnet</a>, who you consider to be perhaps one of the very first psychonauts. Can you describe his story?<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">H: Well, you’ve really been reading my stuff. Thank you, I feel flattered! [both laughs] <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9j8_zaHshX_p70dbyccmBwratQ6E8Cw0wE0jeF9tyAMvE41y_S38HyOiDp1weGbAD3N1gwG-wDOKeLa5HNcp_9PtDCGifAZFco4U9XNyBFPodduzD6TKHtF4t9QbgDGpUHOf8dKOlDt0V/s200/Unknown.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="200" data-original-width="162" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9j8_zaHshX_p70dbyccmBwratQ6E8Cw0wE0jeF9tyAMvE41y_S38HyOiDp1weGbAD3N1gwG-wDOKeLa5HNcp_9PtDCGifAZFco4U9XNyBFPodduzD6TKHtF4t9QbgDGpUHOf8dKOlDt0V/w324-h400/Unknown.jpg" width="324" /></a></div><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><span style="font-size: 14pt;">Cahagnet was a French spiritualist. An interesting guy, not an intellectual, he worked with his hands but was very smart, very intelligent. I have a liking for him. He was working with somnambulic visionaries. Artificial somnambulism, as it was called, was this technique for bringing people into a trance state, during which they would claim to travel into spiritual realms and to other worlds. It was very popular at that time. Magnetizers were mostly men and the persons who went into a trance were usually women. So Cahagnet wrote three volumes about his experiments with somnambulic women. They told him the most amazing stories about other realities, other worlds, they traveled to other planets, they saw angels and all kinds of stuff like that. So Cahagnet got quite frustrated: he wanted to see it all for himself too. But he had no talent for trance himself; and even if you did go into somnambulic trance, you would lose you consciousness and afterwards wouldn’t remember anymore. But he wanted to go there in a conscious state, he wanted to experience it himself. And so he started experimenting with drugs. He tried to find old recipes and hallucinogenic plants. He was really willing to go out there, but nothing worked. He actually poisoned himself several times, got very sick, but nothing worked. Until one day he found “hashish of the orient.” Just in a pharmacy: it was legal at that time, you could just buy it.</span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">J: Really?<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">H: Yes, that’s a bit hard to imagine now. Hashisch had this aura of “oriental mystery.” Cahagnet didn’t smoke it, he dissolved it in coffee, drunk it, and then a couple of hours later it begun to work. He had this absolutely amazing experience, that he say answered all his questions: he got the sense of a complete overview of his whole life. It’s actually quite funny to read the “trip report” of somebody who had no predecessors and absolutely no idea of what to expect. After this, he started to organize sessions with people that he invited to his apartment in Paris. He handed out the hashish to them and became the center of a kind of psychonautic community. And he wrote a book about it. It’s almost never quoted but I think it’s actually a very important text. It was read by most of the founders of the occultist movement for decades after that, and was quite influential. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">J: And what’s the name of the book?<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">H: In French: <i><a href="http://iapsop.com/ssoc/1850__cahagnet___sanctuaire_du_spiritualisme.pdf">Sanctuaire du spiritualisme</a></i> (Sanctuary of Spiritualism, 1850). It was translated into English as <i>The Celestial Telegraph </i>(same year).<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">J: Why did this entheogenic breakthrough remain hidden from the wider public?<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">H: Well, it was basically a minority religion. I don’t think that it was kept secret deliberately. Spiritualism was actually a kind of mass movement at that time, and entheogenic practices spread to some extent in that context. Occultists came out of spiritualism but developed their own rituals, techniques and practices. There was a discrete culture of entheogenic usage in occultism, which has not been systematically studied until quite recently: see <a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/high-culture-9780190459116?cc=nl&lang=en&">Christopher Partridge’s book <i>High culture: Drugs, Mysticism, and the Pursuit of Transcendence in the Modern World</i></a>, which is very valuable. Still, much of this is still largely unexplored territory.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">J: How does Aleister Crowley and his famous love for drugs and bizarre sexuality fit into this atmosphere?<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">H: I have to say that I’m not a specialist of Crowley. I prefer to look at things that are people are <i>not</i> studying, and it almost seems as though everybody is studying nothing but Crowley these days…<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">J: OK, I understand.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">H: But anyway, Crowley was experimenting certainly with mescaline, with hashish, at one point with heroin, and that got pretty fatal, because he ended his life as an addict. We just heard at this conference that this was the cause of his death – I didn’t know that. Basically I can repeat what was said earlier [in the conference]. On the one hand there is this practice of ritual magic, which requires disciplines, focus, attention and so on. On the other hand, there is the use of drugs in occultism, because they open up the mind to other dimensions than normal rational consciousness. Basically, it seems that Crowley was interested in anything that could get him there. And there’s a certain tension I think, between those two approaches.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">J: So how do you consider the impact of this entheogenic occultism on later 60ties counterculture. Is there some connection?<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">H: Of course. <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Forbidden-Science-California-Hermetica-1970-1979/dp/1938398777">I’m just reading the diaries of one of the early pioneers of the fascination with UFOs, </a></span><span lang="EN" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><a href="https://www.amazon.com/Forbidden-Science-California-Hermetica-1970-1979/dp/1938398777">Jacques Vallée</a>. They are fascinating to read, as he gives you a very direct insight in the California counterculture of the seventies. And yes, already then it was all about Crowley, but also about the satanism of Anton LaVey, who was a good friend of Vallée</span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">. And in this whole culture everybody was experimenting with drugs, especially with LSD, but other substances as well. </span><span lang="EN" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">So </span><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">those approaches merged in a natural way, you just can’t skip it in that period.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Then, of course, around 1970 prohibition happened and things changed. Nixon basically used psychedelics as an excuse for putting members of the counterculture into prison. The authorities wanted to break its power, and the drugs were a handy means of doing it. And it must be said: the establishment won, the counterculture lost. That’s very clear. So hippies start to concentrate on meditating instead, they got a bit older too, so they got kids and responsibilities. And the radical movement went underground. One of our PhD students, <a href="https://pure.uva.nl/ws/files/45334015/Front_matter.pdf">J. Christian Greer recently defended his dissertation about what happened in the eighties.</a> This whole underground movement of psychedelia went underground and was flying very much under the radar of the authorities. Because they were using zines: handmade magazines that you would basically circulate among your friends through the mail. So you get this whole network of people who are the heirs of the sixties and seventies psychedelic subculture, and the authorities don’t really know about them. Then in the nineties, of course that movement begins using the internet.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">J: What do you think are the benefits that people can gain from entheogenic visions nowadays?<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">H: Well, I think you have to specify for what kind of substance. Because I think it’s different for each one.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">J: You may choose any substance you want.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjLVW_98kO5CWFlvev0itZKw31y2t8vOV81XMuXmK4T2lcFG-u-swuL9XjiWRU-ja-gdPkqjgmHVnMxTWIqUihOH6S4JpyRIQeH268rmjTNp_twOyT2UAnHr-JqS9IXl46EYorIFjILb7GZ/s600/mapia-igreja-05c44-ma.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="400" data-original-width="600" height="426" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjLVW_98kO5CWFlvev0itZKw31y2t8vOV81XMuXmK4T2lcFG-u-swuL9XjiWRU-ja-gdPkqjgmHVnMxTWIqUihOH6S4JpyRIQeH268rmjTNp_twOyT2UAnHr-JqS9IXl46EYorIFjILb7GZ/w640-h426/mapia-igreja-05c44-ma.jpg" title="Santo Daime ceremony in Mapia (Brazil)" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Santo Daime ceremony in Mapia (Brazil)<br /></td></tr></tbody></table><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">H: Let me think… Well, for example ayahuasca. Basically, as I already said, it has this ability of making people take a distance from their normal social roles. As far as I can tell, ayahuasca is one of the most powerful therapeutic substances in the field of psychedelics, of course if it’s taken in a responsible setting by people who know what they are doing. A few sessions with ayahuasca can potentially be the equivalent of years of therapy, so I think there’s a huge potential for helping people who are struggling with difficult stuff from their childhood, from other things that happened to them, whatever. There were some remarks earlier this day about risks; and unfortunately there’s an increasing trend of commercialization. Around the time of the Santo Daime verdict, there was a case in the Netherlands where somebody was said to have died in an ayahuasca ceremony. Police did not disclose the full information and there’s good reason to assume that in fact it was not actually ayahuasca but something else. But of course, the effect on the general public is predictable: they will think “oh my God, look how dangerous it all is.” Media sensationalism makes it difficult to be nuanced in these domains. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">J: True. We had a similar case in Czech Republic, people got poisoned from fake ayahuasca and the “shaman” spent some time in jail. Now the mainstream media automatically links ayahuasca with danger. But anyway, back to a more positive note – what is your relationship to music? I know that beside your academic career, you are also a classical guitar graduate…<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">H: Well, I love music! I originally was a classical guitar player. I attended conservatory, but then I realized that I didn’t want to end up teaching pupils the first beginnings of guitar for the rest of my life, so I moved into the different direction. But I love music, and in this context – there is a very interesting relation between entheogens and music. Because one of the effects it has, and that goes for many psychedelics, is that one’s sense of music gets three or four-dimensional.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">J: Wow…<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">H: Yes, most users of psychedelics will tell you that even if they listen to music they know very well, it gains an entire new level of depth that is hard or even impossible to explain. Another aspect is that in many entheogenic contexts, like ayahuasca, music plays a crucial role; because people are experiencing very extreme states of consciousness and the music is something they can hold on to, it guides them through the process, again in a way that’s not easy to explain. You have the <i>ikaros</i> in native American contexts. The same goes for the Santo Daime with their hymns. So I think music and entheogens are kind of “natural allies”. They go together: they can both induce alterations of consciousness.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">J: Do you think that music itself can be a means to a transcendental state?<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">H: Yes, I think so. I have experienced that myself. You must be in a kind of a receptive state, at the right moment with the right musician. I remember several cases where I was just completely in another world. There are also documented cases, for instance I’m thinking of a French pianist Pierre-Alain Volondat, who won one of the largest piano competitions in the world, the Queen Elizabeth Contest. He was playing this extremely difficult piano concert by Franz Liszt, in front of this large audience and broadcast live on TV, so he must have been under a lot of pressure. He says that he remembers putting his hands on the piano – and then heard the applause. He couldn’t remember anything of what happened. He clearly got into some kind of a trance state and played so brilliantly that he won both the public price and the jury price, which had never happened before. And if you listen to the recordings (<a href="https://queenelisabethcompetition.be/en/laureates/pierre-alain-volondat/2231/">scroll down here for the audio - I find these Brahms ballads simply one of the best live performances I've ever heard</a>) I think you can hear that they are really of transcendental quality. I do think that great musicians, I mean the really greatest ones, sometimes have that ability to enter into an altered state while playing, while still having all the technique at their disposal. I think that’s really something extraordinary.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgfs-08qu70YSZr6kZ-afDQjfgRYsLVNoMTNc5M1aN19dcvSasx36dLh4Ev2EPfd6jQoF1cOgZk_jrkNk-vcJK-mQOSnjrAN5SpsP_mOZTVhyphenhyphenXKLmu3G_Czr3e8mLtR4n9Yzo0LPtABDedm/s1090/Screenshot+2020-09-25+at+10.32.56.png" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="634" data-original-width="1090" height="372" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgfs-08qu70YSZr6kZ-afDQjfgRYsLVNoMTNc5M1aN19dcvSasx36dLh4Ev2EPfd6jQoF1cOgZk_jrkNk-vcJK-mQOSnjrAN5SpsP_mOZTVhyphenhyphenXKLmu3G_Czr3e8mLtR4n9Yzo0LPtABDedm/w640-h372/Screenshot+2020-09-25+at+10.32.56.png" width="640" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Pierre-Alain Volondat, Queen Elizabeth contest 1983</td></tr></tbody></table><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">J: One last question – what do you think about prohibition of entheogenic substances and psychedelics?<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">H: I think it’s quite irresponsible for society to simply prohibite substances if research shows that they have the ability to seriously help people who cannot be helped in other ways. One colleague of mine, a well known professor of psychiatry in the Netherlands, gave a public lecture not so long ago – slide after slide full of double blind studies, figures, figures, figures, and he basically said that psychiatry has not made any real progress for 15 years or so. There are no new ideas, no new theories, no new practices, nothing. With one exception: it seems that psychedelics are the only thing that actually works and offers new potentials for treatment. More than that, he told us that it works for almost all the major psychiatric problems: anxiety, depression, trauma etc. That’s not a fairy-tale but <a href="https://www.tijdschriftvoorpsychiatrie.nl/issues/555">very well documented</a>. So I think we need a rational approach to these substances instead of one that’s just based on fear without proper knowledge. It’s time for politicians to get over the stereotypes and understand that there’s a real potential here for helping people who are struggling with serious problems.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Betz, Hans Dieter, <i>The “Mithras Liturgy”: Text, Translation, and Commentary</i>, Mohr Siebeck: Tübingen 2003.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Cahagnet, Louis-Alphonse, <i>Sanctuaire du spiritualisme: Étude de l’âme humaine, et de ses rapports avec l’univers, d’après le somnambulisme et l’extase</i>, Paris 1850.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Greer, J. Christian, <i>Angel-Headed Hipsters: Psychedelic Militancy in Nineteen-Eighties North America</i>, Ph.D. Dissertation: University of Amsterdam 2020.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Hanegraaff, Wouter J., <i>Esotericism and the Academy: Rejected Knowledge in Western Culture</i>, Cambridge University Press 2012.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">----, <i>Western Esotericism: A Guide for the Perplexed</i>, Bloomsbury 2013.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">----, “Entheogenic Esotericism,” in: Egil Asprem & Kennet Granholm (eds.), <i>Contemporary Esotericism</i>, Equinox 2013, 392-409.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">----, “The First Psychonaut? Louis-Alphonse Cahagnet’s Experiments with Narcotics,” <i>International Journal for the Study of New Religions</i> 7:2 (2016), 105-123.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Keller, Barbara, Constantin Klein, Anne Swhajor-Biesemann, Christopher F. Silver, Ralph Hood & Heinz Streib, “The Semantics of ‘Spirituality’ and Related Self-Identifications: A Comparative Study in Germany and the USA,” <i>Archive for the Psychology of Religion</i> 35 (2013), 71-100.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Streib, Heinz & Ralph W. Hood, “‘Spirituality’ as Privatized Experience-Oriented Religion: Empirical and Conceptual Perspectives,” <i>Implicit Religion</i> 14:4 (2011), 433-453.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Streib, Heinz & Ralph W. Hood (eds.), <i>Semantics and Psychology of Spirituality: A Cross-Cultural Analysis</i>, Springer 2016. <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Ustinova, Yulia, <i>Caves and the Ancient Greek Mind: Descending Underground in the Search for Ultimate Truth</i>, Oxford University Press 2009.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 22px; text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">----, <i>Divine Mania: Alterations of Consciousness in Ancient Greece</i>, Routledge 2018.<o:p></o:p></span></p><style class="WebKit-mso-list-quirks-style">
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mso-pagination:widow-orphan lines-together;
page-break-after:avoid;
mso-outline-level:1;
font-size:16.0pt;
font-family:"Calibri Light",sans-serif;
mso-ascii-font-family:"Calibri Light";
mso-ascii-theme-font:major-latin;
mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";
mso-fareast-theme-font:major-fareast;
mso-hansi-font-family:"Calibri Light";
mso-hansi-theme-font:major-latin;
mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman";
mso-bidi-theme-font:major-bidi;
color:#2F5496;
mso-themecolor:accent1;
mso-themeshade:191;
mso-font-kerning:0pt;
mso-ansi-language:CS;
mso-fareast-language:EN-US;
mso-bidi-language:AR-SA;
font-weight:normal;}
p.MsoCommentText, li.MsoCommentText, div.MsoCommentText
{mso-style-noshow:yes;
mso-style-priority:99;
mso-style-link:"Comment Text Char";
margin-top:0cm;
margin-right:0cm;
margin-bottom:8.0pt;
margin-left:0cm;
mso-pagination:widow-orphan;
font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif;
mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri;
mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-fareast-font-family:Calibri;
mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri;
mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-bidi-font-family:Arial;
mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;
mso-ansi-language:CS;
mso-fareast-language:EN-US;
mso-bidi-language:AR-SA;}
span.MsoCommentReference
{mso-style-noshow:yes;
mso-style-priority:99;
mso-ansi-font-size:8.0pt;
mso-bidi-font-size:8.0pt;}
p.MsoCommentSubject, li.MsoCommentSubject, div.MsoCommentSubject
{mso-style-noshow:yes;
mso-style-priority:99;
mso-style-parent:"Comment Text";
mso-style-link:"Comment Subject Char";
mso-style-next:"Comment Text";
margin-top:0cm;
margin-right:0cm;
margin-bottom:8.0pt;
margin-left:0cm;
mso-pagination:widow-orphan;
font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif;
mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri;
mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-fareast-font-family:Calibri;
mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri;
mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-bidi-font-family:Arial;
mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;
mso-ansi-language:CS;
mso-fareast-language:EN-US;
mso-bidi-language:AR-SA;
font-weight:bold;}
p.MsoAcetate, li.MsoAcetate, div.MsoAcetate
{mso-style-noshow:yes;
mso-style-priority:99;
mso-style-link:"Balloon Text Char";
margin:0cm;
mso-pagination:widow-orphan;
font-size:9.0pt;
font-family:"Segoe UI",sans-serif;
mso-fareast-font-family:Calibri;
mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-ansi-language:CS;
mso-fareast-language:EN-US;
mso-bidi-language:AR-SA;}
p.MsoListParagraph, li.MsoListParagraph, div.MsoListParagraph
{mso-style-priority:34;
mso-style-unhide:no;
mso-style-qformat:yes;
margin-top:0cm;
margin-right:0cm;
margin-bottom:8.0pt;
margin-left:36.0pt;
mso-add-space:auto;
line-height:107%;
mso-pagination:widow-orphan;
font-size:11.0pt;
font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif;
mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri;
mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-fareast-font-family:Calibri;
mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri;
mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-bidi-font-family:Arial;
mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;
mso-ansi-language:CS;
mso-fareast-language:EN-US;
mso-bidi-language:AR-SA;}
p.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst
{mso-style-priority:34;
mso-style-unhide:no;
mso-style-qformat:yes;
mso-style-type:export-only;
margin-top:0cm;
margin-right:0cm;
margin-bottom:0cm;
margin-left:36.0pt;
mso-add-space:auto;
line-height:107%;
mso-pagination:widow-orphan;
font-size:11.0pt;
font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif;
mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri;
mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-fareast-font-family:Calibri;
mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri;
mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-bidi-font-family:Arial;
mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;
mso-ansi-language:CS;
mso-fareast-language:EN-US;
mso-bidi-language:AR-SA;}
p.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle
{mso-style-priority:34;
mso-style-unhide:no;
mso-style-qformat:yes;
mso-style-type:export-only;
margin-top:0cm;
margin-right:0cm;
margin-bottom:0cm;
margin-left:36.0pt;
mso-add-space:auto;
line-height:107%;
mso-pagination:widow-orphan;
font-size:11.0pt;
font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif;
mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri;
mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-fareast-font-family:Calibri;
mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri;
mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-bidi-font-family:Arial;
mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;
mso-ansi-language:CS;
mso-fareast-language:EN-US;
mso-bidi-language:AR-SA;}
p.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast
{mso-style-priority:34;
mso-style-unhide:no;
mso-style-qformat:yes;
mso-style-type:export-only;
margin-top:0cm;
margin-right:0cm;
margin-bottom:8.0pt;
margin-left:36.0pt;
mso-add-space:auto;
line-height:107%;
mso-pagination:widow-orphan;
font-size:11.0pt;
font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif;
mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri;
mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-fareast-font-family:Calibri;
mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri;
mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-bidi-font-family:Arial;
mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;
mso-ansi-language:CS;
mso-fareast-language:EN-US;
mso-bidi-language:AR-SA;}
span.Heading1Char
{mso-style-name:"Heading 1 Char";
mso-style-priority:9;
mso-style-unhide:no;
mso-style-locked:yes;
mso-style-link:"Heading 1";
mso-ansi-font-size:16.0pt;
mso-bidi-font-size:16.0pt;
font-family:"Calibri Light",sans-serif;
mso-ascii-font-family:"Calibri Light";
mso-ascii-theme-font:major-latin;
mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";
mso-fareast-theme-font:major-fareast;
mso-hansi-font-family:"Calibri Light";
mso-hansi-theme-font:major-latin;
mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman";
mso-bidi-theme-font:major-bidi;
color:#2F5496;
mso-themecolor:accent1;
mso-themeshade:191;}
span.CommentTextChar
{mso-style-name:"Comment Text Char";
mso-style-noshow:yes;
mso-style-priority:99;
mso-style-unhide:no;
mso-style-locked:yes;
mso-style-link:"Comment Text";
mso-ansi-font-size:10.0pt;
mso-bidi-font-size:10.0pt;}
span.CommentSubjectChar
{mso-style-name:"Comment Subject Char";
mso-style-noshow:yes;
mso-style-priority:99;
mso-style-unhide:no;
mso-style-locked:yes;
mso-style-parent:"Comment Text Char";
mso-style-link:"Comment Subject";
mso-ansi-font-size:10.0pt;
mso-bidi-font-size:10.0pt;
font-weight:bold;}
span.BalloonTextChar
{mso-style-name:"Balloon Text Char";
mso-style-noshow:yes;
mso-style-priority:99;
mso-style-unhide:no;
mso-style-locked:yes;
mso-style-link:"Balloon Text";
mso-ansi-font-size:9.0pt;
mso-bidi-font-size:9.0pt;
font-family:"Segoe UI",sans-serif;
mso-ascii-font-family:"Segoe UI";
mso-hansi-font-family:"Segoe UI";
mso-bidi-font-family:"Segoe UI";}
.MsoChpDefault
{mso-style-type:export-only;
mso-default-props:yes;
font-size:11.0pt;
mso-ansi-font-size:11.0pt;
mso-bidi-font-size:11.0pt;
font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif;
mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri;
mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-fareast-font-family:Calibri;
mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri;
mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-bidi-font-family:Arial;
mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;
mso-ansi-language:CS;
mso-fareast-language:EN-US;
mso-bidi-language:AR-SA;}
.MsoPapDefault
{mso-style-type:export-only;
margin-bottom:8.0pt;
line-height:107%;}
@page WordSection1
{size:595.3pt 841.9pt;
margin:70.85pt 70.85pt 70.85pt 70.85pt;
mso-header-margin:35.4pt;
mso-footer-margin:35.4pt;
mso-paper-source:0;}
div.WordSection1
{page:WordSection1;}
/* List Definitions */
@list l0
{mso-list-id:711460064;
mso-list-type:hybrid;
mso-list-template-ids:-1478437854 67436561 67436569 67436571 67436559 67436569 67436571 67436559 67436569 67436571;}
@list l0:level1
{mso-level-text:"%1\)";
mso-level-tab-stop:none;
mso-level-number-position:left;
margin-left:46.35pt;
text-indent:-18.0pt;}
@list l0:level2
{mso-level-number-format:alpha-lower;
mso-level-tab-stop:none;
mso-level-number-position:left;
margin-left:82.35pt;
text-indent:-18.0pt;}
@list l0:level3
{mso-level-number-format:roman-lower;
mso-level-tab-stop:none;
mso-level-number-position:right;
margin-left:118.35pt;
text-indent:-9.0pt;}
@list l0:level4
{mso-level-tab-stop:none;
mso-level-number-position:left;
margin-left:154.35pt;
text-indent:-18.0pt;}
@list l0:level5
{mso-level-number-format:alpha-lower;
mso-level-tab-stop:none;
mso-level-number-position:left;
margin-left:190.35pt;
text-indent:-18.0pt;}
@list l0:level6
{mso-level-number-format:roman-lower;
mso-level-tab-stop:none;
mso-level-number-position:right;
margin-left:226.35pt;
text-indent:-9.0pt;}
@list l0:level7
{mso-level-tab-stop:none;
mso-level-number-position:left;
margin-left:262.35pt;
text-indent:-18.0pt;}
@list l0:level8
{mso-level-number-format:alpha-lower;
mso-level-tab-stop:none;
mso-level-number-position:left;
margin-left:298.35pt;
text-indent:-18.0pt;}
@list l0:level9
{mso-level-number-format:roman-lower;
mso-level-tab-stop:none;
mso-level-number-position:right;
margin-left:334.35pt;
text-indent:-9.0pt;}
-->
</style><style class="WebKit-mso-list-quirks-style">
<!--
/* Style Definitions */
p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal
{mso-style-unhide:no;
mso-style-qformat:yes;
mso-style-parent:"";
margin-top:0cm;
margin-right:0cm;
margin-bottom:8.0pt;
margin-left:0cm;
line-height:107%;
mso-pagination:widow-orphan;
font-size:11.0pt;
font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif;
mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri;
mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-fareast-font-family:Calibri;
mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri;
mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-bidi-font-family:Arial;
mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;
mso-ansi-language:CS;
mso-fareast-language:EN-US;
mso-bidi-language:AR-SA;}
h1
{mso-style-priority:9;
mso-style-unhide:no;
mso-style-qformat:yes;
mso-style-link:"Heading 1 Char";
mso-style-next:Normal;
margin-top:12.0pt;
margin-right:0cm;
margin-bottom:0cm;
margin-left:0cm;
line-height:107%;
mso-pagination:widow-orphan lines-together;
page-break-after:avoid;
mso-outline-level:1;
font-size:16.0pt;
font-family:"Calibri Light",sans-serif;
mso-ascii-font-family:"Calibri Light";
mso-ascii-theme-font:major-latin;
mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";
mso-fareast-theme-font:major-fareast;
mso-hansi-font-family:"Calibri Light";
mso-hansi-theme-font:major-latin;
mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman";
mso-bidi-theme-font:major-bidi;
color:#2F5496;
mso-themecolor:accent1;
mso-themeshade:191;
mso-font-kerning:0pt;
mso-ansi-language:CS;
mso-fareast-language:EN-US;
mso-bidi-language:AR-SA;
font-weight:normal;}
p.MsoCommentText, li.MsoCommentText, div.MsoCommentText
{mso-style-noshow:yes;
mso-style-priority:99;
mso-style-link:"Comment Text Char";
margin-top:0cm;
margin-right:0cm;
margin-bottom:8.0pt;
margin-left:0cm;
mso-pagination:widow-orphan;
font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif;
mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri;
mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-fareast-font-family:Calibri;
mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri;
mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-bidi-font-family:Arial;
mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;
mso-ansi-language:CS;
mso-fareast-language:EN-US;
mso-bidi-language:AR-SA;}
span.MsoCommentReference
{mso-style-noshow:yes;
mso-style-priority:99;
mso-ansi-font-size:8.0pt;
mso-bidi-font-size:8.0pt;}
p.MsoCommentSubject, li.MsoCommentSubject, div.MsoCommentSubject
{mso-style-noshow:yes;
mso-style-priority:99;
mso-style-parent:"Comment Text";
mso-style-link:"Comment Subject Char";
mso-style-next:"Comment Text";
margin-top:0cm;
margin-right:0cm;
margin-bottom:8.0pt;
margin-left:0cm;
mso-pagination:widow-orphan;
font-size:10.0pt;
font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif;
mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri;
mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-fareast-font-family:Calibri;
mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri;
mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-bidi-font-family:Arial;
mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;
mso-ansi-language:CS;
mso-fareast-language:EN-US;
mso-bidi-language:AR-SA;
font-weight:bold;}
p.MsoAcetate, li.MsoAcetate, div.MsoAcetate
{mso-style-noshow:yes;
mso-style-priority:99;
mso-style-link:"Balloon Text Char";
margin:0cm;
mso-pagination:widow-orphan;
font-size:9.0pt;
font-family:"Segoe UI",sans-serif;
mso-fareast-font-family:Calibri;
mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-ansi-language:CS;
mso-fareast-language:EN-US;
mso-bidi-language:AR-SA;}
p.MsoListParagraph, li.MsoListParagraph, div.MsoListParagraph
{mso-style-priority:34;
mso-style-unhide:no;
mso-style-qformat:yes;
margin-top:0cm;
margin-right:0cm;
margin-bottom:8.0pt;
margin-left:36.0pt;
mso-add-space:auto;
line-height:107%;
mso-pagination:widow-orphan;
font-size:11.0pt;
font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif;
mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri;
mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-fareast-font-family:Calibri;
mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri;
mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-bidi-font-family:Arial;
mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;
mso-ansi-language:CS;
mso-fareast-language:EN-US;
mso-bidi-language:AR-SA;}
p.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst
{mso-style-priority:34;
mso-style-unhide:no;
mso-style-qformat:yes;
mso-style-type:export-only;
margin-top:0cm;
margin-right:0cm;
margin-bottom:0cm;
margin-left:36.0pt;
mso-add-space:auto;
line-height:107%;
mso-pagination:widow-orphan;
font-size:11.0pt;
font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif;
mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri;
mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-fareast-font-family:Calibri;
mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri;
mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-bidi-font-family:Arial;
mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;
mso-ansi-language:CS;
mso-fareast-language:EN-US;
mso-bidi-language:AR-SA;}
p.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle
{mso-style-priority:34;
mso-style-unhide:no;
mso-style-qformat:yes;
mso-style-type:export-only;
margin-top:0cm;
margin-right:0cm;
margin-bottom:0cm;
margin-left:36.0pt;
mso-add-space:auto;
line-height:107%;
mso-pagination:widow-orphan;
font-size:11.0pt;
font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif;
mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri;
mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-fareast-font-family:Calibri;
mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri;
mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-bidi-font-family:Arial;
mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;
mso-ansi-language:CS;
mso-fareast-language:EN-US;
mso-bidi-language:AR-SA;}
p.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast, li.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast, div.MsoListParagraphCxSpLast
{mso-style-priority:34;
mso-style-unhide:no;
mso-style-qformat:yes;
mso-style-type:export-only;
margin-top:0cm;
margin-right:0cm;
margin-bottom:8.0pt;
margin-left:36.0pt;
mso-add-space:auto;
line-height:107%;
mso-pagination:widow-orphan;
font-size:11.0pt;
font-family:"Calibri",sans-serif;
mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri;
mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-fareast-font-family:Calibri;
mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri;
mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;
mso-bidi-font-family:Arial;
mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;
mso-ansi-language:CS;
mso-fareast-language:EN-US;
mso-bidi-language:AR-SA;}
span.Heading1Char
{mso-style-name:"Heading 1 Char";
mso-style-priority:9;
mso-style-unhide:no;
mso-style-locked:yes;
mso-style-link:"Heading 1";
mso-ansi-font-size:16.0pt;
mso-bidi-font-size:16.0pt;
font-family:"Calibri Light",sans-serif;
mso-ascii-font-family:"Calibri Light";
mso-ascii-theme-font:major-latin;
mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman";
mso-fareast-theme-font:major-fareast;
mso-hansi-font-family:"Calibri Light";
mso-hansi-theme-font:major-latin;
mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman";
mso-bidi-theme-font:major-bidi;
color:#2F5496;
mso-themecolor:accent1;
mso-themeshade:191;}
span.CommentTextChar
{mso-style-name:"Comment Text Char";
mso-style-noshow:yes;
mso-style-priority:99;
mso-style-unhide:no;
mso-style-locked:yes;
mso-style-link:"Comment Text";
mso-ansi-font-size:10.0pt;
mso-bidi-font-size:10.0pt;}
span.CommentSubjectChar
{mso-style-name:"Comment Subject Char";
mso-style-noshow:yes;
mso-style-priority:99;
mso-style-unhide:no;
mso-style-locked:yes;
mso-style-parent:"Comment Text Char";
mso-style-link:"Comment Subject";
mso-ansi-font-size:10.0pt;
mso-bidi-font-size:10.0pt;
font-weight:bold;}
span.BalloonTextChar
{mso-style-name:"Balloon Text Char";
mso-style-noshow:yes;
mso-style-priority:99;
mso-style-unhide:no;
mso-style-locked:yes;
mso-style-link:"Balloon Text";
mso-ansi-font-size:9.0pt;
mso-bidi-font-size:9.0pt;
font-family:"Segoe UI",sans-serif;
mso-ascii-font-family:"Segoe UI";
mso-hansi-font-family:"Segoe UI";
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</style>wouterjhanegraaff.blogspot.comhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15519965611425366178noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5967881025525384120.post-25089416096176714942020-07-24T06:03:00.012-07:002020-07-24T07:07:45.210-07:00Yes, It Is Possible... (Rainer Maria Rilke)<p style="font-family: "times new roman", serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;"><span lang="" style="color: #1d2129; font-family: cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; font-size: 14pt; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiTT9fCX9BLxoFGVp-otAkaYjBIRcEzpvZs0xFPVjicf30Z4xiAcbVexib5q7X9a2tnO2BNxCkvrOylFkKwxhIcJLCJu5Z5ZSnRVh7B7jE_U-zovgEchCszT6MQb5UbZJsnaoD82c5Xwcwz/s2048/IMG_0401.jpeg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1536" data-original-width="2048" height="469" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiTT9fCX9BLxoFGVp-otAkaYjBIRcEzpvZs0xFPVjicf30Z4xiAcbVexib5q7X9a2tnO2BNxCkvrOylFkKwxhIcJLCJu5Z5ZSnRVh7B7jE_U-zovgEchCszT6MQb5UbZJsnaoD82c5Xwcwz/w625-h469/IMG_0401.jpeg" width="625" /></a></div><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;"><br /></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif;">As the Corona virus was dominating the media and everybody’s daily lives, many of my friends on Facebook began launching “book challenges” to entertain themselves and the members of their networks. I accepted a challenge to list “10 books that changed your life,” and soon discovered that it was not just great fun to select ten titles and write about them, but that the exercise triggered a process of self-reflection. It made me conscious of some deep and long-term motivations and obsessions that have very much determined my personal life and my career as a scholar as well (or the other way around?). Here is nr. 4 on my list.</span><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #1d2129; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> </span><span style="font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #1d2129; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Browsing through my mother's book shelves one afternoon when I was around twenty years old, I came across this small “Salamander” pocket edition of Rainer Maria Rilke’s <i>Aufzeichnungen des Malte Laurids Brigge</i> (1910). My mother’s signature is in it, showing that she herself had bought it in 1956, when she was twenty-eight. If any book ever opened up for me the depth dimension to which great literature can give access, it was this one. I just didn’t know what hit me – this novel was so completely different from anything I had ever read before that I felt like entering an entirely new universe. It took me a very long time to finish <i>Brigge</i>, because I found myself returning again and again to the opening pages and starting over again: no matter how often I read any page, I never felt I had really understood it deeply enough to continue.There was always that sense of a surplus of meaning that kept escaping me, and this remains the case even when I read and re-read it today.</span><span style="font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #1d2129; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;"></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKR8yGyimQz0Pi_uOqg3qOM1YJv-or-C3MLDeaWXWEsK4a-aNZ3gGSLAPV3-CCrW9BWrpk8mRlUoa4sjzXUgAOVIpFU__ZawfRWVnTQ6Sf-Al7ZJ7DfMB-784Vfw_D3XkW2WQXLOXUEc_4/s1442/Screenshot+2020-07-24+at+14.29.53.png" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1042" data-original-width="1442" height="364" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhKR8yGyimQz0Pi_uOqg3qOM1YJv-or-C3MLDeaWXWEsK4a-aNZ3gGSLAPV3-CCrW9BWrpk8mRlUoa4sjzXUgAOVIpFU__ZawfRWVnTQ6Sf-Al7ZJ7DfMB-784Vfw_D3XkW2WQXLOXUEc_4/w500-h364/Screenshot+2020-07-24+at+14.29.53.png" width="500" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">D.A.M. Binnendijk and Nini Brunt<br /></td></tr></tbody></table><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><font color="#1d2129">It is remarkable that I was not even reading an edition in the original German but a Dutch translation by </font><a href="http://resources.huygens.knaw.nl/bwn1880-2000/lemmata/bwn5/binnendijk"><font color="#bf9000">Dick Adrianus Michael Binnendijk (1902-1984)</font></a><font color="#1d2129"> and </font><a href="https://www.tijdschrift-filter.nl/jaargangen/2013/204/ik-heb-mijn-hele-leven-vertaald-maar-ik-heb-niets-te-vertellen-25-35/"><font color="#bf9000">Nini Brunt (1891-1984)</font></a><font color="#1d2129">. Strange as it may seem, even today I find their translation at least as good and in some respects perhaps even superior to Rilke’s own German. So who were these people? As it turns out, both were well-known figures in the circles of Dutch literature. Binnendijk was a poet and critic known best for his friendships with important poets such as Menno ter Braak, E. du Perron en Hendrik Marsman, while Nini Brunt was a devoted and extremely productive translator remembered best for her Kafka translations. They were friends and collaborated on other projects as well, including a volume </font><i style="color: #1d2129;">Demonie en droom: Vertellingen der Duitsche Romantiek</i><font color="#1d2129"> (Demonism and Dream: Stories of German Romanticism). I very much like their ideas about translation: it was Brunt's opinion that readers should not be able to tell in which language the book had originally been written, and Binnendijk wrote that if one does not write clearly, this means one does not think clearly. Both very true. As it turns out, Binnendijk and Brunt were so confident and skilled that even in the case of a writer of genius, they dared to write what Rilke would have written if Dutch had been his native language. This is obviously risky and could lead to disastrous results in the case of lesser translators, but in their case it was a brilliant success. </font></span><span style="font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #1d2129; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Rilke’s novel resonates with me on many levels. Like his protagonist, I too spent a period of my life in Paris living in a single room of my own. As Brigge is wandering the streets, everything he sees and hears enters his mind with incredible intensity, sparking memories and associations that are unlike anything I have ever read anywhere else. Among the many passages that I know almost by heart, the following one in particular may give a clue to why I ended up pursuing the study of “rejected knowledge.” </span><span style="font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #1d2129; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> </span><span style="font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #1d2129; font-family: cambria, serif;">It is ridiculous. I’m sitting here in my little room, me, Brigge, twenty-eight years old, a total unknown. I’m sitting here and I am nothing. And yet, this nobody starts thinking. And five storeys high, on a grey Paris afternoon, he is thinking these thoughts.</span><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #1d2129; font-family: cambria, serif;">Is it possible, he thinks, that nothing true and important has been seen, recognized or said? Is it possible that one has had thousands of years’ time to look, to think and note down, and that one has allowed these thousands of years to pass by like a school break in which one eats one’s sandwich and an apple?</span><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #1d2129; font-family: cambria, serif;">Yes, it is possible.</span><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #1d2129; font-family: cambria, serif;">Is it possible that in spite of inventions and progress, in spite of culture, religion and worldly wisdom, one has remained on the surface? Is it possible that one has covered this surface, which was still something at least, with some incredibly boring fabric, so that it looks like the room furniture after the holidays?</span><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #1d2129; font-family: cambria, serif;">Yes, it is possible.</span><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #1d2129; font-family: cambria, serif;">Is it possible that the whole of world history has been misunderstood. Is it possible that the past is wrong ... ? ...</span><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #1d2129; font-family: cambria, serif;">Yes, it is possible. ...</span><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #1d2129; font-family: cambria, serif;">Is it possible that all those people have incredibly precise knowledge of a past that has never existed? Is it possible that all realities are meaningless for them; that their life is passing without connection to anything, like a clock in an empty room</span><span style="color: #1d2129; font-family: cambria, serif;"> ?</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; text-align: justify;"><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #1d2129; font-family: cambria, serif;">Yes, it is possible. ...</span><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #1d2129; font-family: cambria, serif;">But if all these things are possible, if they have even just a semblance of possibility, - then for the sake of everything in the world, something must happen. The very first person, he who has these disquieting thoughts, must begin to do something of what has been neglected, whoever he is, no matter how unfit he may be for the task: after all, there is no one else. This young, unimportant stranger, Brigge, five storeys high, will have to start writing, day and night. Yes, he will have to write. That is how it will end.</span><o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #1d2129; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> </span><span style="font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #1d2129; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Formulated in different and more familiar terms: could it be that all our narratives are wrong? As individuals we only know who we are because of the stories we have been told (and keep telling ourselves) about where we have come from. And those stories are embedded in the much larger stories or grand narratives that we tell ourselves about our culture and society. Whether on the individual or the collective level, how we imagine our past determines the limits of who we think we are and what we are able to imagine about the future. So what if we were mistaken all along? What if we somehow missed what was actually most important? What if we were looking just at the surface of reality and never beyond? “Could that be possible?” I must have been asking myself, at some more or less conscious level of awareness, and Rilke gave the answer: “yes, it is possible.” </span><span style="font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #1d2129; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">I do not recall any conscious decision on my own part to follow Brigge’s example, but it cannot be doubted that I did what he did: I started writing. And to tell the truth, as I was pursuing my explorations, I began discovering that what first seemed just a “possibility” turned out to be actually true. I remain convinced of that truth: very important dimensions of reality (I mean historical reality, the reality of human beings as they have traveled through time, stretching from remote antiquity all the way up to this very second in which I am typing these lines) have been overlooked, marginalized, distorted, discredited, mispositioned, in short – misunderstood, not just superficially or just concerning details, but at a fundamental level. At bottom, what this means is very simple: <i>it could all be different</i>. I cannot think of anything more liberating than that. </span><span style="font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> <o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;"></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg_sK6_HtsEs4ybVpISmrHq9TO8W-lzpBxBxsNdgj9o1Td6n7almo3FjDKSFNM3lqoorZXvHL6Kz6EVhtSOhOSQcHCMQA5JSKSpfedvyBKOjdwA_NrHE85squPQrwC5Z_iuxOnScoRx52QE/s1000/rilke.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="561" data-original-width="1000" height="440" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg_sK6_HtsEs4ybVpISmrHq9TO8W-lzpBxBxsNdgj9o1Td6n7almo3FjDKSFNM3lqoorZXvHL6Kz6EVhtSOhOSQcHCMQA5JSKSpfedvyBKOjdwA_NrHE85squPQrwC5Z_iuxOnScoRx52QE/w781-h440/rilke.jpg" width="781" /></a></div><span style="font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><br /></span><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> </span></p>wouterjhanegraaff.blogspot.comhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15519965611425366178noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5967881025525384120.post-83877063981330330912020-07-11T06:26:00.000-07:002020-07-11T06:26:41.495-07:00The Third Kind: Gilles Quispel and Gnosis<p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;"><span lang="" style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"><font style="line-height: 1.5;">As the Corona virus was dominating the media and everybody’s daily lives, many of my friends on Facebook began launching “book challenges” to entertain themselves and the members of their networks. I accepted a challenge to list “10 books that changed your life,” and soon discovered that it was not just great fun to select ten titles and write about them, but that the exercise triggered a process of self-reflection. It made me conscious of some deep and long-term motivations and obsessions that have very much determined my personal life and my career as a scholar as well (or the other way around?). Number 3: a Dutch collective volume edited by Gilles Quispel.</font></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;"><span lang="" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;"><span lang="" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiCEFZcPMvEiZrTfvCs9rC85E36ARUp8DCMMFlB987z0Nz41dvlgt5iEC-tlwKIfz3J8PLvoQIg4jb00O0Uysw1YYe21tKdcaTos7nk9HG5V6Ld2nyulzixwqEXOLg2g-dp-L46kA6G3_BD/s987/Screenshot+2020-07-11+at+14.12.58.png" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="987" data-original-width="656" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiCEFZcPMvEiZrTfvCs9rC85E36ARUp8DCMMFlB987z0Nz41dvlgt5iEC-tlwKIfz3J8PLvoQIg4jb00O0Uysw1YYe21tKdcaTos7nk9HG5V6Ld2nyulzixwqEXOLg2g-dp-L46kA6G3_BD/w266-h400/Screenshot+2020-07-11+at+14.12.58.png" width="266" /></a></div><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><div style="text-align: justify;"><span lang="" style="background-color: white; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt;">In a list of “ten books that changed my life,” this small Dutch volume cannot</span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt;"> go missing</span><span lang="" style="background-color: white; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt;"> – </span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt;">and yet I </span><span lang="" style="background-color: white; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt;">must confess that</span><span lang="" style="background-color: white; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt;"> </span><span lang="" style="background-color: white; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt;">I include it with rather</span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt;"> mixed feelings</span><span lang="" style="background-color: white; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt;">. It is not</span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt;"> a </span><span lang="" style="background-color: white; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt;">very</span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt;"> good book</span><span lang="" style="background-color: white; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt;"> at all, and I select it only because the <i>title</i> had quite an impact on me. I bought this volume shortly after its publication in 1988, and quickly discovered that its general agenda and approach to the study of “gnostic” currents was quite different from my own.</span><span lang="" style="background-color: white; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt;"> </span><span lang="" style="background-color: white; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt;">The editor, Gilles </span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt;">Quispel</span><span lang="" style="background-color: white; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt;"> (1916-2006),</span><span style="background-color: white; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt;"> was impossible to miss </span><span lang="" style="background-color: white; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt;">for anybody</span><span style="font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt;"> interested in </span><span lang="" style="font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt;">such topics</span><span style="font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt;"> in the Netherlands </span><span lang="" style="font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt;">by the end of the 1980s. He loved giving lectures for large general au</span><span style="caret-color: rgb(0, 0, 0); color: black; font-family: -webkit-standard; font-size: medium;"></span><span style="font-size: 14pt;">diences, made appearances in the media, and was an internationally recognized authority of gnosticism. Of course I contacted him and he was kind enough to invite me to his home. Unfortunately though, we didn’t pull it off. Our personalities turned out to be so antithetical that we began clashing almost immediately, and our intellectual agendas were diametrically opposed. For my part, I wanted critical historical research free from apologetic agendas; for his part, he wanted to use his authority as a university professor to spread the gospel of gnosis. I do not think he would disagree with that assessment – for instance, when Roelof van den Broek and I organized a summer university “Gnosis and Hermeticism from Antiquity to Modern Times” in Amsterdam in 1994, I distinctly remember how he introduced himself during the opening round, not as a scholar or academic but simply as “Gilles Quispel, gnostic.” </span></div><o:p></o:p></span><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;"><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">A typical representative of the Eranos perspective, Quispel gave a peculiar twist to Jung’s concept of Gnosticism by reading it through the lens of a very specific Dutch type of Protestant Pietism known as <i><a href="https://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bevindelijk_gereformeerden">bevindelijkheid</a></i>. This virtually untranslatable word refers to a deeply conservative Christian tradition that emphasizes an individualized and experiential approach to biblical texts. Quispel loved to speak of gnosis as “knowledge of the heart,” but always made a point of pronouncing it as the <i>bevindelijken</i> did: not as <i>kennis van het hart</i> but in deliberately archaic Dutch as <i>kennisse des harten</i> – a nuance that is bound to escape anyone except a Dutch native speaker familiar with these traditions. It didn’t work for me. I must admit that my instinctive reaction to this type of language has always been similar to how Gershom Scholem reacted to reading Simone Weil, as formulated in a letter to George Lichtheim from 1950:<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;"><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> </span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt 36pt; text-align: justify;"><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; line-height: 28px;"><font style="line-height: 1.5;">What attracts me to this very gifted unhappy young woman is the horrible smell of interiority, that … explains why I find Christianity so utterly unbearable. … Of course the swindle of pure interiority, from which may God preserve us, is presented here at a truly impressive pace, and all I can say is “Good for the Jews! as it just so happens that throughout the history of the world they have decidedly refused to take such a direction!” (<i>Briefe</i> II, 16-17)</font><o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;"><span lang="" style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial; color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><o:p> </o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;"><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Of course it wasn't entirely fair for Scholem to read Weil as representative of Christianity in general, but I understand what he means. Looking back at this time when I was in my late twenties and trying to find my way in a new and bewildering terrain, I cannot help wondering about the obscure psychological causes that lead all of us instinctively to say “no” to some things that come our way while saying “yes” to others, quite as instinctively – as in my case to <a href="http://wouterjhanegraaff.blogspot.com/2020/06/will-erich-peuckerts-pansophie-2nd-ed.html">Peuckert’s <i>Pansophie</i></a>, which (for reasons that I find hard to explain even to myself) strikes me as somehow quite similar to the Jewish perspective that Scholem preferred. Be that as it may, I was certainly making my own choices at the time. While the title of this volume, <i>Gnosis: The Third Component of the European Cultural Tradition</i>, had a decisive impact on the direction I took, its actual contents had an impact on the direction I did <i>not</i> want to take.<o:p></o:p></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;"><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;"></p><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgv3QnV-A3xT3eXEGjiLaJ7wZFy1xrjhz9iSQ4tdypBF6yllQminI5j_oeZs27AfTrmWACipwMQCjLt5ljLgPtq6XqzVHyg2yzn_1QSz7c4a-EUelnsH6ta1PYz6YidUJzs_zjU5_UrC3Gn/s536/Screenshot+2020-07-11+at+14.22.24.png" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="Amsterdam Summer University 1994, Quispel sitting on the right." border="0" data-original-height="314" data-original-width="536" height="358" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgv3QnV-A3xT3eXEGjiLaJ7wZFy1xrjhz9iSQ4tdypBF6yllQminI5j_oeZs27AfTrmWACipwMQCjLt5ljLgPtq6XqzVHyg2yzn_1QSz7c4a-EUelnsH6ta1PYz6YidUJzs_zjU5_UrC3Gn/w611-h358/Screenshot+2020-07-11+at+14.22.24.png" width="611" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Amsterdam Summer University 1994, me on the left, Quispel sitting on the right</td></tr></tbody></table><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;"><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;"><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">I was fascinated by the simple suggestion</span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> </span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">that</span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> the edifice of</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> Western culture </span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">is supported by two </span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">pillars, “faith” (</span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">notably</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> Christianity) and “reason” (rational philosophy, science) </span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">while</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> a third</span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> but equally important</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> component had been suppressed, neglected, and </span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">basically </span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">written out of the history books. Quispel called it “gnosis</span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">.</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">” </span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">At this time I was mostly interested in </span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">music, literature, and all kinds of “alternative” ideas</span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> and traditions such as</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> those I </span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">encountered</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> in</span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> authors like</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> Peuckert or Potok</span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">. Since none of it</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> seemed to fit the “faith” and “reason” categories very well,</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> <span lang="">or at all,</span></span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> Quispel’s </span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">book </span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">title made me wonder whether this mysterious thing called “gnosis” </span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">could</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> be a suitable umbrella to </span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">cover everything I found so attractive.</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> So that’s </span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">the direction</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> I </span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">began</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> to explore</span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">.</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> I ended up </span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">writing a</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> M</span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">aster</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> thesis</span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> in which I</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> attempt</span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">ed to</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> creat</span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">e</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> a systematic typological framework </span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">to make</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> sense of the gnosis</span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">-</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">reason</span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">-</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">faith triad.</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> <span lang="">Bizarre as the combination may sound, I used a type of conceptual analysis that could hardly have been farther removed from Quispel’s Jungian perspective: american analytical philosophy. I had been introduced to it by the theologian Vincent Brümmer, one of my professors at the University of Utrecht, who was using it in a context of Christian-theological apologetics.</span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><span lang=""> </span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;"><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><span lang=""></span></span></p><table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLkyVZU9HyX34YsLx1xUo79-b6pYu-p44qopZxNGne87mZaytXHO0BCqjmLtZuqyrVwdYxYBLJSbV7X-_q9LiXL81gQjy8MYukUWzuCDdkGnSwtA8e0i7096BY4DOtIUlvKDPhJ6WTz4yo/s251/vincentbrummer.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="200" data-original-width="251" height="250" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLkyVZU9HyX34YsLx1xUo79-b6pYu-p44qopZxNGne87mZaytXHO0BCqjmLtZuqyrVwdYxYBLJSbV7X-_q9LiXL81gQjy8MYukUWzuCDdkGnSwtA8e0i7096BY4DOtIUlvKDPhJ6WTz4yo/w314-h250/vincentbrummer.jpg" width="314" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Vincent Brümmer<br /></td></tr></tbody></table><div style="text-align: justify;"><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: Cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 1.5; text-align: start;">Although I did not share Brümmer’s beliefs at all, I appreciated his intellectual openness to other perspectives than his own and his respect for the power of rational argument. I very well remember how one afternoon, I came out of his class and went straight into another one, where we were reading Merleau-Ponty’s <i style="line-height: 1.5;">L’oeil et l’esprit.</i> It was as though I stepped from one universe right into another one. Merleau-Ponty struck me as profound but too vague, whereas analytical philosophy was very clear but somehow too superficial. I was looking for clarity because the subjects that attracted me were still quite vague and confusing to me, and so that combination prevailed. The MA thesis led to <a href="http://pub.esswe.org/publications/A16-02-Hanegraaf-Problem-of-Post-Gosticism.pdf">my first article in english</a>; but I soon abandoned this approach as I found it too clean and artificial for my developing tastes. Under the impact of <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d5a1ezc5XyA&t=1030s">Jan Platvoet</a>, who was teaching study of religions at the Catholic University of Utrecht, I moved towards what I came to call an empirical-historical approach that began with primary sources rather than theoretical abstractions. But that’s another story. </span><span style="text-align: start;"></span></div><o:p></o:p><p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;"><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">The bottom line is that Quispel’s title put me on a path that eventually led towards my understanding of esotericism as “rejected knowledge.” I saw that it was all about getting to know those ideas and traditions that had been</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> excluded from mainstream culture </span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">due to the </span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">ideologi</span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">cal and discursive dominance</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> of “faith” and “reason</span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">.”</span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> </span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Of course, my</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> perspective </span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">soon got much more</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> complicated, </span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">as it dawned on me that</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> this</span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> field of</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> “rejected knowledge” d</span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">id </span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">no</span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">t</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> consist</span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> just</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> of “gnosis” but could also be</span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> captured by </span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">other and quite different terms of exclusion, </span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">such as</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> “paganism</span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">,</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">” “idolatry</span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">,</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">” “superstition</span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">,</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">” “magic</span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">,</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">” “the occult</span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">,</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">” or simply “the irrational</span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">.</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">” Be that as it may,</span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> although </span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;">Quispel</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> <span lang="">was very much an opponent of the entire agenda I stood for, I still owe him a debt of gratitude for coming up with that book title and making</span></span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> me ask the basic question: <i>what</i> is missing from the normative stories that our culture and our educational institutions are telling us?</span><span lang="" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> And <i>why</i> is it missing? Those questions kept me busy for more than twenty years, until I finally answered them, to the best of my ability, in my book <a href="https://www.wouterjhanegraaff.net/esotericism-and-the-academy"><i>Esotericism and the Academy</i> (2012)</a>. </span><span lang="" style="font-family: cambria, serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><o:p></o:p></span></p>wouterjhanegraaff.blogspot.comhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15519965611425366178noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5967881025525384120.post-39464124014872374682020-06-09T06:04:00.005-07:002020-06-10T06:26:50.767-07:00Alterius non sit, qui suus esse potest: Will-Erich Peuckert's Pansophie (2nd ed. 1956)<div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">[Introduction] As the Corona virus was dominating the media and everybody’s daily lives, many of my friends on Facebook began launching “book challenges” to entertain themselves and the members of their networks. I accepted a challenge to list “10 books that changed your life,” and soon discovered that it was not just great fun to select ten titles and write about them, but that the exercise triggered a process of self-reflection. It made me conscious of some deep and long-term motivations and obsessions that have very much determined my personal life and my career as a scholar as well (or the other way around?). Below follows an expanded version of nr. 2 on my list.</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> </span><br />
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">Sometime during the later 1980s, as a student at the University of Utrecht I was browsing through the library and took a book off the shelf by pure chance, not suspecting that it would send me on a life-long quest. I read the title: <i>Pansophie: Ein Versuch zur Geschichte der weißen und schwarzen Magie</i> (Pansophy: An Attempt at Writing the History of White and Black Magic). What was that all about? Today I think of Peuckert as the true but sadly forgotten pioneer of what we have come to refer to as Western esotericism, and <i>Pansophie</i></span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> as his most attractive book. Here I read for the first time about something called Hermetic Philosophy, and</span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> got introduced to</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> Marsilio Ficino, Giovanni Pico della Mirandola, Paracelsus, Jacob Böhme and a large host of lesser figures from the </span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">fifteen</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">th through the </span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">seventeen</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">th centuries. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">But it was not the content alone that impressed me so much</span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">. P</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">erhaps </span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">most of all</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> it was Peuckert’s unique, inimitable style of writing. The book breathed an atmosphere that I found irresistable and that I nowadays recognize as a peculiar kind of German <i>gothic</i>. Peuckert was one of the few specialists of German “folklore” traditions who refused any compromise with the Nazis. As a result, he was deprived</span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> of his right to teach, so he</span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> withdrew to the countryside and</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> wrote this book in enforced isolation during the first half of the 1930s, as a record of his <i>innere Emigration. </i>He</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> was</span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> in fact</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> exploring the true roots of German culture in an attempt to rescue central figures such as Paracelsus or Jacob Böhme from their appropriation by the Nazis. In this regard, <i>Pansophie</i> might be seen as a</span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> direct</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> parallel to what <a href="http://wouterjhanegraaff.blogspot.com/2020/03/reading-thomas-mann.html">Thomas Mann</a> was doing around the same time in</span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> his novels</span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> </span><i><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">Lotte in Weimar</span></i><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">(about Goethe) </span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">and, most of all, <i>D</i></span><i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">oktor</span></i><i><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> Faustus</span></i><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> (</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">for Mann insiders: Peuckert’s true home is in Kaisersaschern!). Of course the</span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> figure of</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> Faust looms large in <i>Pansophie</i> too. I can’t resist translating the final paragraph of the Preface here:</span></span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">I don’t regret it. I have seen what few others have seen: I have seen Faust and Luther and Weigel and Paracelsus and J. Böhme, the great movers of the German spirit. I have sat with astrologers and spent hours listening to alchemists. I have had the privilege to trace magic as truth. I had the chance to grasp what I considered necessary to grasp; the way of understanding lay wide open before me, and I felt no more restrictions than Paracelsus had once felt in his magic. Just <i>one</i> star stood shining above the road, the one that had shaped his destiny: <i>Alterius non sit, qui suus esse potest</i>. I have been allowed to live beautiful years. I want to be grateful for all those years. For these years, and for this road. It is the only one that fits us. <i>Alterius non sit, qui suus esse potest</i> [Let he who can belong to himself belong to no other]</span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"><span style="font-size: large;">Peuckert was grateful for the road, but his later life would be full of tragedy. Having withdrawn to his vacation home in Haasel, in the Silesian Bober-Katzbach Mountains, he had transformed the cow-stable into a library and spent almost all his time reading and writing. But in January 1945, he and his wife had to flee for the advancing Russian troops, and his unique collection of 30.000 volumes would never be recovered. In the Afterword to one of his most important works, <i>Die Grosse Wende</i>, we read these truly heart-breaking words:</span><span style="font-size: medium;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">This book is a child of pain and misery. … The final sentences … were written in the January days of 1945. Next to the writing desk, prepared for flight into the icy winter, stand the backpacks of two people who have grown old in these days; and each title of each book that is quoted means a farewell to that book.<span style="font-size: medium;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"><span style="font-size: large;">Two years later, his wife was killed in a car accident that left Peuckert almost completely blind and with heavy head injuries. Nevertheless, somehow he managed to keep writing books. Then in 1960 he lost his son, and in 1963 suffered a stroke that left him largely paralyzed so that he could only type with one finger. And still he kept writing, until a second massive stroke killed him in 1969.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"><span style="font-size: large;">In a <a href="http://wouterjhanegraaff.blogspot.com/2012/06/memories-of-magician.html">previous posting on <i>Creative Reading</i></a>, I wrote about my discovery of Peuckert’s manuscript “Memories of a Magician.” Another manuscript in the Göttingen collection is clearly autobiographical and full of fascinating observations about what life was like for common people in the countryside during the first half of the twentieth century. Among many other things, it also describes his notorious youthful experiment with the witches’ ointment. As I described in <a href="https://www.academia.edu/1170604/Will-Erich_Peuckert_and_the_Light_of_Nature_2009_">an earlier article about Peuckert</a>, in 1959 he made a passing reference to it in a lecture, resulting in an incredible media hype that ended up making him more famous than all his scholarly work had ever done. In response to continuing media requests, he even accepted to participate in a TV documentary that shows him in the cellar of his own house preparing Della Porta’s witches’ ointment in front of the camera. In the Göttingen manuscript, he describes how he and his buddy (they were about twenty years old at the time) rubbed the ointment on their bodies:</span><span style="font-size: medium;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">I got tired. Clearly tired.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">But then this tiredness vanished, I don’t know why. All I know is that suddenly I should fly. It was a flying without external props, but somehow I managed. It was as if I had flying membranes between my arms and my body, a bit like bats do – but I did not even need to use those membranes, for in fact some kind of force lifted me up from the podium on which I was standing and I floated through the long hall. Then I moved a bit higher and found myself floating above a forest – not high, and always in danger to hit a treetop.<span style="font-size: medium;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"><span style="font-size: large;">He finally arrived at a kind of country fair and in the bustle of a wild party. In a kind of dance pavillion he watched women of all ages dancing in wild ecstasy, he mingled with the crowd and felt overtaken by desire, until he was finally embraced by a horrible old witch who suddenly transformed into a woman he knew... <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"><span style="font-size: large;">But of course, although his experiment with the witches’ ointment caused a sensation, it is in fact just a very minor footnote to Peuckert’s oeuvre. I fully agree with the assessment of Carlos Gilly, perhaps the most important modern specialists in Peuckert’s domain of specialization. Peuckert’s style may not be to everybody’s taste, but as Gilly noted, “Thanks to his immense erudition, which included the most unfamiliar areas of sixteenth- and seventeenth-century literature, Peuckert had such a secure instinct for what was essential, that even with incorrect quotations or insufficient argumentation he was still able to draw conclusions that were essentially correct” (Gilly, "Comenius und die Rosenkreuzer," in: Neugebauer-Wölk, <i>Aufklärung und Esoterik </i>[1999], 95 note 21) </span></span><br />
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"><span style="font-size: large;">It is worth visiting <a href="https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Will-Erich_Peuckert">Peuckert's German Wikipedia page</a> and have a look at his bibliography. This is what scholars were capable of, far before the advent of computers, using typewriters without cut-and-paste options, producing enormous manuscripts that had to be copied manually and then typeset letter by letter! Peuckert's oeuvre includes large biographies of Paracelsus, Copernicus, Jacob Böhme and Sebastian Franck; no less than twenty-four volumes devoted to German intellectual traditions, history and folklore; and on top of that, twenty novels or dramas! An incredible output that has not nearly received the attention it deserves. It is sad how quickly Peuckert was forgotten by German scholars during the seventies, in a climate dominated by Frankfurt School sentiments and their default demonization of all things "irrational" or Romantic. As formulated by Rolf Christian Zimmermann, just “two years after his death [in 1969], the name Will-Erich Peuckert hit … upon an apathetic reserve.” </span></span><br />
<span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"><span style="font-size: large;">Well, not with me! It is thanks to Peuckert that I can echo his own words: I have seen what few others have seen, and have had the chance to grasp what I considered necessary to grasp. I am grateful to him, for the years and for the road. <i>Alterius non sit, qui suus esse potest</i>.</span></span></div>
wouterjhanegraaff.blogspot.comhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15519965611425366178noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5967881025525384120.post-82185269188885303872020-05-06T05:27:00.000-07:002020-06-09T09:49:30.359-07:00Living with Ambiguity: Chaim Potok's The Book of Lights (1981)<div class="MsoNormal" style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif; line-height: 24px; margin: 0cm 0cm 0.0001pt; text-align: justify;">
<span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">[Introduction] As the Corona virus was dominating the media and everybody’s daily lives, many of my friends on Facebook began launching “book challenges” to entertain themselves and the members of their networks. I accepted a challenge to list “10 books that changed your life,” and soon discovered that it was not just great fun to select ten titles and write about them, but that the exercise triggered a process of self-reflection. It made me conscious of some deep and long-term motivations and obsessions that have very much determined my personal life and my career as a scholar as well (or the other way around?). Below follows an expanded version of nr. 1 on my list.</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; font-size: 14pt; line-height: 28px;"> <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">Chaim Potok </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">became</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> famous </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">with </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">his</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> best-selling</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> novels <i>The Chosen</i></span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> (1967) </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">and <i>My Name is Asher Lev</i></span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> (1972). I devoured and loved those books when I was young,</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> but </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">undoubtedly it is</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> </span><i><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">The Book of Lights</span></i><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">that really</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> did it for me. It</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> is</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> not so well known as the others, probably because </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">the central theme is Jewish</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> kabbalah</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> – not such a familiar topic for </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"></span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">the general public. Many readers </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">may have found it somewhat difficult to relate to</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> this story and understand what it was really all about, but I have to say that</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> I took to it like a fish to water. </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">It is through this novel that I first became aware of the great kabbalah specialist </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">Gershom Scholem</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> (1897-1982),</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">who </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">appears in the novel as Professor Jacob Keter</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">. Potok presents him as the polar counterpart of</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> a</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">n equally</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> great Talmud schola</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">r who goes by the name of Nathan </span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">Malkuson</span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">: yes,</span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> </span><i><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">nomina omina sunt</span></i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">, for these are transparent references to the highest and lowest of the ten sefirot (luminous manifestations of divinity) that constitute the kabbalistic “tree of life.” T</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">he novel’s hero</span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">,</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> Gershon Loran</span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">,</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> is a student who falls under Keter’s spell and </span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">embarks on the path of</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> becom</span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">ing</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> a scholar of Jewish esotericism. The novel’s picture of Jacob Keter is so impressive that it became my ideal model of</span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> what the scholarly life was supposed to be all about. Basically what happened is that </span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">I said to myself: “that’s what I want to be</span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">!</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">” </span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">As for Gershon Loran, I think I </span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">identified with </span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">him</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> on several levels</span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">, and as I re-read the novel not so long ago, I found that I still do</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">. </span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">Central to the narrative – written by a writer born in 1929 who came of age in New York during the later 1940s and the 1950s, the high period of Cold War paranoia –</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> is the mysterious phenomenon of the</span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> divine</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> Light of Creation</span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> central to kabbalistic mythology. How, Potok was asking himself, does it relate to</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> the Light of Annihilation </span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">revealed by</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> the</span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> detonation of the</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> atomic bomb</span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">? Is it at all possible to determine</span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">which one comes from the divine world and which one </span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">from the </span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">demonic realm, the</span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> </span><i><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">sita achra</span></i><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">? <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">When I visited the</span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> quinquennial</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> conference</span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> of the International Association for the History of Religion (IAHR)</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> in Japan in 2005, I</span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> took <i>The Book of Lights</i> with me and</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> follow</span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">ed </span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">Gershon Loran’s trajectory</span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">, traveling by high-speed train from Tokyo</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> to Hirosjima</span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">. This</span><span style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> visit remains one of the strongest impressions of my life.</span><span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"> I spent a sunny day in the area where the bomb went off, now known as the “Hiroshima Peace Memorial Park,” surrounded by smiling tourists making pictures while trying to imagine what happened there on 6 August 1945. If by sheer luck you survived at all, how would your mind react to seeing literally everything and everybody around you obliterated, incinerated, utterly wiped away in one single blinding flash of total destruction? I spent hours in the Peace Memorial Museum at the square, feeling sick and exhausted when I finally came out, convinced that any President or PM in control of nuclear weapons should be obliged by law to visit this museum as a condition for taking office. And of course I spent time near the strange saddle-like monument, the Cenotaph, from which Gershon Loran heard a voice from the <i>sita achra</i> whispering to him. For me, Auschwitz and Hiroshima remain the two geographical centers of ultimate demonic horror that demonstrate the evil human beings are capable of. In my mind, the Cenotaph is also linked to Alain Resnais’ great movie <i>Hiroshima mon amour </i>(1959; based on Marguerite Duras). Watching it again after my trip to Tokyo, I realized that the hotel where the French actress and her Japanese lover have their final meeting must be the very same one from which Gershon Loran and his friend Arthur Leiden see the Cenotaph too. <o:p></o:p></span></span><br />
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"><span style="font-size: large;">There are many passages in <i>The Book of Lights</i> that I love, and some of them I know almost by heart. A great favourite is the extraordinary account of Gershon Loran’s oral exam with Keter, during a long walk along Riverside Drive. Gershon drifts into a hallucinatory altered state, watching a numinous white bird circling above the water while listening as if from a distance and in a dream how he and Keter go through centuries of kabbalistic myths and imagery. But I will quote a conversation in Japan with his friend Arthur Leiden, the son of a great physicist who is tormented by the knowledge that his own father helped create the bomb and unleash the death light. Arthur asks Gershon why on earth he is so attracted by those weird kabbalistic books.</span><span style="font-size: medium;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;">Weird? Maybe. Those books are really records of the religious imagination, Arthur. When I was a kid I once went up to the roof of our apartment house in Brooklyn and looked up at the stars. I remember I raised my hands in supplication – a little like the gesture of the monkey we saw today on the road. I felt something touch me. Oh yes, something touched me. I’ve been waiting to feel that touch again. Is that childish of me? This is, after all, the twentieth century. But sometimes when I read those texts I’m on the roof of that building again. I don’t know why I feel that way. They say things in those books that no one dares to say anywhere else. I feel comfortable with those acceptable heresies. God originally as sacred emptiness; ascents to God that are filled with danger, as if you were going through an angelic minefield; creation as a vast error; the world broken and dense with evil; everything a bewildering puzzle; and the sexuality in some of the passages. I like the sexuality. I especially like the ambiguities. Wow, Arthur, listen to me go. I’m saying more to you tonight than I did during all our seminary years. That is really good wine. Where was I? Yes. Ambiguities. You can’t pin most of it down the way you can a passage of Talmud. I can live with ambiguity, I think, better than I can with certainty. <span style="font-size: medium;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="color: #1c1e21; font-family: "cambria" , serif; line-height: 28px;"><span style="font-size: large;">I suppose that it was while reading this passage that I realized this to be true for myself as well. Gershon Loran came from an orthodox Jewish background while I was raised as the son of a Protestant minister; and both religious cultures were teaching their members to understand the world in terms of clear doctrinal certainties. Much too two-dimensional for my taste – reality couldn’t possibly be that simple. I felt more comfortable with the heretics, those who do not follow authorities but “make their own choices.” I still do.</span></span><br />
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wouterjhanegraaff.blogspot.comhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15519965611425366178noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5967881025525384120.post-81490107992606130472020-03-30T07:31:00.000-07:002020-06-09T06:21:04.978-07:00In Search of Humanity: Reading Thomas Mann<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Ein Zweifler bin ich, wie ich hier sitze, nicht weil ich nichts glaubte, sondern weil ich alles für möglich halte</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> </span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">(A doubter I am, as I sit here – not because I believed in nothing but because I consider anything possible).</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> Joseph und seine Brüder,</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> vol. 3</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">, “Zum Herrn”</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">.<span style="font-size: medium;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Two years ago </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">I embarked on a life's mission</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">. S</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">pread out over the next x-number of years, I </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">decided</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> to read my way through all 38 volumes</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">, </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">including commentary volumes</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">,</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> of the <i>Grosse Kommentierte Frankfurter Ausgabe</i> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">(GKFA) </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">of the complete works of Thomas Mann. Simply because no other writer gives me so much pleasure and so many insights, or is so close to how I look at the world.</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> After each volume I wrote some short reflections on my personal Facebook page; below you can find those thoughts in an edited and slightly expanded version.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">Looking at Mann’s oeuvre as a whole, I cannot help perceiving a grand life-long design of the kind you find only in the very greatest creative minds. Thomas Mann began right at home, with a novel (<i>Buddenbrooks</i>) about Lübeck and the German bourgeois milieu in which he had grown up. In <i>Königliche Hoheit</i>, the scope was somewhat broadened to a fictional duchy, symbolic not of Germany but of Mann’s personal “kingdom of the spirit.” Then in <i>Der Zauberberg</i> the scope was widened from Germany all the way to Europe as a whole, and its spiritual condition right before the disaster of World War I. So what could be next – the whole world? In fact what followed was an enormous four-volume novel (a counterpart to Wagner’s <i>Ring des Nibelungen</i>?) about Humanity as such; and it seems significant that this time its mythical representatives and central heroes, the biblical figures Jacob and Joseph, were not Germans but Jews. Only having made his ultimate statement about <i>die Menschlichkeit</i> did Mann return to writing about Germany. His first step was to address yet another myth, that of Goethe (<i>Lotte in Weimar</i>). And after that he delved deep into the abyss of mourning about the German culture that he loved, and its spiritual suicide under Hitler and the Nazis (<i>Doktor Faustus</i>). Thus having made a movement full circle, but not wishing to end in despair, after the war Mann published a light-hearted yet serious epilogue to his oeuvre. <i>Der Erwählte</i> was a brilliant meditation on guilt and redemption, again with human-more-than-human heroes who no longer reflected his own German Protestant roots but the universal aspirations of Catholic culture. So was it all deliberately planned like this? I rather think it was instinctive and not necessarily conscious – “wenn ich selbst es gedacht habe, so war es mehr und weniger als Denken” (if I thought this myself, it was more and less than thinking).<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<b><span style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: #38761d; font-size: x-large;">Volume 1: Buddenbrooks</span></span></b></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">I actually had not read </span><i><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Buddenbrooks</span></i><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> before, strange as it may seem. </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Initially it was just a f</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">antastic experience to get to know this family up close, most of all Tony Buddenbrook (who nevers seems to stop throwing her head backwards while simultaneously trying to put her chin on her breast... remind</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">ing</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> me of Professor McGonagall). </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">The novel is</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> beautifully written, great literature, and the characters will remain part of my inner world forever - and yet... some part of me (spoiled no doubt by his later work) thought "well, </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">this was</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Mann’s </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">first full novel, it may have gotten him the Nobel prize because it was such a popular success, but perhaps it doesn't</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> yet</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> show us Thomas Mann at the full height of his powers."</span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">Well, so I though at first. And there might even be some grain of truth to it in comparison with the very best of his later work. Yet, the characters began to grow on my mind in a strange way, and I ended up reading <i>Buddenbrooks </i>all over again. As I could have known, the experience confirmed what I already knew: if you have read a Thomas Mann novel just one single time, you have barely read it at all. Only at repeated reading does his work begin to reveal its secrets. The chacteristic Mannian irony that I thought was somewhat missing or at least less evident turned out to be omnipresent throughout the book – somehow I must have been so busy focusing on other aspects that I missed it. The personalities particularly of Tony, Thomas and Hanno became fully three-dimensional, and I began to notice various layers of meaning and significance that had partly or completely passed me by: for instance the nature of the process of “decadence” or “decline” in both the family and the wider cultural environment, the inner conflict of Thomas between his public role and the deeper longings of his soul (coming to the surface most clearly when he reads Schopenhauer’s masterpiece <i>Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung</i>, which had been the strongest reading experience of Thomas Mann’s own youth), and Hanno as the family member who exemplifies the ambiguous <i>Todestrieb</i> that, paradoxically, is the motor of Mann’s inspiration as a writer. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><i><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Was ist das?</span></i><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> Tony asks at the very beginning – and in the final lines we find the statement <i>Es ist so!</i> I suspect that the initial question refers to the world in which Thomas Mann was born and raised, and the entire novel gave the answer: so this is how it was, this was the truth!<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #38761d; font-size: x-large;"><b><span style="background-color: white; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Volume 2: </span></b><b><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Early Stories (1893-1912)</span></b></span><span style="font-size: large;"><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"></span></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif; font-size: large;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">These</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> twelve</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> early</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> stories are all about loss, disappointment, unattainable ideals, and dark impulses. They all end badly. All </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">are</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> beautifully written, but</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> I found that</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> only in</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> <span lang="EN-US">“</span></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Der kleine Herr Friedemann</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">”</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> the spark of genius</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> first</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> breaks through all of a sudden. Then</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">,</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> with the brilliant novella </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">“</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Tonio Kröger,</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">”</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> for the first time</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> we see</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> the protagonist overcom</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">ing</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> his disgust with the bourgeois “normality” of common human beings</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">. T</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">he writer </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">– </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">the man of Spirit </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">(<i>Geist</i>) </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">whose soul is secretly</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> <span lang="EN-US">in league with</span></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> the</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> dark</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> powers of nihilism</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">, illness</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> and death</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> – </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">admits his desperate</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> although unrequited</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> love for the health and happiness of simple</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> human </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">joy and </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">life-</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">affirmation. In </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">“</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Tristan</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">”</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">– a tour de force</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> in its</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> combin</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">ation of</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> deep tragedy with farcical humour – </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">a somewhat similar man of </span><span style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"><span style="caret-color: rgb(29, 33, 41);">letters</span> suffers a humiliating defeat</span></span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">. He is</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> faced down by the healthiest baby of all healthy babies in world literature</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">, named</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> Klöterjah</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">n</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">, who </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">gets</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> his jubilant revenge for the Wagnerian love-death </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">that the writer</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> has </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">egoistically </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">inflicted on his mother. From there on</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">, we see</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> Thomas Mann continu</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">ing</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> his life project of making friends with life</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">: </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">henceforth other enemies of humanity in the name of Art fare no</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">better under his pen </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">(think for instance of</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> the Stefan Georgian / Ludwig Klagesian apocalypticist of </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">“</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Beim Propheten</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">”, or the Kridwiß circle in <i>Doktor Faustus</i>)</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">. Finally the cycle ends with</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> Mann’s famous and truly breathtaking short novel</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">“</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Der Tod in Venedig,</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">”</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> grounded in the profound Platonic connection (<i>Phaedrus</i>, <i>Symposium</i>) between death and beauty, transcendence and truth, and hence</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> in</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> the</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> deep</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> moral ambiguity (<i>Fragwürdigkeit</i>) of literature</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> situated</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> in the midst of Life.</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"><span lang="EN-US"><o:p></o:p></span></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Does that sound too abstract? Perhaps, but I won’t explain. You must read it yourself.</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #38761d; font-size: x-large;"><b><span style="background-color: white; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Volume </span></b><b><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">3: Fiorenza etcetera</span></b></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">In</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> the great Frankfurt edition of Thomas Mann’s complete</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> works, this volume</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> is quite slim</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> – in fact </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">the companion volume with introductions and commentaries has more than twice its length</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">. It is</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> devoted to genres</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> that Thomas Mann had been trying out but in which, as</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> it turned out</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">, he </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">did <i>not</i></span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> tru</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">ly excel: theatre, poetry, and even a film script. Most important by far is his drama </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">“</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Fiorenza</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">”</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> (1905), and it came as a complete surprise for me that among its dramatic characters are</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> two of my favourites:</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> the great Renaissance philosophers Marsilio Ficino and</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> his contemporary</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> Giovanni Pico della Mirandola</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">.</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">However,</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> the central protagonists are Lorenzo de’ Medici and Girolama Savonarola, who represent</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> two poles of</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> the inner </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">conflict</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> at the heart of Mann’s mind and soul</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">.</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> Lorenzo stands for the “pagan” perspective of life-affirming sensual beauty in Renaissance art, whereas Savonarola stands for its ascetic counterpart based on the spiritual superiority of <i>the Word</i> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">(<i>Geist </i>and </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">literature) over Nature and the World. Is the deepest motivation of literature a barely conscious wish to transcend life itself and overcome the world</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> of the senses</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">? If so, does this mean that the writer is secretly on the side of death? </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">But then doesn’t</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> this</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> ultimately</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> make him an enemy of humanity at heart, even though he poses as its friend? </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Is</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> beauty ultimately deadly</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">, like the flame that consumes the moth</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">? If the true writer pierces through the exterior surface of things and gains knowledge of the truth, is such knowledge</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> really</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> a blessing</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">? Isn’t it rather</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> a curse</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">,</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">f</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">or isn’t the price of knowledge</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> just</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> too high</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">?</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Shouldn’t the innocence that comes with</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> ignorance</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> <span lang="EN-US">be preferred over the painful knowledge of the man who has freed himself from illusions</span></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">,</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">as suggested by the Grand Inquisitor in Dostoyewsky’s great story (or</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> if you want a contemporary parallel, the character of</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> Cypher in <i>The Matrix</i>)? <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8JlBxbx1GeZpeGAsiwltgzMlo62UmoKA45Qvb4TMk-2CkURxDjgOKxKebY830Oq2DeCwja4OmlGH1cJFsBo1-how9EcIVu2epspHKEcl-rDXCXjn9dY_vaxlwg-9M3BZuvaLjElqJNDEY/s1600/Savonarola.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1186" data-original-width="800" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8JlBxbx1GeZpeGAsiwltgzMlo62UmoKA45Qvb4TMk-2CkURxDjgOKxKebY830Oq2DeCwja4OmlGH1cJFsBo1-how9EcIVu2epspHKEcl-rDXCXjn9dY_vaxlwg-9M3BZuvaLjElqJNDEY/s320/Savonarola.jpg" width="214" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">These existential questions are basic to Thomas Mann’s oeuvre</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> as a whole.</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">They reflect </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">his life-long struggle to</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> define</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> the true heart of</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> humanity</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> (<i>die Humanität</i>), with all its deep moral and political implications, </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">from </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">“</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Tristan</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">”</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">and</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">“</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Death in Venice</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">”</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> to </span><i><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Der Zauberberg</span></i><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">and</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> </span><i><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Do</span></i><i><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">k</span></i><i><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">tor Faustus</span></i><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">. </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">The writer may not be a very nice person – think also of Felix Krull, discussed below – but then again, is it his job to be nice? Isn’t his job rather to tell the truth? </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">In Fiorenza the battle is undecided</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">.</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">C</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">ritics have tried to decide whether Lorenzo or Savonarola represents Thomas Mann’s own perspectice,</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> and Mann himself has admitted that the friar might ultimately be closest to him; but in the end, it seems to me, making an either/or choice means</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> missing the whole point. Two souls were living</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> in Mann’s</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> breast, and </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">precisely</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> their incompatibility made them</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> fit</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> ingredients for transmutation into great art. “I love the fire” are Savonarola’s final words.</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #38761d; font-size: x-large;"><b><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Volume 4: Royal Highness</span></b></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">This is</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> the least known of </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Mann’s</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> novels</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">, and it is often seen as somewhat weaker. Yet Thomas</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Mann</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> himself</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> has always defend</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">ed</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> it against hostile critics, </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">calling it</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> a crucial work in his oeuvre without which <i>Der Zauberberg</i> and <i>Joseph und seine Brüder</i> would have been unthinkable. Among the great things of the GKFA i</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">s</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">that the</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> commentary volumes </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">provide extensive overviews of</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> the critical reception history of each work; and I have to agree with Thomas Mann that as</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> far</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> this novel is concerned, many critics seem to have suffered from a peculiar lack of literary sensitivity, simple intelligence, ideological blindness, or some combination of all</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> of these</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">. <i>Kö</i></span><i><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">nigliche Hoheit</span></i><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">(Royal Highness) </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">is a wonderful modern fairy tale, clearly driven by the experience of Mann’s own marriage with the daughter of a millionaire, Katia Pringsheim. </span></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjIWD6_mCAAus4A_u0KCrioqqTuRMoBiZtJUPrZa-zTJrpE7srlFjxLwSttKVoTUW4UQBQ30n2iEc5sv0W9QEzsOlRXpPjTl1h9EMYrxm2ZlmT5nu1kU_rtrzA43mvl0RiU_5LVPV62K3Bj/s1600/f82778585022a3adf3f9218037700f48.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="395" data-original-width="295" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjIWD6_mCAAus4A_u0KCrioqqTuRMoBiZtJUPrZa-zTJrpE7srlFjxLwSttKVoTUW4UQBQ30n2iEc5sv0W9QEzsOlRXpPjTl1h9EMYrxm2ZlmT5nu1kU_rtrzA43mvl0RiU_5LVPV62K3Bj/s320/f82778585022a3adf3f9218037700f48.jpg" width="238" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">The lonely prince of a small and badly impoverished duchy, condemned to an isolated existence</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> of</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> pure</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">ly</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> ceremonial “representation”</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> that never allows him to show who he really is</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">, falls in love with the equally isolated daughter of an American billionnaire; and </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">as he</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> marr</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">ies</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> her, he finds salvation not just for himself but for his kingdom</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> as well</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">.</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> <span lang="EN-US">Of course the metaphor is rather obvious.</span></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> Thomas Mann’s early stories and his first novel <i>Buddenbrooks</i> all end badly, but this one finishes like fairy tales</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> do</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">: they</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> go on to</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> live happily ever after. Critics who </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">saw</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> that</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> as just</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> a bit too shallow and predictable seem to have missed </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">much of what</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> is great about <i>Königliche Hoheit</i></span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">, such as</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> its sensitive analysis of extremely delicate inner states</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">;</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">the psychology of power and authority</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">;</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">the tension between political necessity and individual spontaneity</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">;</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">the subconscious resentment against whatever is “higher” (the urge to pull it down to one’s own level)</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">; the experience of</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> loneliness pure and simple</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">;</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">the nature of</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> friendship</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">;</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> and last but not least, </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">the adventure of</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> falling in love. And then of course there is always that glorious language – the most beautiful German ever written by anyone ever, as far as I’m concerned. What a writer!<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #38761d; font-size: x-large;"><b><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Volume 5: The Magic Mountain</span></b></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">T</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">his was perhaps the fifth or sixth time I read Thomas Mann’s <i>Zauberberg</i>. Although there are few novels I know so well, it’s the mark of supreme literature that the book managed to </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">utterly </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">surprise me all over again! Somehow, for some reason</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">,</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">never before did I</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> experience the story so intensely and so vividly with all five senses; never before was I able to imagine the physical and emotional situations and interactions so concretely and in so much human and psychological detail; and</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">I had to admit to myself</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">, with some embarrassment,</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> that many of this novel’s deeper emotional and intellectual subtleties had remained completely hidden to me </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">and</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> reveal</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">ed</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> themselves</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> <span lang="EN-US">now</span></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> for the very first time. It</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> is</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> also the first time that I read the novel not primarily as a metaphor of the intellectual, social, and political situation of Europe before W</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">orld War I</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> (with Settembrini and Naphta </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">famously </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">fighting over the soul of Hans Castorp, this <i>Sorgenkind des Lebens</i> who has to find his way between the alternatives of liberal humanitarian progressivism and its illiberal authoritarian</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> and</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> reactionary counterpart) but, first and foremost, as <i>a great “hermetic-alchemical” love story</i> about personal transformation through suffering and acceptance. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">The novel is even shaped like a mountain. The first part reaches its culmination exactly halfway, in the “Walpurgisnight” chapter, where Hans experiences his witches’ sabbath on top of the mountain with Clawdia Chauchat. After he has fallen under her spell forever, we move downward (while the flow of time keeps slowing down</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">…</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">) </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">until</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> Chauchat return</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">s</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> in the company of Mynheer Peeperkorn, culminating in the chapter where the three members of th</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">is </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">love triangle seal their pact of mutual solidarity. Meanwhile Hans Castorp learns deep lessons about the relation between spirit and body, body and illness, illness and life, life and death, and death and love, culminating in an initiatic death and rebirth experience surrounded by literally </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">deadly</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> mountains of snow and ice. But his adventure of transmutation on the magic mountain, hermetically isolated from the course of history </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">that carries on in</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> the “flatland” below, ends when the alchemical vessel is shattered with a huge blow and Hans finds himself face to face with imminent physical death on the battlefield of the Great War. Only a little bit better prepared, perhaps, than he would otherwise have been.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">There are many other great novels</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">, </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">and some of them were written by Thomas Mann too</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">, but </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">there</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> i</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">s no other novel like this. It remains a unique phenomenon, and although I feel </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">as though </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">I</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> ha</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">ve understood it more deeply than ever before, it</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">’s very</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> likely that many of its secrets still did not reveal themselves to me this time around. I’m not yet done with this book</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">. Or</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> perhaps the book is not yet done with me.</span><span style="font-family: "cambria" , serif;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<b><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"><span style="color: #38761d; font-size: x-large;">Volume 6: The Later Stories</span></span></b></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Having finally completed his massive political essay <i>Betrachtungen eines Unpolitischen</i></span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> in 1918, </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Mann felt a deep need to escape mentally from the horrors of World War I,</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> from polemics and public attacks, from politics, and from essay-writing as well. He must have been longing for peace and innocence, and so what did he write about now? His dog Bauschan and his newborn baby daughter Elisabeth! These delightful idylls are all about simple life and love, but their author would</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> no</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">t be Thomas Mann if they had</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> not</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> also contained some deep reflections on the mystery of suffering, our complicity in causing it, and our helplessness to relieve it. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Then, in 1930, </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">“</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Mario and the Magician</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">”</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">: the rise of Italian fascism captured in a story about a stage hypnotist performing for the summer guests in a beach resort</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">.</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">It is</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> really all about ruthless psychological manipulation and the exploitation of mob cruelty</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> (s</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">poiler: the dictator dies</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">)</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">. In the slipstream of <i>Joseph and his Brothers</i>, </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">we read </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">two further exercises</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> in what might be called its central theme,</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> the humanization of myth through literature</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">. O</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">ne rather grue</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">some </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">story</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> is</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> placed in India</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">, and is </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">all about the relation between mind and body and between eros and transcendence</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">. The</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> other</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> is</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> a remarkably funny re-telling of the story of Moses and the Ten Commandments. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">And then finally, at the end of vol</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">ume six</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">, I had my very first experience of being just a tiny bit disappointed (dare I say bored?) by Thomas Mann. That</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">’</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">s a rare occurrence. </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">“</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Die Betrogene</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">”</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">was written towards the end of his life</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">,</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> and you can tell that Mann’s powers were waning</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">. In fact t</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">he story was a struggle for him to finish,</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> as</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> he admitted that the main characters left even him a bit cold, and the dialogues between mother and daughter were frankly too unrealistic. No matter, even the greatest writer is entitled to his moment of weakness…</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<b style="font-family: Calibri, sans-serif;"><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"><span style="color: #38761d; font-size: x-large;">Volume 7-8: Joseph and his Brothers</span></span></b></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">It took a long time before I was ready for this novel. Years ago I started it, but didn’t finish – somehow I got stuck or got lost in the scene where Joseph overhears the conversation between Potiphar’s parents, so I put the book away. For me as for so many other readers, Thomas Mann remained primarily the author of <i>The Magic Mountain </i>and <i>Doktor Faustus</i>. Why write about biblical figures if you can write about the modern world?<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">But then in the summer of 2018 I took the book with me on vacation through Germany. This time I really allowed myself the time for my mind to adapt to the slow but majestic rhythm of those long and wonderful sentences, beginning with the opening words: <i>Tief ist der Brunnen der Vergangenheit. Sollte man ihn nicht unergründlich nennen?</i> (Deep is the Well of the Past. Shouldn’t we call it unfathomable?) – perhaps the ultimate statement of how I experience history and historicity, as a <i>numen</i>, a <i>coincidentia oppositorum</i> of contingency and human meaning. Now I realize that this was Thomas Mann’s perspective too.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJYwu0YC0wA-7lJiVxU0eW-AQQJU3uVqgd_vYpz-HFKJbbzE3nz-2YTaf6RcCd7CN0UdGK6fc4feYHk3dctZrcFbu1NQQn4OUVDonFyRTm7lAFe088H_siuSEGAsGGRrl3NxbQwZC2tC5V/s1600/Screenshot+2020-03-30+at+15.27.52.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="435" data-original-width="301" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjJYwu0YC0wA-7lJiVxU0eW-AQQJU3uVqgd_vYpz-HFKJbbzE3nz-2YTaf6RcCd7CN0UdGK6fc4feYHk3dctZrcFbu1NQQn4OUVDonFyRTm7lAFe088H_siuSEGAsGGRrl3NxbQwZC2tC5V/s320/Screenshot+2020-03-30+at+15.27.52.png" width="221" /></a></div>
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<span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"><span style="font-size: large;">About a book like this, one should be either very expansive or very short, so for now I’ll have to stay with the latter. Since that summer of 2018, <i>Joseph und seine Brüder</i> stands lonely at the very top of my list of “best novels ever.” I know nothing like it. As suggested in the introduction to this overview, I see it as Mann’s ultimate story about humanity, <i>die Menschlichkeit</i> – a mythical account of perhaps even greater ultimate concern than his great works about supremely important historical topics such as World War I and the fate of Europe’s soul (<i>Der Zauberberg</i>) and World War II and the suicidal devil’s pact of German culture (<i>Doktor Faustus</i>). This story about Jacob and his beloved Rahel, Joseph and his troublesome brothers, their wives and their families, the archetypal encounter between Israel and Egypt, the One God of Jacob <i>and</i> Akhnaton against the many gods of Egyptian tradition, deep mourning and despair as well as unhoped-for deliverance, exile and return, providential mystery and wild adventure, and so much more – all of this, woven into one incredible complex composition that never loses its coherence, becomes Mann’s ultimate statement about what it means to be human. Hence the painful contrast with the story that came right after, about Andrian Leverkühn and what it means to be inhuman. If Wagner wrote his <i>Ring des Nibelungen</i> in four parts, grounded in German mythology and admired by Hitler, Mann responded with his own four-part tetralogy grounded in the foundational myth of the same people that Hitler sought to destroy. The parallels and contrasts are deep and troubling. Mann admired Wagner and saw music as the deepest language through which the soul could express itself directly; but over against its dark and primal powers stood literature, the medium of the spirit (<i>Geist</i>) with its promise of redemption through the Word (<i>Logos</i>). If any book will ever convince us that such redemption is possible, then this is it.<i><o:p></o:p></i></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #38761d; font-size: x-large;"><b><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Volume 9: Lotte in Weimar</span></b></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">It took me quite some time to finish <i>Lotte</i> – or rather, I</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> finished it twice. I w</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">ill hardly</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> have been the first Thomas Mann reader to experience some trouble getting through this novel, which </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">feels</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> somehow different from all the others and </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">may be</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> less immediately appealing.</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> Have reached the end, I was not satisfied. I did not really know what to make of the novel, but my admiration for Mann was much too great for me to assume that the failure lay with him. So I started again,</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">making good use of the introductions & commentaries in the </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">GKFA. Lo and behold:</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> the novel did begin to open up to me, and</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> now </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> I</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> a</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">m sure that</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> some day</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> I will r</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">eturn to it</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> again. One thing that makes the book difficult to appreciate for contemporary readers is that it responds to a phenomenon </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">which</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> is </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">rather </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">hard for us to imagine today</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">:</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> the pre-W</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">orld War II</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> "Goethe cult" in Germany and its appropriation by the Nazis, who were trying to claim Goethe for themselves and present him as the supreme semi-divine "Aryan Genius" </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">who represented</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> the superiority of German culture. Thomas Mann (who famously spoke the words "where I am, there is Germany</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">”</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">one</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> year before <i>Lotte</i> got published) felt a need to come to terms with</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> Goethe,</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> his main competitor for the position of the most representative literary writer of German culture.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1S3V_IFtCcJ7pn9D6A8P4pEAetdrg5HcDCiOE7Yub8Dexgbe9pdsvfxUPn3WYffJpoSJco46LJyweelyEyhoVs4QzymPH0uBOm7w632KFLYsw7ow7UrVCGlM9wGuKVJIwOVK7-9j1Hl5-/s1600/johann-wolfgang-von-goethe-famous-people.jpg.webp" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="563" data-original-width="676" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1S3V_IFtCcJ7pn9D6A8P4pEAetdrg5HcDCiOE7Yub8Dexgbe9pdsvfxUPn3WYffJpoSJco46LJyweelyEyhoVs4QzymPH0uBOm7w632KFLYsw7ow7UrVCGlM9wGuKVJIwOVK7-9j1Hl5-/s320/johann-wolfgang-von-goethe-famous-people.jpg.webp" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Mann’s</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> respect for Goethe was very great, and his knowledge of his work impressive, but <i>Lotte in Weimar</i> is a deliberate attempt</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> (like the <i>Joseph</i> tetralogy)</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">"<i>den Mythos den Fascistischen Dunkelmännern aus den Händen zu nehmen und ihn ins Humane 'umzufunktionieren'</i>" – to </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">wrest </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Myth </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">out of</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> the hands of the fascist obscurantists and humanize it. That</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> i</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">s exactly what happens in t</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">his Goethe</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> novel. Charlotte Kestner </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">is </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">the real-life model of the</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> young woman, also named</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> Lotte</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">,</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> with whom Werther fell in love in Goethe's famous first novel</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> <i><span lang="EN-US">Die Leiden des jungen Werthers</span></i><span lang="EN-US"> –</span></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> the archetypal story of unrequited passion</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> that was</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> known to every German school child</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">.</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">She is</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> now over sixty years old and returns to Weimar to visit her family. She hopes to use the opportunity </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">of visiting</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> her one-time admirer, now an old man and an international celebrity of mythical dimensions. Most of the novel consists of very long conversations that all circle imaginatively around </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">T</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">he Great Man, who himself does not appear until the </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">seven</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">th chapter, a very long <i>monologue intérieur</i> that gives us the uncensored Goethe </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">“</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">from within</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">.” </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Then in chapter </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">eight</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">, when Charlotte is finally introduced to </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">him</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">, we get to see Goethe </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">“</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">from without</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">”</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">: the old and stiff celebrity who brilliantly plays his social role but never for a moment </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">leaves room for even</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> a moment of intimacy, to Charlotte's deep disappointment. Only in the final chapter do Charlotte and Goethe get to talk the way she had been hoping – but it happens in a dreamlike vision that straddles the boundaries between the world of the living and the world of the dead. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Re-reading the novel, it became clear to me that these final two chapters in particular are masterpieces; and </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">again I realized that</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> like all the great novels that Mann has written, <i>Lotte</i> too needs to be read at least twice. The extremely detailed commentaries helped me realize that while this novel may be les</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">s</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> appealing </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">for</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> general reader</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">s less</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> familiar with Goethe, it is</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> in fact </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">a tour de force in which Mann </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">plays</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> on a whole series of registers, revealing many levels of meaning where at first one seems to see just one. The basic problem of myth versus reality was very well known to Mann himself. The writer creates works of the imagination, and if these are works of genius that have great appeal, then one effect is that the writer himself takes on mythical dimensions that conflict with the much more humbling realities of himself as just another human being. For instance, the chapter that gives us Goethe's inner life – the </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">“</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">writer’s workshop</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">”</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> behind the surface of the public oeuvre – does a very thorough job of demystification</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">. T</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">he Nazis and other readers</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> eager</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> to heroicize Goethe will have been properly horrified to see that the Great Man wakes up with an erection caused by the dream of a mythological painting, and is congratulating himself in his solitude on the fact that at his age he can still </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">“</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">do it.</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">” That passage is of course mostly humorous; but reading it</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white;"><span style="color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> in our present moment (as we see too many great artists, along with their entire oeuvre, "canceled" or "de-platformed" for no other reason than the fact that they are flawed human beings like the rest of us) it all adds up to a salutary reminder of our common humanity: no matter how</span></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> annoying and unsympathetic a person may be in actual life, that doesn't mean he cannot also</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> be a</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">n utterly</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> brilliant and profound thinker, speaker, and writer who deserves our admiration for his work. Lotte succeeds in the subtle balancing act of demythologizing Goethe while preserving his greatness – a thoroughly humanistic enterprise that obviously reflects back on how Thomas Mann would like to see himself as well.</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> Our inner world may not be politically correct, but it is the honest truth, and it is ours. By contrast, the pleasant and acceptable person we like to present to the world may be just a lie and a deception through which we sell ourselves to others. If one puts it like this, one sees how deeply this pattern runs through the whole of Mann’s oeuvre, from Thomas Buddenbrook through Goethe all the way to Felix Krull.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #38761d; font-size: x-large;"><b><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Volume 10: Doctor Faustus</span></b></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Again, one reading proved not enough. So</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> I started right over again, </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">this time</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> paying close attention to the extremely detailed commentaries in the </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">GKFA – </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">including an appendix with all the poems that are put to music in the novel, and which proved extremely illuminating </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">to </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">understand what</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">’</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">s going on behind its surface. I think this was the fourth time in my life I read </span><i><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Doktor Faustus</span></i><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">, and only this time do I think I was able to really connect to the strange character of Adrian Leverkühn, the German composer who sells his soul to the devil in exchange for supernatural demonic inspiration. Again, the book leaves me utterly stunned about the depth and complexity of Thomas Mann’s thinking and writing. It plays simultaneously on more registers of significance than I can keep track of. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjehAtNtBX1zgmkA1H3_72zkFPdBX2LC0Kl3YrYexw-WBrdrwNVznSC37b_U4f0EUgBrb6pzpLw6Nd4x1Ptxxbm5ej1p_KtDaVcTFIzCro2p_cYb65dBtOjnloADVzgVXpwNe7AOlVLw7f4/s1600/Screenshot+2020-03-30+at+15.35.51.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="242" data-original-width="353" height="273" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjehAtNtBX1zgmkA1H3_72zkFPdBX2LC0Kl3YrYexw-WBrdrwNVznSC37b_U4f0EUgBrb6pzpLw6Nd4x1Ptxxbm5ej1p_KtDaVcTFIzCro2p_cYb65dBtOjnloADVzgVXpwNe7AOlVLw7f4/s400/Screenshot+2020-03-30+at+15.35.51.png" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">From the movie <i>Mefisto</i>, based on Klauss Mann's novel</td></tr>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Having fled from the Nazis to America, Mann famously said “where I am, there is Germany</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">,</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">” and basic to this novel is the parallellism between German culture as a whole, Leverkühn as its fictional representative, and Mann himself as the real-life double of both. I know of no comparable case of a writer practicing such deep and honest introspection with respect to his very own sources of creative inspiration, under the pressure of having to compare them to something as frightening and demonic as the Nazi horrors. Only against this background is it possible to really understand Mann’s development from his initial political conservatism (<i>Betrachtungen eines Unpolitischen</i>) to his </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">eventual</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> embrace of liberal humanism and democracy. This gradual process of transformation led from intellectual aestheticism and cultural elitism towards</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> an ever deeper</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> concentration on the values of common humanity, <i>die Menschlichkeit</i></span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> –</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">a concern that</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> had moved </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">towards the </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> foreground in <i>Der Zauberberg</i> and culminated in his great four-volume series <i>Joseph and his Brothers</i>. Very significantly, it was not in the German but in the Jewish context that </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Mann</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> found his most potent models of humanity; but</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> it is</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> only in <i>Doktor Faustus</i> that one</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">feel</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">s</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> the full extent of the emotional pain,</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> violent </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">conflict and</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> deep</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> mourning</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> that was</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> involved</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> for Mann</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">in having to</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> fac</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">e</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> up to and analyz</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">e</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> the pathological potential of the German culture that he himself embodied and loved. In this sense, </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">this novel may be</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> the most impressive example of literary psychoanalysis (in the original sense of soul-searching) that I have ever come across.</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<b><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"><span style="color: #38761d; font-size: x-large;">Volume 11: The Holy Sinner</span></span></b></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Having emerged from the deep darkness of <i>Doctor Faustus</i>, I </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> wasted no time and continued right away </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">with</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> </span><i><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Der Erwählte</span></i><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> (The Elected, </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">but </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">known in English as The Holy Sinner). I ha</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">d never read it</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> before. This small novel is based upon the medieval legend of the great pope St. Gregory as originally told by Hartmann von Aue. Thomas Mann already included a short version of it in <i>Doktor Faustus</i> too, where the composer Adrian Leverkühn puts it to music</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">,</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> but clearly Mann felt that the story deserved more.</span><span style="color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"><br /><span style="background-color: white; background-position: initial initial; background-repeat: initial initial;">Again, what a delight!</span></span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> As already indicated,</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> </span><i><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Doktor Faustus</span></i><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">i</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">s a</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> dark, indeed</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> very dark</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> and </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">heavy novel, a tragic and deeply pessimistic work of mourning (<i>Trauerarbeit</i>) over the catastrophic decline of German culture under Hitler. Now that he had put that task behind him, and World War II was mercifully over at last, it</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> i</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">s clear that Mann needed some emotional relief. On every page of this book, you can feel the sheer joy of finally being able again to just </span><i><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">tell a story</span></i><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> –</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> for the fun of it, without all that heavy sense of responsibility about writ</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">ing</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> </span><i><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">the </span></i><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">novel about German’s pact with the devil while knowing all t</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">oo well</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> that you are yourself Germany’s greatest living writer.</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"><o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiuxuIfvQMxMaCb2HJyXVqghC_WibnWTZvc9mmUqyeotBBauHSN56MwxcjJaslXDV_lhyphenhyphen3weHfcS7BT_FIJF_8R0tfUaG5fM5XrJme4SXPQ4ocw9VC73XkMgB725gAXu1oFhyphenhyphenCUMtnbr4fU/s1600/Screenshot+2020-03-30+at+15.39.14.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="247" data-original-width="483" height="203" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiuxuIfvQMxMaCb2HJyXVqghC_WibnWTZvc9mmUqyeotBBauHSN56MwxcjJaslXDV_lhyphenhyphen3weHfcS7BT_FIJF_8R0tfUaG5fM5XrJme4SXPQ4ocw9VC73XkMgB725gAXu1oFhyphenhyphenCUMtnbr4fU/s400/Screenshot+2020-03-30+at+15.39.14.png" width="400" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">And what a</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">n amazing</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> story it is... A royal couple have twins: a brother and a sister. The twins fall in love (or rather, are in love since they are born) and commit incest, resulting in her giving birth to a baby boy, who like Moses is put in a little boat and sent out into the sea, to prevent a scandal. The baby reaches an isolated island and is saved; and having grown up, he sets out to find his parents. Coming to the city where his mother still reigns as queen (his father has </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">died </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">on a crusade to do penance</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> for his sins</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">), but not knowing who she is, he miraculously saves the city from its enemies and ends up marrying the queen, his own mother, who gives birth to two daughters. Incest n</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">umber two</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">. When they finally discover who they are, they see no other way to escape eternal damnation than </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">through</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> the gravest penance. The son/husband spends seventeen years on a lonely rock in the sea, surviving on some kind of earthly “mother’s milk” that </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">miraculously </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">comes from the rock</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">. Finally he</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> is saved because two Roman gentlemen have divine dreams that tell them that the person elected by God to be the new pope will be found there on that rock. </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">And so it</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> happens</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">. H</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">e ends up becoming a “very great pope</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">,”</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> is re-united with his mother</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">-</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">wife</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> and</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> his daughters too, and they all live happily ever after.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">I guess </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">it’s a no-brainer that only </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">a very great writer </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">can</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> re-tell such a wildly improbable story full of “naive” medieval piety (not to mention the incestuous and oedipal theme) and make it </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">all work</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">. You guessed it – Thomas Mann proves more than up to the challenge. </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">T</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">his novel contains perhaps some of the very best written prose I</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> ha</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">ve ever read, by anyone anywhere</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">, including even in Mann’s own oeuvre</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">– sparkling, sovereign, with incredible rhythmic flexibility, light and yet serious, poised perfectly between irony, satire and tragedy,</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> so that the</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> reader </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">is </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">willing to believe anything he</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> i</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">s being told, no matter how weird it gets. </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">So that’s</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> what a genius writer does when the hard work is finally over and he is looking to have some fun.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #38761d; font-size: x-large;"><b><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Volume 12: Felix Krull</span></b></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">I had</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> not</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> read this one before, and it was a surprise in several ways. As the editor explains, the Krull project is the only one that spans the entirety of T</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">homas Mann</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">’s career: he started it in his early years, then kept dropping it for other projects and kept returning to it, with increasing hesitation as time went on, until finally he just barely managed to finish its third book shortly before his death. Krull remains unfinished an</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">d</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> ends with a surprising cliffhanger. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">One effect of the very long writing period is that the three published books document the development of T</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">homas Mann</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">’s writing skills like no other. Parts of it are simply well written without being extraordinary; but then again and again,</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> quite</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> suddenly from one moment to the next, the writing moves to an entirely different register with such absolutely luminous prose and such profound levels of observation and reflection that one knows </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">this</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> must have been written in </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Mann’s</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">final</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> and most mature period. For me</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> personally</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">, the chapters about the actor Müller-Rosé and the circus trapeze artist “Andromache” remain unforgettable highlights </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">(again, about the conflict between the public persona and one’s own real self),</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> but there are many other gems</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">. I think for instance of</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> Krull’s simulation of sickness to stay out of school</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">;</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> his simulation of epilepsy to stay out of military service</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">;</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> his seduction by a wealthy woman in the hotel</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">,</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> who gets excited by the idea of him stealing valuables from her room (the most erotic scene</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> Thomas Mann</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> ever wrote, which actually caused some reviewers to call it “not suitable for minors”!)</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">;</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> and his nearly successful seduction of Zouzou </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">by means of</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> a beautiful long discourse about the true nature of love</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">This latter passage is </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">profoundly ambiguous, because by now the reader knows that </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Krull</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> does not</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">understand what love is</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">.</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Yet</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> he can still talk about it so well that</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> as readers</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> we</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> a</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">re more than happy to believe everything he says</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">. </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">For seasoned </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Thomas Mann</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> readers, most fascinating about the Krull project </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">must</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">be how he analyzes </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">the hidden connections between the artist and the imposter (<i>Hochstapler</i>) or confidence man. </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Mann</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> says that the artist, by necessity, is playing a role, and must play it to such perfection that the audience will never notice the effort. What the audience loves about the artist is the brilliance of the act, the perfection of the deception – not the actual truth of the person behind the screen, the one who is doing the acting but whose true nature must remain hidden from view. The audience does not love the artist, only his art. The public honour and recognition that the artist earns through his work is the flip side of his solitude: nobody knows who he really is, and</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> frankly,</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> nobody cares. <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Krull is the natural born pretender, and at the core of his identity there is a void</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> –</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> his public roles are</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> really</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> all there is, and </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">that seems to be just</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> fine with him. At the core of Thomas Mann’s identity</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> and at the heart of his oeuvre,</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> by contrast, there is not a void but a deep loneliness</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">:</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> a profound human need to express himself to his readers – to tell them who he really, <i>really</i> is – but </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">with the</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> acute awareness that he will never be able to express that truth except by</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> continuing to hide behind</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> </span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">one mask after the other. </span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">Again, t</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">hey do not want the truth, they want the illusion. And they are right too, for the truth may be deeply human but isn’t beautiful. Still, paradoxically, the undeniable and even deeper beauty of Thomas Mann’s oeuvre comes precisely from this human core at the very center</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">, one</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> that can only be revealed and expressed by</span><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> virtue of</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;"> being hidden and suppressed.<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: large;"><span lang="EN-US" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "cambria" , serif;">And now I will continue my exploration of the GKFA with Thomas Mann’s non-fiction, beginning with <i>Betrachtungen eines Unpolitischen</i>. Stay tuned…<o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
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wouterjhanegraaff.blogspot.comhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15519965611425366178noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5967881025525384120.post-17379478445096617452019-10-25T03:07:00.001-07:002022-05-18T08:03:18.622-07:00Remembering Jac. Lissenberg<div style="text-align: justify;">
It gives me great joy that the middle initial in my name refers to my maternal grandfather Jacobus Lissenberg (1894-1970), who from 1929 until his retirement in 1964 worked as a minister in a small Dutch denomination, the Covenant of Free Evangelical Congregations in the Netherlands, and was a prominent voice in that community. Yesterday I attended the presentation of a book that has been written about him by the church historian Leo Mietus and which tells the hitherto forgotten story of Lissenberg's activities as an opponent of fascism and national socialism.</div>
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Like the members of many other Dutch denominations during the 1930s, Free Evangelicals were often hesitant and undecided about what to think of Mussolini and Hitler; and according to the dominant view among historians of this community, their narrow millenarian focus on the imminent arrival of the eschaton resulted in a passive attitude towards current political events. Leo Mietus corrects this picture by showing that Jac. Lissenberg, one of the most prominent and authoritative voices within the Free Evangelical Community of the Netherlands, spoke out against fascism, national socialism and antisemitism from the very beginning. As editor of the community's journal <i>Ons Orgaan</i>, he made perfectly clear that any acceptance of fascist or antisemitic ideology was wholly incompatible with the core convictions that evangelical Christians should hold sacred. As such, he played an important role in warning his fellow believers against the temptation of a collaborationist attitude and opening their eyes about the truth of what was going on. Based on meticulous archival research, Leo Mietus tells the story of Lissenberg's anti-fascist engagement through the 1930s and 1940s and the resulting discussions, including conflicts with colleagues and other members of his community. During the preparation of his book, Mietus also conducted several interviews with my mother, who is now 92 and the only one of Jac. Lissenberg's children to be still alive. Some photos from the family album are reproduced in the book. </div>
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To read this story about my grandfather was a moving and inspiring experience for me. Having been raised with my mother's stories about the German occupation, his horror of fascism and antisemitism came as no surprise, but I did not know how explicitly and eloquently he had expressed his convictions in writing and how influential he had been in his religious community. I also learned much about other aspects of Jac. Lissenberg's personality, such as his profound love for literature, music, and art (including the satirical anti-fascist cartoons of Georg Grosz; but my mother had also often told me about his hobby of hunting for paintings at the <i>Waterlooplein</i>, the famous Amsterdam flea market in pre-commercial times). </div>
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As we find ourselves faced with a return of right-wing extremism and racial hatred today, and with a public debate that often seems to mirror that of the 1920s and 30s, Lissenberg's writings as recovered by Mietus remain as relevant as they were in the 1930s. He lived in other times, and his religious or spiritual outlook was somewhat different from my own, but this book made me realize how superficial such differences may sometimes be. Underneath the transformations of history and culture, profound as they may seem, I perceived an even deeper moral and existential continuity that seems to have been running through our maternal family line for a century or more. Jac. Lissenberg lived his life with his eyes and heart wide open, and never hesitated to speak out on behalf of goodness, truth, and even beauty. I feel proud to be his grandson.</div>
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[I attach an English translation of my Foreword to Leo Mietus' volume]</div>
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<span style="font-family: "gentium";">I know my grandfather through my mother’s memories. Thanks to her stories, after his death in 1970 he lived on in my family’s collective memory not just as a good and sincere human being but as a man of righteousness, a man who lived from his deepest convictions and inspired others by his example. Undoubtedly he himself would have been the first to protest against such a picture and try to relativize it, because of his strong conviction that no human being can ever claim to be better than others. Indeed he made no such claim, and it is precisely for that reason that the picture is correct. It is the key to his personality and explains his unwavering attitude towards National Socialism.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "gentium";">On the basis of extensive and very diligent archival research, Leo Mietus in this book corrects the traditional image of the Covenant of Free Evangelical Congregations in the Netherlands as a “defeatist faith community that had remained in default during the 1930s and 1940s.” As it turns out, in the Free Evangelical periodical <i>Ons Orgaan</i>, the authoritative voice of minister Jacobus Lissenberg was speaking out, ever again and without the slightest ambiguity, against Hitler’s ideology as “a most fatal spiritual revelation from the abyss” and against antisemitism, “from the poison of which God may preserve the Netherlands!” For me as his grandson, the fact that this was my grandfather’s opinion did not come as a surprise. My sister and I have been raised with my mother’s memories of the German occupation: the persecutions of the Jews, the razzias, the hunger winter, the voice of Hitler bragging over the radio, or the sinister threat of soldiers’ batallions that she, as a little girl lying in her bed at night, heard marching through the silent streets while singing sentimental German folk songs. There was also the amusing anecdote about an in-law who imagined he could visit my grandfather in his home dressed in the uniform of the NSB [the Dutch National Socialist organization] but was told to go home and change into civil clothes before he could come inside.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "gentium";">As grandchildren we had also heard the beautiful story of how one Sunday, my grandfather led his community in church to sing the Wilhelmus (the Dutch national anthem) <i>whispering</i>. But that his public role as a critic of Nazism in the Free Evangelical Congrations had been <i>that</i> important – this we hardly knew. From the archival materials that Mietus has collected and put in context, it has now become clear how early and how sharply Lissenberg perceived the true nature of National Socialism, how forcefully and explicitly he took his stance both in speech and in writing, and how courageously he responded to those who thought their Christian beliefs could be combined with support or tolerance for the Nazi ideology. However, it was typical of his approach that he nevertheless refused to condemn or “cancel” people as human beings because of their weakness or lack of deeper understanding of what was really going on. Lissenberg considered it his task to be a witness of the truth and try to arm his parishioners against the temptation of evil, but as concerns those who succumbed nevertheless, he left judgment to God. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "gentium";">This book’s title is very well chosen, for it touches the core of Lissenberg’s existential attitude to life. Quite rightly he comes back several times to Kierkegaard’s statement that Christian faith is like “floating above a thousand fathoms’ depth.” These words have sometimes been placed in connection with a quotation by Wittgenstein, who compares religion to the depths of the ocean that remain undisturbed regardless of the storms that may rage on the water’s surface. But Kierkegaard’s meaning was much more radical, and I am sure that Lissenberg followed him in this: about that unfathomable abyss in which we might drown at any moment we <i>know </i>nothing at all, not even whether any eternal rest will be found there. According to the Danish philosopher, as human beings we find ourselves in a permanent situation of “mortal danger” in which certainty is an illusion and all we can hold on to is our ability to let go. This analysis becomes acute in situations of war and occupation.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "gentium";">Thanks to this book, my mother’s memories of her father and my grandfather have gained a wholly new dimension, based on a wealth of factual information that had so far remained unavailable. The picture of his personality is now no longer limited to the personal sphere of family memories but has taken on a broader relevance for the church history of the Netherlands during the German occupation and the years before and after. Many thanks to Leo Mietus for rescuing Ds. Jacobus Lissenberg from oblivion and restoring him to the place in our history that he deserves. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "gentium";">Wouter J. Hanegraaff, “Voorwoord” (pp. 10-12) in: Leo Mietus, <i>Geloven is drijven boven duizenden vademen diepte: De vrije evangelische Predikant ds. Jac. Lissenberg en zijn verzet tegen het fascisme en nationaalsocialisme</i> [Believing means floating above a thousand fathoms’ depth: The Free Evangelical Minister ds. Jac. Lissenberg and his resistance against fascism and national socialism], Stichting Seminarium Bond van Vrije Evangelische Gemeenten 2019 [259 pp.]<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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wouterjhanegraaff.blogspot.comhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15519965611425366178noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5967881025525384120.post-91168348933605307352018-06-16T10:20:00.000-07:002019-08-08T07:30:36.154-07:00Esotericism and Criticism: A Platonic Response to Arthur Versluis<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhFbWW43gpszkTB2hrfrpIOGN9jBOyFQIPj5MGAzS55hAvLqfEBSxFxNTVE9t6F6e-YH-nfPNHP7ja2spoGmO68oW_5NP2BuDK_1t0rm0yGmblqoCOP0Tmt-QXAweEpRxuoEF3MbG9l1lJ-/s1600/63595_cov.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="648" data-original-width="432" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhFbWW43gpszkTB2hrfrpIOGN9jBOyFQIPj5MGAzS55hAvLqfEBSxFxNTVE9t6F6e-YH-nfPNHP7ja2spoGmO68oW_5NP2BuDK_1t0rm0yGmblqoCOP0Tmt-QXAweEpRxuoEF3MbG9l1lJ-/s640/63595_cov.jpg" width="425" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">The establishment of Western
esotericism as a field of academic research since the 1990s has been
accompanied by a good deal of theoretical and methodological debate. However, because scholars are understandably passionate about
their work, such discussions always run the risk of degenerating into negative
polemics and personal invectives, and our young field has certainly had its
share of those. It is a fact of human psychology that if opinions that we
personally cherish are being criticized by others, nothing is easier than to
experience such criticism as a personal attack. Once this happens, most of us
find it hard to keep listening accurately to what our opponents are trying to
say – it is all too easy to begin imagining them as “enemies” rather than as
colleagues whose opinions and commitments just happen to be different from our
own and who might have something to say that we do not yet see. On the
following pages I will be discussing a strong example which seems
representative of an unfortunate rift that has appeared in the community of
esotericism scholars. This case concerns an attack on my own work that is just
a bit too extreme to be ignored, but I hope to avoid falling into the retaliatory
trap of tit-for-tat. Rather, I want to do my best to re-open an important
discussion in the study of esotericism that has clearly turned sour and
negative. The occasion for making this attempt is a chapter in Arthur
Versluis’s recent volume <a href="http://www.sunypress.edu/p-6429-platonic-mysticism.aspx"><i>Platonic Mysticism: Contemplative Science, Philosophy, Literature, and Art</i> </a>(State University of New York Press: Albany
2017).</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">To understand
what is happening in this chapter, a bit of context and background is needed.
Arthur and I have known each other since the early 1990s, when he visited the
Netherlands, and we saw quite a lot of each other in the years that followed.
He spent time at my place in Utrecht, and I came to visit him for days at his
amazing house in the midst of the Michigan cornfields. Since we were both passionate
about the project of promoting the study of Western esotericism, we engaged on
a course of fruitful and friendly collaboration, as can be seen from a whole
series of articles that we contributed to one another’s publication projects. It
was pretty clear from the beginning that we came from very different academic
traditions and our approaches to “esotericism” were quite different as well,
but for a long time this did not cause serious problems. Of course we had our
moments of disagreement or mutual puzzlement about one another’s positions, but
the basic situation was one of mutual respect, friendship, and appreciation. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">That all
changed in 2013, when I published a large review article <a href="https://www.academia.edu/3883451/Textbooks_and_Introductions_to_Western_Esotericism_2013_">“Textbooks and Introductions to Western Esotericism,”</a> including a section titled “Esoteric
Religionism” about Arthur’s <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Magic-Mysticism-Introduction-Esoteric-Traditions/dp/0742558363"><i>Magic and Mysticism: An Introduction to Western Esotericism</i> </a>(Lanham 2007). Here I introduced him as “the most prominent
American representative, in his generation, of a pure religionist approach to
esotericism in the tradition of Eliade, Corbin or the younger Faivre” (186). My
discussion focused on what I saw as a lack of textual organization and careful
editing, on some questionable choices concerning what to include and exclude,
and most importantly, on what struck me as a “lack of real interest in
confronting the problems and dilemmas of modern historical scholarship” (187). I
personally considered it a critical but fair review, and this remains my honest
opinion as I re-read it today. Arthur, however, responded with great anger. He
clearly experienced the review as a personal attack, and our contact came
virtually to an end. This was a sad experience for me, as I’m sure it must have been for him, but I had no other choice than to accept it.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Although
my review article is never mentioned, Arthur’s chapter “The Externalist
Fallacy” (<i>Platonic Mysticism</i>, 71-84) is clearly his response to it. My
critiques of his 2007 book are passed over in silence, but what appears to have
incensed him is being described as a “religionist” (worse: a “pure” one!). This
is because he believes – incorrectly, as I will try to explain – that I use “religionism”
as a <i>pejorative</i> label for approaches I dislike; or in other words, he
seems to think I was <i>accusing</i> him of being that most despicable thing –
a <i>religionist</i>. Starting from this incorrect assumption, Arthur embarks
on a whole series of allegations, some of them very much <i>ad hominem</i>. The
final result is a picture of my work and its “malign” (72) intentions that, as
I hope to show, bears almost no resemblance to my actual perspective. If I were
to return the compliment and suspect Arthur of “malign” intentions towards me,
there would be no point in responding. However, the fact is that I do not doubt
his honesty – I readily assume he believes sincerely in the accuracy of his
interpretation. This gives me some hope that I might perhaps be able to correct
the picture. As far as I can see, it can be broken down into six interrelated
claims about me and my ideas. I will discuss them one by one.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-size: x-large;"><span style="color: #38761d;">Wouter hates
religionism</span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">Arthur quotes my technical definition
of “religionism” – a term, by the way, which I did not invent but that was
current at least as early as the 1990s – as “the project of exploring
historical sources in search of what is eternal and universal” (75, referring
to <a href="http://www.cambridge.org/gb/academic/subjects/religion/religion-general-interest/esotericism-and-academy-rejected-knowledge-western-culture?format=HB&isbn=9780521196215#oGDEMvjVkISLH5Ka.97"><i>Esotericism and the Academy</i></a>, 296). Therefore he knows what I mean by
it. Nevertheless, elsewhere he claims that critics like me dismiss as a religionist
“anyone who takes seriously the philosophical and religious perspectives that
he or she is studying” (27). Now this is something else entirely: presumably I believe
that scholars of esotericism should not take those whom they are studying
seriously! To be honest, this claim makes my head spin. How, I wonder, could
anybody who has read my work draw such a conclusion? I am all about trying to
do justice to esoteric traditions, thinkers, and ideas that have been unjustly
marginalized for a long period but deserve to be taken seriously. I’m not sure
how it happened, but somewhere along the way, Arthur seems to have gotten me
confused with a certain type of debunking skeptic, a hyper-rationalist of the
old school who considers it the sacred duty of academics to expose esotericism
as “irrational rubbish.” In fact all my work is directed <i>against</i> such attitudes.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<br />
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1QZUilcU9fYBh_7WZiKT0CpvfB_5Kz_D32b-Eg8MUqjTEJU5DUUDIrLDF_-cCF7mVm4MxAJsVx-Ru-nduk00LITYC3WpzaSGaxBsXTm9WgYmxPAsUYnHxNEya5uaAJSlZUyyxA9myecD4/s1600/eranos-1974-durand-corbin-faivre_jpg.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="751" data-original-width="1600" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj1QZUilcU9fYBh_7WZiKT0CpvfB_5Kz_D32b-Eg8MUqjTEJU5DUUDIrLDF_-cCF7mVm4MxAJsVx-Ru-nduk00LITYC3WpzaSGaxBsXTm9WgYmxPAsUYnHxNEya5uaAJSlZUyyxA9myecD4/s640/eranos-1974-durand-corbin-faivre_jpg.png" width="640" /></a></span></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">Religionists: Gilbert Durand, Henry Corbin, and Antoine Faivre at Eranos (1970s)</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">How
to explain such a monumental misperception? As far as I can see, two things are
going wrong in the chapter. First, Arthur seems to think that “taking
esoteric beliefs seriously” means affirming that they are true. If an esoteric
Platonist professes belief in the eternal ideas, then I am not taking him
seriously unless I say “yes, you are right, the eternal ideas exist!” Second,
Arthur seems to assume that one cannot have respect or appreciation for any
perspective with which one does not personally agree. Therefore if I disagree
with religionist methodologies for technical reasons, this must mean that I
have no respect or appreciation for them or their representatives.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">Both
assumptions are wide of the mark. In fact I take <i>any</i> belief seriously if I can see
that it is being held with sincerity and conviction – but obviously that does
not mean that I necessarily share it. Only by taking someone seriously can I
empathize with him or her, and it is my duty as a scholar (a very pleasant one,
I might add) to do what I can to imaginatively “enter” the world of those I
study, so as to understand as well as possible what they are saying and doing,
or why. I am not saying that the task of the scholar ends there. Once having
immersed oneself deeply in a text or a tradition, there comes the point where
one has to step back and create sufficient distance to see the topic from a
wider and more independent perspective. The ability to do <i>both</i>, and do
it well, I see as a boundary condition for quality in scholarship. As for
the second point: it is certainly true that I have serious objections to
religionist theories and their methodological implications, but this has
absolutely nothing to do with respect or appreciation. Perhaps the best example
is my longstanding friendship with Jeffrey J. Kripal, the most sophisticated
“neo”religionist scholar of religion known to me (he himself accepts the label
as “not inappropriate,” see page 129 <a href="http://www.press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/S/bo17677462.html">here</a>). <a href="https://www.academia.edu/1170512/Leaving_the_Garden_in_search_of_religion_Jeffrey_J._Kripals_vision_of_a_gnostic_study_of_religion_2008_">I have reviewed his work critically</a>, and he has returned the favour (see pp. 125-132 <a href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/Secret-Body-Esoteric-Currents-Religions/dp/022612682X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1529147664&sr=8-1&keywords=Kripal+SEcret+Body">here</a>), but our discussions have always
been grounded in mutual respect and, indeed, admiration. I wouldn’t teach his approach
to my students, but I do make them read his work and tell them they have to
consider it seriously. If they end up following Jeff's course, they have my blessing.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"> The simple
truth is that I do not hate religionism at all. On the contrary, I see it as an
inherently problematic but very important intellectual tradition.
Religionist scholarship has always been an endlessly fascinating phenomenon for
me, and I have the greatest respect for its famous representatives (plus some
of its less famous ones). So what do I find so “problematic”? Simply the fact that you cannot write the history of something that transcends history. Still, the very
impossibility of resolving this paradox, which I believe lies at the heart of religionism, has led to brilliantly creative and
profound attempts at resolving it nevertheless. That is where the fascination
lies, at least for me. In this regard – and here Arthur and I find ourselves in
agreement – the religionism of Eranos is somewhat similar to the great tradition
of Platonism, which I admire even more, and which lives from the deep
contradiction between Being (the eternal forms or ideas) and Becoming (our
world of impermanence and change). Being able to hold two
contradictory notions in one’s mind at the same time is not a sign of intellectual
weakness: on the contrary, all the great metaphysical thinkers in the Platonic tradition (think
for instance of Cusanus or Bruno) have known that, once you go beyond first
appearances in exploring reality, you encounter logical paradoxes all the way
down – or rather, into infinity. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">So no, Arthur,
believe me: I don’t hate religionism. I don’t despise it. I don’t try to
exclude it. Sure: I do not share its approach to the study of religion, and I
do advocate different methodologies in esotericism research. But I do so
openly, explicitly, with respect, and with arguments. If there is anything that
has disappointed me about this debate since the 1990s, it is that so few
scholars on the “religionist” side (Jeff Kripal being a notable exception) have
been interested in listening to critics and engaging their arguments in a
constructive manner. Instead, what almost always happens is that critics are
simply dismissed out of hand, and perceived as “inquisitors” with “malign” intentions who try
to “exclude” or even “excommunicate” those with whom they disagree. This brings
me to the second point.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="color: #38761d;"><span style="font-size: x-large;">Wouter is a
Protestant heresiophobe </span></span></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="color: #38761d;"><span style="font-size: x-large;">who wants to dump
esotericism into the dustbin</span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">From my discussion of the
Protestant “anti-apologetic” tradition and its battle against Hellenistic
paganism in the early modern period (<i>Esotericism and the Academy</i>, ch. 2), Arthur appears to have concluded that I am
on the side of the heresy-hunters and applaud their ideas! They were sworn
enemies of esotericism, and so am I (75ff). This misinterpretation is so
bizarre that, frankly, I had trouble believing my eyes when I first read it. But
I had to believe them, for one page later it got even worse:</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 36.0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">It is perhaps
worth noting … that Wouter Hanegraaff’s father was a Protestant minister and
theologian and that one of the most prominent American evangelical authors is
in fact Hanegraaff’s relative, Hank Hanegraaff, who has produced antiesoteric,
antioccult resources online, derived from a combination of, yes, biblical
Protestantism (he is known as the “Bible Answer Man”) and opposition to what he
perceives as irrational or demonically inspired superstition (76).</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">Is this supposed to be the
smoking gun? It is certainly correct that my father was a Protestant minister.
His brother Hans – also a minister – emigrated to the United States, and Hank
Hanegraaff is one of his sons, so we are cousins. We met just once in our
lives, when Hank was visiting the Netherlands. We had one friendly chat in my
mother’s garden, and everybody was careful not to mention religion. Anyone who
is remotely familiar with my work knows how strongly I feel about the study of
religion as a secular discipline incompatible with doctrinal theology of any
kind. As for Hank, with all due respect, his ideas about cults and the occult
as demonic threats could not be further removed from mine, as anybody will see
who just cares to compare our writings. So what is the point of Arthur bringing
this up? Does he want his readers to think of me as some kind of sinister
double agent, a Christian fundamentalist in disguise who is out to destroy
esotericism under the pretense of studying it? </span><br />
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgtTQ6niFGpK5184i6Kd27GIiWXinkye97X0F8k_mwHwyDb3z1OYvx_KqM2U-kEgZPkDUc4Lsf0w5PnbTE8bDPszHFliW41fidBva-nTXzEikyWqNUGc9TTByNlD-Ik3h6aSu7R4Cix1_6N/s1600/Brucker001.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1600" data-original-width="1395" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgtTQ6niFGpK5184i6Kd27GIiWXinkye97X0F8k_mwHwyDb3z1OYvx_KqM2U-kEgZPkDUc4Lsf0w5PnbTE8bDPszHFliW41fidBva-nTXzEikyWqNUGc9TTByNlD-Ik3h6aSu7R4Cix1_6N/s320/Brucker001.jpg" width="278" /></a></span></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">Johann Jacob Brucker</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">My actual argument, of course, is the very
opposite. Protestant heresiophobes (Arthur's term: see p. 81) like Jacob Thomasius and Ehregott Daniel
Colberg created the intellectual foundations for an “anti-apologetic” tradition
(a systematic attack on the Platonizing patristic theology of the so-called “Christian
apologists”) that made it possible for Jacob Brucker – whose work came to
dominate the field of history of philosophy during the 18<sup>th</sup> and
early 19<sup>th</sup> centuries – to expurgate everything we now see as
“esotericism” from the history of legitimate academic philosophy and dump it
into the “wastebasket” of history. Like his predecessor Christoph August
Heumann, he would like to see it all vanish “into the sea of oblivion,” to be
forgotten forever. In a nutshell, this is how and why esotericism came to be
excluded or “exorcized” from academic research since the period of the
Enlightenment and throughout the 19<sup>th</sup> century. Obviously I do not
consider that a good thing, as Arthur seems to believe. On the contrary, it was
an intellectual disaster that has distorted our very understanding of Western
culture up to the very present; and the entire rest of my book describes the
difficult process of restoring esotericism to the academy from the 20<sup>th</sup>
century on. In short, the modern study of esotericism is all about undoing the
damage done by those Protestant heresiophobes and their agendas. Nevertheless,
Arthur seems to have made up his mind that I am on <i>their</i> side and
secretly applaud their anti-Platonist and anti-esoteric alarmism. On page 75,
he triumphantly quotes me for endorsing their polemics as “exactly the right
combination.” In fact, if you read those words in context you will see that I
was saying something different:</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 36.0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">[T]he
anti-apologetic historiography pioneered by Jacob Thomasius, Colberg, and
Brucker … was characterized by a <i>methodology </i>of historical criticism
combined with a <i>theoretical focus</i> on the manifold effects of the
encounter between Hellenistic paganism and biblical traditions. This, I
suggest, was exactly the right combination. If this basic agenda had been
continued and further developed after the Enlightenment (presumably shedding
its normative theological assumptions in the process), the study of “Western
esotericism” might well have established itself on secure historical
foundations already in the nineteenth century. As it happened, this line of
inquiry was cut short … leading to a scholarly “Waste Land” instead. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">There is no cure for sloppy
reading. What I am advocating here is not some heresiophobic agenda congenial
to Protestant fundamentalists such as Colberg or my cousin Hank. Instead, I am
making two points. First, to understand what “esotericism” is all about, from a
historical and theoretical point of view, the history of the encounter between
Hellenistic paganism and biblical traditions is absolutely central.
Second,<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I advocate the methods of
historical criticism as crucial to studying this field. Of course, one might
agree or disagree with that agenda. Other scholars may well propose different
ways of conceptualizing and studying the field, and that is perfectly fine.
What is not fine is to distort an argument beyond recognition and then score
points against the caricature. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-size: x-large;"><span style="color: #38761d;">Wouter “orientalizes”
Platonism</span></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjY5EFFTpI6FqbFP1PERJ-tz-x_YerTD-dPBzXNou8eW5E5CGYCpLRSZ34D2vWGLlpOm_qLImmj1iZoRrCYgA419Bgi8NoyoHt03c-q-AoyMmbC-SVN-gzLiX5kwHBXSYNqxZX58Iih8fxD/s1600/plato.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="656" data-original-width="1400" height="298" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjY5EFFTpI6FqbFP1PERJ-tz-x_YerTD-dPBzXNou8eW5E5CGYCpLRSZ34D2vWGLlpOm_qLImmj1iZoRrCYgA419Bgi8NoyoHt03c-q-AoyMmbC-SVN-gzLiX5kwHBXSYNqxZX58Iih8fxD/s640/plato.jpg" width="640" /></a></span></div>
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">The general point of Arthur’s
book is that Platonism should be restored to its original position as the
central tradition of what has come to be called “mysticism.” In his second and
third chapters, he shows how the rise of cross-cultural comparativism during
the 20<sup>th</sup> century resulted in an eclipse of the original
understanding of mysticism as Platonic. This is a strong argument with which I
agree completely. It is all the more regrettable that Arthur completely misses
the point of my concept of “Platonic Orientalism” and thinks it is inspired by
some kind of Protestant anti-Platonic agenda. </span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"> Nothing could
be farther from the truth. Arthur notes correctly that the term “Platonic
Orientalism” was <a href="http://www.sunypress.edu/p-3405-the-wisdom-of-the-mystic-east.aspx">coined by John Walbridge</a>, but mistakenly claims that “much of
[Walbridge’s] work is dedicated to critique of the French scholar of esoteric
Islam, Henry Corbin” (79). In truth, Walbridge’s books are deep and sensitive
studies of the key Islamic thinker Suhrawardi; but the mere fact that he dares
to disagree with Corbin’s reading of Suhrawardi seems enough for Arthur to see
him as yet another enemy out to attack Corbin. As for my own understanding of
“Platonic Orientalism,” once again Arthur creates a caricature by either
ignoring or misrepresenting everything I have written about it. In fact the
term refers, quite simply, to a very influential tradition that saw Platonism
not as a rational philosophy created by Plato but as a spiritual wisdom
tradition rooted in pre-Platonic sources such as Pythagoras, Moses, Zoroaster,
or Hermes. Ironically, this should be quite congenial to Arthur’s own
understanding of Platonism as a spiritual tradition. What seems to have
provoked his ire, however, is the term “Orientalism,” which he thinks is “of
course, a pejorative” (79). Never mind that both Walbridge and myself are
explicit in pointing out that the terminology should <i>not</i> be confused
with Edward Said’s famous notion but is wholly independent of it. Arthur simply
ignores these statements, or refuses to believe them. He goes so far as to
claim, without providing any evidence, that I use the term “not despite but <i>because
</i>of the pejorative implications of ‘orientalism’” (79, emphasis in original)
because it provides me with an excuse for not having to take Platonism and
Platonic mysticism seriously “on their own terms” (ibid.).</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">Again, this is
completely wrong. Nothing in my work (or Walbridge’s, for that matter) suggests
a pejorative understanding of “Platonic Orientalism” – quite the contrary. Far
from wanting to “dismiss” it, I want to <i>restore</i> it to academic agendas.
Moreover, I happen to agree with Arthur that what he calls the “mystical”
dimension of Platonism must be taken very seriously indeed (not just in Plotinus
or Dionysius, but also in Plato himself). Again, my true agenda is to expose
the long-term negative effects of the Protestant heresiological imagination and
its Enlightenment continuations, so that it may be possible for Platonism to be
seen in its true light. How is it possible that Arthur got it so wrong? The only
explanation I can think of is that, having already decided that I am a Protestant heresiophobe
with malign intentions, just reading the term “Orientalism” caused his
irritation to rise to such heights that he stopped reading and began jumping to
conclusions all of his own.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="color: #38761d;"><span style="font-size: x-large;">Wouter embodies </span></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="color: #38761d;"><span style="font-size: x-large;">the
externalist fallacy</span></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg6MsotV7yyHdFRPFSj4yHwpsg3_pTU3fXbLb0d8_DQMeOggntQXLgAz-_zXz1WpfylCtpGyBVBK7mKIxGw541jlAGvoeRqaStIXjSlNHD3Ye8XB8jj7lWah4uQVS9aaSvecFm1dp6ZQk9h/s1600/Impostures_et_pseudo-science_-_L_oeuvre_de_Mircea_____Daniel_Dubuisson_-_Decitre_-_9782859398743_-_Livre.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="952" data-original-width="580" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg6MsotV7yyHdFRPFSj4yHwpsg3_pTU3fXbLb0d8_DQMeOggntQXLgAz-_zXz1WpfylCtpGyBVBK7mKIxGw541jlAGvoeRqaStIXjSlNHD3Ye8XB8jj7lWah4uQVS9aaSvecFm1dp6ZQk9h/s320/Impostures_et_pseudo-science_-_L_oeuvre_de_Mircea_____Daniel_Dubuisson_-_Decitre_-_9782859398743_-_Livre.png" width="194" /></a></span></div>
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">In passing, I should mention that
the other scholar of religion singled out in Arthur’s chapter as exemplifying
“the eternalist fallacy” is Daniel Dubuisson. Because we are both critical of
“religionism,” readers could get the impression that Dubuisson’s perspective
must be similar to my own. Certainly Arthur thinks that this is the case, but
in fact it is not. While Dubuisson’s ideas would require a separate discussion,
I do not at all share his extreme ideological viewpoint according to which
fascism and antisemitism are structurally encoded in the type of
(“religionist”) scholarship represented by Eliade (for this point, see <i>Esotericism
and the Academy</i>, 302-3 nt 169, with special reference to the cogent
refutation of such arguments by Elaine Fisher). Arthur does not mention this
political dimension, but it might help explain the “withering scorn” (72) with
which Dubuisson writes about Eliade. This is not my attitude at all, but Arthur
suggests a connection by describing us both as guilty of the “externalist
fallacy”:</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 36.0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">What authors
like Dubuisson and Hanegraaff assert is a radical externalism. Hanegraaff
claims that the “experiential dimension that transcends history … will always
remain inaccessible to scholarly research by definition” (78).</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">It is very strange that Arthur
objects so much to this, for if you read the quotation closely and think it over, you will see
that it describes exactly his <i>own</i> point of view! <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And more than that, it is a view with which I
wholly agree. I know that this statement is likely to make his head spin, so let me
explain.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">The
externalist fallacy, as Arthur puts it, is “that one can do justice to esoteric
religion from an exoteric perspective” (82), or “that what is most meaningful
can be understood only through external discursive analysis” (82-83). Against
this externalist fallacy, he quotes Peter Kingsley as saying that “there is no
entrance to the esoteric from the outside” (82). Arthur might be amazed to hear
it, but that is <i>exactly</i> what I am saying as well. Just compare those two
statements by Kingsley and myself, and you will find they reach the same
conclusion: if there is an “esoteric” dimension that transcends history, then
obviously it will not be accessible by scholarly methods. I could not agree
more. The externalist fallacy does not apply to me, so let me try to put the record
straight once and for all. I do <i>not </i>at all believe “that one can do
justice to esoteric religion [here understood in Arthur’s sense of the word, as
an absolute reality that transcends history] from an exoteric perspective.” Nor
do I believe “that what is most meaningful can be understood through external
discursive analysis, as if one sought to realize the beauty of a magnificent
Hudson River School landscape painting through analysis of its chemical content”
(82-83). How could I possibly mean something so ridiculous? Again Arthur has
gotten me confused with some old-fashioned reductionist of the crudest and
stupidest variety.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">In fact I
stated <a href="https://www.academia.edu/1761692/Empirical_Method_in_the_Study_of_Esotericism_1995_">as early as 1995</a> – and have kept repeating ever since – that what I
advocate is an empirical/historical methodology grounded in <i>methodological
agnosticism</i>. Sometimes I wonder how often I’ll need to explain what that
means and what it doesn’t. Here is one of my latest attempts:</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 36.0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">[T]he academy has
no instruments for gaining direct access to the true and absolute nature of
reality that is claimed to exist according to [the religionist] model, and it
has no methodologies for either verifying or falsifying the claim that such a
reality exists in the first place. The Absolute or the Divine is simply not a
possible object of research: all that scholars can do is study the beliefs,
convictions or theories that have been formulated <i>about </i>it, but as scholars
they are not qualified to assess their truth or falsity. … [I]t is simply a
matter of recognizing the limitations of what scholarly research can and cannot
do. Some academics claim that since science and scholarship cannot discover the
divine or the absolute, it therefore does not exist. However, it is logically
more consistent to admit that we simply do not know – and cannot know. This
position, which neither affirms nor denies that it might be possible to
discover the true nature of reality by <i>other</i> means than science and
scholarship (such as spiritual techniques or mystical contemplation), is
technically known as “methodological agnosticism.” (<a href="https://www.bloomsbury.com/au/western-esotericism-a-guide-for-the-perplexed-9781441136466/"><i>Western Esotericism: A Guide for the Perplexed</i>,</a>
11-12)</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">How much clearer could I put it?
What this means is that science and scholarship are modest and limited
instruments that cannot claim to provide access to the “esoteric” realm of the
transcendent or the absolute; and therefore scholars, <i>as scholars</i>, are
not in any position to either affirm or deny its existence. Ironically, this is
in perfect accord with the very heart of Platonic mysticism as understood by
Arthur himself. In this same passage, I even take care to reject the
reductionist interpretation that he imputes to me (the argument that “since
science and scholarship cannot discover the divine or the absolute, it therefore
does not exist”), pointing out that we should better admit that we simply do
not know. To put the record even straighter, this also means that I
respectfully disagree with the position of <i>methodological naturalism</i>, which
“sees any non-natural explanations that we may encounter on the emic level as
irrelevant” and argues that “any explanation that is not in accord with our
best present knowledge of how the world works …, or which lacks any plausible
support by such knowledge, is … automatically disqualified from the accounting
of things” (Egil Asprem, <a href="http://www.sunypress.edu/p-6566-the-problem-of-disenchantment.aspx"><i>Problem of Disenchantment</i></a>, 85 nt 118). </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-size: x-large;"><span style="color: #38761d;">Wouter wants to
exclude </span></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-size: x-large;"><span style="color: #38761d;">the study of consciousness</span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">The problem with Arthur’s chapter
is that he reads my work selectively on the basis of what appear to be preconceived notions. As a
result, he misses most of what I say. When I write (in the quotation just
given) that <i>as scholars</i> we can neither verify nor falsify the reality of
the transcendent, this implies that there might be <i>other</i> (non-scholarly)
means of doing it, and I explicitly mention “spiritual techniques or mystical
contemplation.” Arthur, for his part, states (more reductively than he might
intend) that “[u]ltimately, the study of esoteric religion is the study of different levels
or kinds of consciousness” (83), and advocates practices of mystical contemplation.
From that perspective, he writes, “the externalist fallacy is to believe that
one can accurately convey or depict esoteric religion from outside, without
respecting the fact that esoteric religious traditions allude to changes in
consciousness” (83-84). As already explained above, this externalist fallacy is
nowhere to be found in my work: all I ever do is insist that we should not
confuse<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;">
scholarly methods with mystical contemplation or other spiritual techniques.
Both are equally valuable on their own terms, as far as I am concerned, but
they are not good for the same things. A spoon is helpful for eating soup and a
hammer for hitting nails into the wall, but you won’t get far hitting nails
with a spoon or eating soup with a hammer. It is really as simple as that:
scholarship is not mysticism, and mysticism is not scholarship. </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>As
for the study of consciousness, it so happens that my true perspective is very
close to the “radical empiricism” and philosophical pragmatism associated with
William James. The relevant quotation is so famous that I hesitate to give it
once again, but it simply cannot be said any better than James said it, so here
we go:</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 36.0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-language: HE; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">[O]ur normal waking
consciousness, rational consciousness as we call it, is but one special type of
consciousness, whilst all about it, parted from it by the filmiest of screens,
there lie potential forms of consciousness entirely different. We may go
through life without suspecting their existence; but apply the requisite
stimulus, and at a touch they are there in all their completeness, definite
types of mentality which probably somewhere have their field of application and
adaptation. No account of the universe in its totality can be final which
leaves these other forms of consciousness quite discarded. How to regard them
is the question, – for they are so discontinuous with ordinary consciousness
(James, <i>Varieties</i>).</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiEwuJMZIwk1Y9Km1hnmNoIuTfwOvC2aGZesmvzIZSwCROgtDGPpid8meZlabp9MaN_WJeaP43RS4WOw_kewJk_O5dqRS8NopihvtBAysbS5smS-_c4NtiSxtsYDqTBANFPilh-uXFXKFG-/s1600/William-James-Quotes.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="700" data-original-width="1200" height="372" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiEwuJMZIwk1Y9Km1hnmNoIuTfwOvC2aGZesmvzIZSwCROgtDGPpid8meZlabp9MaN_WJeaP43RS4WOw_kewJk_O5dqRS8NopihvtBAysbS5smS-_c4NtiSxtsYDqTBANFPilh-uXFXKFG-/s640/William-James-Quotes.jpg" width="640" /></a></span></div>
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;">For quite a long while now, in many
publications, I have been calling attention to the role of “alterations of consciousness”
in Western esotericism (including, of course, the Platonic tradition, or more
precisely – sorry Arthur! – Platonic Orientalism). If you look closely at the
relevant texts and traditions, again and again you will find practioners
experimenting with how to apply the “requisite stimuli” for influencing or
altering human consciousness, resulting in visions, voices, mystical
experiences, and so on. I have come to consider this absolutely central to the
study of esotericism (it's been at my suggestion that <a href="http://www.esswe.org/event-2918786">the 2019 ESSWE conference, in Amsterdam, will be devoted to this topic</a>), so how could I reasonably be suspected
of attempting to <i>exclude</i> consciousness from the field? Nevertheless,
Arthur takes me for an “externalist” who wants to censor experiential
dimensions and prohibit scholars from even mentioning them. He thinks I blame
him for discussing such dimensions in one of his books about Christian
Theosophy: “Were I to remove [the experiential accounts of esoteric
practitioners],” he protests, “it would no longer give the reader a sense of
the theosophical tradition from the perspective of the theosophers, but rather
would only give names, dates, and data.” Quite so! How could I possibly
disagree? Just look at how much attention I give to such experiential accounts
in my own publications, which are by no means restricted to just names, dates,
and data. In short, again Arthur has gotten me confused with some other guy.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The
only real difference that I see between Arthur’s perspective and mine – but it
is a very important one – is that I believe scholarly method should not be
confused with mystical contemplation or other spiritual techniques. I see no
reason why these two could not learn to co-exist in friendship and mutual respect,
but trouble will arise if we require carpenters to use spoons or expect soup to
be eaten with hammers. This means that in my capacity as a scholar (a
carpenter) I will be using the tools of my trade: hammers, not spoons. Of
course those tools will not allow me to have direct experiences of the
transcendent: that is simply not what they are designed to do. But they can do
many other things that I consider extremely valuable and important, which is
why I am a scholar. When my working day as a carpenter is over, perhaps I will
decide to take a cup of soup! That is a personal choice for which I’ll
definitely need a spoon, and I’ll be happy to use it. But it will not be of
much help to me during working hours.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="color: #38761d;"><span style="font-size: x-large;">Wouter is a self-appointed
inquisitor</span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;">We finally come to what might be the
core of the conflict. Judging from the book as a whole – and this is what I
already suggested in 2013 – it seems that Arthur has rather little interest in
secular methods as tools to be used on their own terms and valuable for their
own purposes. Such approaches he seems to perceive as either inherently
meaningless “nihilistic” pursuits (86) or as destructive instruments for expelling
esotericism, mysticism, or Platonism <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>from the academy (see for instance his
discussions of various secular approaches on pp. 62-64, 125-18). This argument
might seem surprising at first sight: after all, esotericism found itself excluded
from the academy to begin with, and only thanks to the application of standard
secular methods did it finally get <i>included</i> as an academic field. But in
fact this is exactly what seems to be the problem, the real source of the pain:
“in the name of ‘academic respectability,’ exactly what is esoteric about
esoteric religion is excluded, making the field into a kind of ironically empty
exercise” (82). In other words, Arthur thinks that the field has sold its soul
in exchange for “academic respectability.” As one of the chief culprits
responsible for this development, I am being framed throughout the chapter as a
“self-appointed inquisitor” (83) who wants to “exclude” (72, 79, 82), “excise”
(8), or “excommunicate” (72, 84) dissenting approaches from the academy.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhzqwpzUe_cLPpfs4nDv74kefOsP7w28jUj2Y5PufKczvBuwTL0HM7zWKgMkLl8BB_1LpKICR2EqjnylIILx_Np9WPBM09Eq59pR_uFzbSnEyWr2doAwiMpGkNW3cWmpcTpo85T8xtfAGLG/s1600/Relief_Bruno_Campo_dei_Fiori_n1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="993" data-original-width="1600" height="396" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhzqwpzUe_cLPpfs4nDv74kefOsP7w28jUj2Y5PufKczvBuwTL0HM7zWKgMkLl8BB_1LpKICR2EqjnylIILx_Np9WPBM09Eq59pR_uFzbSnEyWr2doAwiMpGkNW3cWmpcTpo85T8xtfAGLG/s640/Relief_Bruno_Campo_dei_Fiori_n1.jpg" width="640" /></a></span></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">Giordano Bruno before the Holy Inquisition</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;">This
is a very serious allegation, but the truth of the matter is rather different, and
in fact very simple. I am trying to advance what I see as proper scholarly
methods, and this involves not getting them confused with non-scholarly
pursuits such as mystical contemplation or spiritual techniques (no matter how
valuable I may – and in fact do – find those in and for themselves). For reasons
already explained above, I believe that <i>scholarly</i> methods are simply incapable
of gaining direct access to whatever transcendent reality might exist out
there. They can only approach it indirectly and at second hand, and therefore
they cannot give scientific proof of its truth and real existence. All they can
do is report what practitioners are saying about it, and then try to analyze or
interpret (by whatever methods, from hermeneutics to neurobiology) what might
be going on in such transcendental experiences. Is it possible then to
scientifically <i>disprove</i> the truth and real existence of transcendent
realities? Here opinions differ. I would personally argue that it is not
possible, which makes me an advocate of methodological agnosticism; others,
along the lines of methodological naturalism (see above), seem to assume that
it is possible. In this debate, the jury is still out. In any case, we are not
dealing here with some conspiracy of academic “externalists” against Platonism
or esotericism, but with a serious and legitimate debate about the limits of scientific method.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I
do not see anything “inquisitorial” about my concern with the boundaries of
proper scholarly method. A better analogy is that of a professional teacher of
music (a former occupation of mine). If a student fails her conservatory exam
in classical guitar because she cannot play her scales and keeps hitting the
wrong chords, nobody will accuse the teacher of “excluding” or “excommunicating”
her from the profession. Nor will anybody be surprised to see her rejected if
she does not take her guitar to the exam but insists on performing a dance instead (no matter how skillful!). Scholarship is scholarship; it
has methods and standards. Mysticism is mysticism; it has other methods and
other standards. The teacher of mysticism will send me home if I insist on sending
him a research paper instead of practicing my meditation. And he will be right:
he is not being inquisitorial, he is just doing his job.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span></span>Finally:
has the study of esotericism been selling its soul in exchange for academic respectability?
I do not think that such a thing is possible. The soul of our field is embodied
in the texts and traditions and practices that we study: it cannot be destroyed
by whatever we may be saying about them as scholars. As for the tradition of
critical scholarship: it has a soul of its own, which thrives on honest dedication
to the pursuit of knowledge. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="color: #38761d;"><span style="font-size: x-large; mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;">The practice
of criticism</span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">Let me sum it all up. I do not
hate religionism; I am not a Protestant heresiophobe; I do not want to dump
esotericism into the dustbin; I do not want to dismiss Platonism as
“Orientalist”: I do not embody the externalist fallacy; I do not want to
exclude the study of consciousness; and I am not inspired by any inquisitorial
motives. Arthur’s list of accusations is so long and so seriously mistaken that,
coming as it does from a well-known and prominent figure in the field, it just
couldn’t be left unanswered. That I have chosen to respond on a public blog
is for two reasons: firstly, I do not want this debate to be hidden behind the
paywall of some closed-access academic journal, and secondly, the blog format
makes it possible for readers to respond. I would welcome further discussion,
for my rejoinder is not just addressed to Arthur personally but to the wider
field of academics in the study of esotericism, where some might be getting the
wrong ideas about what I advocate or represent. As I wrote at the very
beginning, an unfortunate rift seems to have appeared in the community of
esotericism scholars, and this is my attempt at reaching out to the other
side.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_gXMU1OQ9Lc9Gm4xdgC3SlVpZmVwsrJyKPsfsR_0mlRKBRSSBgb4IROkkqRQGyLUeqo-Om6Nbzjgm8nOA1Ss4a5OfywORRbDoMD12kkx7KVPfuKmCUYGOOauqSbWj7TbeAvPndCW-YNih/s1600/WCCC_1_vs2017.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1550" data-original-width="1384" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_gXMU1OQ9Lc9Gm4xdgC3SlVpZmVwsrJyKPsfsR_0mlRKBRSSBgb4IROkkqRQGyLUeqo-Om6Nbzjgm8nOA1Ss4a5OfywORRbDoMD12kkx7KVPfuKmCUYGOOauqSbWj7TbeAvPndCW-YNih/s320/WCCC_1_vs2017.png" width="285" /></a></span></div>
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"> Therefore I
would like to end on a positive note. One thing that Arthur and I have in
common is that we share a deep love and admiration for the Platonic tradition.
We both see it as absolutely central to the intellectual and spiritual culture
of Europe, and we agree that Western esotericism would be inconceivable without
it. But perhaps the choices we make within that tradition are slightly
different. Arthur highlights the magnificent metaphysical architecture of
Plotinus and Dionysius the Areopagite, with its splendid multi-leveled
hierarchy ranging from the multiplicity of material realities to the ineffable One above
Being itself. This perspective is admirable, beautiful, and profound – no question
about it. As for me, my ultimate allegiance is not to these later
Platonists, or even to Plato himself, but to Socrates. It is in Socrates that I
find my model for the “methodologically” agnostic scholar, who is in search of
knowledge because he knows he does not have it but cares about the truth.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-indent: 36.0pt;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">In the <i>Symposium</i>
we read how he became a philosopher: it was because the seeress-priestess
Diotima initiated him into the mysteries of Love and taught him to seek Wisdom
(Symp. 201d-212a). Ever since, Socrates has known that he does <i>not</i> have
wisdom – only the love for it. He is not up there in the world of eternal ideas
but down here in the world of impermanence and change, together with his
pupils, ignorant of the truth but filled with desire to find it. Sometimes he
gives speeches while in a state of divine inspiration (as in the <i>Phaedrus</i>),
but far more often he engages in dialogue: <i>critical</i> dialogue, sharp and
precise, with the knife on the table, argument against argument, no quarter
given! Socrates does not place himself above his pupils, proclaiming the Truth
and expecting them to just accept it or raise themselves up to his superior level.
On the contrary, he takes his position next to them, as their equal: he is just
another human being like themselves, ignorant of the truth but searching for
clarity. I am very well aware of how far the modern Academy has drifted away
from its original Socratic model, but this is still what I think it should be:
not an arena for power play and ego gratification, not a school where
professors tell their students what they should do or believe, but a community
of the ignorant devoted to the search for knowledge. In such a context, the
practice of criticism has nothing to do with one person attacking another, for
it is not a game with winners and losers, but a method for learning in which
everybody wins. It is in this spirit that I have tried to respond to Arthur’s
chapter, and I hope it will be understood as such.</span></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVJyEPegcUu66-MIHYFS4z8rThiCU3MNSxSZJ8clBRS0-EoEru2Z6CoYwJi0bAlh7RnAMz6UHzjnsj-QpgNCydyda335wtGEzXfR3xe609EMpjRI271383MT6EEua2XIFoNkGd-DVSPLHi/s1600/14_GeorgeProchnik.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="820" data-original-width="1436" height="364" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiVJyEPegcUu66-MIHYFS4z8rThiCU3MNSxSZJ8clBRS0-EoEru2Z6CoYwJi0bAlh7RnAMz6UHzjnsj-QpgNCydyda335wtGEzXfR3xe609EMpjRI271383MT6EEua2XIFoNkGd-DVSPLHi/s640/14_GeorgeProchnik.png" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">George Prochnik</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
Two great Jewish writers and intellectuals of the twentieth
century, Stefan Zweig (1881-1942) and Gershom Scholem (1897-1982): on one side we have the
cosmopolitan advocate of humanistic tolerance, mutual understanding, and peaceful
European integration who was forced out of Europe and died in isolation far
from home in Brazil<i>, </i>while on the other side we have the
Zionist and pioneering scholar of kabbalah whose search for the deep historical
and existential roots of his Jewish identity led him to leave Europe behind of
his own volition to build a new home in Palestine. The American author George
Prochnik has published an impressive biographical diptych about these two
famous personalities and their very different experiences and perspectives: <a href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/Impossible-Exile-Stefan-Zweig-World/dp/1783781165/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1504435296&sr=8-1&keywords=prochnik+impossible+exile"><i>The Impossible Exile: Stefan Zweig at the End of the World</i></a> was published in 2014, and <i><a href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/Stranger-Strange-Land-Searching-Jerusalem/dp/1783781785/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1504435353&sr=1-1&keywords=prochnik+stranger+in+a+strange+land">Stranger in a Strange Land: Gershom Scholem and Jerusalem</a> </i>came out in 2016. I found these
two books to be full of valuable insights that carry deep relevance for the
political and cultural conflicts we are currently experiencing. Just like about
a century ago, once again we find the Humanistic and Enlightenment ideals of “cosmopolitanism
and secular liberalism” pitted against the Counter-Enlightenment forces of “nationalism,
religion, and identity politics.” What can we learn from comparing Zweig and
Scholem?</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiEcNufpFSjgne0IMHdBUG0mUZfh3wRo4pikJHeSJyUbrmjxpd4noq669IL0HYBZtxBRjnyxkIQPOA-TqQaTG-wHxE6mkWo2rSqpzX7u_eaAA8GBTc-SK4vNIZb8TobdiJRlkQU-JfG6VIR/s1600/stefan-zweig_WEB.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="667" data-original-width="1001" height="426" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiEcNufpFSjgne0IMHdBUG0mUZfh3wRo4pikJHeSJyUbrmjxpd4noq669IL0HYBZtxBRjnyxkIQPOA-TqQaTG-wHxE6mkWo2rSqpzX7u_eaAA8GBTc-SK4vNIZb8TobdiJRlkQU-JfG6VIR/s640/stefan-zweig_WEB.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Stefan Zweig in 1917<i><br /></i></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<br /></div>
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“I love the Diaspora,” Zweig wrote to Martin Buber in 1917.
He went on to explain that he had “never wanted the Jews to become a nation
again and thus to lower itself [sic] to taking part with the others in the
rivalry of reality” (<i>Exile, </i>134). When Buber responded by restating his Zionist
convictions, Zweig insisted: “the more the dream threatens to become a reality,
the dangerous dream of a Jewish state with cannons, flags, medals, the [sic]
more than ever am I resolved to love the painful idea of the Diaspora” (135). Zweig
felt perfectly at home in his native Austrian culture because he considered
himself a citizen of Europe and the international republic of letters. Frankly,
he could afford it. Born in 1881 in a very affluent Jewish family in Vienna, he
seems to have been absolutely fine with both the ideals and the realities of
cultural and ethnic assimilation that had worked out so beautifully for him. Almost to
his own surprise – he never had a particularly high opinion about himself as a
writer – all doors to fame and success seemed to open almost by themselves and
he enjoyed a dream career as a writer. The world was his oyster. </div>
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<br /></div>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjxrvvu95J57pj2sCeG8l10sCH_KzdTvRPEeQZQq-vRvSEw2qIKIzleRsoUoS3bN8phKI-mR3rfzqKZyRMpn096x5SV7LXPyC4G40EpBlhrT_9HF3FXnCXJz51SWie7-E1SiLvIWUWwSEdK/s1600/0507-BKS-NEWHOUSESUB1-blog427.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="610" data-original-width="427" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjxrvvu95J57pj2sCeG8l10sCH_KzdTvRPEeQZQq-vRvSEw2qIKIzleRsoUoS3bN8phKI-mR3rfzqKZyRMpn096x5SV7LXPyC4G40EpBlhrT_9HF3FXnCXJz51SWie7-E1SiLvIWUWwSEdK/s640/0507-BKS-NEWHOUSESUB1-blog427.jpg" width="448" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Gershom Scholem at twenty-seven </td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"></td><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><br /></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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What a difference with Scholem! Born in 1897 as the son of a printer
living in Berlin, he was sixteen years younger than Zweig and rebelled
violently against his bourgeois father with his strong assimilationist views. If
Zweig felt he belonged to the German people (meaning the German-speaking peoples
of Europe), Scholem would later dismiss such feelings of belonging as “a lurid and tragic
illusion” for Jews, even on the level of culture alone (147; <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Stranger</i>, 9). While Zweig was a typical
representative of Liberal Humanism in the tradition of his hero Erasmus,
Scholem’s deep concern was with his Jewish identity and he became a vocal activist
on behalf of the Zionist cause. For Zweig, leaving Europe meant exile. For
Scholem it meant liberation.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-large;"><span style="color: #38761d;">The Cosmopolitan Idealist</span></span></div>
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
Reading Zweig’s autobiography <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><a href="https://www.amazon.de/Welt-Gestern-Erinnerungen-eines-Europ%C3%A4ers/dp/3596211522/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1504435853&sr=8-2&keywords=zweig+welt+von+gestern">Die Welt von Gestern</a> </i>(The World of Yesterday) in tandem with
Prochnik’s <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Impossible Exile</i> about
Zweig’s final years means<i> </i>receiving an introduction to the original meaning of Liberalism
as an ethical and humanitarian ideal with deep roots in European history. Zweig
had no sympathy for the American culture of capitalist consumerism that – especially
in the form of its radical “Neoliberal” upgrade since the 1980s – is so often
confused with Liberalism today. On the contrary, he felt that “global dance
crazes, mass fashion, popular cinema, et cetera were leveling the cosmos of
human expression ‘into a uniform cultural schema’,” and feared that “[t]he
United States had inaugurated a ‘rush into servitude’ of the masses, clearing
the way psychologically for dictatorships of every variety to seize power. If
the Great War marked the first phase of Europe’s destruction, he concluded,
‘Americanization is the second’” (<i>Exile</i>, 235-236). Of course such words sound
uncannily prescient today. In fact, reading Prochnik’s description of how the
refugee Viennese psychoanalyst Ernst Kris discussed Hitler, I could not help
noticing that he might as well have been talking about Donald Trump. The principles of demagoguery seem universal:</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-left: 36.0pt; text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
[Hitler] once said the masses were so dumb
and so feminine, they would take anything you told them, so long as it was
expressed in the manner of advertising catchphrases. “Truth is of no avail, but
there must be an ideology behind it, something to inspire the imagination,”
Kris explained (152).</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
As an alternative to the degenerate culture of American
consumer capitalism, Zweig did not
advocate a return to nationalism or a revival of populist <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Blut und Boden</i> sentiments but quite their opposite: a Pan-European
humanism grounded in tolerance and mutual understanding as guiding ideals that
should be passed on from one generation to the next by means of responsible
education, or <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Bildung</i>. His confidence
in this approach seemed boundless:</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-left: 36.0pt; text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
Reverence for <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Bildung</i>, that magically potent idea of holistic, rigorously
intellectual character development, predicated on fluency in the canon of
Western knowledge, had made it impossible for educated Germans to take Hitler
seriously, Zweig wrote. It was simply inconceivable that this “beer-hall
agitator” who had not even finished high school, let alone college, “should
ever make a pass toward a position once held by a Bismark, a Baron von Stein, a
Prince Bülow.” In consequence, Zweig said, even after 1933 the vast majority
still believed Hitler was only a kind of stopgap, and that the Nazis would
prove a transient phenomenon. </div>
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What Zweig did not make explicit in his memoir was that
he’d made this mistake himself. No one placed a greater trust in the redemptive
power of cultural education than did Zweig, who expressed his faith, even after
Hitler’s appointment as chancellor, that the Third Reich would prove only a
brief hiccup en route to the unification of Europe – the coming “world
Switzerland,” as he labeled it. It took years for Zweig to really absorb the
notion that the masses’ indifference to intellectual and cultural achievements
might be a lasting condition. … The best response to Hitler’s popularity was
not to demonize his supporters, Zweig believed, but to communicate to them the
value of the rich German cultural legacy that was being jeopardized by Nazi
politics (62-63).</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
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<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh29o9axZDDuaubr1-8biniMQGXx0kW6Nwb6hzVtPv2kK-hxh1N8NUwufIVotH3un84aZokmK6PnW9n37euEvRyn5b9zKTGogLL6A_KunoyxQdF2xjpuBYySGPQC0LEvnMSkYEFRFDPb-6V/s1600/zweig_03_stefan_zweig_centre_s.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="871" data-original-width="1225" height="283" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh29o9axZDDuaubr1-8biniMQGXx0kW6Nwb6hzVtPv2kK-hxh1N8NUwufIVotH3un84aZokmK6PnW9n37euEvRyn5b9zKTGogLL6A_KunoyxQdF2xjpuBYySGPQC0LEvnMSkYEFRFDPb-6V/s400/zweig_03_stefan_zweig_centre_s.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
Today, of course, it is very easy for us to dismiss such statements as tragically naïve – much easier, in any case, than it
is to explain how and why an attitude of dismissive cynicism about such
highminded ideals should be any more likely to succeed! As Prochnik puts it – and
I agree –, “Illusions are not to be eliminated but encouraged, since only the
powers of imagination can summon a vision of a more humane future” (255). Zweig
did believe deeply in the value of building bridges, by cultivating generosity
and empathy (137) instead of hatred and suspicion. Seeking out alternatives to
the privileged milieu of his own upbringing, during his younger years he spent
much of his time “at motley bars and cafés squeezed between ‘heaving drinkers,
homosexuals and morphine addicts’,” for (as he commented) “the worse someone’s
reputation was the more I wanted to know him personally” (90). This fascination
with the so-called “losers” and social outcasts who populated the seedy underbelly of bourgeois
society was linked to an acute ethical awareness that “between power and
morality there was rarely a bond but rather an unbridgeable gap” (358). The
power that came with his own position as a famous writer never seems to have
blinded him to the moral arbitrariness of the privileges he enjoyed. In other
words, he never thought that his talent and success made him “better” than
others. Having been accepted as a refugee by several countries in succession, these
are his words to one of his benefactors in the last of them, Brazil:</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-left: 36.0pt; text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
You have been kind enough to honor me, to
welcome me among you. I should feel proud and happy. But I must confess to you
that at a time like this I am not able to feel happy and still less to feel
proud. On the contrary, I feel heavy at heart that you should show me such
friendship while countless people, our own and others, are suffering. We as
human beings, and especially as Jews, have no right in these days to be happy.
… We must not imagine that we are the few just people who have been saved from
the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah because of our special merits. We are not
better, and we are not more worthy than all the others who are being hunted and
driven over there in Europe (208).</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
The inevitable counterpart to Zweig’s humanitarian idealism was
the deep despair he felt about the collapse of European culture and
civilization caused by the Nazi takeover: as Prochnik puts it, towards the end
of his life he seems to have lost all hope because he had “ceased to believe
his works were part of any larger edifice” (259). He was haunted by
premonitions of catastrophe, years before they became reality: “my nose for political disaster
tortures me like an inflamed nerve” he told Joseph Roth in 1936 (130, cf. 218,
285). Just days before the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Anschluss</i>
he was watching in helpless horror as his fellow-Austrians were blissfully
doing their Christmas shopping and going about their daily affairs: “Don’t you
understand? All this will be gone in a few months’ time. Your homes will be
plundered. Your clothes will be changed for prison garb” (176).</div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span> </div>
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Prochnik
gives much attention to the international refugee crisis that followed the Nazi
takeover: “The trickle. The stream. The flood. And then people surging all over
the globe, falling from the skies, splashed up by the seas, hurled
helter-skelter by the wildly spinning red-and-black wheel” (204). In an
analysis that should sound bitterly familiar to us today, he points out that
even though the numbers of refugees that actually made it to America were
astonishingly small, intentional propaganda and general paranoia caused many
Americans to believe that their country was overrun with “millions of
refugees,” “swamped with exiles to the point where millions of jobs and
democracy itself were at risk” (205). Where have we heard such things before? For Zweig personally, exile brought the
bizarre realization that while his “intellectual fatherland” no longer considered
him to be German, the British <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">did</i> classify
him as “German,” that is to say, as an “enemy alien” (164-165). In short, he
found himself rejected by both Germans and non-Germans.</div>
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What then about his Jewish identity? It
didn’t help either. In a highly illuminating passage, Prochnik points out that
for Zweig, the defining experience of exile turned out to be that of “being
forced to identify with people who bore no relation to him” (164). He wrote
that most Jews in Western Europe had no clue about why they were being thrown
together for persecution (163): </div>
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[they were] no longer a community and had not
been one for a long time. They had no law. They did not want to speak Hebrew
together. Only exile swept them all together, like dirt in the street. … If
Shylock’s famous question – “If you prick us, do we not bleed?” – was intended
to show that the Jews share a common humanity with all mankind, Zweig
approached the injustice of anti-Semitism by revealing the total absence of
common ground between the Jews themselves (164).</div>
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And that brings us to one of the most harrowing passages in
the book, at least to this reader. Prochnik begins by discussing the famous
passage in the 2<sup>nd</sup> chapter of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Mein
Kampf</i> where Hitler describes how he became an anti-semite. On the streets
of Vienna he saw an orthodox Jew in a long caftan with black curls, and found
himself wondering “Is that a German?” His conclusion was that only the German
language made it possible for Jews to pass as real members of the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Volk</i>: in fact they were cosmopolitans
who could “speak a thousand languages,” and “if they ever got into power they
would force everyone to speak an international language such as Esperanto”
(155). From there, Prochnik cuts straight to a scene shortly after Zweig went
into exile. He spent an evening in a Yiddish theater in London together with
Otto Zarek, where they watched a performance about Jewish ghetto life in
Russia: </div>
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… after the show Zarek was struck by Zweig’s
state of acute nervous agitation. He could not contain his inner excitement.
“These old Jews,” Zweig said, “in their grotesque dresses, their beards
unshorn, their eyes flaming, these adherents to Chassidism … they are <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">our brethren</i>.” It was only the measures
toward assimilation taken by their great-grandparents that had kept them from
looking just like those Jews did, Zweig told Zarek. Had it not been for their
near forebears, the two of them would have ended up “believing in what they
believe,” considering “our life in the midst of the Western world as just a
transitory period – we, too, would harbour in our very hearts, the dreams of
our eventual ‘return to the land of our forefathers’.” Zweig comes within a
hair of saying, “There but for the grace of God.” But Zarek said that Zweig’s
voice took on a note of despair and resignation, as he registered that he
hadn’t, after all, quite dodged the bullet (156). <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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Prochnik hardly needs to spell it out. To his enormous
distress, Zweig was experiencing the very same kind of instinctive prejudice
that had made Hitler an antisemite, and of course he was far too
sensitive and intelligent not to realize it. In his own life he had always
sought to emulate the spirit of Schiller: “I write as a citizen of the world.
Early did I exchange my fatherland for mankind” (156). But now Hitler had
deprived him of the community of language that constituted his true spiritual
fatherland, and - not unlike what happens to the rich kid in Bob Dylan’s “<a href="https://bobdylan.com/songs/rolling-stone/">Like a Rolling Stone</a>” - those outcasts and “others” with whom he felt no spontaneous
kinship had suddenly become his closest brethren whose company he could not
avoid: “go to him now, he calls you, you can’t refuse…”</div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Once upon a
time Zweig had told Buber that he loved the diaspora, but now he had become a
refugee himself and there was nothing he loved about it. He was longing not for
the land of Israel (it struck me that he never seems to have considered seeking
refuge in Palestine), nor for the Austria in which he had grown up. He missed <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Europe</i>: his invisible community of the
spirit, his universal republic of humanitarian brotherhood, his true
cosmopolitan fatherland that represented inner freedom and unlimited
possibilities, a land without borders that would welcome all comers. This was
his true home, and it had come crashing down all around him. In the long run,
the loss proved unbearable. On 22 February 1942, Stefan Zweig was found dead in
his Brazilian home. He and his young wife Lotte had committed suicide together.</div>
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFzqekmK2WpLaDa_O8q7rjDl1uUKpod6qNlnMNO-NGLpER_bizZSPFXX501JxlBGZci-au-eQ2AZ0eeXzo1zGP9hiDVcAiU972fJ2c3tYl2iUBGMsUEi_1rsXp6ggMsqF2TX92NV-ogvAq/s1600/Stefan_Zweig-suicide.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="572" data-original-width="777" height="470" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFzqekmK2WpLaDa_O8q7rjDl1uUKpod6qNlnMNO-NGLpER_bizZSPFXX501JxlBGZci-au-eQ2AZ0eeXzo1zGP9hiDVcAiU972fJ2c3tYl2iUBGMsUEi_1rsXp6ggMsqF2TX92NV-ogvAq/s640/Stefan_Zweig-suicide.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Stefan and Lotte Zweig on their deathbed</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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Quite like his model of Enlightened Liberal
Humanism Erasmus (whom <a href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/Triumph-Tragik-Erasmus-von-Rotterdam/dp/3730603477/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1504551482&sr=1-2&keywords=zweig+erasmus">he painted in sharp contrast to Luther</a> as the archetypal “fanatic” with evident traits of
Hitler), Zweig had never been a fighter. “I can only write positive things; I
can’t attack” (65, cf. 290). Irmgard Keun once described this natural-born
pacifist as “one of those noble Jewish types who, thin-skinned and open to
harm, lives in an immaculate glass world of the spirit and lacks the capacity
themselves to do harm” (246).<br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="color: #38761d;"><span style="font-size: x-large;">The Dialectical Zionist</span></span> </div>
<br />
In this regard his disposition could not have
been more different from that of Scholem. While Zweig was ultimately powerless to
defend himself against the forces that destroyed his glass world of the
spirit, Scholem seems to have been born a rebel and a firebrand, a fighter by
nature. It would seem that throughout his life, the only way he could
conceive of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">anything</i> whatsoever was
in terms of dialectical struggle ruled by the paradoxical logic of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">coincidentia oppositorum</i>. For Zweig,
losing all hope could only mean that no hope was left – obviously. But Scholem’s logic worked differently: “In his final years he was very hopeless. He said that
now the only thing that remained was hope,” his widow recalled (426). The paradoxicality of such a
remark has <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Scholem</i> written all over
it.</div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>This
profoundly dialectical mentality ruled Scholem’s life and career. I consider it
the key not only to understanding his concepts of Zionism and of Jewish mysticism,
but ultimately to understanding <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">everything</i>
he ever did or thought. Consider the following list of conflicts and oppositions,
which makes no claim to completeness: </div>
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<br />
Scholem emigrated “from Berlin to Jerusalem” in spite
of (or rather, I suspect, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">because</i>
of!) his core conviction that Zion was a messianic dream that could not and in
fact should not be realized in this world. As a scholar searching for the roots of authentic
Judaism, he explored the broader world of Hellenistic “paganism” and its legacy: I think he was driven by an intuition that the secret of Jewish life could be found precisely in the culture of the idolaters. As a model “historian’s historian,” he insisted on strict philology and
textual criticism but applied these methods precisely to the “non-historical” world
of mythical symbolism that appeals to the imagination rather than to strict literalism. While Jerusalem was in a state of siege, and extreme violence was rampant,
he sat down to write a famous essay (analyzed at length by Prochnik) exploring
the notion of “redemption through sin.” Scholem’s life-long search was for the authentic secret at the heart of
Jewish tradition, as an alternative to the Germany he rejected, and
yet the hermeneutics that allowed him to discover Jewish secrets was grounded
in German scholarship, German Idealism, German Romantic speculation. He never ceased emphasizing that <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">der Liebe Gott lebt im Detail</i>, so that
only by focusing on the particular and the unique could one gain lasting
insights and discover general or even universal truths - and yet, he knew that
without such general perspectives and a search for the universal, one would
never succeed in opening the closed shell of the particular in the first place, and would fail to discover its
hidden contents. Scholem could be described as a Jewish representative of the interwar
“conservative revolution” who tried to impact the future of Judaism not by rejecting past traditions but by preserving
and reviving them. In short, Scholem was a modernist struggling (like all modernists) with modernity itself. He was a rationalist driven by the energy of the non-rational: “my
secularism is not secular” (58-59).</div>
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<br />
Whereas
Zweig’s despair ended up killing him, Scholem’s dialectical mindset seems to have enabled him
to use it as a creative force, as he wrote in a letter to Hugo Berman in 1947:
“I live in despair, and only from the position of despair can I be active” (<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Briefe</i> I, 331). In an earlier discussion
of Scholem, I concluded that, for him</div>
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… the fact that eternity cannot appear in
time mean[t] that the hope that sustains Jewish identity through history can
only be called an “aspiration to the impossible.” Under these conditions, the
historian must have the courage to “descend into the abyss” of history, knowing
that he might encounter nothing but himself, and guided by nothing but a
desperate hope for the impossible: that against all human logic, the
transcendent might inexplicably “break through into history” one day, like “a
light that shines into it from altogether elsewhere” (<a href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/Esotericism-Academy-Rejected-Knowledge-Western/dp/1107680972/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1504552152&sr=1-1&keywords=hanegraaff+esotericism+and+the+academy">Hanegraaff, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Esotericism and the Academy</i></a>, 297).</div>
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Prochnik reads Scholem’s story as a mirror of his own. His
book consists of two interwoven narratives, one of which traces the first four
decades of his subject’s life (from his adolescent years of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Sturm und Drang</i> in Berlin to his
reaching maturity as a scholar in Jerusalem during the 1930s), and one that
describes his own deeply personal search for an authentic Jewish identity that led
him and his wife Anne to emigrate from New York to Jerusalem in the mid-1980s. Scholem’s
beginnings were very different from Prochnik’s though. He depicts himself and
his wife as a couple of young starry-eyed idealists driven to Jerusalem on the wings of “a
dream of compassion” (87). By contrast, the young Scholem was an angry
extremist who “went into overdrive” (109) around the age of seventeen:</div>
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Thinking about the collapse of Europe led him
to picture the Land of Israel as a kind of womb, streaming with the ages,
awaiting insemination. … Scholem took solitary walks … during which he would
scream out speeches that he ordinarily whispered. People stared at him, and he
blushed. … He imagined a novella about his own suicide … “I would shoot myself
after concluding that there was no solving the gaping paradox in the life of a
committed Zionist.” </div>
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Paradoxes, rages, fears, and desires were
flying off the fabric of his being like burst buttons and seams. Raving on the
street in some paroxysm of humiliation and fury, he might have hurled himself
in front of a train or off a bridge. He might also have leaped on his father
with any weapon at hand. He seems to come within a razor’s breadth of some
irrevocable act of destruction. Scholem’s whole story might have ended before
he ever reached Jerusalem. He craved too desperately for an impossible purity
(110).</div>
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Reading such passages, I could not ignore the contemporary parallels,
uncomfortable as they might be. Prochnik describes a youthful Zionist hothead,
in full rebellion against his father’s demand that he sacrifice his Jewish
identity by “assimilating” and becoming an obedient member of German bourgeois society. Today we have the
phenomenon of youthful Jihadist radicals born in the West, who likewise refuse
the dictates of cultural “integration” and declare total war on Liberal society
in the name of Islamic purity. Scholem’s brand of Jewish identity politics
seems an extreme counterpart to the Liberal universalism represented by
intellectuals such as Zweig, and often enough he would find himself brandishing
“the torch of ethnic-historical particularity against the ambient moral glow of
universal ideals” (105).</div>
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Still it is important to emphasize that,
for all his violent feelings of revolt, Scholem’s Zionism was predicated on the
ideal of a peaceful settlement between Jews and Arabs. Having arrived in
Jerusalem, he became a core member of the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Brit
Shalom</i> (Covenant of Peace) movement that would later be described by one of
its founders, Hugo Bergmann, as “the last flicker of the humanist nationalist
flame, at a historical moment when nationalism became among all the nations an
anti-humanist movement” (304). Sympathetic as its ideals might be, Prochnik does
not spare his critique: <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Brit Shalom</i>’s
slogan “Neither to dominate nor be dominated” sounds somewhat less commendable if
one realizes that its “commitment to absolute political equality with the Arabs
was presumptuous at a time when Jews were still less than 20 percent of
Palestine’s overall population” (305). Likewise, Scholem’s commitment seems to
have been inspired more by “his aspirations for the ideal manifestation of
Zionism” (307) than by any deep sense of fellowship with his Arab neighbors.</div>
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Prochnik does not try to conceal the
similarity of such attitudes to those of Anne and himself during their years in
Jerusalem. Like Scholem, they desperately wanted to believe
in the Zion of their dreams, but they had trouble seeing what was actually
going on all around them in the state of Israel. Wondering what it must have been like for Scholem to
enter Jerusalem for the first time, in late September 1923, Prochnik expresses
doubt about whether the actual land of his forefathers had any reality for him at all: </div>
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</div>
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Did</i>
Scholem in fact see where he was once he arrived here – really notice it? In
the hundreds upon hundreds of pages he wrote from Jerusalem, he barely makes
mention of the natural surroundings. He might be writing from space, from a
black box theater, or – most plausibly – from between old manuscript pages”
(243). </div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8poaRi7J0xV-GqqCeBTSgvcElpRE70bUDN3zklZ5uMxRprzcn-8wq7wNz-B5pdCQGnq3oQq6_ULUM_HfsGBnYVk7jOtlwUhm_mwBN_Qg5BM7DgQNjm2Totm9fF_UmOL2qbaAzEwA1BEjN/s1600/JERUSALEM_OLD_CITY_%2526_DOME_OF_THE_ROCK.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="674" data-original-width="1200" height="358" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8poaRi7J0xV-GqqCeBTSgvcElpRE70bUDN3zklZ5uMxRprzcn-8wq7wNz-B5pdCQGnq3oQq6_ULUM_HfsGBnYVk7jOtlwUhm_mwBN_Qg5BM7DgQNjm2Totm9fF_UmOL2qbaAzEwA1BEjN/s640/JERUSALEM_OLD_CITY_%2526_DOME_OF_THE_ROCK.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
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Prochnik’s own descriptions of Israel are far more attuned to
the natural environment, but he admits with brutal honesty that he and Anne –
for all their idealism and excellent good intentions – had been utterly
oblivious to the social and political realities of the state of Israel, until
Yitzhak Rabin’s assassination on 4 November 1995 finally opened their eyes: “Anne
and I hardly realized…,” “we gathered…,” “we had no clue…,” “we didn’t
comprehend…,” “we had no notion…,” “without ever grasping…,” “we didn’t follow…,”
“we could not fathom…,” “we could not begin to comprehend…,” “Anne and I could
not understand…,” “knowing as little as we did…” (all on pp. 380-383). In terms
of the ethical contrasts that underpin Prochnik’s two books – humanism versus fanaticism, like Erasmus versus Luther, liberalism versus authoritarianism, like Zweig versus
Hitler – it was only after having returned to the US that
Prochnik recognized the adversary who had been at work all along without
him paying attention: Benjamin Netanyahu. “Only long after Rabin was dead did I realize
how Netanyahu had <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">always</i> been there,
placing himself at exactly the right spot relative to the firestorm to whip up
the flames without getting singed, always preserving plausible deniability for
the worst excesses committed by the followers he goaded” (356-357).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Netanyahu had been whipping up his right-wing supporters
against the peace process from the beginning (355), and it is chilling to reach
Prochnik’s description of those rallies: </div>
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A chorus of support arose from amid the
crowd: “In blood and fire we will do away with Rabin!” Torches were hurled at the police monitoring the demonstration. Chants of “Bibi! Bibi!” alternated with choruses of “Nazi! Nazi!” as images of Rabin with his head at
the center of a bull’s-eye framed with the word “Traitor!” in Hebrew and
English were brandished aloft (356). </div>
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In this violent context of populist hate-mongering, it appears that some
enemies of the peace process resorted to kabbalah, in a particularly cruel
refutation of Scholem’s attempts (rightly criticized by Prochnik, with
reference to <a href="https://www.academia.edu/913890/_The_Imagined_Decline_of_Kabbalah_The_Kabbalistic_Yeshiva_Sha_ar_ha-Shamayim_and_Kabbalah_in_Jerusalem_in_the_Beginning_of_the_Twentieth_Century_Kabbalah_and_Modernity_eds._Boaz_Huss_Marco_Pasi_Kocku_von_Stuckrad_Brill_Leiden_and_Boston_2010_pp._197-220_English_">the scholarship of Jonatan Meir</a>, 252-258) to deny it any relevance to
modern and contemporary society:</div>
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<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuAoowSbVBJzBIiDJuUSwiG1q9Vx23ErQK3kzFZIMKQWzKjoNqPavpp9MPUaQGgmb4a-sLIXgxvamye10durTgEUgcJrdeQdZmkCJhsxAW0KqDnO2qiZYBIP5FaRz5Y8ogNMP82VJluI8D/s1600/Rabin-Assassination-resize.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="759" data-original-width="1012" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhuAoowSbVBJzBIiDJuUSwiG1q9Vx23ErQK3kzFZIMKQWzKjoNqPavpp9MPUaQGgmb4a-sLIXgxvamye10durTgEUgcJrdeQdZmkCJhsxAW0KqDnO2qiZYBIP5FaRz5Y8ogNMP82VJluI8D/s320/Rabin-Assassination-resize.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Leaflet "Song of Peace" with Rabin's blood on it</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
On the evening of Yom Kippur, right in front
of Rabin’s official residence a few blocks from our apartment, a group of men
stood in a circle draped in prayer shawls chanting softly. … [I]t later emerged
that these men were uttering what they understood to be a kabbalistic curse,
the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Pulsa da-Nura</i>, Lashes of Fire. At
its climax, the leader raised his gaze to the prime minister’s residence and
chanted, “I deliver to you, the angels of wrath and fire, Yitzhak, the son of
Rosa Rabin, that you may smother him and the specter of him. … May you be <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">damned, damned, damned</i>!” The medieval
legend surrounding this curse declares that its recipient will die within
thirty days. And to the group’s satisfaction and awe, exactly thirty days
later, Rabin was murdered.</div>
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Yigal Amir, Rabin’s assassin, performed
mystical rites just before pulling the trigger. As Rabin stood above him on the
stage singing “Song of Peace,” Amir waited in the darkness, practicing the
esoteric art of Gematria … Concentrating on lines from Genesis … a passage
that includes the line “a smoking fire pot and a flaming torch passed between
these pieces” – Amir found that by sliding forward one letter from each word to
join the following word, the words “a flaming torch passed between” transformed
into “fire, fire, there is evil in Rabin.” And then Amir knew his bullet would
strike home (357-358). </div>
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Rabin’s assassination killed the dream: “Our sense of magical
solidarity with the Land and the people dissipated like smoke after an
explosion” (378). George and Anne Prochnik packed their things, took their children, and fled the scene: “Clutching the children. Clutching each
other, we were blown into the air forty thousand feet above the earth and cast
through the sky to America” (409). Back home they discovered that the end of
their dream of compassion meant the end of their marriage as well. </div>
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<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-large;"><span style="color: #38761d;">... and all that remains is hope</span></span><br />
<br /></div>
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Prochnik’s two books have at least one obvious thing in common: they are all about broken dreams. Zweig’s Humanist dream of Europe was destroyed by Hitler – so cruelly and so completely that he saw no future and decided to kill himself, taking his wife with him. Scholem’s Zionist
dream suffered shipwreck on the hard rocks of nationalist <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Realpolitik</i>; the German culture that had nourished his very understanding of Judaism was reduced
to smoking ruins; and his people were murdered on an industrial scale and with a maniacal determination that defies imagining. As for Prochnik’s mystical and messianic dream of
Jewish community - grounded as much in his understanding of Scholem’s antinomian
dialectics of kabbalah and modernity as in the liberal and humanitarian idealism represented by Zweig -, it was blown to pieces by Yigal Amir and transformed into a cruel
nationalist <i>Blut und Boden</i> caricature by orthodox fanatics and right-wing
politicians. </div>
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Stories of failure and the loss of illusions. So what is the point? Why bother reading about dreams that do not come true - while nightmares do? Are we to conclude simply that all these highminded ideals about a better world and all these aspirations towards a better future are bound to end in
disappointment and despair, leaving the final word to violent hatred, bloodshed, fanaticism, cynism, nihilism, power, and domination? Was it all in vain? Of course Prochnik asks himself the same
questions, and he ends by quoting a wonderful legend about the Baal Shem that was told by Scholem
at the end of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Major Trends in Jewish
Mysticism</i>. Scholem in turn had heard it from the novelist S.J. Agnon, who might
have found it in a Hasidic collection published in 1906. Its point is that
even when all seems lost and gone forever – “when the sacred fire can no longer be lighted, the prayers
can no longer be spoken, and the sacred place is no longer known” – in the end it is sufficient that the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">story</i> can
still be told. Perhaps this might explain why even stories that end badly, like those told by Prochnik, have the power - paradoxically - to <i>inspire</i> their readers rather than leaving them crushed and defeated. It is of vital importance that such tales be told, for they are all about hope, and hope remains alive as long as its memory remains alive - after all, whatever can
be remembered in our personal or collective imagination can be imagined as real, and whatever can be
imagined as real has not lost its potential of being realized. Sometime. Somewhere. Somehow.<br />
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wouterjhanegraaff.blogspot.comhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15519965611425366178noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5967881025525384120.post-42825527746093970662017-08-04T05:52:00.000-07:002018-11-15T04:27:00.711-08:00Evola in Middle Earth<style>
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As part of <a href="http://westernculturecounterculture.blogspot.nl/">my Western Culture & Counter Culture project</a>
I’m studying the various “grand narratives” that have been told about the
history, meaning, and direction of Western civilization – from optimistic
stories of evolution and progress to their darker and more pessimistic
counterparts. Perhaps the most uncompromising example of this latter category,
and one of the most influential, was published in 1934 (and republished several
times after, in expanded editions) by the controversial Italian esotericist
Julius Evola (1898-1974) under the title <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Rivolta
contro il mondo moderno</i> (Revolt against the Modern World). I decided it
might be time for me to finally read it, and so I did, in an <a href="https://www.amazon.fr/R%C3%A9volte-contre-monde-moderne-Julius/dp/2813200344">excellent French translation by Philippe Baillet</a>.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEikVliyVWKXsr7GFcMfXsO792HiiWa8lOlroZ5q7PhNyCd42VH3FsUZWn9_aTAXow8W-km2RPFJZV_PuRdhSOlxDVMpYiWkdlnUDl9OcSMkpf79QJJ69QQuJqyXVwA30aoRWIDRv06Yvm-2/s1600/Julius_Evola.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="293" data-original-width="220" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEikVliyVWKXsr7GFcMfXsO792HiiWa8lOlroZ5q7PhNyCd42VH3FsUZWn9_aTAXow8W-km2RPFJZV_PuRdhSOlxDVMpYiWkdlnUDl9OcSMkpf79QJJ69QQuJqyXVwA30aoRWIDRv06Yvm-2/s400/Julius_Evola.png" width="300" /></a></div>
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Well, it proved to be quite a ride. Having read various
discussions of Evola over the years, I was broadly familiar with the nature of
his worldview and ideas (including, of course, his fascist sympathies and
antisemitic tendencies) so I cannot say that I began with an empty slate.
However, actually reading <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Revolt against
the Modern World </i>from cover to cover is an altogether different experience
from just reading about it. Let me begin on the positive side. Impressive about
Evola’s book is the remarkable degree of internal logic and consistency of
vision with which he deconstructs every imaginable belief or assumption that
modern people tend to take for granted, exposing the whole of it as one long
series of errors and perversions of the universal metaphysical truth on which
all Traditional societies were based. He manages to strike a tone of “academic”
authority that gives the impression that he knows what he is talking about, and
it is not so hard to understand that a book like this can make a deep
impression on readers who feel alienated from contemporary global consumer
culture and would like to see it destroyed. With a radicalism reminiscent of
contemporary Islamic Jihadists, Evola tells his readers that modernity is the
very negation of everything valid and true.<br />
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<span style="color: #38761d;"><span style="font-size: large;">Antihistorical
Consciousness</span></span></div>
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So what is his alternative? This is where it quickly gets problematic.
First of all, while Evola’s modern Right-wing admirers like to claim “historical
consciousness” for themselves while blaming their “Liberal” enemies for having
no sense of history, Evola himself makes perfectly clear that any attempt to
find evidence for his historical narrative will be an utter waste of time. He
claims that “Traditional man” had a “supratemporal” sense of time, and
therefore the reality in which he lived cannot be grasped by modern historical
methods at all. In an absolutely crucial passage in the Introduction (poorly
translated in <a href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/Revolt-Against-Modern-World-Politics-x/dp/089281506X">the English standard edition</a>, unfortunately, so my translation
below is based on the Italian original while taking inspiration from the French
version) he takes care to emphasize</div>
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… how little esteem we have for everything
that, in recent years, has officially been considered under the label of
“historical scholarship” in matters of ancient religions, institutions, and
traditions. We want to make clear that we wish to have absolutely nothing to do
with such an order of things, as with all that derives from the modern
mentality; and as for the so-called “scientific” or “positive” perspective,
with all its empty claims of competence and monopoly, in its best cases we
consider it to be more or less the perspective of ignorance. … In general, the
order of things with which we will be principally concerning ourselves is the
one in which all materials that have a “historical” and “scientific” value are
those that are the least important; whereas everything that, as myth, legend,
and saga, is deprived of historical truth and demonstrative force, by that very
fact acquires a superior validity and becomes the source of a more real and
more certain knowledge. Precisely this is the boundary that separates
traditional doctrine from profane culture. …</div>
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The scientific anathemas in regard to this
approach are well known: Arbitrary! Subjective! Fantastic! From our perspective
it is neither arbitrary, subjective or fantastic, nor is it objective or
scientific as understood by moderns. All of that does not exist. All of that
stands outside of Tradition. Tradition begins at the point where one is able to
place oneself above all that, by adopting a supra-individual and nonhuman
perspective. That is why we have minimal concern for discussion and
“demonstration.” The truths that the world of Tradition can make us understand
are not of a kind that one can “learn” or “discuss.” They either are, or they
are not. One can only <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">remember</i> them,
and this happens when one is liberated from the obstacles represented by the
various human constructs (beginning with all the results and methods of the
“researchers” considered to be authorities), when one has evoked in oneself the
capacity to <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">see</i> from the nonhuman perspective,
which is the Traditional perspective itself.</div>
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Clearly this means that any critical objection, any disagreement,
any reference to historical evidence that might possible undermine Evola’s narrative,
and indeed any reference to historical sources at all, will have no impact
whatsoever. And this fits perfectly with the extreme authoritarianism that is
typical of Evola’s attitude: the reader is given to understand that it is not
really Julius Evola who is speaking to us in these pages – no, he is speaking
on behalf of the supreme source of superhuman metaphysical truth itself (the
nature of which, by the way, remains very vague). Disagreement is therefore
synonymous with spiritual ignorance: one is not supposed to ask questions but
to listen and accept.</div>
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<span style="color: #38761d;"><span style="font-size: large;">Doctrine
and Storytelling</span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<br />
So what is this supreme Source of Truth telling us? <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Revolt agains the Modern World</i> consists
of two parts: the first is doctrinal and discusses the various elements of “the
World of Tradition,” whereas the second should perhaps not be called historical
– for how could it be that, on the foundations just outlined? – but does tell a
grand story of spiritual decline and degeneration through the ages. Like
Guénon, one of his major influences, Evola distinguishes between four stages of
human and cultural development, from the Golden Age to the modern world (the<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"> kali yuga</i>). The metaphysics of
Tradition according to Evola are built upon the primacy of Being; on the notion
of one absolute Spiritual Center that is the exclusive source of legitimate Authority,
reflected in an ideology of Sacred Kingship; on the notion of a “natural”
social hierarchy of four castes, with spiritual leaders at the top and servants
(including slaves) at the bottom; on the primacy of masculine “virile” qualities
over their feminine counterparts; and on an ascetic warrior ethics grounded in
honour and heroic values. If anything stands out as central in this overview,
it is Evola’s obsession with <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">power</i>. </div>
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<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The second
part is built upon the doctrine of “four ages,” with reference to Hesiod (the
ages of gold, silver, bronze, and iron) and Hindu scriptures. Evola tells us
that during the Golden Age, the region that is now the North Pole was inhabited
by a pure race of superior beings who exemplified a “non-humain spirituality.”
Due to some primal catastrophe, the representatives of this Hyperborean race
began migrating southward towards what is now North America and the continent
of Atlantis. This was the beginning of the Silver Age and the first stage of
degeneration. Basic to the story that follows is the idea of a basic hostility
between the heaven-oriented, solar, heroic, and masculine people from the North
and their earth-oriented, lunar, matriarchal counterparts from the South (as is
well known, Bachofen’s <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Das Mutterrecht</i>
[1861] had a huge influence on Evola in this regard). Cultural contact led to
wars and interbreeding, so that the original purity of the Northern race got
mixed and its culture began to decline. From there on it all goes downward.
Things get ever more complex and messy during the Third Age, as the “heroic”
descendants of the ancient superior culture progressively lose their vitality
and the culture of the original spiritual elite slowly but certainly loses the
battle against “anti-Traditional” forces. In spite of temporal revivals,
notably during the the Roman Empire and the Holy Roman Empire during the Middle
Ages, we steadily move foreward (or rather, downward) towards modern culture
with its degenerate values of liberalism, humanism, egalitarianism, democracy,
and so on. If Part I of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Revolt</i> is
marked by Evola’s obsession with power, Part II is marked by an incredibly
virulent hatred and supreme aristocratic contempt for modernity and everything
it stands for. </div>
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<br /></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: center;">
<span style="color: #38761d;"><span style="font-size: large;">The
Deadly Sword of Philology</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
Of course it will be useless for me to apply the instruments
of historical criticism in order to point out the utter absence of any credible
evidence for Evola’s narrative: in making any such attempt, according to
Evola’s admirers I will merely be demonstrating my own ignorance of the truth,
and my naïve belief in such useless illusions as “critical discussion,”
“historical thinking,” or “scholarly methods.” Trust in such merely human approaches
betrays the false assumption that there exists such a thing as “progress in
knowledge,” that is to say: it reflects the modernist delusion that it is
possible to make advances in our understanding of the past, by learning
important things about it that were not known before and by correcting earlier
interpretations. No such progress is possible: it is excluded from the outset
that I will ever discover anything important that Evola doesn’t already know. All
I’m allowed to do is “remember” the eternal truth (obviously in terms of Plato's <i>anamnesis</i>), and if what I remember would
turn out to conflict with anything that Evola is telling us, this could only
mean that it’s not <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">real</i> memory: I must
have made it up myself. Evola, of course, has made nothing up – how could he? It
is not him who is saying all these things. He speaks for Tradition.</div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "cambria"; font-size: 12.0pt;">Still, although I know it’s pointless, I’ll make
just one little attempt. Part II of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Revolt</i>
is preceded by two mottos, one of which is taken from Jacob Boehme. Evola is
quoting Louis-Claude de Martin’s French translation (1800) of Boehme’s first
book, the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Aurora</i>: </span><br />
<br />
Je vous dis un secret. Voici le temps où
l’époux couronnera son épouse: mais où est la couronne? Vers le Nord … Mais
d’où vient l’épouse? Du centre, où la chaleur engendre la lumière, et se porte
vers le Nord … où la lumière devient brillante.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-left: 36.0pt; text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
[Translation: I tell you a secret. Behold the
time when the bridegroom will crown his bride: but where is the crown? Toward
the North … But from where does the bride come? From the centre, where the
warmth brings forth the light, and is directed towards the North … where the
light becomes brilliant] </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
Evola clearly saw this quote as a wonderful confirmation of
his belief in a superior spiritual Light coming from the North. Of course it takes
an unrepentant modernist like myself to be so deluded as to think it might be
worth my while to check the source. Was Boehme really speaking about Evola’s
North? You guessed it – I checked anyway. And what did I find? This is what Boehme actually wrote:</div>
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<br /></div>
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Sihe Ich Sage dir ein geheimnis. Es ist Schon
die zeit / das der Breutigam Seine Brautt kröntt / Raht fritz wo ligt die kron
/ <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Kegen Mitternacht</i>. … Von wannen
kömpt aber der Breutigam. Auß der mitten / wo die Hitze das licht gebüred / vnd
ferdt kegen mitternacht … / da wird das licht Helle. [emphasis in original]</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; margin-left: 36.0pt; text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
[Translation: Look. I am going to tell you a
secret. The time has come for the bridegroom to crown his bride. Guess, dear
fellow, where is the crown to be found? <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Toward
midnight</i>. … Whence issues the bridegroom? From the middle, where the heat
gives birth to the light, shooting towards midnight … That is where the light
is growing bright]</div>
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[German original & English translation:
<a href="http://www.brill.com/products/book/jacob-boehmes-aurora-translation-introduction-and-commentary">Jacob Boehme, Aurora (Morgen Röte imauffgang, 1612) …, transl. Andrew Weeks, Brill: Leiden / Boston 2013</a>, 324-325]</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
What is going on here? Boehme spoke about “midnight,” not the North: that translation came from
Saint-Martin. Interestingly though, it turns out that there was a solid foundation to this choice of word. As explained by Andrew Weeks in a footnote (p. 325 nt 12), Boehme had a very peculiar way of alluding to the 24-hour cycle and the geographical locations in relation to divine revelation. The light had begun to shine in the Holy Land (Dawn, i.e. East), the “sleeping” Papacy in Rome represented the midday of revelation (12.00) in the South of Europe, then it moved northward to the Reformation in Germany, which is in the Middle between the South and the Scandinavian North, which represents the midnight of revelation (0.00) because this is where Lutheranism spread unopposed. So we are dealing here with a movement of progressive Christian revelation that moves from the South to the North. It is therefore clear that the “crown” in the North has nothing to do with a hyperborean race migrating southward; rather, the light that moves from the Middle to the North is the light of Christian truth that goes into the opposite direction. Admittedly, Boehme also spoke of the North in a different sense (inspired by Ezekiel 38:15): as a wild place inhabited by a savage people that “had not known the true light of God from the beginning unto this very time” (<i>Aurora</i>, Preface, in Weeks ed., p. 91). As the prince of darkness saw that the people were being saved by the fragrance of the divine tree of life, he planted a “savage tree” of his own in that very same place in the North (indeed: “toward midnight”) and proclaimed that this was the tree of life (see Weeks, p. 91 with nt 17). If one takes this into account, the only way in which Boehme’s quotation could be construed as referring to the Hyperboreans is by claiming that they were precisely those people mentioned in Ezekiel: the virile Northern opponents of the effeminized Southern force of Jewish and Christian revelation. This would mean that Evola was reading Boehme against the grain, taking the side of the “prince of darkness” and his savage tree; but more importantly, it would go straight against the meaning of the passage about the crowning of the bride by the bridegroom, where the light coming from the Middle is clearly the positive power that grows stronger as it moves northward. In sum: although Midnight in Boehme’s quotation does indeed refer to the North, it has no reference to Evola’s ideas about the North and is actually written from the perspective of his opponents. <br />
It’s a complicated story (more so than I first realized myself: I want to thank Francesco Baroni and Hadi Fakhouri for alerting me to the background for Saint-Martin's translation), but the point is simple. It is only on the basis of strict
philological criticism, going back to the original sources and analyzing the intended meaning of terms in their initial context, that one can possibly evaluate the
truth of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">any</i> of the countless
historical claims on which Evola builds his narrative. If one would take the
(considerable) trouble of doing so, then the narrative would quickly start
crumbling before one’s gaze. One would discover the enormous extent to which
Evola was relying on dated, questionable, or wholly corrupt sources and on
scholarly interpretations riddled with assumptions that often tell us more
about the authors and their culture or personal preoccupations than about the
texts and traditions they were studying. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>So are we
simply dealing here with the typical naïvety of an amateur
historian? I don’t think so. I am convinced that Evola’s highhanded statements
about the total irrelevance of historical scholarship reflect an acute
awareness on his part that these methods and technical tools had the power to
undermine and destroy everything he wanted to say. If he dismisses textual
criticism or philological analysis <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">ex
cathedra</i>, describing them as the feeble props of deluded ignorants, this is
because he knows that in reality they are deadly weapons against which his
claims would be utterly helpless. Better discredit your critics in advance so
that your readers will not even bother taking their arguments seriously. Better
make use of the popular and populist resentment of “academics” in their ivory
tower, of all those “specialists” who are making everything so difficult instead
of telling a clear and simple story that normal people can understand. We find a similar strategy in the current
conservative and rightwing campaigns of denying climate change (Trump: “just
look out the window!”), undermining the credibility of science and academic
research, attempting to defund Humanities programs, and spreading the trope of
“alternative facts”. Science and scholarship are inconvenient to these
antimodernists because they hinder them in saying what they <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">want</i> to say and doing what they <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">want</i> to do. Never let evidence stand in
the way of a good story. We find the same approach in Evola. In sum, I do not
think he doesn’t take historians seriously, on the contrary: he is afraid of
them. He knows that his weapons are no match for theirs, and so he seeks to
avoid a direct confrontation.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<br /></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: center;">
<span style="color: #38761d;"><span style="font-size: large;">Transpolitical
Conservative Liberalism</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
If Evola’s grand narrative of historical decline is a
fantasy, then does this leave us with anything worth salvaging? Even if one
does not accept his specific understanding of “Tradition,” one might still be
inclined to agree in general terms with the idea that premodern cultures were
superior and modernization is therefore a process of decline instead of
progress. Or instead of thinking in terms of either decline or progress, one might argue that traditional and modern societies <i>both</i> come at a price, so we need to strive for a healthy balance between the advantages and disadvantages of both, rather than making an either/or choice. This would be my position. Now it is very interesting to observe that, whatever the official ideologies might say, a deep
longing for premodern conditions is by no means restricted to the Right wing of
the political spectrum but is widespread among its “progressive” opponents as well. While
reading <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Revolt</i>, I was struck by the
structural parallels with one of my own all-time favourite novels, J.R.R.
Tolkien’s <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Lord of the Rings</i>. It is
well known that Tolkien’s work became something close to Holy Scripture among the
Hippies during the 1960s and remains a classic in the Pagan community that came
out of that era.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<br />
Obviously the enemy Saruman, with his
“mind of metal and wheels,” mirrors the spirit of the Industrial Revolution and
its destructive effects on nature (the Ents) and traditional communities (the
Shire). In other words, he stands for modernization as a negative force. All
readers of Tolkien instinctively take the side of the Hobbits (that is to say,
of traditional culture) and the Elves (that is to say, of an elite culture that
embodies high spiritual values). Quite as instinctively, they embrace the
notion of a sacred “bloodline” of Kings who are destined to rule: it would be
ridiculous to imagine a democratic Middle Earth where Aragorn would have to
stand for election and get his legislation through parliament. Middle Earth is a
traditional hierarchical society where everybody seems to accept his or her
appointed rank and station, where families are intact, where men are real men and women are real women. It is inhabited by a whole series of higher and lower
races (Elves at the top, Men in the Middle, Orcs at the bottom), and although
these may form coalitions of friendship, it is well understood that ultimately
they are supposed to stay in their own homelands. Nor would they wish
otherwise: they are all proud of who they are and determined to protect their own
culture. </div>
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All of this is very clearly Conservative
rather than “Liberal,” and Traditionalist rather than Progressive.
Nevertheless, few readers understand <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Lord
of the Rings</i> as a political manifesto, and the novel has been widely experienced
as a source of deep inspiration among such typical “Lefties” as the Hippies or
most Pagans since the 1960s and their descendants or sympathizers up to the present. Of course
some important footnotes should be added here, about ideological critiques of
Tolkien on the Marxist Left and a deliberate embrace of traditional community
values in Right-wing paganism. I’m aware of those complications, but what
interests me here is the very broad base of readers (including myself) who
appear to be perfectly capable of loving <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Lord
of the Rings </i>while rejecting right-wing authoritarianism and embracing universal
“Liberal” human values such as freedom, equality, or democracy. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36.0pt; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
So this is where it all gets very
complicated. How can Tolkien’s perspective be so compatible with “Liberalism”
and “the Left” if his ideal society exemplifies “Traditionalist” values
promoted by authors on the “Right” such as Evola? It’s not a new problem either.
During the 1960s and the following decades, the new Liberal culture that
flourished on the Left in California and elsewhere in the United States embraced
the scholarship on myth and symbolism associated with Eranos luminaries such as
Carl Gustav Jung, Mircea Eliade, or Joseph Campbell. All these authors were
very clearly conservatives, and much has been written about their relation with
fascism and antisemitism; but the fact is that their work was experienced as
deeply inspiring by American “Liberals” from the 1960s to the 1980s at least, and had a big influence on
them.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36.0pt; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
In short, there seems to be such a thing
as Transpolitical Conservative Liberalism. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Transpolitical</i>
because it does not fit the neat ideological straightjacket of Left versus
Right as conventionally understood. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Conservative</i>
because it seeks to protect traditional values that are being threatened by the
forces of “modern progress.” <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Liberal</i>
because it <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">also</i> believes in freedom
and equality as values that should be universal for all human beings. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify; text-indent: 36.0pt; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<br /></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="color: #38761d;">Human
and Non-Human Conservatism</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
Evola is clearly not on that side though. His vision is
marked by a strong and perfectly explicit emphasis on human <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">in</i>equality and an obsession with power
and authority. Both elements are grounded in his personal psychology: they follow
logically, in his case, from his deep-seated desire for absolute autonomy, that
is to say, of total freedom <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">for himself</i>.
From an early age on, so he tells us in his autobiography <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Path-Cinnabar-Julius-Evola/dp/1907166025"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Path of Cinnabar</i></a>, his all-consuming wish was to be absolutely free
and autonomous: he did not want to be dependent on anything or anyone
whatsoever. In terms of the German Idealist philosophers he was reading at the
time, the whole of reality had to be subject to his absolute “I” (<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">das Ich</i>), which had to transcend the
physical world and all its contingencies. So extreme was this desire that it
brought him close to suicide, until a Buddhist fragment convinced him that in
extinguishing his personal existence he would not be achieving freedom but would
in fact be demonstrating his <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">failure</i>
to achieve it. This is not the place to discuss the “magical” philosophy that
came out of this realization, fascinating though it is. Important for our
present concerns is Evola’s obsession, throughout his life, with the absolute
power and unquestionable authority of a spiritual elite imagined as standing at
the very top of a hierarchy: far above the ignorant masses, the contingencies of
history, the limitations of material existence, or anything else that could possibly
trouble its “non-human” purity and spiritual independence. Needless to add,
such dreams are dreamed only by those who imagine that they themselves are lucky enough
to stand at the top of the hierarchy.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>It is hardly
surprising that such a man would be lacking in all human warmth and empathy for
others. Evola was known as a cold fish who did not care about anyone but
himself, and this is not the critique of a hostile outsider. Evola himself
described his character in these terms:</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<br /></div>
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A spontaneous detachment from what is merely
human, from what is generally regarded as normal, particularly in the sphere of
affection, emerged as one of my distinctive traits when I was still in my early
youth … [S]uch a detached disposition<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>…
was the cause of a certain insensitivity and cold-heartedness on my part. But
in the most important of all fields, this very trait is what allowed me to
recognize those unconditioned values which are far removed from the perspective
of ordinary men of my time (<i>Path of Cinnabar</i>, 6-7).</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<br /></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiCpQLjoiicicQbuf1UVuvzDRji8qdgo2i75z6os3kfa7j63jTvlBokk5bIeSYDHOYtzFwwaKhWgwIgMVNokckzq-1Tm-0WEw3QV2FCUA9RLxCmBVSW7OOMX1idtVZ_J2gOayKjLCyN3Jjv/s1600/2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="500" data-original-width="400" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiCpQLjoiicicQbuf1UVuvzDRji8qdgo2i75z6os3kfa7j63jTvlBokk5bIeSYDHOYtzFwwaKhWgwIgMVNokckzq-1Tm-0WEw3QV2FCUA9RLxCmBVSW7OOMX1idtVZ_J2gOayKjLCyN3Jjv/s320/2.jpg" width="256" /></a></div>
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One has to agree, Evola was not an ordinary man. But much
more important, given his current influence in Right-wing circles, is his utter
contempt for human beings <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">qua</i> human
beings. His commitment was explicitly to what he called the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">non</i>-human. Any true spiritual values, as
he understood them, had to be the exclusive preserve of a spiritual elite far
above the common run of humanity. Whatever might happen to the masses of
“ordinary” human beings was none of his concern: in his ideal world, they simply
have to obey, and will be forced into submission if they dare to resist the
dictates of “legitimate authority.”<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<br /></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="color: #38761d;">The
Faultline</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<br /></div>
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;">
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<span style="font-family: "cambria"; font-size: 12.0pt;">It is precisely in this regard that Evola’s
Rightwing conservatism is utterly incompatible with the perspective of its “Liberal”
counterparts – including those that share a deep concern with “Conservative”
values. If Middle Earth is a Traditional society threatened by Saruman’s
modernism, then Evola is much closer to the mindset of Sauron than that of
Gandalf, Aragorn, the Hobbits, or the Elves. They are fighting against Mordor
because it seeks to destroy everything that makes life worth living: freedom,
peace, friendship, love, happiness, beauty, brotherhood, tolerance, mutual
understanding, and the willingness to transcend boundaries of race and culture
(exemplified, of course, by the friendship that develops between Legolas and
Gimli). The traditional society they want to conserve and protect exemplifies precisely
those values. Sauron, on the other hand, is obsessed with one thing only:
power. He demands absolute authority, submission to his will.</span>
</div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
Evola’s case has exemplary significance in the current
political debate. What ultimately divides the “New Right” from its “Liberal”
opponents is <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">not</i> the dilemma of
Tradition versus Modernity, or Conservatism versus Progress: about those issues,
difficult as they may be, it is possible to find common ground. Only one
principle is not negotiable: that power and authority must be at the service of
humanity, and not the other way around.<br />
<br /></div>
wouterjhanegraaff.blogspot.comhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15519965611425366178noreply@blogger.com27tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5967881025525384120.post-29928845125086266022017-06-17T02:06:00.001-07:002017-07-02T23:24:31.988-07:00The European New Right Doesn't Get It Right: The Danger of Manichaean Historiography<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">In
an attempt to educate myself a bit about the European New Right, I’ve been
reading two books about the movement: Tomislav Sunic’s 1988 dissertation <i>Against
Democracy and Equality</i> and Michael O’Meara’s <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">New Culture, New Right: Anti-Liberalism in Postmodern Europe </i>(2013).
I learned a lot, although perhaps not what the authors hoped I would.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<br /></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="color: #38761d; font-size: large;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Tomislav
Sunic</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEifN1nvNWX_SCtpRBCP5GFzeRYhjG9WxH2AbtlqhcIiCM7HMDtzP8dCJZVoalHy4Y_EXe6xmhdfiZJY-Sj2WnWP4oS8sCNRDmeAhAZNjHSa8F2Z374R-N3EGw4fr1qQ2y4ExT64-W1eUrSo/s1600/SPLC-Extremist-Files-Tomislav-Sunic-1280x720.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="720" data-original-width="1280" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEifN1nvNWX_SCtpRBCP5GFzeRYhjG9WxH2AbtlqhcIiCM7HMDtzP8dCJZVoalHy4Y_EXe6xmhdfiZJY-Sj2WnWP4oS8sCNRDmeAhAZNjHSa8F2Z374R-N3EGw4fr1qQ2y4ExT64-W1eUrSo/s400/SPLC-Extremist-Files-Tomislav-Sunic-1280x720.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Sunic’s
book was republished by Arktos and has received much praise in rightwing
milieus as a reliable introduction. Ironically though, the ENR's central
representative Alain de Benoist in his Preface (p. 18) points out that the very
title of the book is completely wrong: it shouldn't be about equality but
egalitarianism! Unfortunately, Sunic doesn't seem to understand such basic
distinctions and makes an utter mess of it. First, on pp. 132-135 he gives a
quite adequate summary of what the liberal concept of equality actually means,
with reference to the Declaration of Independence: "At bottom the
democratic faith is a moral affirmation: men are not to be used merely as means
to an end, as tools [etc.]" Each human being "has an equal right to
pursue happiness; life liberty and the pursuit of happiness are his simply by
virtue of the fact that he is a human being" (Milton Konvitz, quoted on p.
132). Clear enough, isn't it? One might think that Sunic understands it too:
"When liberal authors maintain that all men are equal, it is not to say
that men must be identical ... and liberalism has nothing to do with
uniformity. To assert that all men are equal, in liberal theory, means that all
men should be first and foremost treated fairly and their differences
acknowledged" (p. 135). </span><br />
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Bravo, well said - it would seem that Sunic gets
it. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">But no. He then launches into a chapter (pp. 141) riddled with so many non
sequiturs and sheer nonsense that it made my head spin. Instead of attacking
the actual liberal notion of equality that he has just been describing,
conservative authors and ENR sympathizers such as Hans J. Eysenck, Konrad
Lorenz, Pierre Krebs and others are endorsed for attacking a bizarre straw man
that is actually the opposite of what equality means. Suddenly the Declaration
of Independence is supposed to say "that all human beings are absolutely
identical" (Lorenz, quoted on p. 145), i.e. "that all people at birth
are endowed with the same talents, and that all peoples possess the same
energies" (Krebs, quoted on p. 146). What is so hard about seeing the
difference between human rights (which should be equal) and human talents,
abilities, or cultures (which obviously aren't all the same)? Why not have the
honesty of acknowledging what was actually meant, i.e. that all human beings
should have equal rights to life, liberty & happiness, regardless of
whether they are smart or dumb, talented or untalented, educated or uneducated, and of course regardless
of their race, gender, culture, beliefs and so on? But no, that's clearly not
what Sunic wants to say, so to hell with logic. From here on the argument
degenerates into a claim that defending the equal right of all human beings to
"life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness" (Decl. of Ind.) means
justifying "genocidal crusades" (Bérard, quoted on p. 150) and
ultimately leads to "state terror, deportations, and the imprisonment of dissidents
in psychiatric hospitals in the name of higher goals, democracy, and human
rights" (p. 157). </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Ehm, am I missing something here?? Did it ever occur to
Sunic and his sympathizers that these horrors mean what they obviously mean,
i.e. that - far from <i>exemplifying</i> an ideology of "human
rights" - the sad realities of (neo)"liberal" politics and
global domination keep betraying and making a mockery of the basic human values
that they should in fact be defending? In other words, it seems to me that Sunic should be
attacking the practices of (neo)liberalism in the name of equality and human
rights instead of conflating the two. But I'm afraid all of this is not about
logic or clear thinking. It's about pursuing an agenda inspired by emotional
resentment, regardless of arguments or evidence. If this is the intellectual
level on which the ENR is attacking "liberalism" and equality, then I’m
afraid they have a long way to go.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="color: #38761d; font-size: large;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Michael
O’Meara</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjqXZ3DWo0kH1uGGZ6dBrbgu4EpzDTgAj86ciuGIslPeMSl6KRn8WYojaLIsnjclcwCO7TnWzhfBZgCThD8Pi7wd_5S-AE9ecGJe8-HrAL4l8GZfhoo61rRJVeHE_dkeFRvueRIR1odAHW-/s1600/michael-omeara.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="500" data-original-width="500" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjqXZ3DWo0kH1uGGZ6dBrbgu4EpzDTgAj86ciuGIslPeMSl6KRn8WYojaLIsnjclcwCO7TnWzhfBZgCThD8Pi7wd_5S-AE9ecGJe8-HrAL4l8GZfhoo61rRJVeHE_dkeFRvueRIR1odAHW-/s320/michael-omeara.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">But
is Sunic’s book representative? When I posted these reflections on Facebook,
several friends mentioned Michael O’Meara’s <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">New
Culture, New Right: Anti-Liberalism in Postmodern Europe</i> (Arktos 2013) as a more
solid and reliable introduction to the topic, so I ordered and read it. But unfortunately
I cannot say I’m impressed with this book either, to say the least. It looks a
bit more solid, it’s better written, and it has an extensive apparatus of
footnotes that gives it an “academic look and feel”. There’s certainly a lot of
research behind it, and the apparatus is a treasure trove of references to
relevant primary and secondary sources. Nevertheless, it quickly became evident
that I was reading not a historical analysis of the ENR interested in balance
and nuance, but a political pamphlet grounded in ideological tunnel vision. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
very first pages already set the tone, when O’Meara discusses the aftermath of
what he calls the “Second European Civil War” and makes clear that for him the
“liberation” of France was in fact an “occupation” by the hostile forces of
American Liberalism, which proceeded immediately to “decimate” what he calls
the Old Right in “a murderous purge”. Never mind the murderous Nazi regime that
went before, which seems not worth mentioning in this context and is clearly
not much of a problem for O’Meara (in providing figures of the number of casualties in this
so-called <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">épuration</i>, he relies
primarily on the neo-fascist “negationist” and explicit defender of National Socialism
Maurice Bardèche). Of course it’s well known that after years of Nazi
occupation, the reaction of revenge and “payback” after the liberation produced
fresh horrors and tragedies; but O’Meara wants to speak of “murder” only when
the victims are on the right. I find it illustrative that whenever he mentions
Jews and Judaism we immediately encounter standard antisemitic stereotypes such
as the image of the “rootless” cosmopolitan Jew with his “revolutionary” (read:
anti-traditional) mentality and obsession with money and materialism. Most
important is that, throughout his discussions, O’Meara never makes even the
slightest attempt to understand his opponents’ point of view. Why be fair to
those “Liberals” and their ideas? They are the enemy, so their perspectives are
wrong and without any validity. No need to spend any time taking them seriously. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Should
one even bother to read such books? I think one should. Firstly because it’s
important to do what O’Meara does not, that is to say, make a serious attempt
at listening and understanding how your opponents look at the world and why. If we aren’t
willing to make that effort we have no right to expect them to do any better.
And secondly because O’Meara’s book is an excellent example of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">how historical narrative can be used for purposes
of manipulation</i> – or in other words, of the power of storytelling in historical
writing. This is in fact an issue of enormous importance, and its relevance
goes far beyond this one specific example. Whether we realize it or not, all of
us are constantly exposed to such narratives, and they determine how we
perceive what happens in the world around us. So we’d better be aware of how
they work.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<br /></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="color: #38761d; font-size: large;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Manichaean
Historiography</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhcb5KPJMK1jOS0NgXH723Qbbc35QiiXC3C6Fn0I4SQHQIn8B0cpz1Sd2zWErcHBM7QX8z_-QON2p6fWCiMlKBA7XXaaSbTqvq1Ah5D7A_FT1BEwHuO0wVG36XPuWsWeW1DGNIhpiph0V7y/s1600/9989c423c68e47a13c83212f805a958a.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="900" data-original-width="1600" height="360" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhcb5KPJMK1jOS0NgXH723Qbbc35QiiXC3C6Fn0I4SQHQIn8B0cpz1Sd2zWErcHBM7QX8z_-QON2p6fWCiMlKBA7XXaaSbTqvq1Ah5D7A_FT1BEwHuO0wVG36XPuWsWeW1DGNIhpiph0V7y/s640/9989c423c68e47a13c83212f805a958a.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">O’Meara’s
book reflects a Manichaean style of historiography based upon the reification
and essentialization of (in this particular case) “Liberalism” and “Tradition”
as two hostile movements or forces that are supposed to have been battling one
another since antiquity. If you trace the components of the narrative, which
can be found in many variations elsewhere in the literature of the New Right,
then it looks somewhat like this. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 36.0pt; text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The story of “Liberalism” begins with
the “revolutionary spirit” of Judaism and its monotheist revolt against the
stable traditionality of “pagan” culture, which used to ensure that people knew
who they were and where they belonged. It continues in the universalizing
tendency of Pauline Christianity, which no longer seeks to address just one
people (the Jews) but sets its sight on the whole of humanity, understood as
one homogeneous collection of individual souls that are equal before God and
all need to find salvation. This approach is taken up by the Christian Church,
which proceeds to conquer the pagan peoples of Europe and convert them to the
new faith: the result is that local communities lose their autonomy and are
expected to become parts of one Holy Roman Empire. While Roman Catholicism had
a policy of absorbing “pagan superstitions” into its own framework, the fatal
process of liberalization moves to its next level with the Protestant
Reformation: now we have a situation of total war against paganism, in favour
of an interpretation of the Christian faith that puts all emphasis on the
isolated individual and its personal relation to God, thereby further eroding
the traditional sense of community. Next we get to Descartes, whose emphasis on
pure rationality creates the intellectual foundation for modern science and its
“reign of quantity” at the expense of all qualitative features, which now
become totally irrelevant, thus paving the way for the commodification of
everything under capitalism. From there we get to the famous disenchantment of
the world under the reign of industrialization, which proceeds to further tear
traditional communities apart, resulting in an urban mass society of alienated
individuals. In the wake of Protestantism and the scientific revolution, the
next victim of Liberalism is the traditional notion of social and political
hierarchy. The revolt of the “third estate” during the French Revolution leads
finally to an ideology of social egalitarianism and hence to modern mass
democracy, thereby legitimating a whole series of “emancipatory” movements: for
instance, women or homosexuals begin to claim equal rights, non-white peoples (black
slaves, the colonized) start doing the same, and so on. Due to their success,
we no longer have a traditional European society with a “natural” hierarchy
dominated by white males but a multicultural society based on the principle
that “all men (and women) are equal”. This process moves into its logical end
phase with the economization and commodification of everything, known as <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">neo</i>liberalism, and its ambition of a
global egalitarian society of consumers.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So
what is wrong with such a narrative? Perhaps even this short summary shows how
plausible it can be made to look at first sight. I do not think the problem
lies so much in the basic historical “facts” as such (although of course one
may quibble about many details and especially with how they are framed), in O’Meara’s
attempt at a critical analysis of the problems and dilemmas caused by
modernization (a perfectly legitimate pursuit), in the fact that he tries to
understand them from a broad historical perspective (equally legitimate), or in
his radical rejection of modernity and his heartfelt wish for a return to
“traditional” values (realistic or not, such wishes are understandable enough). </span><br />
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Rather, the core problem is quite simply that this polemical manifesto, like so many
similar ones, derives it plausibility and persuasive power from a very common
type of bad historiography. A first objection concerns the “presentist”
approach to history: you begin with what worries you in the contemporary
situation and then start cherry-picking for its causes back into the past to create a narrative that, predictably, culminates in the very phenomena you
were trying to "explain" in the first place. A second and even more serious
objection, on which I will be concentrating, is that the entire enterprise is built upon an essentialist approach to historical writing grounded in a very common
type of mental delusion (see below) but that can be used to great rhetorical
effect and has tremendous potential for political propaganda. Let me emphasize
right away that O’Meara is not alone in this regard. The same structural
problem is basic to countless other grand narratives of modernity, with Hegel
as the classic example.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="color: #38761d; font-size: large;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
Power of Reification</span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">So why
is this bad historiography? To put it as sharply as possible: because <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">there is no such thing as a “historical
process”</i> – there are only historical events. This might sound like an
exaggerated or hyper-theoretical claim, so allow me to explain. Egil Asprem has
nicely made the basic point in his deconstruction of another so-called “historical
process”, that of disenchantment:</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 36.0pt; text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Conceptualizations of disenchantment as
a socio-historical process affecting modern societies imply rather abstract,
top-down explanations of individual beliefs and actions: in these accounts, it
is not so much individuals that define their reality, build societies, make
choices, create and negotiate culture and meaning, as it is the overarching
“systems”, “structures”, “worldviews” or “ideologies” that determine what
individuals do and say (<a href="http://www.brill.com/products/book/problem-disenchantment">The Problem of Disenchantment, 47</a>).</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The
same argument applies to “Liberalism”. O’Meara’s story derives its seductive
power from the fact that it lends agency not to human beings but to abstract
“forces” of which they are supposed to be the puppets. Hence readers are led to
imagine the history of Western culture <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">not</i>
as a series of events based on human actions, which could all have happened
differently, but as one momentous battle that has been unfolding over time
between two hostile <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">forces</i> (Tradition
and Liberalism), each sticking to their own internal logic and dynamics until
the bitter end. Within the economy of this dualism, Tradition is clearly on the
side of Being, while Liberalism is on the side of Becoming: the former is
imagined to exist in some kind of nonhistorical space (hence its supposed “naturalness”
or “universality”, its association with “eternal values”, and so on) while the
latter unfolds in historical time (and is therefore seen as unstable,
contingent, und ultimately less “real”). The narrative makes them appear like
spiritual or metaphysical entities that are invisibly at work, as the hidden
secret of “external events” that we can observe with our senses. Thus we are
told that history has been influenced by the “Jewish Spirit”, the “Spirit
of Christianity”, the “Spirit of Capitalism”, the “Spirit of Liberalism”, and
so on and so forth. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<br />
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Spirits... </span><br />
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Entities you can't see...</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLOWJnTIIMvGMGW1Ny3WM0XTRau2c0VOOzdqtsboYQiOsDtjR5nUR87ICs6azCzc3VmkMJZnUcVx92GshEN2lgdAC_tNv7UUEpoFBZlTrUQTC6Ke5oFiVzvxgp_eB_xypolv1n3Fhqk-ni/s1600/American_progress.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="952" data-original-width="1280" height="475" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiLOWJnTIIMvGMGW1Ny3WM0XTRau2c0VOOzdqtsboYQiOsDtjR5nUR87ICs6azCzc3VmkMJZnUcVx92GshEN2lgdAC_tNv7UUEpoFBZlTrUQTC6Ke5oFiVzvxgp_eB_xypolv1n3Fhqk-ni/s640/American_progress.JPG" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">John Gast, "American Progress" (1872)</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">There
is a good reason why we cannot see them, except in our imagination: they do not
actually exist. What we need to get is that “Tradition” and “Liberalism” are
not entities, forces, spirits, or realities at all. They are <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">words</i>, labels – no more, no less. The
function of this particular type of words consists in highlighting and calling
attention to structural similarities of an ideal or abstract nature. In themselves
there is nothing wrong with such operations of mental comparison and
abstraction: they are not just useful, but often indispensable in our continuous
attempts at bringing some order to the world that surrounds us in time and
space. However, that does not diminish the fact that they exist nowhere else
but in our minds: they are mental tools that operate in our imagination. The
problem is that our minds have learned to neglect this and hence misperceive
the true nature of such concepts. Instead of seeing them for what they are, we imagine
them to be somehow real, and this happens through a cognitive process that is known as <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">reification</i> or, in its strongest form, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">essentialization</i>. It causes us to
imagine, more or less vaguely, that there <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">are</i>
such things as “Liberalism” or “Tradition” and that history can be seen as the
story of their encounter. Sometimes we say that this story unfolds “on the
stage of world history” – another nice example of how we imagine things that
are not there. For where is that “stage”? Where are those “actors”? These are
metaphors, but we tend to confuse them with realities.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Why
is all this a problem? Because once we start thinking along these lines – and
it is perfectly natural for us to do so – we feel that we need to get involved
and take sides. Do we identify with the hero on that stage or with the villain?
And so we start glorifying one of those spirits or entities while demonizing
everybody that we imagine to be standing on the other side. This is how we get
Rightwingers depicting “Liberals” as enemies of humanity in league with the Forces
of Evil, and Leftwingers depicting “Traditionalists” as – well, exactly the
same.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<div style="text-align: left;">
</div>
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Reification
can be defined as the process of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">making
mental abstractions real</i> by projecting them onto the world, and then allowing
our actions to be guided by them (for a theoretical discussion, see <a href="https://www.academia.edu/28891053/Reconstructing_Religion_from_the_Bottom_Up_2016_">pp. 579-582 here</a>). Enormous simplifications are the inevitable
result, and in the real world these can often be destructive in the extreme. Manichaean
historiography based on reification (whether from the Left or from the Right)
leads to false but seductive narratives that sacrifice historical complexity to
the requirements of ideology – that is to say, to power. We are told that we need
to make a choice and show what side we are on: “you are either with us or with
the terrorists – choose!” Although I disagree with Eric <table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7yQE3v_Sj9QcmJTBiLysx2c5xvx2FL_8R7A4MXT_6k4sR3sxOnbuUefuW4YauXi8vrT4Rz2e4Xx_w_vAfnuziMLcagOTI9voIZZNI55Uqe6VSs7AnkSwD_OKsykkKFjZtWr3LWlRKWzyH/s1600/mid_34697.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="331" data-original-width="560" height="188" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj7yQE3v_Sj9QcmJTBiLysx2c5xvx2FL_8R7A4MXT_6k4sR3sxOnbuUefuW4YauXi8vrT4Rz2e4Xx_w_vAfnuziMLcagOTI9voIZZNI55Uqe6VSs7AnkSwD_OKsykkKFjZtWr3LWlRKWzyH/s320/mid_34697.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Eric Voegelin</td></tr>
</tbody></table>
Voegelin’s notion of
“gnostic politics” (tragically, his Cold-War imagination fell prey to the very
same pathology he believed to be fighting), his description of what
happens next is perfectly correct:</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 36.0pt; text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">[At issue is] the legitimation of
violence as a spiritual act of punishment against the Powers which threaten the
Light. The situation of the underlying party is terrible, because he is not
merely a political opponent in the battle for power but, in the dream fantasy
of the gnostic, a cosmic enemy in the war between Light and Darkness ("Gnostische Politik", 308; see discussion on<a href="https://www.academia.edu/3461333/On_the_Construction_of_Esoteric_Traditions_1998_"> pp. 29-36 here</a>). </span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">That
is what happens, all the time (for some of the most influential cases, see <a href="https://www.academia.edu/30438845/Religion_and_the_Historical_Imagination_Esoteric_Tradition_as_Poetic_Invention_2017_">discussion here</a>). Instead of seeing people you
start imagining Powers – forces of darkness at work in the world that are
destroying everything you care about. You feel you must fight them. You tell
yourself that your eyes are wide open and you see the truth. They cannot fool
you anymore, you are seeing through the delusion! Your opponents, on the other
hand, are clearly under the sway of evil. They are living in ignorance,
hypnotized, they act like automata, unable to see how they are being
manipulated by the powers that are running the show. So if you cannot convince
them, you will have to fight them. Perhaps they are looking at you in exactly
the same way? Well, that might be, but it doesn’t matter. The point is that they
are wrong and you are right. You cannot allow yourself to try understanding their point of view. That would only weaken your resolve, and anyway, you already know all you need to know about them.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<br /></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><span style="color: #38761d;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Contingency
and Human Values</span></span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi-cRCMRb5WaDTlEhnRGL6ad_GI_M7PfZ_Uvk3ib_gObyL7lWqVys8Q9Ji15gSKonWHMX2Mfk7RiAmaGg6Y9xUOsUVcdCRn6KO4Cvlvt90BZt4fwEhbRrWPwMvX8KXD4VqJbvAmaq6ZXX5H/s1600/Paulus.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="562" data-original-width="522" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi-cRCMRb5WaDTlEhnRGL6ad_GI_M7PfZ_Uvk3ib_gObyL7lWqVys8Q9Ji15gSKonWHMX2Mfk7RiAmaGg6Y9xUOsUVcdCRn6KO4Cvlvt90BZt4fwEhbRrWPwMvX8KXD4VqJbvAmaq6ZXX5H/s320/Paulus.jpg" width="297" /></a></div>
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">What
does it mean to look at history in terms of contingency instead? It means
taking a step back and focusing our attention, first of all, on what is really
and undoubtedly there: human beings of flesh and blood like ourselves, and
their actions in the world. Take the case of Paul the apostle. It is nonsense
to see him as some kind of instrument through which Liberalism (or, for that
matter, Christianity) was beginning its long campaign of conquering the world, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">en route</i> towards its <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">telos</i> of a neoliberal world filled with
McDonalds and Coca Cola. That is not what was happening in the first century
CE. Something much more human and down-to-earth was happening. We are dealing with a
Greek-speaking Jewish guy who, for reasons best known to himself (possibly the guilty trauma of having been a witness and accomplice, <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Paul-Mind-Apostle-N-Wilson/dp/0393317609">as argued by A.N. Wilson</a>), got quite
obsessed with the death by crucifixion of an obscure teacher from Nazareth
called Jesus. He came up with some new and quite idiosyncratic ideas about
its true cosmic significance for the world at large, and felt strongly that
everybody should know. So he went on a mission to spread the word, and turned out to be really good at it. The rest, as one says, is history. The
point is that none of it needed to have happened the way it did happen. If for some
reason Paul’s (or rather, Saul’s) parents had not met, then he would never have
been born – and it is absolutely impossible to say in what kind of world we
would be living today. We can be sure though that it would look very different. However, his parents did meet; he was born; and he did what he did. What came out of
it is what came out of it – not because it was meant to be, as if there were
some great plan, but simply because this is what happened and not something
else. What goes for Paul goes for Plato, Jesus, Muhammad, Constantine the
Great, Luther, Descartes, Voltaire, Napoleon, Hitler, and all the rest. Human
beings who happened to do what they happened to do.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">All of which might sound almost trivial. But it is not: the implications reach very far, much farther than we commonly
recognize. One often hears the objection that pure and utter contingency
“empties history of any meaning”, beause it implies that history is just a
string of random events, “one damn thing after another”. I disagree. Grand
narratives based on reification do not <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">discover</i>
any true meaning in history. What they do is <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">impute</i> meanings on history, and while it is true that this can bestow
a sense of purpose and personal fulfilment, the results can be utterly destructive too. Does
this mean then that in fact there is no meaning or value to be
found in the world? On the contrary! All it means is that if you look for it in
“the historical process”, in some kind of political ideology or theology of
salvation, then you’re looking in the wrong place. You find it in a meaningful life. And here, I think, lies the real tragedy of
political ideologies, whether from the “Left” or from the “Right”. Although their
very power and motivation comes from a deep and genuine concern with protecting important
human values (how can we lead a meaningful life under conditions of modernity?), those who take it upon themselves to impose such values infailingly end up sacrificing real human beings on the
altar of “the greater good”. In the end, they care more about ideas than they care
about people.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="color: #38761d;"><span style="font-size: large; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Getting
Real</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-indent: 36.0pt; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgy_CcIR3-YD8oXR8himy2GNPhpUhObg8nCmAvol0w6ZRY79bspIUmmzZrMyE6rn_SUh2IGnmPp6yTYZa2Cym5XmiO-2gNa0NLXmnNv_FEwPsJijc9H1y2v7gW-lFvts-wRbg-kVuHDc_ce/s1600/28McCarthy-facebookJumbo.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="550" data-original-width="1050" height="208" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgy_CcIR3-YD8oXR8himy2GNPhpUhObg8nCmAvol0w6ZRY79bspIUmmzZrMyE6rn_SUh2IGnmPp6yTYZa2Cym5XmiO-2gNa0NLXmnNv_FEwPsJijc9H1y2v7gW-lFvts-wRbg-kVuHDc_ce/s400/28McCarthy-facebookJumbo.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">As
formulated by Mark Lilla in a wise and perceptive discussion of reactionary thinking, “when it comes to understanding history we are still
incorrigibly reifying creatures” (<a href="https://www.amazon.com/Shipwrecked-Mind-Political-Reaction/dp/1590179021">The Shipwrecked Mind, 134</a>):</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 36.0pt; text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">One needs not have read Kierkegaard or
Heidegger to know the anxiety that accompanies historical consciousness, that
inner cramp that comes when time lurches forward and we feel ourselves
catapulted into the future. To relax that cramp we tell ourselves we actually
know how one age has followed another since the beginning. This white lie gives
us hope of altering the future course of events, or at least of learning how to
adapt to them. There even seems to be solace in thinking that we are caught in
a fated history of decline, so long as we can expect a new turn of the wheel,
or an eschatological event that will carry us beyond time itself. … [T]throughout history [this apocalyptic
imagination] has … provoked extravagant hopes that were inevitably
disappointed, leaving those who held them even more desolate. The doors to the
Kingdom remained shut, and all that was left was memory of defeat, destruction,
and exile. And fantasies of the world we have lost. (Ibid., p. 135, 137).</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 36.0pt; text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">What
makes New Right narratives so seductive is the fact that they respond to
problems that are perfectly real and important. The ideology of neoliberalism has created a
terrible mess, and many of its basic assumptions need to be reconsidered. But
to address the enormous problems that we are facing and not make matters worse, we need to stop fooling
ourselves and get real about what really counts: not the purity of some
“Traditional” or “Liberal” ideal that exists nowhere but in our imagination and
has never existed anywhere else, but the suffering of people and the damage done to the world. Both Traditional <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">and</i>
Liberal ideals can be excellent guidelines, and they are by no means so
mutually exclusive as their fanatical apologists would like to suggest. But the point
is that they are not realities. They are ideals, and as such they will always
be hovering on the far horizon, at the edge of our vision or just beyond. We cannot reach
them, and that is good, for absolute purity is a deadly thing. But they can be sources of inspiration, beacons of hope, and we can try to move into their
general direction. </span><br />
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">In the words of Annie Dillard, we are all in the same boat (or rather, in her story it is an ice floe),
on our way towards <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Teaching-Stone-Talk-Expeditions-Encounters/dp/0060915412">the Pole of Relative Inaccessibility</a>. Let's face it: we shouldn't
expect to arrive there anytime soon. It's total chaos on that floe, but we're all on it together. So while we're all there and have nowhere else to go, we’d better learn to get over
ourselves and try treating our fellow-travelers the way we’d like to be treated
ourselves. Listening to what they have to say would not be a bad beginning.</span></div>
wouterjhanegraaff.blogspot.comhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15519965611425366178noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5967881025525384120.post-35934500164146990672017-04-30T04:44:00.001-07:002017-04-30T06:39:57.374-07:00The Cure (or: Confessions of a Liberal Anti-Neoliberal, with Recommendations)<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
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--</style><span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;"><span style="font-size: large;"><span style="color: #38761d;"><span style="font-size: x-large;">Make Holland Great Again...? </span></span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: large;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNWVfdsYKLKxjn6ll2DgYoFhjwbEjhvoUrtQp6ft0Y86b7AzAGgXhHFzLhi-8Ba_SZeSHYVtPysd8myJQPHyoegLfNlqj9N1-dzzsEyppTQiSzl6PwA2_6KDNLX-iNUC5I0K1II5fGYkaK/s1600/amsterdam-canal-bridge-bike-590-590x393.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgNWVfdsYKLKxjn6ll2DgYoFhjwbEjhvoUrtQp6ft0Y86b7AzAGgXhHFzLhi-8Ba_SZeSHYVtPysd8myJQPHyoegLfNlqj9N1-dzzsEyppTQiSzl6PwA2_6KDNLX-iNUC5I0K1II5fGYkaK/s400/amsterdam-canal-bridge-bike-590-590x393.jpg" width="400" /></a></span></div>
<br />
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;">Who am I?</span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;">What do I stand for?</span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;">What is it that unites
me with those who are like me?</span></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;">What is it that divides
me from those who are unlike me?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;"> </span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;"> </span></i>
</div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;">The current wave of
rightwing populism answers these questions along lines of nationality and
ethnicity, often with strong racial connotations. The slogan “Make America
Great Again” really means “I want to be proud again of being an American.” Likewise,
in my own country, followers of Geert Wilders want to be proud again to be
Dutch. The French want to be proud again to be French, the English to be
English, and so on. Only in Germany such sentiments of national pride have long
been taboo, for obvious historical reasons: if Germans should be proud of
anything, it had to be of being exemplary Europeans. They still are, but even
in Germany the tide is beginning to turn. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-indent: 36.0pt; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;">I
understand these sentiments very well, for once upon a time I used to be proud
of being Dutch. This was in the mid-1990s, when I was living in Paris and began
seeing my own native culture and mentality in a new light. Not that I disliked
the French – on the contrary, there was much that I admired about them – but I
liked the values of my own little country even more. I felt that in the
Netherlands, small as we might be, we had excellent reasons to be proud of our
long and thoroughly sympathetic tradition of openness and pragmatic tolerance
in dealing with the facts of cultural or religious diversity. Those values of
Dutchness went at least as far back as the seventeenth century, when my country
was a relatively safe haven for refugees persecuted for their beliefs elsewhere
in Europe. And for a Dutchman of my generation, such values were connected on a
deep emotional level to the stories my parents had passed on to me, about Dutch
resistance against totalitarian oppression during World War II. True: today we
know that these heroic stories were partly idealized and romanticized. Still, there
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">was</i> an important movement of resistance.
Many ordinary people did risk their lives to stand up for those who were being persecuted.
These stories helped define my way of looking at the world. I am grateful to my
parents for passing them on.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-indent: 36.0pt; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;">And
then everything changed. While I used to be proud of being Dutch, during the
years after 9/11 I have grown to be deeply ashamed of how my country abandoned
and betrayed its core values. With surprising speed, we descended downwards
along a negative spiral ending up in a poisonous climate of intolerance,
suspicion, xenophobia, egoism, hatred, and verbal and sometimes even physical
violence against minorities of all kinds. This development began with Pim Fortuyn, a
flamboyant figure on the right, a political outsider who began saying things
that many people were thinking but did not dare to admit. With hindsight, I
still look at him with some sympathy. I did not share his political stance, but
I respected his attitude of </span><span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;">“</span>saying what I think and doing what I say” and his
disregard of bourgeois morality (for example, even while running an election campaign for becoming Prime Minister, he was perfectly open about his
homosexuality). However, Fortuyn opened the gate for a whole second wave of
much more vicious rightwingers, demagogues, and opportunists such as Theo van
Gogh, Rita Verdonk, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, and many others. Finally we ended up with
Geert Wilders. Fortuyn was murdered by an animal rights activist, and van Gogh
was butchered in the street by a radical Islamist. Those were deeply shocking
events, and my country has never recovered. We have not been able or willing to
find our way back to what used to “make Holland great”: our traditions of
tolerance and acceptance, of “live and let live,” our openness towards others, our
nondogmatic mentality, our way of dealing in a low-key and pragmatic manner
with the facts of cultural or religious or sexual diversity – ideally with a sense of self-relativizing
humor that befitted such a small country, and that somehow seemed to capture
what it meant to be Dutch.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-indent: 36.0pt; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;">All
of that vanished almost overnight. Today I feel that my country has betrayed me
– or rather, that it has betrayed itself and what it once stood for. Dutch “identity” seems to have become
an empty shell, a vacuum ready to be filled with depressing debates about <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">zwarte Piet</i> and groundless paranoia
about refugees and what they might be up to. Refugees from countries such as Syria –
normal people, ordinary people like ourselves who have lost everything and had to run for
their lives to escape from murderers, torturers and rapists – are routinely
portrayed as though they are dangerous criminals themselves. What happened to
common decency? What happened to our willingness to empathize with other human
beings? Watching the public debate, I cannot but look with feelings of deep
shame at what the Netherlands have become. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-indent: 36.0pt; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;">“Make
Holland great again”? Never before have we been so small.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-large;"><span style="color: #38761d;"><span style="font-weight: normal;"><span style="font-family: "times new roman";">The Takeover</span></span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9lqv-0C5HcF9kYNDIaJwiNcSfy3T79uoAx8MaWJEEpPwpVyQoFljefkL4oUsd9XAAuJ7nctLMayg2FdX7-dEI9AbcG5oBSAUW8wB1R19jiMPc2xN-elLtatdczujG_G2ao7RcGSaEbORr/s1600/lifestyle-graffiti-crop.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="427" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg9lqv-0C5HcF9kYNDIaJwiNcSfy3T79uoAx8MaWJEEpPwpVyQoFljefkL4oUsd9XAAuJ7nctLMayg2FdX7-dEI9AbcG5oBSAUW8wB1R19jiMPc2xN-elLtatdczujG_G2ao7RcGSaEbORr/s640/lifestyle-graffiti-crop.jpg" width="640" /></a></i></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;">Now does all this imply
that I embrace “Europe”? Isn’t that what stereotypical “liberals” or “lefties”
like myself are supposed to do? Well, no! Around the same time, during the mid-1990s
when I began discovering my positive Dutch identity, I also became aware of a
very different phenomenon. People all around me seemed to be getting quite
obsessed with “the economy.” Why was that? With hindsight it is clear to me
that I was perfectly naïve and ignorant about what was going on at the time. For
instance, it puzzled me that we suddenly needed to have a separate block for
“economic news” on the evening news. Why make such a big fuss about money, I
wondered, we had been doing just fine without that – thank you very much! At
the time, I did not grasp why politicians on the Social-Democrat left, such as
our Prime Minister Wim Kok or Tony Blair in the UK, were so proud to “shed
their ideological feathers” and began looking and behaving exactly like the
capitalist rightwingers that I had always disliked. And I did not understand
why, all of a sudden, public services such as transport, health care, or education
needed to be “privatized” and turned into commercial enterprises. They had
served us quite well, hadn’t they? We were being told that those measures would
“reduce prices and increase quality,” but it was clear for all to see that the
opposite was true. Prices went up, quality decreased, and worst of all,
everything became infected by the slick dishonest language of commerce.
Hospitals once used to exist to cure the sick – but now patients became
“consumers,” health care became a “product,” and the bottom line became
financial profit rather than making people well. Was I naïve? I certainly was,
and I was ignorant too. Like so many others, I simply could not see what was
causing these changes.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-indent: 36.0pt; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;">Very
similar developments were taking place everywhere else around me, and it all
became wrapped up with another New Thing called “European integration.” It
wasn’t just that politicians, across the spectrum from “left” to “right,” all
began spouting the same economic newspeak about privatization and deregulation,
so that if you didn’t like the economization of everything you were left pretty
much without a credible candidate to vote for. But on top of that, it became
clear that those politicians who were supposed to be in charge had less and
less control over what was happening in my country. They kept handing big
chunks of national sovereignty over to Europe, without <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">ever</i> asking their own citizens for permission to do so. They had no
respect for the truth: to give just one small and mostly symbolic example, after the introduction
of the Euro everybody could see that a glass of beer in downtown Amsterdam was
suddenly more than twice as expensive, but I stil remember well-known politicians
simply denying it. “No no, you’re mistaken, the price has not gone up.”
Everybody could see that the sky had turned green, but they insisted it was
still blue. Such dishonesty was shocking, but we learned to get used to it, for it kept happening all the time.
Eventually, it became perfectly clear to me what this thing called “Europe”
really meant. Of course: it was “the economy” again – what else? The slogans
are well known: “It’s the economy, stupid!” (Bill Clinton) “There Is No
Alternative” (Margaret Thatcher). </span></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigbRAD-PRnyqmn_cG8gqxE_h2fBMf_-duDJhF6b2i68htLlr7zfeBqRRcI2ffQZNFfM-RMhyphenhyphenB3HzAdatBD29WKtT0a-tz2d4LIWSFdolPrzIi1yhyphenhyphenTHeqqEW07BckRAjwoWYN8Mfa6EZmC/s1600/TNI-report.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="268" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigbRAD-PRnyqmn_cG8gqxE_h2fBMf_-duDJhF6b2i68htLlr7zfeBqRRcI2ffQZNFfM-RMhyphenhyphenB3HzAdatBD29WKtT0a-tz2d4LIWSFdolPrzIi1yhyphenhyphenTHeqqEW07BckRAjwoWYN8Mfa6EZmC/s400/TNI-report.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-indent: 36.0pt; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;">No
alternative indeed. We pretty much ended up with no credible politicians to
vote for because they were all saying more or less the same thing. Hence we
ended up with no opportunity for citizens to influence what happened to their
own country. And we lost our opportunity to choose for anything that actually <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">meant</i> something real to human beings
unless it had first been quantified and converted into economic terms. In
short, it was not enough that the Netherlands had forgotten and betrayed their
identity: the very country itself seemed to be taken away from us and handed over to
some remote, abstract, democratically deficient economic entity called “Europe”.
Did anybody ever ask me, or my fellow citizens, whether we agreed with all of
this? No, our politicians felt sure they knew best what was good for us all.
Even at those rare moments when European citizens managed to get a word in, and
used it to say “no!” (as in the case of the European “Constitution,” rejected
in 2005 by the Dutch and the French), those leaders found a way to work around
the problem and end up doing what they wanted anyway (the Lisbon treaty of
2007). They had learned their lesson though: better not ask your citizens for
permission again, just do it. This type of arrogance became typical of the managerial
“elites”. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-indent: 36.0pt; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;">I
repeat: I was perfectly clueless at the time. It was only much later that I
began to understand a bit better what was happening, and why. The story is well
known by now: the move from Keynesian “embedded liberalism” to the triumph of
Hayek’s and Friedman’s ideology of Neoliberalism under Thatcher and Reagan,
leading to the “Washington Consensus” after the end of the Cold War, and so on
and so forth. After the Wall had come down, Neoliberalism would deliver “the
End of History.” American-style capitalism would spread all over the world, bringing
the blessings of freedom and democracy wherever it went. The global free market
would make us all into one big happy family.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-indent: 36.0pt; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;">Of
course it didn’t work out that way. How is it possible that so many people even
believed in such a story – and some still do? The problem with any dominant
ideology is that it is blind to whatever does not fit its own narrative. In
this particular case, the grand narrative is incapable of perceiving any dimensions
of reality that do not fit the particular logic that governs neoliberal
economics or cannot be translated into its language. From the outset, the whole
thing was based on wholly unrealistic and perfectly utopian dreams unchecked by
historical awareness. And perhaps most of all, it reflected a shocking disregard
of basic human psychology. Which brings me full circle: human beings need more
than money and security. They need identity too. We need to know who we are,
what we stand for, what unites us with others like ourselves, and what divides
us from others unlike ourselves. That is the bottom line. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-large;"><span style="color: #38761d;"><span style="font-family: "times new roman";">Human vs Neoliberal</span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhxDWTF_NVHR87vJqzchjGaOqkJSLMrGP7UJzrNeL3PRFB1sKvZfccdRu8GlV9E-0T3_1SozKLRKimeon5QPrw3Urfkg50CpsIjvloaJqERL99GLdrnwyl2fOwckIONdBVmCMpkIDo-jibN/s1600/barcode-1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="303" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhxDWTF_NVHR87vJqzchjGaOqkJSLMrGP7UJzrNeL3PRFB1sKvZfccdRu8GlV9E-0T3_1SozKLRKimeon5QPrw3Urfkg50CpsIjvloaJqERL99GLdrnwyl2fOwckIONdBVmCMpkIDo-jibN/s400/barcode-1.jpg" width="400" /></a></i></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;">Finally then, after
several decades of neoliberal brainwashing, the chickens have come home to roost.
The populist revolt is telling us what those who have been dreaming of a neoliberal
world order refused to see, or were incapable of seeing. It is not a pretty
sight. As regards identity, this is how I imagine the conversation between an
average Human Being and a neoliberal ideologue:</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;">Human: “Who am I?” </span></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraph" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;">Neoliberal: “You are a
consumer. Or let me be more specific, you are an individual. That is to say:
you are a rational agent who is driven exclusively by your own self-interest.” </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;">Human: “What do I stand
for?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraph" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;">Neoliberal: “Well, ehm,
didn’t I just tell you? You are a consumer on a market. So you stand for
yourself. For maximizing your own interest!”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;">Human: “But what unites
me with others like myself?” </span></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraph" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;">Neoliberal: “Ehm… nothing
really, to be quite honest. Except that all those others are self-interested
individuals too! You have that in common.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;">Human: “What then
divides me from others unlike myself?” </span></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraph" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;">Neoliberal: “They hate your
freedom!”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;">Human: “Excuse me? How
so? Can you please explain?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;">Neoliberal: “Isn’t it
clear? Your freedom as a consumer is your freedom to choose, and it is the
market that gives you that freedom. Make sure that you remain a consumer! Make
sure you value nothing higher than your own personal interest: make sure that <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">you</i> get what <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">you</i> want. And for God’s sake, don’t act irrationally! I mean, don’t
be so stupid to ever think of others first, or imagine that you should share
what you have. Never put <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">their</i> interest
above <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">your</i> own interest. If they win,
you lose. Think of yourself first, for that is what everybody else is doing.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;">The problem is that the
neoliberal, in this conversation, is in fact not much of a human being – at
least he doesn’t behave like one. And this is what makes it so easy and natural
for our generic Human to morph into a populist. See how that goes:</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;">Human: “OK, OK, you made
your point. But now shut up, for I have something to tell you. Yes, I will put
my own interest first – all right. But here’s the thing: I am not ‘interested’
in being just a consumer! I do not want to be just some disconnected atom in
some impersonal machine that is just trying to manipulate me to squeeze money
out of me. That is not my ‘interest.’ And don’t you tell me that I’m all about
making ‘rational choices.’ No, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">I care</i>!
I care deeply, you idiot, that’s why I’m so fucking angry! Don’t you get it? I’m
a human being. I have feelings. I care about people. I care about <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">my</i> people. I want to be with people who
are like me. I want our leaders to be people like me: I want them to be people
who care about me and who care about people who are like me. And you know what?
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">You</i> are not like me at all! Just now,
you were trying to tell me that those who are unlike me ‘hate our freedom’.
Well, I have news for you buddy: it is <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">you</i>
who hates my freedom! You just want me to follow your rules. You want to turn
me into a ‘consumer’ who does what he’s being told so that you can take
advantage of me. I suppose that’s how you ‘maximize your own interest’. Well,
I’m not interested in what you want, or what anyone else wants. I’m interested
in what <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">I</i> want, and I sure do not
want that F$%^&*@#$%! system of yours! And by the way, don’t you dare
lecture me about ‘democracy’ or ‘equality’ or ‘human rights’. You least of all!
You’re so full of shit, you don’t even believe in that stuff yourself – look at
how you behave! So how do you expect <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">me</i>
to believe in those things? You have no decency. You talk about ‘democracy’ but
you don’t listen to people. You talk about ‘equality’ but you look at folks
like us as deplorables. You talk about ‘human rights’ but you don’t believe in
any ‘rights’ except your own god-given right to pursue your own individual
interests at the expense of others. How could I possibly have any respect for
you and your so-called humanitarian ‘values’? Get out of my face! I’d trust
anyone rather than trust you – I’d even rather vote for some idiot with funny
blond hair, just to piss you off.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;">What a dilemma! </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;">I recently discovered
that some of my friends hate the “neoliberal world order” so much that they
even seemed willing to welcome Donald Trump and keep trying to defend him as
“the lesser evil.” Anything but Hillary! Anyone who will blow
up the system for us! Then again, some of my friends are so scared of Trump (as they
should) that they are tempted to forgive even
the neoliberal world order. By comparison, its defenders now look almost benevolent. Anything but Trump, anything but Le Pen, and so on. As should be
perfectly obvious by now, I see the choice between neoliberalism and rightwing
populism as a choice between the Devil and Beëlzebub. They are both enemies of
humanity. I perfectly understand the fury of my “Human” against the
“Neoliberal” and his system, for I share that fury, and I even understand quite
well how s/he turns into a populist. But here’s the thing: the Human revolts
against neoliberalism <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">because s/he is Human</i>.
Human beings are not made to live in an inhuman world, they cannot stand it. It
is for that very reason that the politics of hate, intolerance, egoism and
xenophobia do not offer any real alternative, and never will – not even to the
rightwing populists who think they will. They are the symptoms of a disease,
not the cure.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-large;"><span style="color: #38761d;"><span style="font-family: "times new roman";">So What is the Cure?</span></span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimYOG9TWktcZYXFzByJH2bmZGsB2CAqEysnIn4aazPcEQjM6_slsMVHHECum-RqzKJ76b12vbgGI1sZHoZrKl28mHMdjSS26WAQyXz2a3PAZ1fHkf9e0Hb3dL23v0OeKnobzN2Yxe9R_f1/s1600/Stunning_images_showcase_the_beauty_of_Iranian_mosques___Daily_Mail_Online.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="534" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEimYOG9TWktcZYXFzByJH2bmZGsB2CAqEysnIn4aazPcEQjM6_slsMVHHECum-RqzKJ76b12vbgGI1sZHoZrKl28mHMdjSS26WAQyXz2a3PAZ1fHkf9e0Hb3dL23v0OeKnobzN2Yxe9R_f1/s640/Stunning_images_showcase_the_beauty_of_Iranian_mosques___Daily_Mail_Online.png" width="640" /></a></i></div>
<br />
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<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;">The cure is that we
care. The cure is that we care about what is happening to the world around us,
that we care about human beings and what is happening to them right now and
everywhere around us. Not just what is happening to ourselves, to “our own,” to
“people like us” – no, the cure is that we care about what is happening to
people, period. Please note that I'm not talking about some kind of generic </span><span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;">“</span>love for humanity</span><span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;">” in the abstract</span>: no, I mean caring for human beings because they are human beings, people like us.</span><span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;"> Why do we care? We
care because we empathize. We happen to know very well what it is to be a human
being – after all, we are human beings ourselves. We know what it’s all about.
Underneath the anger there is fear, and underneath the fear there is suffering.
Unvariably, that is what you find when you get past all the bullshit. </span>
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-indent: 36.0pt; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;">The
cure lies in rediscovering what it really was that those people used to mean, once upon a
time a long while ago, when they were using such very big words: “freedom”,
“democracy”, “equality”, or “human rights” – and used them wholeheartedly, with
full conviction, without irony, and without apologies. These are big words for
a reason: they refer to big ideals. They have absolutely nothing to do with
the small stuff that neoliberalism has been selling us (!) under those names.
In fact they are the very opposites of what they have been made out to be. They
need to be rediscovered.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;">The
cure lies in rediscovering our common humanity, because that is what really
unites us. Make no mistake: it unites us not just with our friends or our
facebook buddies in our facebook bubble. It unites us even with those who
oppose us, even with those who hate us, even with those who are trying to kill us, who seem to have
forgotten what it means to be human because they have forgotten themselves.</span><span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;"> The
cure is to go - not halfheartedly but with full force and full conviction - for true values: the kind that
cannot be quantified and converted into money, statistics, or other tools of
power and domination. Not by any coincidence, such values are basic (or should
be basic) to what is called the “Humanities.” In the most profound sense, they
are what still remains when all else vanishes, for unlike their opposites they
cannot be destroyed. What are those values? The big ones, of course, the
classics (traditionally known as </span><span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;">“</span>the trancendentals</span><span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;"><span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;">”</span>): goodness, beauty, truth. What else could they be? There’s no room for irony or
cynicism here: if we are afraid to be serious even about these matters, then we
might as well give up for then we have already lost.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;">So that is the cure:
that we care for whatever is good, whatever is beautiful, and whatever is true.
</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: "times new roman"; font-size: 13.0pt;">All else is secondary. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<br /></div>
wouterjhanegraaff.blogspot.comhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15519965611425366178noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5967881025525384120.post-19325855341009153832016-12-30T04:55:00.000-08:002016-12-30T07:57:23.176-08:00Horizon 2020: Walking the Road with Robert Musil<style>
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<span style="mso-ascii-font-family: Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family: Cambria; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">Last year,
during these dark days before Christmas, I posted an even darker text with the
title <a href="http://wouterjhanegraaff.blogspot.nl/2015/12/perspective-2016.html">“Profile 2016”</a>. I made an attempt to highlight and analyze the main
structural problems with which Western society is struggling, especially the
Reign of Neoliberalism combined with Information Overkill. Insiders from the
Faculty of Humanities of the University of Amsterdam will have noted that my
title alluded to the notorious <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Profile
2016</i> document that had been one of the triggers for the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bungehuis_and_Maagdenhuis_occupations">occupation</a> of the
administrative centers first of the Faculty of Humanities (the Bungehuis) and
then of the whole university (the Maagdenhuis), in a large and inspiring revolt
against the neoliberal takeover of academia. This time I have taken inspiration
from another typical product of neoliberalism in academia, the “<a href="https://ec.europa.eu/programmes/horizon2020/">EU Framework Programme for Research and Innovation</a>”. </span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQ-RqsQ7yFV474pzSC40vKodfc2PywjVPYLc5ocs0MW0tC4bi94Ikw-2sF5yk9kMppWeZvtyMvRl3cBnorlZVgTEG1zT6WlSL8BrotHyMOIXGKtchRnrHAGV0Ou7mr5g02hs3B1m2dmemK/s1600/17199892451_f66aee9aa0_b.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="428" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQ-RqsQ7yFV474pzSC40vKodfc2PywjVPYLc5ocs0MW0tC4bi94Ikw-2sF5yk9kMppWeZvtyMvRl3cBnorlZVgTEG1zT6WlSL8BrotHyMOIXGKtchRnrHAGV0Ou7mr5g02hs3B1m2dmemK/s640/17199892451_f66aee9aa0_b.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;">
<span style="mso-ascii-font-family: Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family: Cambria; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">However, my
true reason for choosing this particular title “Horizon 2020” has less to do
with either neoliberalism or the reign of information as such than with the
child that was born from those two parents last November. 2016 will be remembered as the year when
fascism (or at least the kind of populism traditionally known by its literal German equivalent, referred to as <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">völkisch</i>) announced its return to the center stage of
American society. It is all set to become the most powerful force in the world.
One night in February 2016 I found myself waking up in the middle of the night,
my heart booming, in a sudden surge of panic at the idea that Donald Trump
could win the election. But when he actually <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">did</i> “win” (I know, he lost the popular vote, and about half of the US population didn't bother to vote at all),
this still came as an utter shock, a sudden nightmare from which quite
honestly I may not yet have woken up and have certainly not recovered. Profile 2017 looks even
darker than its predecessor; so on the screen of my imagination, “Horizon
2020” has now become the closest horizon of hope. Barring impeachments or other
extreme events (which might well happen, of course: see below), it seems that Sauron alias Voldemort will be running the show for the next four years at least. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;">
<span style="mso-ascii-font-family: Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family: Cambria; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">Looking at the
sudden rise to prominence of forums such as Alt Right, including <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3xD9NdBbEPM">a new breed of right-wing intellectuals</a> who take inspiration from Traditionalism and certain
other forms of esotericism in their assault on “the evils of the modern world”
(liberalism, democracy, cultural and religious plurality, human rights,
gay marriage, LGBT rights, and so on), I couldn’t help being reminded of a
speech I gave at the opening of the <a href="https://esswe.wildapricot.org/Conference-2009">2nd biannual conference of the European Society for the Study of Western Esotericism</a>. I now realize that
at that time, in 2009, I hadn’t yet grasped the true nature of neoliberalism,
and did not yet fully understand its centrality to how the European Union had
worked out in practice; but with that minor reservation, I still stand behind every
word I said. The lecture was never published and was not made generally
available at the time, but because of what I see as its relevance to the
present situation in Europe and the United States, especially for scholars of
Western esotericism, I just put it <a href="https://www.academia.edu/30576084/Politics_and_the_Study_of_Western_Esotericism_2009_unpublished_">online</a> for whoever might be interested.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;">
<span style="mso-ascii-font-family: Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family: Cambria; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">It seems to me
that the new <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">völkisch</i> movement is the
child of two parents who have been running the show for quite a while now. One
of them, neoliberalism, has made it possible for an international power elite
of multinational corporations and financial institutions to gain far more power
than has ever been enjoyed by any democratically elected government. As a
result, regular or mainstream politicians have become puppets of the true
powers that are running the world: if your prime minister wants to have
influence at all, s/he will need to make deals with the international
corporations and financial institutions, on terms that are dictated or are at
least acceptable to the latter. No surprise then that the general electorate
feels disempowered. Most of us have come to realize that the politicians that
we “vote into power” do not actually have that power anymore: it is the
international corporate and financial system that is pushing the buttons. This
system functions not as a top-down hierarchy but as a non-hierarchical
self-governing network (for the emergence of the “network mode” out of the
1960s Counterculture and its relation to both cyberculture and neoliberal
economics, see <a href="http://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/book/chicago/F/bo3773600.html">this fascinating study</a>); but any strings that are still there to
be pulled are in the hands of unelected leaders whose business interests decide
what is done or left undone. As regards the economic system as a whole, it
functions very much like <a href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/Swimming-Sharks-Inside-World-Bankers-x/dp/1783350652/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1483097759&sr=8-1&keywords=luyendijk">an airplane on autopilot with an empty cockpit and no licensed pilot on board</a>.</span></div>
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<span style="mso-ascii-font-family: Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family: Cambria; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">For the general
electorate, the penny has dropped a long time ago. Voters understand that it
doesn’t matter whether you vote “left” or “right”: surely there are some
differences in emphasis between the various political parties, but these are
marginal and largely cosmetic. Basically all political parties are dancing to
the same tune of the international market, which is presented as “the only
option”, so what the voter thinks of it does not really matter. Therefore what happens?
The “common people” play the only card that is left to them: their vote. They
are using the only tool they still have to fight against the educated “elites”: those guys (and girls) who keep claiming they
represent the people’s best interests while clearly they are serving their own.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;">
<span style="mso-ascii-font-family: Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family: Cambria; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">That is one
part of the story. The other part has to do with knowledge and information: increasingly,
over the last decade or so, we have been losing sight of the difference between
those two. The important thing about <i>knowledge</i> is that <span style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">it</span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"> is true by definition</i>: if it isn’t, then it isn’t knowledge but
something else (delusion, falsehood, misperception, misunderstanding,
ignorance, and so on). Information, by contrast, is just data: it doesn’t
matter to the system whether it is true or false. Computers or information
networks do not differentiate between statements such as “Hillary is an advocate of human rights” or “Hillary is a reptile in disguise”. Both are just pieces of
information; <i>to decide whether they are true or false you need a human being</i>.
However, as human beings we have grown remarkably reluctant to accept that
responsibility. Intellectuals have grown suspicious of anyone who dares to make
claims of “truth”: we have learned how often such claims are just masks of
power and domination, we have come to appreciate that there are “different
kinds of truth”, we know that people may disagree about almost everything, and
so we have sort of given up and decided that it’s all just a matter of personal opinion.
Who is to judge? But if the educated have lost their faith in searching for
truth, and hence in the value (or even the very possibility) of knowledge,
inevitably this realization trickles down to the broader population: “Even
those educated elites no longer know what is true. Look at them: they no longer speak with any
confidence. Their so-called ‘knowledge’ is really just another opinion. If so,
then why should we keep funding those guys with taxpayers’ money? No, we will
make up our own minds, thank you very much. We can very well find out for ourselves:
it’s all on the Internet!”</span></div>
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<span style="mso-ascii-font-family: Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family: Cambria; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">The reign of
Neoliberalism has created an ever-growing reservoir of pent-up resentment and
anger: the pressure has been building up for a long time, and is now breaking
through to the surface. Simultaneously, as knowledge has tacitly been replaced by
information, intellectuals (who have been very much complicit in this
phenomenon) have lost their ability to question power by appealing to standards of truth:
welcome to the “post-truth society”. </span></div>
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<span style="mso-ascii-font-family: Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family: Cambria; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">So that is what we are up against: fury
and ignorance. A deadly combination. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;">
<span style="mso-ascii-font-family: Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family: Cambria; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">I will try to
resist the temptation of predicting what will happen between now and the 2020
horizon. It's depressing and pointless. Why repeat the well-known litany of dangers and destructive trends that
will certainly continue into the New Year? We know that they are very real, but if
we allow our imagination to be colonized by fear and depression, we endanger
the most important source of hope: the simple fact that while we are perfectly capable of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">imagining</i> what might happen, we simply do
not <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">know</i> the future. <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/jul/15/rebecca-solnit-hope-in-the-dark-new-essay-embrace-unknown">Hope lies precisely in that realization.</a> </span></div>
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<span style="mso-ascii-font-family: Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family: Cambria; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">What we <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">can</i> know is the nature of the evil that
we are facing. We can learn to recognize it when we encounter it, and we can
learn how best to deal with it. Last week I have been re-reading Robert
Musil’s great novel of modernity, <a href="https://www.amazon.de/Mann-ohne-Eigenschaften-Erstes-Zweites/dp/3499134624"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Man without Qualities</i></a>, and came across a long passage that impressed me so much
that I decided to translate it. Beware, this is no food for hasty readers! </span><br />
<br /></div>
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<span style="mso-ascii-font-family: Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family: Cambria; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">Musil has just been describing how a carefully selected group of writers and other literary figures has been invited to the home of a highminded patroness of culture, Diotima, together with a selection of scientists. The writers have been giving speeches, and the scientists have been listening. Here we go.</span></div>
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<span style="mso-ascii-font-family: Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family: Cambria; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">Science smiles
in its beard; or, first extensive encounter with evil</span><span style="mso-ascii-font-family: Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family: Cambria; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"></span> </h3>
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<span style="mso-ascii-font-family: Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family: Cambria; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">Now some words
must be added about a smile, and what is more: a masculine smile –</span><span style="mso-ascii-font-family: Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family: Cambria; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"> one that
involved a beard (indispensable to the masculine practice of smiling in it). It
is about the smile of the scientists who had accepted Diotima’s invitation and
were listening to those famous fine spirits. Although they were smiling, one
should certainly not think that they did this ironically. On the contrary, it
was their way of showing their feelings of respect and incompetence ... But
this, too, should not delude us. It is correct according to their conscious
opinion, but in their unconscious – to use that fashionable term, or better, in
their totality – these were people in whom a tendency towards Evil was
crackling like fire under a cauldron.</span>
</div>
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<span style="mso-ascii-font-family: Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family: Cambria; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">Of course, at
first sight that might seem a paradoxical statement. If an ordinary professor
would be told this to his face, he would probably respond that he was simply
serving the cause of Truth and Progress and for the rest didn’t know of any
such thing; for that is his professional ideology. But all professional
ideologies are noble. It never occurs to hunters to call themselves the
butchers of the woods, they rather call themselves the friends of animal and
natural sustainability, just as merchants uphold the principle of fair profit,
and thieves in turn appeal to the god of merchants, that is to say, to the
distinguished international god Mercury, who brings nations together. Therefore
one should better not attach too much value to what an activity looks like in
the mind of those who practice it. </span></div>
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<span style="mso-ascii-font-family: Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family: Cambria; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">If we ask
ourselves frankly how science came to assume its present shape – and this is
important because, after all, we are ruled by her, and even an illiterate
person is not safe from her, since he must learn to live with countless things
that were born in learning – then a different image emerges. According to
credible tradition it is in the sixteenth century, a period of intense
spiritual excitement, that science gave up on trying to penetrate the secrets
of nature (as had been the custom for twenty centuries of religious and
philosophical speculation), henceforth to be satisfied, in a manner that can
only be described as superficial, with studying its surface. For instance, the
great Galileo Galilei (who is always mentioned first here) did away with the
problem of what is the reason lying in Nature’s essence that causes her to abhor
a vacuum, so that she makes a falling body enter and occupy space after space
until it finally hits solid ground, and contented himself with something much
more trivial: he simply established the speed at which such a body falls, the
course it takes, the time it takes, and its rate of acceleration. The Catholic
Church made a grave mistake in threatening this man with death and forcing him
to recant, instead of just killing him without much further ado; for from the
way he and people like him were looking at things, there sprang – in almost no
time at all, if we think in terms of historical periods – railway time-tables,
factory machines, physiological psychology, and the moral corruption of our
time, against which she (the Church) no longer stands a chance. This mistake
she probably made out of an excess of shrewdness – after all, Galileo was not
just the discoverer of the law of gravitation and of the earth’s motion, but
also an inventor in whom, as one would put it today, the commercial world took
an interest; and moreover, he was not the only one seized by the new spirit. On
the contrary, the historical record shows that the matter-of-factness which
inspired him spread far and wide like an infectious disease; and although today
it may sound offensive to speak of somebody as being “inspired” by
matter-of-factness, of which we already think we have too much, at the time
(according to witnesses of all kinds) the awakening from metaphysics to the
sharp observation of things must truly have been a frenzy and a blazing fire of
matter-of-factness! But if we ask ourselves how humanity got it into her head
to change herself in this manner, then the answer is that she did what every
sensible child does when it has tried walking too soon; it sat down on the
ground, making contact through a dependable but not very dignified part of the
body. It must be said: she did it simply with that part on which one sits. For
the remarkable thing is that the earth has shown itself so extraordinarily
receptive to this, and, ever since this touchdown, has offered up such a wealth
of inventions, conveniences, and discoveries that it can almost be called a
miracle.</span></div>
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<span style="mso-ascii-font-family: Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family: Cambria; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">After this bit
of prehistory, one could be forgiven for thinking that it is the wonder of the
Anti-Christ in the midst of which we find ourselves; for the simile of sitting
down that was just used can be understood not only in the direction of
reliability, but also in the direction of the indecent and forbidden. And
indeed, before intellectuals discovered their passion for the facts, only
soldiers, hunters and merchants had it – that is to say, only shrewd and
violent types. In the battle for survival there is no room for philosophical
sentimentalities: all that counts is the wish to dispose of one’s opponent as
quickly and efficiently as possible – here, everybody is a positivist. Nor
would it count as a virtue in business to allow oneself to be bamboozled
instead of staying with the established facts – profit boiling down, in the
end, to a psychological process that makes use of circumstance to overpower the
other. On the other hand, if we consider the qualities that lead to
discoveries, we find an absence of all traditional scruples and inhibitions,
courage, a spirit of enterprise as much as of destruction, annihilation of moral
considerations, patient bargaining for the tiniest advantage, dogged endurance
on the way towards the goal, if necessary, and a respect for measure and number
that is the sharpest expression of distrust towards all that is uncertain. In
other words, we observe nothing but those old sins of hunters, soldiers, and
merchants; only now they are translated into intellectual terms and explained
as virtues. And although this may have placed them at a distance from the quest
for personal and relatively lowly profit, the element of primal Evil, as one
could call it, has not vanished after this transformation. For it seems to be
indestructible and eternal, at least as eternal as everything humanly sublime,
because it consists of nothing more, nor less, than the pleasure of tripping
that sublimity up and watching it fall flat on its face. Who does not know the
malicious temptation, while watching a beautifully voluptuous glazed vase, that
lies in the thought that one could smash it to smithereens with <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">one</i> single blow of one’s stick?
Intensified up to the heroism of bitter realization that in one’s life one can
rely on nothing but what can be nailed down with iron certainty, that
temptation is a basic feeling engrained in the matter-of-factness of science –
and if for reasons of reverence one does not want to call it the devil, there
is at least a faint smell of sulfur about it.</span></div>
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<span style="mso-ascii-font-family: Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family: Cambria; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">We can start
right away with the remarkable preference that scientific thinking has for
mechanical, statistic, and material explanations from which, as it were, the
heart has been cut out. Considering goodness only a special form of egoism;
relating emotions to internal secretions; establishing that a human being
consists for eighty or ninety percent of water; explaining the famous moral
freedom of human character as an automatic side-product of free trade; reducing
beauty to good digestion and well-developed fat-tissue; reducing procreation
and suicide to annual curves that unmask what seems to be the most free of all
decisions as a matter of compulsion; experiencing ecstasy and insanity as akin;
identifying anus and mouth as the rectal and oral extremity of one and the same
thing – : ideas like those, which to some extent expose the trick in the
magical act of human illusions, always encounter a kind of positive prejudice
and are then considered to be particularly scientific. In this, undoubtedly, it
is the truth that one loves; but all around this blank love lies a preference
for disillusion, compulsion, implacability, cold intimidation and dry rebuke, a
malicious preference or at least an unintentional energy that comes from such
feelings.</span></div>
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<span style="mso-ascii-font-family: Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family: Cambria; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>(Robert Musil, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Der Mann ohne Eigenschaften</i>. vol. 1 [1930], ch. 72; transl. W.J. Hanegraaff)</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="mso-ascii-font-family: Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family: Cambria; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">Please note: if
you think that Musil is just blaming science for the evils of the modern world, you need to read again. “It is the truth that one loves”, and yes, the truth can be
hard. The fact that knowledge can be bitter is no reason at all to prefer
illusions: what we are reading here is not an argument against science and rationality, but against cynicism and despair.</span></div>
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<span style="mso-ascii-font-family: Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family: Cambria; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">There are many reasons why I love this passage. Of course, the image of science as a toddler that sits down on its bottom because it has failed in its attempt to walk is unforgettable. But most of all, this passage
is a reminder of what it is that makes us human; that is to say, of the unique and amazing faculty that distinguishes us from all other animals, and the denial of
which (or so we can learn from Musil) is what we refer to as “evil”. </span></div>
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<span style="mso-ascii-font-family: Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family: Cambria; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">What is this faculty? It is the ability - not just of our intellect, but of our heart and soul - to be deeply concerned
with what traditional metaphysics used to refer to as the three
“transcendentals”: the Good, the Beautiful, and the True. About at least the first two of those, and to a larger extent than we might realize even about the third,
it just so happens that neither the natural nor the social sciences have much to tell us: it is here, more than anywhere else, that
we need those arts and disciplines that are – appropriately – known as the Humanities.
When all is said and done, their true concern is and should be - do we need to be reminded? - with <i>what it is
that makes us human</i>. There are those who find pleasure in “tripping such
values up” and watching them fall flat on their face. And there are those who love those beautifully voluptuous glazed vases (vessels of goodness,
beauty, and truth) for what they are: inherently fragile expressions of “all that is uncertain”
and therefore worthy of protection and care. So that's the choice: two mentalities. As formulated by David Foster Wallace in <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8CrOL-ydFMI">this luminous speech of 2005</a>, </span><span style="mso-ascii-font-family: Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family: Cambria; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-ascii-font-family: Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family: Cambria; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">“</span>there is no such thing as not worshipping. Everybody worships. The only choice we get is what to worship</span><span style="mso-ascii-font-family: Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family: Cambria; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-ascii-font-family: Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family: Cambria; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">”</span>.</span><br />
<span style="mso-ascii-font-family: Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family: Cambria; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">Let's try to keep that in mind as we start walking the path towards horizon 2020. </span></div>
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wouterjhanegraaff.blogspot.comhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15519965611425366178noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5967881025525384120.post-88467306902810537962015-12-26T04:31:00.000-08:002019-08-08T07:29:02.326-07:00Profile 2016<style>
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<span style="font-size: 13.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">The world is changing. At this end of the year, with
Christmas coming up and a New Year just around the corner, I feel a need to
gain some perspective on what is happening all around us, and how it is
affecting our very ways of thinking, our very ways of living, our very
conceptions of what is possible, our very expectations of where we are going,
and most importantly, our very ways of imagining where we <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">should</i> be going.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 13.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">The reflections that follow have had a long
gestation period. For years now, the realization has been slowly dawning upon
me that we are living in extraordinary times of irreversible transformation for
which there is no historical precedent. We are entering uncharted territory and
have no script to predict, or even begin to understand, what might be ahead of
us. Of course, as a historian I know very well that the world has <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">always</i> been changing: creative
innovation is the rule, stasis is an illusion, and unheard-of events may happen
any time. That’s how it has always been. But something larger is happening now.
Until rather recently I still felt that as an academic and intellectual, I was
playing my little part in a great story that might be described (for better or
worse) as the story of “Western Culture” – and I saw no reason why it wouldn’t last.
Let me hasten to add that I don’t mean this in a provincial manner: I’ve
always been extremely interested in the rest of the world, in different
cultures and different ways of life, because I’m a curious person who likes to
look beyond the boundaries of his familiar world. Nevertheless, my identity and
guiding values have been formed by the cultural, intellectual, and spiritual
history of Europe. That has always been my world. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 13.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">And now it is changing. In my darker moods I fear
that very soon – sooner than I used to consider possible – a time may come when
(to paraphrase Galadriel at the opening of the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Lord of the Rings</i> movie) much that is of great value will be lost
forever, because “no one will live who still remembers it”. Yes, I feel a bit
like the Elves… Increasingly, I fear that the culture that I love and care for
is disintegrating and vanishing around me, and the leaves are falling. Winter
is coming.</span></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi4yyg4A9DeslyPsyx1fYWHa3BZHTTUwu-PH7IkXtbYMFVFKAFn3BaeSMfS34V9nTHwzsKrKV9nvz1cyYc36tNuBGjEU2ZW5nfAKTPwU26YLXz2hNCxnS7EFcM6HvrD15JDwFCbJj1eE5s5/s1600/leaving_middle_earth_by_erynlasgalenphotoart-d8dufsx.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="374" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi4yyg4A9DeslyPsyx1fYWHa3BZHTTUwu-PH7IkXtbYMFVFKAFn3BaeSMfS34V9nTHwzsKrKV9nvz1cyYc36tNuBGjEU2ZW5nfAKTPwU26YLXz2hNCxnS7EFcM6HvrD15JDwFCbJj1eE5s5/s640/leaving_middle_earth_by_erynlasgalenphotoart-d8dufsx.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: 13.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">I don’t mean to stay with such a dark and
pessimistic mood. Towards the end of this text I will be looking for the light
at the end of the tunnel. But first I want to take a few steps back to try and
gain some perspective. What are the essential changes happening around us, that
might explain my feelings of decline and loss?</span><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="color: #38761d;"><span style="font-size: x-large;">1. The Reign of Neoliberalism</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 13.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">Firstly we have seen the global ascendency of what,
for lack of a better word, I will call <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">neoliberal
capitalism</i>. I don’t mean to go into any deep analysis here, because I think
most of us have a pretty good idea of what it is. Since the Thatcher/Reagan era
of the 1980s, slowly but surely our minds have been taken over by the idea that
everything in the world can be described in terms of “markets”, and that the
only ultimate values are economic values. The result is a systematic reversal
of the normal relation between means and ends. We used to think that money was
the means to achieve desirable ends: you obviously needed money to create good
systems of healthcare, you needed money to create good institutions of learning,
and so on. Money was a means that served non-economic ends that we valued <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">in and for themselves</i>. That logic has been
reversed. Healthcare and education (to stay with those examples) are now defined
as products on a market. As such, they are no longer desirable <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">ends</i> that are considered intrinsically
valuable, just for what they are, but have become the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">means</i> to achieve a new and different end: that of maximizing profit.
Healthcare and education are now sold for money. The internal logic of this
system says that we do not really care that much whether people are actually healthy
or well educated: what counts is whether they are buying healthcare or
education, at minimal costs and for maximum profit. In short, health and
knowledge are no longer basic values. The only true value left is monetary or
economic value. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 13.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">We are seeing this dynamic everywhere, including, of
course, the universities. In the wake of the financial crisis of 2008, and kick-started
by the most extreme right-wing government in Dutch history (Rutte I), I watched
it spiraling wholly out of control. Like many of my colleagues, I began to feel
that if I was still doing my work (trying to teach my students something real,
trying to focus on content, trying to keep my eye on the ball), I was doing so
not thanks to the University system but <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">in
spite of it</i>. The institution had been turned into a factory, designed to
produce a product for profit: although administrators and politicians keep
invoking “excellence” and emphasizing the need for “quality” in education, the
truth is that (like everywhere else in the neoliberal economy) quality has
become irrelevant to how the system works. It recognizes only quantifiable data
that lend themselves to statistical analysis and can be translated into
economic and financial terms. As a result, universities are no longer institutions
devoted to “higher learning”: they are now running on an operating system that
subverts the very ends (goals, objectives) they were once supposed to be
promoting. Last year, at the University of Amsterdam, students and staff
revolted against the systemic financialization and corporatization of the
academy. They occupied the administrative center of the Faculty of Humanities,
and after they got expelled, they <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bungehuis_and_Maagdenhuis_occupations">occupied the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Maagdenhuis</i></a>, the University’s administrative center. Similar
protests are happening at other universities around the world, and I very much
hope that these grassroots revolutions will have a positive effect. However,
I’m afraid that real and lasting change will prove to be impossible as long as
neoliberal capitalism remains in place as the operating system of higher
learning in Europe. An upgrade of that system is not enough. On the contrary:
by perfecting its functionality even further, we will only make matters worse.
We need a new operating system grounded in the very principle that is anathema
to the current one: that <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">quality</i> in
education and research cannot be quantified and translated into financial
terms, but is an irreducible core value entirely independent of (and
incommensurable with) the logic of economic calculation.</span></div>
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<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: 13.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"><span style="color: #38761d;"> </span><span style="font-size: x-large;"><span style="color: #38761d;">2. Information Overkill</span></span></span></div>
<br />
<span style="font-size: 13.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">The second major change I observe in our world is <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">information overkill</i>. The information
revolution has been gathering steam roughly since the early 1990s, in perfect
parallel with the ascendency of neoliberal capitalism. Of course, the basic
facts hardly need to be stated here: we all know how incredibly powerful the
new information technologies are, how much we are benefiting from the miracles
they accomplish, and how utterly dependent we have become on them. But while
the benefits are very real (of course, like everybody else, I’m profiting from
them every day and would hate to miss them) they come at a heavy price. In this
case the problem is not the reversal of means and ends, but the ever-increasing
impossibility of distinguishing between reliable, less reliable, and unreliable
information. There is another way of saying this: it gets harder and harder for
all of us to draw the crucial distinction between <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">information</i> and <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">knowledge</i>
(in fact, I have found that more and more people respond with profound puzzlement
to the very idea that there is a difference at all). We have unlimited amounts
of information at our fingertips, but just cannot tell anymore what is true and
what is not. This goes even for highly specialized fields of knowledge. There
was a time when I could gain a reasonably complete and accurate overview of the
scholarly literature on a given topic; but nowadays I am overwhelmed, even in
areas that I know very well, by a daily tsunami of publications online (which,
by the way, almost inevitably tend to be given preference over offline
materials, simply because it’s already far too much to handle anyway). Nobody
can keep up anymore, and the situation is aggravated by the fact that
traditional selection criteria no longer have much of a bearing on the actual <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">quality</i> of publications: truly excellent
stuff appears online for free, while too much that makes it into peer-reviewed
“top journals” is of unremarkable or even mediocre quality. This in itself can
be explained largely through the two developments under discussion here. The
impact of neoliberal capitalism on academic publishing means that selling the
product (in this case: getting your stuff published in a peer-reviewed journal)
has become much more important than the actual quality of that product. And moreover,
authors need to anticipate what the market seems to want from them: if your
work is too daring, original, or creative, too “out of the box”, that may lessen
your chance of acceptance. As for the dynamics of information overkill, it
results in journal editors and anonymous peer reviewers receiving far too many
requests, resulting in hasty and superficial reviews, processed hastily and superficially
by journal editors, who do not have the time either – all in the context of an
increasingly impersonal bureaucratic machinery of editorial decision-making. As
a result of all this, scholars are no longer working the way they used to work.
The really good ones among us used to be studying a given topic thoroughly and systematically,
attempting to get to the very bottom of things because we still felt there was
a bottom to be reached. But that illusion is gone, and so we find ourselves
“mining data” instead, or just cherry-picking more or less at random. Too often
we feel we just don’t have the time for deep and concentrated study of just one
particular source, or one particular scholar’s work. For what about all those
countless other sources? What about all those other scholars whose work is
still waiting in line to be read too? Are we sure we are reading the right
article at this moment? Perhaps we should be reading one of all those countless
others out there… But how should we choose? How can we possibly know which ones
deserve our attention and which ones are just a waste of time, if we haven’t at
least “scanned” them first? And so we keep “mining”, hastily and superficially;
or otherwise we resign ourselves to the inevitable and just start picking
selectively, more or less at random.</span><br />
<br />
<span style="font-size: 13.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">It seems to me that these two core developments are
intimately related to four further new developments. These, too, are
irreversibly changing our world at present. They might be seen as a second
level built upon the first.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 13.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"><span style="color: #a64d79;"><span style="font-size: large;"> <span style="font-size: x-large;">a. Disempowerment</span></span></span></span></div>
<br />
<span style="font-size: 13.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">To begin with, we are witnessing a systematic <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">disempowerment</i> of citizens, resulting in
a huge democratic deficit. Neoliberal capitalism has created a situation where
international banks and corporations run by unelected CEOs and managers are much
more powerful than national states, so that the results of democratic elections
lose most of their relevance. Ordinary citizens feel in their guts that it
doesn’t matter anymore what political party they vote for, because politicians
have no other choice than pursuing “business as usual” anyway (see, for
instance, the recent Greek Drama): what little power we used to have to
determine our fate has been taken away from us. Deep resentment and frustration
over this fact is then channeled towards convenient scapegoats such as “the
immigrants” or “the Muslims”, diverting attention away from those who are
actually responsible (for instance, although it is evident that the financial
crisis is product of neoliberal capitalism, the Dutch neoliberal capitalists
won the next election and remain in the driving seat!). This dynamics has been
analyzed endlessly, but perhaps there has been less attention to the
disempowering effects of the second element highlighted above: that of
information overkill. Even where we still have something to choose, we no
longer know <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">what</i> to choose, because we
no longer know how to select reliable information from the staggering amounts
of online disinformation, mythmaking, fear-mongering, propaganda, “spin”, and
sheer nonsense. </span><br />
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<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: x-large; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"> <span style="color: #a64d79;"><span style="font-size: x-large;">b. Brain Change</span></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 13.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">A second and very different development could be
described as <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">brain change</i>. The rise
of information technology and its omnipresence in our daily lives – the fact
that all of us are spending more and more of our lives gazing at computer
screens or portable devices – means that we are using our brains to do things
that are very different from what they used to be doing. We are continually
training them to excel in those kinds of tasks that we need to handle our
computers efficiently, but the flip side is that we are no longer training
those skills that are needed for different but equally important tasks. We are
especially good at switching our attention quickly from one thing to another, but
we are losing our ability to concentrate on one single thing and stay
concentrated for a long time. We are very good at “scanning” information
quickly, but we are losing the ability of deep thinking and the sustained reflection
required for converting data into actual <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">knowledge</i>.
Having a lot of information available says absolutely nothing about how well we
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">understand</i> what that information
really means. But such understanding requires muscles in the brain that are
being trained less and less. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #a64d79;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #a64d79; font-size: x-large;"><span style="font-size: x-large;">c. Historical Amnesia</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 13.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">A third development I would describe as <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">historical amnesia</i>. For me, as a scholar
in the Humanities, this one is particularly painful, because it undermines the
very foundations of what my own work has always been about. Over the last
decades, education reforms have been dominated by the idea that students need
to learn <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">skills</i> rather than acquire
knowledge: what you <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">know</i> is not so important,
as long as you can find the information you need at the moment you need it. This
educational philosophy is based upon a fundamental mistake. We have overlooked
the fact that in the absence of knowledge, information becomes meaningless, and
data selection (informed choice) becomes impossible. Having placed the cart
before the horse, we find ourselves helpless in the face of information
overkill. As for my second element, the logic of neoliberal market capitalism:
within that context, historical knowledge has no practical utility or economic
value and is reduced essentially to the status of a “hobby” (more specifically:
a <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">left-wing</i> hobby, as right-wing
politicians in my country like to add). It is perceived as an object of mere
private interest or leisure activities, like going to the Opera, so why should
society support it with taxpayers’ money? The results of these ideas have
become obvious in recent years. In so far as we are still learning history at
all, we tend to focus on isolated episodes from the modern and contemporary
period (with World War II as an all-time favorite) and on social, political,
and economic history. Ancient and pre-modern history is becoming irrelevant
(“it’s all over, isn’t it?”); and most importantly, we are losing sight of the
general storylines of Western cultural and intellectual history (not to mention
non-Western history, in spite of all the talk about globalization). Over the
last ten years or so, I have seen my students become ever more clueless
whenever I referred to such things as “Late Antiquity”, “the Middle Ages”, “the
Renaissance”, “the Scientific Revolution”, “the Enlightenment”, “Romanticism”,
and so on and so forth. Most of them have only the vaguest ideas about when
that was, what it all meant, where it all came from, and why they should care. In
short, we are rapidly losing our sense of orientation in historical time. But
if we no longer know where we come from, this means we cannot tell where we are;
and as a result, we will finally lose our sense of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">who</i> we are. This is because human beings are wired to define their
identity through memory: individual amnesia means we no longer know who we are
and what we’re all about, and historical amnesia does the same for society as
large. We become clueless, disoriented, directionless.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-large; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"> <span style="color: #a64d79;"><span style="font-size: x-large;">d. Evaporation of Values</span></span></span></div>
<br />
<span style="font-size: 13.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"> Which brings me to my fourth point. At the risk of
sounding a bit dramatic, there’s no better way to describe it than as a
fundamental <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">evaporation of values</i>. In
a way, this brings me full circle, for I began by highlighting the fact that
neoliberal capitalism recognizes no other values than those that lend themselves
to economic calculation. The notion that something has value in and for itself
– intrinsic quality, not measurable in terms of quantity – is literally
impossible to consider or even imagine within the neoliberal/capitalist
paradigm. It’s like asking a mechanic to take account of the color of a
machine: he won’t see the point. He will tell you that it runs just as well,
regardless of whether the cogwheels are painted green or blue. And he is right,
of course. But colors do have value for us as human beings, and so do values.
Color doesn’t matter to the machine, but it matters to us: we attach value to
it. Now where will we get our values under conditions of historical amnesia? This
is not a matter that can be figured out by “finding the right data, getting the
right information”. Beyond some very basic values grounded in animal biology
(e.g. “pleasure = good / pain = bad” – but even those can be reprogrammed, as
anyone knows who has studied the history of martyrdom), we basically get them
not from information but from <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">culture</i>
and <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">memory</i>: values are literally “cultivated”
from one generation to the next, on the basis of what is remembered. We used to pass on values derived from European culture, notably classical antiquity, Jewish and Christian religion, Enlightenment rationality, and modern science; but instead of living traditions, these have all become mere options of consumer choice, available to us as a bewildering mass of unassorted data that come without criteria or guidelines for selection and evaluation. Please
note: none of this implies that values are necessarily good. For instance, Islamic
State is currently cultivating a set of values that not just condone but actually advocate the murder, rape,
and torture of “infidels”. But horrible as they may be, these <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">are</i> values, part of a much larger and
functional valuation system for which these people are willing to sacrifice
their lives. So we have no reason whatsoever to sentimentalize “values”; but we
should recognize their incredible power of motivation, of bestowing a sense of
meaning and direction, of telling people what things are worth living and dying
for. What I’m claiming here is that our reigning paradigm of neoliberal
capitalism combined with rampant information overkill and historical amnesia leaves
us clueless in that regard. We are deeply insecure about our values, because
neither “the market” nor “the data” can provide them. This makes us incredibly
weak in the face of cultures or ideologies that know perfectly well why we are
here and where we should be going.</span><br />
<br />
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-size: 13.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"><span style="color: #0b5394;"><span style="font-size: x-large;">Quality </span></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 13.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">So where <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">should</i> we be going, and why? I began by
admitting that, these days, I often feel like the Elves. Winter is coming. But
perhaps I’m too much wedded to the past. Perhaps I’m in a state of mourning, simply
because I’m too much in love with European culture. In spite of all its
horrors, crimes, and tragedies, I still love and admire it. I hold it dear for its incredible beauty,
wisdom and – not in the last place – its profound ambivalences and never-ending
struggles. At the end of the day, I prefer to see the history of Europe as a
hero’s story, a story of how we have been trying to improve ourselves in spite
of ourselves, setting ourselves goals that might be impossible to attain but
that we tried to reach anyway - often at great cost to ourselves and to others. I don’t want to believe that this struggle has
been pointless.</span><span style="font-size: 13.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"> </span>
</div>
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<span style="font-size: 13.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">So where is the light at the
end of the tunnel? I don’t presume to have the answer, and I surely cannot look
into the future. I’m just trying to gain some perspective here. One thing seems
clear to me: surely the only way forward is by setting our sails precisely
towards what we are currently lacking. To discover what that is, we might ask
ourselves what the two basic factors of neoliberal capitalism and information
overkill share in common. It seems to me the answer is very simple: the absence
of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">quality</i>.
Neoliberal capitalism is incapable of handling quality and therefore converts
it into quantity; and the replacement of knowledge cultivation by information
overkill requires that quality be sacrificed to data accumulation. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 13.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">So what we need to do is ask
ourselves the question that <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_M._Pirsig">Robert Pirsig</a> asked in his classic <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance</i>
(1974): what is quality? Don’t be fooled by appearances or first impressions: this
is not just an abstract or philosophical question, suitable for polite discussion
with a glass of red wine in the evening. It’s an existential pursuit,
inseparable from the search for true values. If taken with full seriousness, and if
deeply understood (and I don't pretend that I'm so successful in doing either, for it’s
very hard to do) it will claim the whole of our lives and determine all that we
do. We might ask this question explicitly, or just implicitly, perhaps using
different terms, or expressing it through action rather than through words. But
it will still be the pursuit of quality.</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 13.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;">So that is my suggestion for a light to guide us towards the exit of a long tunnel that, admittedly, I have been painting in very dark colors. Perhaps it’s not much, but it’s the best I have to
offer. It is not an answer but a question – not a fixed goal to be reached, but
an open path towards the future. If we stop asking this question – because we
have lost interest or just don’t see the point – then I’m afraid it’s all over
with us. But I don’t think that will happen. Even with “brain change” working
against us, I have to believe that the search for quality is just too deeply ingrained
in what it means to be human. Even with the daily attacks of hypnosis by the
popular media, to which we are all exposed, human beings will keep looking for
values and meaning – simply because we cannot help ourselves. So I guess that’s my message
for the New Year: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8CrOL-ydFMI">Stay awake!</a> Let’s refuse to be fooled. Let’s not allow
ourselves to be lulled into compliance with a meaningless world made of markets
and data, for though it dominates the present, it literally has no future: nothing to strive or hope for. <a href="https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/originals/45/d4/c3/45d4c384c0bbd3ffe45dff7855d6a6d5.gif">Let’s keep using our imagination to look for what’s real</a>.</span></div>
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wouterjhanegraaff.blogspot.comhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15519965611425366178noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5967881025525384120.post-59926092061633175592015-10-22T08:54:00.003-07:002019-08-08T07:28:03.061-07:00Theosophy in Secret Germany<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgmUCxyQ_jy4tYPCrdXuiJCtoz9wWArzBg14PFrkuk3Hr_ok7BFn4hJzMv5SHZfPSe1NGHxInc90znHCFwY1CSfSuMaOG21rQUeRXi0Z9kJprioXZZIG3IeM3QWHUyo7oDyME5aPXyAsZ8q/s1600/Lechter190.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="571" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgmUCxyQ_jy4tYPCrdXuiJCtoz9wWArzBg14PFrkuk3Hr_ok7BFn4hJzMv5SHZfPSe1NGHxInc90znHCFwY1CSfSuMaOG21rQUeRXi0Z9kJprioXZZIG3IeM3QWHUyo7oDyME5aPXyAsZ8q/s640/Lechter190.jpg" width="640" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Melchior Lechter, Panis angelorum (1906)</td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">In <a href="http://wouterjhanegraaff.blogspot.nl/2012/06/i-am-presently-working-as-fellow-at.html">my very first blogpost</a> on </span><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><i>Creative Reading</i> (2012)
I wrote about the German poet Stefan George and his "hidden church of the
spirit." At first sight, this elite cult of refined esthetics and
homo-erotic spirituality might seem to have pretty little in common with madame
Blavatsky (ridiculed by George himself as “die dicke Madame”, “the fat madam”)
and the popular movement of Theosophy that was making headlines in the same
period. However, in his excellent recent monograph <a href="http://www.amazon.de/Der-George-Kreis-die-Theosophie-Swastika-Zeichen/dp/3835311972"><i>Der George-Kreis und die Theosophie, mit einem Exkurs zum Swastika-Zeichen bei Helena Blavatsky, Alfred Schuler und Stefan George</i></a> </span><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">(The George Circle and
Theosophy: with an Excursus about the Swastika symbol in Helena Blavatsky,
Alfred Schuler and Stefan George) Jan Stottmeister shows that by making the
comparison nevertheless, we can learn much that has been forgotten about
the cultural climate of the early twentieth century. The book begins with well-documented
overviews of modern Theosophy and the esthetic milieu of the <i>fin-de-siècle. </i><span style="mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">What these networks had in common, in spite
of all differences, was their counter-culturalism: “</span>From 1889 ... to the
turn of the century ... George moved in counter-cultural milieus that, by
communicating knowledge about secrets, constituted themselves as the esoteric
Other to the outside world. The outside world was the bourgeois society of the
late 19th century, experienced as disenchanted, rationalized, dominated by mass
culture, and hopelessly ugly. Estheticism and occultism, the esthetics and
hermeneutics of secrecy, symbolist art programs and secret teachings, the
intermingling roles of artist and visionary, artistic/religious and other
alternative religious constructions of meaning – all belonged inseparably
together within this milieu. Whether "the secret" meant the essence
of a poetry that, following Mallarmé, should remain linguistically aloof and
beyond the public gaze, so as to be revealed only to "âmes d'élite"
(elite souls) capable of understanding it; or whether it meant the knowledge
claimed by charismatic leaders of Orders that promised to initiate their pupils
into the secrets of the world – such distinctions were subordinate to the general
desire of demarcating oneself, socially, intellectually, and habitually, from
the dominant culture of materialism (p. 91).</span></span></div>
<table cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="float: left; margin-right: 1em; text-align: left;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhfL4YO4KIFnD9iRgpqc39O7qx3aMkllIIun0OxXauI5geIDSCNA02AnJ098qADO9dNWWB76zF5FCFy9gjWgZFdh14ktonwjo9seI83nY2US8T_-D1H0ijjPS6FrrZEOKtZpcDb17N7oAFb/s1600/Lechter+Shambhala191.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhfL4YO4KIFnD9iRgpqc39O7qx3aMkllIIun0OxXauI5geIDSCNA02AnJ098qADO9dNWWB76zF5FCFy9gjWgZFdh14ktonwjo9seI83nY2US8T_-D1H0ijjPS6FrrZEOKtZpcDb17N7oAFb/s400/Lechter+Shambhala191.jpg" width="336" /></a></span></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">Melchior Lechter, Shambhala (1925)</span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">However, as George began establishing
his circle after 1900 – by demarcating his vision from that of competing groups
such as the "Cosmic Circle" of Munich (dominated by Alfred Schuler
and Ludwig Klages), staking his claim of ultimate and undisputable authority,
and instituting his cult of the "divine boy" Maximin – it became intolerable
to <i>der Meister</i> to think that his pupils might show allegiance to any
other "Masters" (such as the Theosophical Mahatmas) or to any other boyish
vehicle of divinity (such as Jiddu Krishnamurti, the Indian boy elected by the
Theosophists as their future World Teacher). As Stottmeister shows, the central
figure in George's competition with Theosophy was the nowadays forgotten artist
Melchior Lechter (1865-1937; for the only collection with full-color prints of
his paintings, glass-paintings, prints and designs, see<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"> </b>the catalogue <a href="http://www.amazon.de/Melchior-Lechters-Gegen-Welten-zwischen-M%C3%BCnster/dp/388789149X"><i>Melchior Lechters Gegen-Welten</i></a> of 2006).</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Lechter turns out to be a
fascinating character. He admired J.-K. Huysmans’ famous novel of extreme
fin-de-siecle decadence, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">A rebours</i>,
and followed the example of its protagonist, Des Esseintes, by turning his
house and atelier into a private artistic “Counter-World” (<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Gegen-Welt</i>) against bourgeois society: a place where everything
breathed a refined atmosphere of sacrality more reminiscent of a Catholic
church than a living space. It became the favourite meeting place of George’s
circle in Berlin; and among all George’s friends, only Lechter was recognized
by <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Der Meister</i> as a “Master” in his
own right. Most notably, all George’s volumes of poetry first appeared in
limited bibliophile editions designed by Lechter, who thereby dominated the
visual imagination of George’s religion of art. However, Lechter was not just
an extreme fin-de-siècle esthete, but also a great admirer of Madame Blavatsky.
In his mind, these two perspectives seem to have gone perfectly together; and
so it is not suprising that hidden references to his Theosophical beliefs are
omnipresent in his artistic production, including his works commissioned by
George. Stottmeister’s analyses of this discreet Theosphical presence in works
of art are precise, detailed, full of interest, very well informed, and last
but not least, written (like the whole book) in excellent prose with a fine
sense of subtle humor whenever the occasion calls for it. </span></span></div>
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<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgSZpAWVgcKBw1H-ITA3Q_Hx7h3oK-0CZ2Ibq8FTeTg3aQ0k0tt6W45ZIbgBde2UOHOVjbH5xxhlltnrWiY1MllVWMPP0rc42F4qsr-5cd6bihmkPLopI0FTCm09Vc8S-yHeI5nVX_JyWhl/s1600/Lechter+landschaft192.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="324" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgSZpAWVgcKBw1H-ITA3Q_Hx7h3oK-0CZ2Ibq8FTeTg3aQ0k0tt6W45ZIbgBde2UOHOVjbH5xxhlltnrWiY1MllVWMPP0rc42F4qsr-5cd6bihmkPLopI0FTCm09Vc8S-yHeI5nVX_JyWhl/s640/Lechter+landschaft192.jpg" width="640" /></a></span></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">Melchior Lechter, Sacred Tower in the Mountains with the Four Sources of the Streams of Life (1917)</span></td></tr>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">The fascination with
Theosophy among members of his circle did become a problem for George. Sometimes
he seems to have tried making opportunistic use of it for his own purposes, as
in an intriguing conversation reported by Herbert Steiner (no relation of the
founder of Anthroposophy Rudolf Steiner, discussed at length elsewhere in
Stottmeister’s book), who claims that George described himself as a messenger
sent by the Mahatmas (p. 199-200). But in the end, there could be only one
Master in George’s universe. In October 1910, Melchior Lechter made a trip to
India, together with another central member of the George circle, Karl
Wolfskehl. Both had becomes members of the Theosophical Society briefly before
(p. 254). They paid no less than five visits to Adyar, had a private meeting
with Annie Besant, accompanied her and her followers on walks, listened to
lectures, and met the young Hindu “vehicle of the world teacher”
Jiddu Krishnamurti. Back home, Lechter published an account of his trip to
India as <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Tagebuch der indischen Reise</i>
(Diary of the Indian Journey, 1912) and sent it to George as a Christmas
present. This proved to be a fatal miscalculation. George refused to answer and
cut all ties of friendship with Lechter. They had a few awkward meetings in
later years; but as usual with George, the break was final and irreversible.
Henceforth, George’s books were published without Lechter’s designs. For
Lechter himself, the break was deeply painful.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhzwCUaSDaKsW5RBeTSz8-ToU74NkUxy1gUXG9xudVRTovCrbHYEvlBOp0jRTZRQNc7xyKQ1i3YMH7hV7cfNVJHF4JxJxXBD-qrJt2xmumu1jjZMgf-7qNEEpkXqviIy4n7rAzjXdy2cYs8/s1600/495.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="286" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhzwCUaSDaKsW5RBeTSz8-ToU74NkUxy1gUXG9xudVRTovCrbHYEvlBOp0jRTZRQNc7xyKQ1i3YMH7hV7cfNVJHF4JxJxXBD-qrJt2xmumu1jjZMgf-7qNEEpkXqviIy4n7rAzjXdy2cYs8/s320/495.jpg" width="320" /></a></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">While Melchior Lechter is
the central figure in Stottmeister’s analysis, separate chapters full of
fascinating information are devoted to other figures relevant to the relation
between George and Theosophy, notably the composer Cyrill Scott; the poet Karl
Wolfskehl (the true “inventor of the George cult”, according to Stottmeister,
p. 254); the writer, spiritualist, Theosophist, and alchemist Alexander von
Bernus; and even the Marxist philosopher Ernst Bloch. Finally, Stottmeister
shows that Friedrich Gundolf’s deeply apologetic book <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">George</i> (1920) is permeated not only by an agenda of hero-worship premised
on George’s unique spiritual superiority (he is described, in biblical terms,
as “The Way, the Truth, and Life”, p. 287) but also, simultaneously, by an
urgently felt need to demarcate him sharply from the competition of Theosophy,
“the worst idea of modernity” (p. 290). </span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Henceforth (and this is a
familiar story in the study of Western esotericism) the dimension of Theosophy
and occultism was written out of standard scholarly treatments devoted to
Stefan George and his circle. Just as (to mention just one parallel) <a href="https://www.academia.edu/3461793/Swedenborg_aus_dem_Sicht_von_Kant_und_der_akademischen_Kant-Forschung_2008_">Swedenborg was reduced in academic Kant scholarship to no more than a ridiculous Spirit Seer without serious philosophical import</a>, Theosophy got reduced to no more
than the flaky brainchild of “die dicke Madame”. In a sharp and perfectly
justified critique of the dominant academic trend in Germany after World War
II, Stottmeister remarks (with obvious reference to Adorno’s famous definition
of occultism as “the metaphysics of the stupid guys”) that “from an academic perspective,
the occultist interests of the smart guys – Ernst Bloch and Walter Benjamin, to
mention just those closest to Adorno – are no longer noticed. In the decades
after World War II, henceforth historians of modernity just know about one type
of occultists: Nazis” (323). The deep irony is that such notions of “Nazi
occultism” have been embraced as historically correct by generations of German
academics, in blissful ignorance of the fact that they were thereby lending credence to <a href="http://wouterjhanegraaff.blogspot.nl/2013/05/superpower.html">occultist pseudo-histories</a> themselves (largely originating from
Pauwels & Bergier’s bestselling <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Morning
of the Magicians</i>, but given credence, as demonstrated by Stottmeister, by
the authoritative work of George Mosse).</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhoz5GQxdy6HiRH7M7YDZFZrFpkz-67qbxrq9M_hdTKf7iGX_v5qGa0tdNE16PFMMeXa1tSSwWf6COuq7dmoSiNflXQ3Py40YLxSdGMEcdgoe68n84WHS_8ui7O5LHYEmHel9W-QyYcuP1N/s1600/maximin03.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhoz5GQxdy6HiRH7M7YDZFZrFpkz-67qbxrq9M_hdTKf7iGX_v5qGa0tdNE16PFMMeXa1tSSwWf6COuq7dmoSiNflXQ3Py40YLxSdGMEcdgoe68n84WHS_8ui7O5LHYEmHel9W-QyYcuP1N/s1600/maximin03.jpg" /></a></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">These concluding remarks
about the question of National Socialism – inevitable in a book like this,
given the oft-debated question of how George’s “Secret Germany” is
related to the Third Reich – prove to be the upbeat for a truly impressive
Appendix of more than seventy pages, devoted to “Helena Blavatsky, Alfred Schuler,
Stefan George, and the Western History of the Interpretation of the Swastika Sign” (pp. 327-398). This appendix should definitely be translated into English
as soon as possible. The Swastika sign was not just adopted by the Nazis as
their symbol, but also appears prominently in the seal of the Theosophical
Society (as well as in Blavatsky’s private seal), on Melchior Lechter’s designs
of books from the George Circle, as well as in the work of Alfred Schuler (the
central figure of the Munich “Cosmic Circle” that originally overlapped with
George’s circle). As such, it looks like a red thread among George and
Theosophy that requires interpretation. Stottmeister has excellent things
to say about what he calls the “Swastika effect”, which makes it psychologically
impossible for us to see the swastika without being reminded of the Nazis. In fact, however, the sign
became popular first “in apolitical contexts: as the sign of an occultist
society that actually promoted the brotherhood of races and nations, as a
favourite ornament in Jugendstil and Art Deco design, and as a profane business
logo for products of all kinds (p 330). Ironically, from our present-day
perspective, it was seen as a sign of good luck. Against the background of
popular 19<sup>th</sup> century theories of race and evolution, including antisemitic
argumentations for Aryan supremacy such as Emile Burnouf’s <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">La Science des Religions</i> (1870), Stottmeister provides a sterling
analysis of how the swastika symbol adopted from India functioned in the
context of Blavatsky’s “race-theoretical anti-racism”, followed by equally
impressive discussions of Alfred Schuler’s obsession with the symbol and, of course, its
appearance in the circle around Stefan George. Any further non-political use of the
Swastika became impossible after World War II, of course, for as Stottmeister
notes, “historical contextualizations were powerless against this reconditioned
visual perception. The Good Luck sign had been transformed irreversibly into a
sign of Horror” (p. 344). </span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;">Still, powerless or not,
what is the point of historical scholarship if we do not insist that
fiction can be distinguished from fact and that it is important to do so? Like all good researchers in
the modern study of Western esotericism, Stottmeister gives us a careful deconstruction
of ingrained academic myths that have been taken for granted by scholars for
generations and have obstructed and distorted our view of historical reality.
This <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">pars destruens</i> is necessary in
order to clear the ground for the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">pars
construens</i> that should follow in its wake: that of reconstructing our standard ways
of imagining Western culture from the bottom up.</span></span></div>
<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj692wM6vmmjIRviy52Ymq4PYu5xZKn0g6Ma9bDumIsZOo2GKYMrDjg3pgOuwVcjf5FqH-pAlpaVcMGXxzZ6mzx5ZXAbLaxXQBu7DRB0FNI31m8m2LFkQaOjpYDN2uYtIrLP2_wMsalbyJK/s1600/b18c25dbe396086392e65b9f527facb0.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" height="336" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj692wM6vmmjIRviy52Ymq4PYu5xZKn0g6Ma9bDumIsZOo2GKYMrDjg3pgOuwVcjf5FqH-pAlpaVcMGXxzZ6mzx5ZXAbLaxXQBu7DRB0FNI31m8m2LFkQaOjpYDN2uYtIrLP2_wMsalbyJK/s640/b18c25dbe396086392e65b9f527facb0.jpg" width="640" /></a></span></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;">Melchior Lechter, Orpheus (1896)</span></td></tr>
</tbody></table>
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<span style="font-family: "georgia" , "times new roman" , serif;"><span style="font-size: 12.0pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 10.0pt;"><br /></span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
wouterjhanegraaff.blogspot.comhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15519965611425366178noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5967881025525384120.post-15588249883955580022015-08-20T03:38:00.001-07:002019-08-08T07:27:17.881-07:00On the Death of Khaled Asaad<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi773GUygOooQTsO7sD3TU2XcHhs0AHbt6hXmK5iKqd_zToA2uL6u_dHxQVu0Zu-MZSPTJFkGVPELh4fZMHiFapksQ-QYcr4FeLYd1xKuAKWbLWFIZKsbmITWH7OahrV6z3sAmFv6iKlDim/s1600/palmyra-khaled-asaad-getty.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="300" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi773GUygOooQTsO7sD3TU2XcHhs0AHbt6hXmK5iKqd_zToA2uL6u_dHxQVu0Zu-MZSPTJFkGVPELh4fZMHiFapksQ-QYcr4FeLYd1xKuAKWbLWFIZKsbmITWH7OahrV6z3sAmFv6iKlDim/s400/palmyra-khaled-asaad-getty.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
This week, IS tortured and killed Khaled Asaad, the antiquities chief of Palmyra. He was decapitated at a public square, and his body was hung from a Roman column in one of the ruins to the restoration of which he had devoted more than fifty years of his life. He was 81 years old.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
After having neglected my blog for a year, this news hit me so hard that I felt I needed to write about it. But what is there to say? As with all the previous news about the atrocious horrors perpetrated by IS, my overwhelming feelings are grief and fury, combined with a debilitating sense of powerlessness. The Nazis have returned in our midst, only this time they do not do their torturing and killing behind barbed wire fences or prison doors but proudly display them on the internet. We are watching it on TV and reading about it in the newspapers, and then move on to our daily business. Because what can we do? </div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Just one thing. Speaking out about the values that <b>we</b> represent, or should represent, and mustering the courage to fight for them in word and deed, wherever we have a chance of doing so. This goes for everybody, anywhere in the world. But having been raised in a European country and devoting my life to studying, writing, and speaking about its cultural traditions, I may perhaps be excused for focusing on Western civilization. <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/middle-east/isis-executes-palmyra-antiquities-chief-khaled-asaad-and-hangs-him-from-ruins-he-spent-a-lifetime-restoring-10461601.html">We are told </a>that Khaled Asaad was murdered for the crime of "overseeing 'idols' in the ancient city" and "attending 'infidel' conferences as Syrian representative". This makes him one of the most recent casualties in a culture war that has been raging for thousands of years: that of exclusive monotheism against its mortal enemy, "pagan idolatry". We should not delude ourselves: historically, our "own" dominant Western culture has not been on Khaled Asaad's side but overwhelmingly on the side of his murderers. The idea that paganism and idolatry is the ultimate abomination that must be rooted out and destroyed, along with anybody who practices or sympathizes with it, goes to the heart of Jewish, Christian, and Islamic identity (though it should be added that while Christianity and Islam gained the power to put the idea into bloody action, post-biblical Judaism never had that chance and rather found itself on the receiving end of atrocities, as we know all too well). Moreover, (<i>pace</i> Peter Gay c.s.) it goes to the heart of Enlightenment rationalism as well, which inherited the Protestant view of paganism and idolatry. This story is not well known, precisely because our dominant cultural institutions are grounded in the very same bias and therefore prefer to tell the story differently. But the painful truth is that, culturally and historically, we are hardly in a position to mount our high horse and condemn IS for continuing our very own battle against the religious culture of the ancient world and everything it stood for. "We" have been every bit as brutal and cruel as they are being now, and <a href="http://wouterjhanegraaff.blogspot.nl/2014/03/exterminate-all-idols.html">until much more recent times than we care to remember</a>.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
But here is the paradox. In spite of everything, I deeply care about this same Western culture, for it has richly provided us with all those ultimate values that IS is trampling upon. In spite of all its horrors, a deep commitment to the Good, the Beautiful, and the True runs through the story of Western civilization as well - and this tradition is deeply indebted to the very culture of classical antiquity and Hellenistic civilization that IS would like to destroy. But I'm afraid that during the last couple of decades, we have rapidly been losing touch with these foundational values on which our very culture and civilization were built. Most of us no longer know who we are, what we are supposed to stand for, or why we should. The Good has been made subject to the laws of the marketplace (economic value trumps moral values: the question of what we <i>should</i> do is irrelevant if it cannot be paid for, right?). The Beautiful has been reduced to esthetics and leasure time activities (likewise for sale, of course). And as for the True - the province of science and scholarship, my own domain of activity - well, that is just a matter of opinion, isn't it? This is why the Humanities are declining, and too many of us (academics included) find it hard to see any difference between knowledge and information. This is why we have lost our ability to explain what we are all about. I don't mean to be cynical, but I'm afraid that this is the point of history at which we have now arrived as a culture and a society: we are in decline, and we know it. No wonder that we feel so vulnerable. No wonder that for so many people (not just "elsewhere" but at home as well) "Western civilization" no longer inspires admiration and respect but is becoming an object of hatred, contempt, or simple indifference. I hate to say it, but IS has a story. We don't.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Back to Khaled Asaad. From all that I can tell, I think that he was "one of us". By this I mean that he belonged to all of us who want to devote our lives to real values: knowledge, understanding, generosity, love, beauty, awe. It won't do to respond to his death only with some academic reflections on culture and civilization, although that must be done too (after all, those were the values he deeply cared about and that ultimately cost him his life). We must take our stand next to him, for his horrible death has made him a symbol of everything that is being threatened today and needs to be defended by us, at whatever cost. </div>
wouterjhanegraaff.blogspot.comhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15519965611425366178noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5967881025525384120.post-77302912898534177682014-07-30T08:12:00.001-07:002021-01-08T05:09:45.085-08:00On Reading Email (Once a Week)<style>
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I remember it very well. One day in
the early 1990s I was reading the weekly journal of the University of Utrecht,
where I was a student, and came across a small column that announced the
invention and introduction of a brand-new way of communication. It was called
“e-mail” (that stands for “electronic mail”, the note explained), and was
extremely cheap because it used the telephone line to transmit entire text
messages in just a fraction of a second. I was impressed. Could it really be
true that instead of incurring expensive telephone bills for calling my friends
at the other side of the Atlantic or Europe, I could tell them
everything I had to tell them for almost nothing? It seemed too good to be
true. Surely there was a catch, and the telephone companies would find some
other way to make us pay.</div><div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;"><br /></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj6iORLYv6wLf7XvzTXpcCLbC8zIAiLjwG3p69QfydCvbb3NOt4NvB_0dgZabUxAb30cGrQA17Q-iW1oP47bdCT32g8M9-FSsJwofdqWgji-6iXsYH6ggw1fvJO-E6ojVcmdO0yifSGg51_/s1600/violawwwabout_1-4e906d8-intro.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="246" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj6iORLYv6wLf7XvzTXpcCLbC8zIAiLjwG3p69QfydCvbb3NOt4NvB_0dgZabUxAb30cGrQA17Q-iW1oP47bdCT32g8M9-FSsJwofdqWgji-6iXsYH6ggw1fvJO-E6ojVcmdO0yifSGg51_/w308-h246/violawwwabout_1-4e906d8-intro.jpg" width="308" /></a></div>
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That is now more than twenty years
ago, and I have forgotten what those early emails even looked like. Email has
become so normal and omnipresent that we find it hard to imagine how people got
anything done before the nineties. What did you do if you were organizing an
international conference, for instance, and needed to communicate with your
colleagues about all kinds of tiny details, correct misunderstandings, create consensus, and so on? Well, there is an answer. We sat down to write letters.
And having finished them, we had to go out and put them in a physical mailbox,
or find a fax machine somewhere, in cases of great hurry. Or we made a phone
call, in spite of the costs, and it all took a lot of time. Didn’t we have
anything else to do than wasting hours and hours on such laborious and
time-consuming procedures? Well, there’s an answer to that too. We <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">could</i> find the time, for a very simple
reason. We did not need to spend hours every day reading email and responding
to it.<br />
<br /></div>
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When email was first introduced, its benefits seemed a bit similar to those of voicemail. Instead of having to deal with phonecall interruptions all the time, you could quietly read your messages at a moment of your own convenience. If people wanted to speak with you right away, well, bad luck for them, they just had to wait. But as email took over as the dominant means of communication, along <span style="line-height: 150%;">with the introduction of visual and auditory cues ("you got mail!" - nowadays abbreviated as "bleep" or "boink" or just a number, for </span><b style="line-height: 150%;">of course</b><span style="line-height: 150%;"> you got mail!) this quickly proved to be an illusion. Nowadays, email looks more like a </span><span style="line-height: 150%;">wide</span><span style="line-height: 150%;"> open door that
gives direct access to your home, with a large invitation over it: </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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WELCOME!
Everybody, known or unknown, may enter here at any moment, day or night, twenty-four
hours a day. Feel free to walk straight into my study whenever you feel like
it, <span style="line-height: 150%;">and start talking to me about anything that’s on your mind, important or
unimportant. I might be busy trying to concentrate on something when you enter,
but no need to worry about that. Just start talking anyway. I’ll do my best to
interrupt everything I’m doing right away, I'll listen to whatever you have to say, and will do what I can to answer immediately.</span><br />
<br /></div>
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How normal is it, really, that we
now find this normal? Should we even be surprised when scientists find that email
<a href="http://today.uci.edu/news/2012/05/nr_email_120503.php">increases mental stress and decreases our ability to concentrate</a>? Or that our continuous exposure to internet, twitter, or texting cues causes
our brain to get addicted to them, for <a href="http://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/brain-wise/201209/why-were-all-addicted-texts-twitter-and-google">straightforward chemical reasons based upon dopamine</a>?
As a result of that mechanism, known as a dopamine loop, the stream of
interruptions gets even bigger: for <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">if</i>
we are left in peace for a little while, this very fact makes us so nervous that we start interrupting ourselves. </div>
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In his important and predictably controversial book <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Shallows-Internet-Changing-Think-Remember/dp/1848872275/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1406809439&sr=1-1&keywords=nicholas+carr+the+shallows"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Shallows</i></a>, Nicholas Carr begins with
an <span style="line-height: 150%;">observation that I trust will sound familiar to many of us:</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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I’m not thinking
the way I used to think. I feel it most strongly when I’m reading. I used to
find it easy to immerse myself in a book or a lengthy article. My mind would
get caught up in<br />
the twists of the narrative or the turns of the argument, and
I’d spend hours strolling through long stretches of prose. That’s rarely the
case anymore. Now my concentration starts to drift after a page or two. I get
fidgety, lose the thread, begin looking for something else to do. [...]</div>
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I think I know
what’s going on. For well over a decade now, I’ve been spending a lot of time
online, searching and surfing and sometimes adding to the great databases of
the Internet. The Web’s been a godsend to me as a writer. [...] The boons are
real. But they come at a price. [...] [W]hat the Net seems to be doing is
chipping away my capacity for concentration and contemplation. Whether I’m
online or not, my mind now expects to take in information the way the Net
distributes it [...].</div>
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<br /></div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjsXh14ZsOrTRjhE3fCwDeVOWz8-BHVXj0HgE2V7jJ6oU39khPgZdfIwTlY4zL_ifsLLOsZtREsvMizwzpj0QQxHobyM55dQIspAIwaN0bY-4_4S8dYGVyJNa9C6AqKHqul6fy2CFGrwuwm/s1600/brain-dopamine.jpg" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="480" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjsXh14ZsOrTRjhE3fCwDeVOWz8-BHVXj0HgE2V7jJ6oU39khPgZdfIwTlY4zL_ifsLLOsZtREsvMizwzpj0QQxHobyM55dQIspAIwaN0bY-4_4S8dYGVyJNa9C6AqKHqul6fy2CFGrwuwm/s640/brain-dopamine.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
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Carr provides hard neurological
evidence. Our brain is very flexible: it quickly learns in response to whatever we ask it to do – <span style="line-height: 150%;">and unlearns
what we neglect to ask it. At present, we continuously train ourselves to get better and
better at those skills that allow us to use the Internet quickly and
effectively. And boy do we get good at it! But it goes at the expense of other
skills that the Internet just doesn’t require, or even discourages. Notably
those skills of deep and prolonged concentration on one single piece of text –
without continuous hyperlinks that move us instantaneously to another text,
full of other hyperlinks that again move us elsewhere, and so on.</span> The fact is that we are
systematically training our brain <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">not</i> to
concentrate on a line of thought, an argument, a narrative. We are training it in the art of <i>breaking</i> our
concentration. </div>
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<br />
Reading <a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Circle-Dave-Eggers/dp/024114650X/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1406800375&sr=1-1&keywords=eggers+circle">Dave Eggers’ novel <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Circle</i></a> (yes, that's a hyperlink! Please stay with me anyway) made me aware of another
dimension of email: that of guilt and social pressure. It is already <span style="line-height: 150%;">bad enough
that my concentration gets shattered whenever a new visitor walks into my study
and issues a beep to interrupt what I’m doing. And it is even worse that when nobody walks in
for five minutes, my dopamine compels me</span><span style="line-height: 150%;">
to get up and walk to my door to check whether anyone is coming yet, and that when I’m back at
my desk, I am distracted because my brain keeps wondering why nobody is there to
disturb me. </span><br />
<br />
<span style="line-height: 150%;">! When will the next beep come? </span><br />
<span style="line-height: 150%;">! Why haven't I heard it yet? </span><br />
<span style="line-height: 150%;">! Have they forgotten me? </span><br />
<br />
<span style="line-height: 150%;">But the process does not stop there. When new visitors come in, as
they invariably do, they expect me to answer quasi-immediately and are likely
to take offense if I don’t. </span><br />
<br />
<span style="line-height: 150%;">! I </span><i style="line-height: 150%;">have</i><span style="line-height: 150%;">
received the email, haven’t I? </span><br />
<span style="line-height: 150%;">! I </span><i style="line-height: 150%;">have </i><span style="line-height: 150%;">the
technical means to respond, don’t I? </span><br />
<span style="line-height: 150%;">! So then why the f@#$%^&! do I not respond? What is it that’s keeping me? </span><br />
<br />
<span style="line-height: 150%;">And even this can get worse.
Similar to what happens in the dopamine loop (first you get interrupted by
others, but eventually you don’t need them anymore: you’ve started doing it all by yourself)</span><span style="line-height: 150%;">, even if nobody is blaming me for being slow with my
answers, I end up feeling guilty all by myself. </span><br />
<br />
<span style="line-height: 150%;">! I don't want them to think I’m impolite
and egoistic. </span><br />
<span style="line-height: 150%;">! They might think I’m some arrogant ass (those professors, you know...) who finds his own stuff so important that he just can't be bothered to take an interest in others and respond to their needs. </span><br />
<span style="line-height: 150%;">! Too busy? What nonsense! They get as many emails as I do. No cause for me to
complain, as if I’m in some special category. If they can answer their emails,
so can I. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;">
I have been thinking about these
problems for a long time and have come to a clear decision. I refuse to be
manipulated and disciplined into conformity with the logic of <i>The Circle</i>, and most importantly: I reserve the right to protect my own brain. I don't want to expose it systematically to conditions that limit my ability to do what I do best: concentrate. <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">From now on (July 2014) I will therefore be
reading my email once a week, and will disable it
entirely during the rest of the week</b>. I know that many people will find
this incredibly radical, or preposterous, and some will get angry with me - so let me explain. It is really very simple. <i>My core business as a scholar in the Humanities requires the ability of deep “concentration
and contemplation”</i> (as formulated by Carr). That is what I need most when I'm studying books, articles, or primary sources. I have a responsibility, to myself and to society, to
protect and cultivate those skills, for if they wither and decline then the quality of my
work will suffer. I know very well that even this brief explanation sounds like a justification or even an excuse. Perhaps it is. But if so, it nicely illustrates the very point I've just been making: like everyone else, I'm by no means immune to the guilt-inducing <span style="line-height: 150%;">magic of The Circle.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%; text-align: justify;">
Now I’m well aware that even though
these general problems of concentration/interruption, dopamine loops, or social
pressure by the internalization of guilt are real and universal, something that doesn’t work
for me might work better for others. Different people have different mental
constitutions, not everybody responds in the same way to stress, and quite some friends and colleagues do not experience email as a problem the way I do. Some people are able to switch quickly from one task to
another, and that's great for them, but I have never had that ability: I just happen to be a deep concentrator with a long and slow curve. Some people enjoy digital socializing, and that's great for them too,
but I don’t: I find it empty and superficial and prefer meeting people face to face. Some people like to focus on information, and that's fine too, but my interest is in
<i>knowledge</i>, which is not the same thing.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<div style="text-align: justify;">
Am I too naive or optimistic in thinking
that this could actually work? I’ll have to see how it works out in practice,
especially as the new academic year begins. But one thing is clear: reading email
once a week means that once I sit down to do it, I will be concentrating on it.
100%.</div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Postscript 2017</span></b></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><br /></span></b></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">It
does work. Sort of. Or rather: it works very well, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">but</i> it requires discipline, and you regularly need to remind yourself
of why, exactly, you decided to implement this once-a-week rule in the first
place and why it’s so important. Re-reading the entire text of my 2014 blogpost
made me recognize that from time to time (and increasingly, as time went by) I
did fall prey again to those unconscious dopamine cues and subtle psychological
guilt-inducers mentioned above. Make no mistake about it: they are incredibly
effective. The only way to fight them successfully is by remaining <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">conscious</i> of their presence and <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">attentive</i> to how they operate and how
your brain responds to them.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">What
happened to me was that, from time to time, I knew somebody was about to send
me (or had already sent me) an email that required a quick response; so at
first I would simply activate my email program for that purpose, find that one
email and answer it, while disregarding the rest. Fine. But after this had
happened a few times, my brain had understood that it is in fact possible to
read one single email and leave the rest to be handled on the designated “email
day.” But if reading/answering just one single email is not seriously
disruptive, or so my brain concluded, then surely picking out just two or three
for quick processing cannot be such a big problem either. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">And
there I went down the slippery slope.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;"><span style="text-indent: -18pt;">* Before I knew it, rather than picking
out that one email, I was scanning the list of unread messages in my mailbox to
select those I felt could be more urgent and/or might easily be gotten out of
the way right now, to leave the rest for the “email day.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;"><span style="text-indent: -18pt;">* Soon enough, the number of messages I
felt I could handle got determined by the amount of time I felt willing to
spend on them on that particular day.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;"><span style="text-indent: -18pt;">* In fact, however, seeing all those
unread messages sitting there, my brain sometimes got curious: “What is that
one all about? Interesting header… I’ll just take a quick look.”</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;"><span style="text-indent: -18pt;">* Also, my brain began to send messages
along the lines of “if you get rid of those messages now, then your ‘email day’
will be so much shorter and easier! Instead of spending it on email, you’ll be
free to spend a large part of it doing things you really want to do...”
Needless to say, this meant that in fact I was not doing those things at </span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal; text-indent: -18pt;">that</i><span style="text-indent: -18pt;"> moment but ended up doing email
instead: self-delusion.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;"><span style="text-indent: -18pt;">* And once I had broken my own email
agreement a few times in this manner, it became quite easy to do it most days,
or even every day, while still telling myself that </span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal; text-indent: -18pt;">basically</i><span style="text-indent: -18pt;"> I was “reading email once a week!” More self-delusion.</span></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast" style="text-align: justify; text-indent: -18pt;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<span style="mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">And
so that is how it works, and why one needs to remain conscious and attentive
all the time. The two chief factors are (1) unconscious addictive brain
processes based on <i>dopamine</i>, and (2) psychological processes based on <i>social
guilt</i>. They are particularly effective because the former acts behind the
scenes while the latter presents itself as so ethically commendable. But make
no mistake: both are powerful adversaries, opposed by their very nature to deep
work and peace of mind.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify; text-justify: inter-ideograph;">
<br /></div>
</div>
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