The New Discourses Podcast with James Lindsay, Episode 108
Marxism is not a philosophy. Neither are its derivatives, like “Wokeness” (Woke Marxism). These are a strain within a broader category of cult religious movements that pose as economics, sociology, and politics. The broad name for these Esoteric cult religions is “Gnosticism,” but that’s a confusing label for a number of reasons. The first of these reasons is that “gnosticism” as a term, either as a descriptive or proper noun, means several things at once, which requires clarification. Another is that as economic, social, and political movements, they don’t look at all like the pre-modern spiritualist and mystical movements that go by those names. In this groundbreaking episode of the New Discourses Podcast, host James Lindsay clarifies the term “gnosticism” and unmasks what amounts to a huge “New Age” movement in the Middle Ages as the source of a thread of Gnostic cult belief that has shaped every facet of the West for at least the last three hundred years. He also explains how the shift from the Middle Ages to the Modern period included a shift in the Gnostic project, out of overt spiritualism and into exactly those society-building realms of economics, sociology, and politics. Join him to gain a completely new understanding of these dangerous movements and how they’re relevant to our lives today.
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27 comments
(Sociologist: I cannot reply to your comments so must post a reply at the top of the thread — so techno irritating)
Thank you for that. You are a most patient person.
What more can I say other than: “My hovercraft is full of eels.”
Funny you mention Monty Python as I happen to be re-watching the entire series at this very moment. I need it as a sanity talisman to ward off the evil eye of idiocy that threatens every morning as I head out for my 15k bicycle ride at the huge old cemetery across from my building (where my grandparents are buried) and am forced, while wheeling my bike to the elevator, to observe the day’s headlines from the mainstream media (Pravda Kanada) newspapers lying in front of the apartment doors of my retired woke senior citizen irritating leftist neighbours. If I didn’t see (against my will) these headlines each day, I would never have known that Adolph Trump had made a pact with Satan to fascist-dominate the world but only after he killed off all the retired irritating leftist woke senior citizen Canadians unless they vote for socialist Messiah Justin “Arthur Two-Sheds Jackson” Trudeau as their only hope against the new Orange Fuhrer’s wrath. What a depressingly Dasein-free world they live in, nothing but “spam, spam, spammity spam”.
(ps: self-recrimination is not self-loathing but its opposite: the germination of hope)
“ontology is the philosophical study of being. It investigates what types of entities exist, how they are grouped into categories, and how they are related…”
Why? Why study this? Serious question. I know you genuinely know about these things unlike other commenters who seem to be proselytizing their chosen brand of self-deification (reification?). Please explain why anyone is investigating such things – to what end? For what purpose? Is there an outcome? If so, what is done with the outcome of the investigation? Do these investigations ever “end” or are they like Woke’s “anti-racism”, a process that never ends but is a perpetual queered “becoming”. Have such investigations contributed anything that concretely made humans’ lives more bearable in the physical actual world? If so, what would be three examples of practical useful outcomes of such ontological investigation (from any time in history) that improved normal people’s nasty brutish lives.
“the creator debate (to exist or not exist)”
Again: Why? Why the need to “know”? What difference does it make one way or the other since not one human in all history has ever been able to prove or disprove the existence of any creator (but killed millions in the process). Why waste precious time on such a futile pursuit? Unless this pursuit is merely the mask for a deeper and concealed purpose (status, vanity, money, power, ego, tribalism, baseness). What is the practical useful purpose of all these investigations into “metaphysics” including all the ones described in the comments below – all the old familiars: the magus, the adepts, special gnosis, “hidden” books, levels and stages, Enoch’s searchers, Hermes fetishists (Crowley, Anger, Lavey, Manson), the Blavatsky channelings, the demiurges, the alien uber-beings, and all of this literal rubbish concocted by fevered psyches to be sold as product to desperately lost and repellently conceited people.
To me, all of this preposterous “metaphysical” New (and Old) Age WooWoo has the same quality about it as most “serious” philosophers’ investigations: mental masturbation. Nothing wrong with masturbation of any kind (natural preventative for older men’s prostate problems btw) but it has no connection to quotidian human life and Man’s struggle to survive his span in the vale of tears. I’ll grant that some mental masturbation is fun of course. I loved Schopenhauer’s “Studies in Pessimism” (his realism made me feel optimistic). Whereas I found what little I could read of Heidegger’s “Being and Time” incomprehensible gobbledygook — all that flunging of Dasein to me was nothing more than high level monkey spanking. What use is Dasein in the real world? Some philosopher’s do impact life but always negatively, such as Sartre’s support of “revolutionary” violence or Foucault’s support of abolishing age of consent laws. Name one positive impact or outcome of the ideas of even one philosopher.
I spent years politely giving the benefit of the doubt to people who obsessed over all this stuff in the hope that perhaps it would some day have some positive use to real people until my good will died on Oct 7 2023 when all of this philosophizing became to me nothing more than an incantatory death rattle, a decadent and obscene pissing in the wind. Prove me wrong. Please.
I missed this post and comment thread and just read through it now. Wow. The Woo-Woo in many of these comments is so New Age deranged, it makes Woke seem normal.
Humans are from an alien galaxy imprisoned on Earth. OK. Don’t make any sudden movements — just back away slowly. I was a fugitive from an alien reptile chain gang. The mind boggles. So many Hermes Trismegistus wannabes, so little time. Channeling more imaginary higher planes and fictitious mystical realms than Eno’s Sweet Regina who’s gone to China cross-legged on the floor. It’s an orgy of Fairyland! Enough magical thinking superiority complexes for an entire psychiatric conference.
Reminds me of this classic line from Rosemary’s Baby: “They don’t just want the blood. They want the flesh!” George Romero call home. It rubs the lotion on its skin. Certifiably Whacko! Psycho-emotional dysentery requires an enema of the brain: What does any of this nonsense have to do with the price of eggs?
Hitting the point in the point with a point. Simply an amazing thought process of contemplation.
The signes where already there when technological breakthroughs were presented as a promise to get rid of all the supposed flaws of material life.
If society can get rid of the addiction to the technological fruit of cult thinking is something to ponder about as it looks like this technology was designed to be used as a cult behaviour force multiplier.
Hey James, my name is Sonny, last name Lindsey, lol. I serendipitously found your work while having a major breakthrough in my own understanding of how these Magicians are operating. Your work has put many pieces together that begins to clarify the enemy we are dealing with.
I’m writing you because unfortunately while you have rightly identified Gnosticism and Hermeticism as being the Why and the How, I haven’t yet heard you (maybe I’m missing a podcast) strongly mention that these two things actually fall under one umbrella – Pantheism.
Pantheism is the unseen enemy. By definition it is incongruent with Christian Theism and is the real war taking place. Pantheism vs Theism. The reason it is so hard to spot is because it has over the ages gone under the name of The Mysteries in various secret societies and mystery cults – Pantheism as term itself not being coined until the 1700’s.
Christians often view the ‘enemy’ as Paganism, not realizing the Paganism is only one side of the coin. Paganism on Wiki (don’t mind the source) says that “Paganism has broadly connoted the “religion of the peasantry”. Which begs the question – If the peasants are pagans, which often translates into POLYtheists, then what are the Elites? Do you see the dialectic emerging?
The Elites worship The All – The peasants worship the Many.
Understanding the enemy is PANTHEISM is the biggest redpill, because once you see, you can’t unsee. It’s what ties all of the occult/esoteric/philosophy suspects together. And they all have one enemy – The Catholic (Universal) Church. Why? Because it’s THE ONLY religion that actually puts God OUTSIDE of themselves.
Pantheism was the ruling religion underlying EVERY culture prior to Christianity. This is why the Old Testament is so important. Who wrote The Pentateuch? Tradition says Moses. Where did Moses grow up? In Egypt. Raised by the royal family. Becoming a priest. It’s very likely he was initiated into the Egyptian Mysteries. Which would have tried to convince him of what? The story of Moses is the story of humanity beginning to understand that there is Objective Truth. Moses rejected Pantheism.
Under Pantheism, morality has no choice but to dissolve. All becomes a matter of perspective. Right and Wrong is merely an illusion of Duality. What then becomes the WHY for why kings rule and peasants drool? Reincarnation is sold to the peasants – “Well you must have fucked up in your past life, do better”. For the Elites’ – one’s own WILL becomes the rationale for their position in life. It’s Game of Thrones baby. And do what thou wilt is the whole of the law.
Keep doing the work you’re doing my friend, it’s so important. And if you haven’t become a Christian yet, give it time. If you believe in Objective Truth you’re already half way there. And if you believe you aren’t God then you might as well just throw your hands up and praise Jesus. 😛 Thank you for your hard work.
Question:
WHO deceived Eve in Genesis… was it the serpent… or was it God? (Well, you tell me.)
Gen. 2:17 — “But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely DIE.”
Gen. 3:1 – Now the serpent was more subtle (crafty, cunning, shrewd, sensible, PRUDENT) than any beast of the field which the LORD God had made. And he said unto the woman,” Yea, hath God said, Ye shall not eat of every tree of the garden?”
Gen. 3:2 – And the woman said unto the serpent, “We may eat of the fruit of the trees of the garden,
Gen. 3:3 – But of the fruit of the tree which is in the midst of the garden, God hath said, Ye shall not eat of it, neither shall ye touch it, lest ye DIE.”
Gen. 3:4 – And the serpent said unto the woman, “Ye shall NOT surely die:
Gen. 3:5 – For God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and YE SHALL BE AS GODS, knowing good and evil.”
Gen. 3:6 – And when the woman saw that the tree was good for food, and that it was pleasant to the eyes, and a tree to be desired to make one WISE, she took of the fruit thereof, and did eat, and gave also unto her husband with her; and he did eat.
Gen. 3:7 – And the eyes of them both were opened, and they knew that they were naked; and they sewed fig leaves together, and made themselves aprons.
(and then,,,)
Gen. 3:22 – And the LORD God said, “Behold, the man is BECOME AS ONE OF US, to know good and evil….”
Elohim is plural for the Powerful Shining Ones. A Family of Advanced Anunnaki Alien Beings. You are Deceived. The Bible was Neutered and Feminized with Agnostic Feeling, while the Masculine Gnostic Knowledge was removed including 68 Books and Enoch, the Science that has been taken away explained Enki (Jesus) – the Serpent was Christ Knowledge of Good who saved us from being the Slave Race that his brother Enlil (Jehovah) commanded and Christ saved us from the Flood. See the Enuma Elish, Altra Hasis and Lost Books of Enki to see where the Jews plagiarized and the Roman Catholic Church hid the truth and does not exist in King James at all. Jesus taught Reincarnation and Ascension and there is No Death.
The Serpent
Was Satan
A fallen Angel
Who rejected the role God gave him
He hated humanity
Christ redeemed us because God loved us so much
He was willing to die for us and pay for our sins
He died for us and redeemed us
Something no human could do
Humans do not reincarnate
They are raised from the dead on the day of Judgement
And dealt with according to their own actions
Stop spreading Satanic lies if you want to be saved
“AS Gods”, knowing good and evil. Not “ARE Gods”. The serpent was cursed to crawl on its belly – that was God’s curse – not who God is. God wanted Adam and Eve to follow his will and the tree was their test to see if they would rebel (sin) or follow God’s instructions. To say or imply the God deceived them representing himself as the serpent is to deny God deity and call him a lier. God can not lie or he wouldn’t be God. God would not tell them to not eat of the tree and then present himself as something else to deceive them. Men are evil not God.
Dr. Lindsay,
I have to say that while I really appreciate much of your work, we really dovetail on your word-choice of “gnosis” and conflation of Marxism with the likes of DesCartes. You are being very intellectually dishonest by claiming that anyone who disagrees with your take on the mind-body duality or spiritualism is a Marxist.
I understand that you’re trying to understand Hegel and the connection between his philosophy and Marxism, or Marxism’s connection to CRT, but you can do this without attacking Christian groups that you don’t understand. You basically slandered all Rosicrucians, Hermetic Christians, etc. all in one go simply because you don’t really understand their ideas.
Additionally, as others have mentioned, you do not need a 2hr talk to say the following:
“Evil exists, Marxism is a form of evil because of x, Hegel promoted x under the guise of materialist paradigm, which Marxists took hold of, CRT evolved from Marxists who promoted x.”
Instead, you dance around the concept of evil (which is itself an Occam’s razor argument against your position) because intellectually you’re far too arrogant and immature to admit that you can’t justify your own moral authority from your self-professed position of Atheism. You therefore use the word “gnostic” or “spiritualist” to smear devout religious individuals as a way to then give yourself the supposed moral high ground.
Essentially, you are arguing the following: x,y,z amounts to spiritualism/gnosticism, gnosticism is superstitious, superstitions are bad therefore x,y,z people are bad. Bluntly, this argument does not follow from your position of atheism which rejects the notion of metaphysical evil/the quality of “badness” to begin with.
Instead James, we come to the conclusion that through your own reasoning, you yourself are engaging in “gnostic” arguments by insisting that your audience through their enlightenment from the ideas you profess, may come to know the “truth” of reality by the rejection of Marxism and CRT.
Kind regards,
Hey James, I just got around to listening to this podcast. You ask for help exploring the topic and say you reach an impasse with some Christians who only focus on ancient heresies. I’m a Christian and I’ve been reviewing “Science, Politics, and Gnosticism” in a series of posts looking from a Christian perspective. Maybe your audience would appreciate.
https://doveserpent.substack.com/p/reflections-on-voegelin-pt-1-the
https://doveserpent.substack.com/p/reflections-on-voegelin-pt-2-the
https://doveserpent.substack.com/p/reflections-on-voegelin-pt-3-what
As much as I enjoy James’s dissection of the woke religion, the biggest problem I have with his overall worldview is his conflation of Karl Marx with the essence of “wokeness.” I think we’re doing a great disservice to Marx’s most important contribution, which is *not* the idea or structure of communism as so many falsely believe, but his brilliant critique of capitalism.
Sitting here writing from a country (USA) where wages in real terms have been flat for 50 years while the GDP continues to soar, meaning the bulk of the productivity gains now go to the very top – to the banks, credit card companies, tech monopolies, and heavily subsidized fossil fuel companies (due to the de-industrialization, and financialization of the economy), how can anyone who is intellectually honest NOT take Marx’s ideas more seriously than ever? American workers are living in a late-stage, capitalist nightmare with very little bargaining power, and less ability to own a home, start a family, get an education, or receive healthcare than ever before, and compared to every other developed, first-world nation.
Now, just as (IMHO) James has taken liberties with Marx via his unfair conflation of ideas, he has now waded in way over his head with Gnosticism, Hermeticism, and spirituality. While I agree that the “woke cult” seems to be informed by a bastardization of New Age spiritual concepts, as other commenters have pointed out, there is some truth within the spiritual traditions. How much “truth” rests with the individual, particularly the personal experiences of the individual, so it’s pointless to attempt to speak to that truth in any general sense.
The moment I saw “Gnosticism” in the title here at New Discourses and on YouTube, I knew there was going to be some very intelligent pushback in the comments, and these comments did not disappoint!
James is also a religious man, only his religion is capitalism informed by atheism. Capitalism is weak and visibly crumbling, and the certainty of atheism is quite literally incompatible with the scientific method. The only rational position is agnosticism, and that fact should lead us to question James’s entire logical structure, brilliant as his overall construction is.
Is it possible to buy the book ANYWHERE else other than from Amazon? I’d rather not support that global giant. Thanks.
I must first comment on some of the lengthy posts in the comments section. One set is by someone who wrote a scholarly book and another set is by someone who self-identifies as a “sociologist.” We can all wish that more people could express themsleves more concisely. But that particularly applies to comments on another’s work. If you want others to explore your own work, get your own blog or website. I have my own blog. I have even been paying (recently) to keep ads off of it.
I also recognize that most people can’t sit and listen to James talk for two hours. I honestly don’t know why he does this, but this is his place to express himself. He could be better prepared for these talks. But so be it.
The basic concepts I can lock onto include “New Age” and “mysticism.” What I can say about those concepts, and about “ordinary” religions as well, is that they all share at least two common problems: First, there is some truth in them. Second, there is some falsehood in them.
And the higher-level problem is that most academics or intellectuals have no real idea of how to separate out the truths from the falsehoods. Thus, many are willing to dismiss all these concepts as superstitious and useless if not dangerous.
However, there are a FEW academics and intellectuals who have developed research tools that could penetrate the confusion and resolve it. These include Hubbard, the remote viewers (C. Brown in particular) and the hypnotists (such as Dolores Cannon). There are also the academic parapsychologists who are mostly working in the group that was started by Ian Stevenson.
Several of these researchers have reached the conclusion that one of the basic assertions of what James calls Gnosticism is true: That we were forced to come to Earth to live here as prisoners. Those researchers are quite sure of this finding, and so am I. But very few others share that certainty. And I don’t think we can move forward in understand the work of past intellectuals who for some reason felt they couldn’t just come out and state exactly what they thought unless we recognize that they were actually scared to do so.
In the context of ancient times, if for some reason a person could remember or recognize that they have been imprisoned here, then this could only be interpreted as personal spiritual knowledge. It would be a little like remembering a past life, which Stevenson verified can actually happen. It is then not that much different than remembering events in one’s own life, which we consider normal. Very few here can recall their past lives, so it is not considered normal here, but it is really not that different from “normal” remembering. You can understand that if someone were to constantly invalidate your own life memories, that you would be pissed off at them. And so those who authentically recall their past lives could likewise become pissed off. And the next step is arrogance and then self-protection. At that point, quackery can enter into the situation. And thus these subjects earn public scorn. We must remember, however, that these subjects contain elements of truth.
To this day, there is no agreement on how to verify spiritual truths, or (of course) what they really are. Further, there is no agreement on what to do about those truths. I consider this a sad state of affairs. But it means to me that those intellectuals who can’t find a way to penetrate the “secrets of life” will never make it to a higher (better) level (degree) of understanding.
That means, further, that the “woke” are dealing with some perceptions that are basically true. But they, like most others, are confused about what to do with these perceptions. Marx and all his intellectual descendents got it wrong. We know that by simple experience. Ultimately, we can judge all “religious sytems” in the same way: Do they work?
Your connection to Plato is accurate but gnosticism is simply the inversion/ perversion of Plato’s republic complete with “archons” or rulers, those who have knowledge vs . those who get a “noble lie” and of course the demiurge or “architect”.
Read the republic and you’ll understand all the various nonsense that “Gnosticism” claims to represent.
A study on the New Testament and Plato is also helpful as “Heremeticsm” is essentially just Christian “Platonism”.
The celebration of ignorance that is Wokeism is yet another, failed and feeble attack on Plato.
The Socialist Phenomenon by Igor Shafarevich is another book in this line of research. Shafarevich lays out how socialism is a gnostic religion and looks at the development of socialist ideas in ancient, medieval, and modern societies. The last third of the book examines the lead-up to and the catastrophic consequences of the Bolshevik Revolution in Russia. The final section of the book also makes it perfectly clear how the broadly western world has become more or less bolshevized, depending on the country.
The book is no longer in print, but the pdf can be downloaded for free if searched on the internet.
Just wanted to drop in and say TY FOR THIS.
The topic is daunting, the material is obtuse when compared with the ‘shapes’ and ‘associations’ people are mentally primed for. But I think you’re on to something, and I will soooo be reading your book rec by O’Regan.
Cheers!
Replying to my own comment because that’s how my brain works. Damn it.
Watching your lectures with Sovereign Nations, one thing I kept being reminded of was how creepy Marx’ book ‘Oulanem’ is. The inversion of Immanuel.
James, check your edition of Voegelins “Science, Politics nd Gnosticism”. At 0:56:27 you ruminate about “thingness” (Intro). However, my edition reads “…the ancient gnostics respond to the condition of ‘flungness’ in the alien world.” And I am not aware of “thingness” as a Heideggerian term. Verdinglichung appears in Hegel, Marx and Adorno frequently. However, this is not thingness but rather reification.
James, You say gnosticism and hermeticism are difficult to describe. Historians of science have been describing it for several decades. From my book The Soul of Science:
In 1964 Frances Yates published a book that dramatically changed the study of science
history. She brought into the hallowed domain of science a whole host of things previously
shunned as unworthy of serious attention—mysticism, magic, religion. Titled Giordano
Bruno and the Hermetic Tradition, Yates’s book argued that the Renaissance philosopher
Bruno (1548–1600), often portrayed as a martyr for the sake of science, was in reality no such thing. Instead, he was a magus who traveled across Europe preaching a pagan gospel rooted in mystical hermetic texts.
Bruno was, it is true, an early advocate of Copernican astronomy—hence his standard
portrayal as a hero of science. He is frequently treated as a representative of rationality, a ray of truth in a dogma-darkened world. For example, in The Making of the Modern Mind,
historian John Herman Randall describes Bruno as “the great martyr of the new science… a
man whose soul was set on fire by the Copernican discoveries.”
But this stirring picture ignores most of what Bruno actually wrote and said. His soul, it
turns out, was set on fire less by Copernicanism than by pagan religion. He regarded himself
as a missionary for the hermetic tradition, a movement based on the writing of Hermes
Trismegistus, erroneously thought to be an Egyptian sage from the time of Moses. The
hermetic writings frequently treat the sun as a god, and the rest of the universe as moving and hence alive. This, it turns out, was the real reason Bruno was attracted to Copernicus’s
heliocentrism. The divinity of the sun seemed compatible with an astronomy that granted it an honored position at the center of the planetary system.
Although Bruno also had some acquaintance with the scientific and mathematical basis of
Copernican theory, it was not on those grounds that he defended the theory but rather on
religious grounds. In the words of historian Hugh Kearney, “Bruno transformed a
mathematical synthesis into a religious doctrine.” Eventually, in the Inquisition Bruno was
burned at the stake—not because he courageously promulgated a better scientific theory, as is often maintained, but because he claimed to offer a better religion. He argued that the
Egyptian pantheism described in the hermetic writings was superior to Christianity.
Bruno was not the only thinker of his generation to plumb ancient mystical texts for
inspiration. Renaissance thinkers often sought wisdom from the ancients, which they hoped to present as an alternative to Aristotle’s philosophy, then the ruling orthodoxy in theology,
philosophy, and science. Among the alternatives that emerged was neo-Platonism, a mystical
philosophy from the third century that made extensive use of the hermetic writings. Bruno
participated in this broader revival of neo-Platonism.
The new interpretation of Bruno as a neo-Platonic mystic did not come easily to Frances
Yates. Originally, she says, she had simply intended to make an English translation of one of
Bruno’s writings “with an introduction emphasizing the boldness with which this advanced
philosopher of the Renaissance accepted the Copernican theory.” Yet as she read his works,
Yates was puzzled by a sense that what really concerned Bruno was not Copernicanism per se but something else. So thoroughly was she primed by the standard historical interpretation that it took several years of study to recognize that the interpretative key to Bruno’s thought was hermeticism.
By treating seriously the philosophical and religious context of the historical debate over
heliocentrism, Yates helped spur a new trend among science historians. She was among the
first to suggest that mysticism had exerted a positive impact on the origin of the scientific
outlook and was therefore a proper object of study for the historian. The Yates thesis, as it
came to be called, did not merely hold that science had emerged from a world permeated with magic and mysticism; that was already widely known. Her novel interpretation was that
mysticism produced a frame of mind that actually fostered the rise of modern science.
Standard histories of science treat magic and mysticism as the antithesis of science—as
superstitions that hindered the emergence of the modern scientific outlook. For example, Sir
James Jeans denounces the “dismal ages” of the medieval period as a time concerned with
alchemy, astrology, and magic—“wholly unprofitable quests.” Yet this interpretation of
history, Yates argues, has limited explanatory power. It can explain and follow the various stages leading to the emergence of modern science in the seventeenth century, but it does not explain why this happened at this time, why there was this intense new interest in the world of nature and its workings.
The “new interest” in nature had to come from outside science. In fact, it often came from
neo-Platonic and hermetic notions of natural magic. As Yates says, magic promoted a new
conception of humanity as an active controller of natural forces and inspired an effort to
understand nature’s mysterious workings.
The Yates thesis sparked extensive polemical debate and helped inspire a new generation
of historians who began to work on topics previously deemed marginal and insignificant.
https://www.amazon.com/Soul-Science-Christian-Natural-Philosophy/dp/0891077669
Renaissance humanism grew out of a revival of the hermetic, neo-Platonic tradition. From my book Saving Leonardo:
During the Renaissance, the Platonic Academy in Florence revived neo-Platonism. Philosophers such as Marsilio Ficino regarded it as a “perennial” wisdom given by God to the Gentiles, parallel to the Old Testament given to the Hebrews. As a result, they were convinced that they could harmonize this perennial wisdom with Christianity. What they really did was transform it into Renaissance humanism.
Recall that for neo-Platonism, the source of evil and suffering was dualism. The spirit was trapped within matter (the body), which was subject to death and corruption. Ficino’s philosophy thus began with the question: How can we overcome dualism? His answer was that humans must rule over matter. Created in the image of God, the human being must become a “terrestrial god.” He is “god of the animals” because he governs them; he is “god of all materials” because he uses them to manufacture the things he needs. Instead of calling for a monastic retreat *from* the world, Renaissance humanism called for mastery *of* the world. The old-age dichotomy of spirit and matter would be overcome as spirit conquers matter. In this way, writes one historian, Renaissance thinkers hoped to overcome “the impediments and limitations resulting from man’s dualistic nature.”
https://www.amazon.com/Saving-Leonardo-Secular-Assault-Meaning/dp/1433669277
You mentioned Madame Blavatsky. Artists are well aware of theosophy:
Hegel’s philosophy appeared before any of these archeological facts were available, so it was entirely speculative. Yet it had enormous impact. Spiritualized versions of evolution became hugely popular, especially among artistic and literary figures. They began flocking to assorted spiritual and mystical techniques—astrology, mediums, séances, automatic writing, psychic research, and spirit guides. They embraced occult philosophies such as Theosophy, which had roots in neo-Platonism. In earlier ages, as we have seen, theologians had sought to make neo-Platonism compatible with Christianity. But now people tended to be more intrigued by its affinities with Eastern thought. Schopenhauer became the first philosopher to import full-blown Buddhism into the West. (Nietzsche dubbed his philosophy “European Buddhism.”) Because Schopenhauer also offered a highly influential aesthetic theory, his Eastern ideas penetrated deeply into the art world.
However, it was a Russian medium named Madame Blavatsky who had the greatest impact
on artists. In the late nineteenth century she developed Theosophy into its modern form. It became a common-denominator mysticism that synthesized Eastern and Western thought, teaching that everything is part of an all-pervading divine essence. Through mystical experiences, the mind can evolve to higher levels of consciousness until it reaches a state of oneness with ultimate reality, the Absolute.,,,
Consider, for example, the twentieth-century abstract expressionist Ad Reinhardt, who was deeply influenced by Theosophy. He “developed a religious perspective that blends Eastern and Western mysticism to form what is, in effect, an artistic via negativa,” says
postmodern theologian Mark Taylor. Reinhardt is best known for a series of black paintings that represent, in his own words, a “mystical ascent.” The mind leaves
behind “the world of appearances” composed of separate images until it reaches an “undifferentiated unity.” In this state, there is “no consciousness of anything”
and “all distinctions disappear in darkness.” The mind attains “the divine dark.” It has immersed itself in the cloud of unknowing.
https://www.amazon.com/Saving-Leonardo-Secular-Assault-Meaning/dp/1433669277
I think the broader label that might be helpful is neo-Platonism.
Like the Romantics, the symbolists mined mythology and dream imagery. The dramatist
August Strindberg wrote plays with titles like The Ghost Sonata and A Dream Play. They believed that these dream-like symbols had immense power because they functioned as windows into a higher reality. Where did this conviction come from? It was derived from “the neo-Platonic concept . . . that natural forms were living symbols of a higher reality and that the artist’s imagination was the key that could reveal these spiritual truths.”21
That may sound abstract, but we can understand it better by focusing on that term neo-
Platonic. Though we have touched on this philosophy a few times already, we must now dig more deeply, for it played an enormous role in the continental tradition. Neo-Platonism was founded in the third century by a Greek philosopher named Plotinus, who sought to imbue philosophy with the inspirational power of a religion. He patched together elements from the major Western thinkers—Pythagoras, Plato, Aristotle, the Stoics—then cast his net still further to include Eastern thought. From these diverse sources, Plotinus crafted a “big tent” worldview.
You might think of neo-Platonism as the New Age movement of the ancient world because it combined elements from both East and West .22 Its central concept, as we saw earlier, was that ultimate reality is the One, the Absolute. This was not a personal God who thinks, feels, wills, and acts. Instead it was a nonpersonal essence or substance. But how does a nonpersonal essence create the world, since it cannot consciously will or act? Neo-Platonism answered that the One was so “full” of being that it simply emanated other beings automatically, without conscious intention, like the sun radiating light or a fountain spurting water. The world was thus an emanation or manifestation of the divine being. Just as a fountain may cascade down in successive waterfalls, so the world consisted of several levels of being—first a succession of spiritual entities (somewhat like the ranks of angels), then humans, animals, plants, and finally rocks and inanimate matter. And just as the sun’s rays gradually fade into dark, so at each descending level, there was less spirit and more matter. The entire series of
emanations was called the Ladder of Life or Great Chain of Being. The goal of life was to reascend the ladder and re-unite in mystical union with the One.23
Back in the Roman Empire when neo-Platonism was first proposed, its main appeal was
that it offered an alternative to Christianity. During the first three centuries after Christ, the Christian church grew so rapidly that pagans began casting about for a philosophy attractive enough to counter it. Neo-Platonism seemed to fit the bill. It was not just a philosophy but also a mystical vision of spiritual ascent. Soon it was being wielded as a weapon by paganism in its battle against the church. When Roman emperors persecuted Christians, they often justified their harsh actions by citing the words of the neo-Platonic philosopher Porphyry, who was bitterly opposed to Christianity. In the fourth century, the emperor Julian tried to oust Christianity
and restore paganism as the official religion of the Roman Empire. Though he did not succeed, the form of paganism he sought to reinstate was neo-Platonism.
Plato and Modern Science
Despite this hostility to Christianity, surprisingly the church fathers did not reject neo-
Platonism outright. It did at least acknowledge the reality of a spiritual realm, in contrast to the materialist philosophers of the ancient world (such as Epicurus and Lucretius). Consequentlymany early Christian theologians—Clement, Origen, Augustine—reached over and borrowed philosophical arguments from neo-Platonism to defend doctrines such as the existence of the human soul. Augustine even said his conversion to Christianity was helped along by “certain books of the Platonists,” which historians believe were works by Plotinus. (The more precise term neo-Platonism was not coined until the nineteenth century.)
The writer whose neo-Platonism had the widest influence on later times went by the name of Dionysius the Areopagite, a convert of St. Paul mentioned in Acts 17:34. He was later discovered to be a fraud who lived four hundred years later, so today he is known as Pseudo-Dionysius. Yet for centuries his work was thought to be genuinely apostolic, and was therefore highly revered. Translated into Latin in the ninth century by John Scotus Eriugena, it influenced virtually of all of medieval theology.
During the Renaissance, this neo-Platonized Christianity became quite popular among
philosophers and artists (chapter 4). It also had a significant impact on the rise of modern science. Take heliocentrism, the idea that the sun, not the earth, is the center of the planetary system. Where did that idea come from? It was inspired by neo-Platonic dualism, in which God is the immanent soul of the material world. And what would be the most fitting place for the divine presence to be concentrated or localized? The sun. Just as God is the spiritual source of life, so the sun is the physical source of life on earth. And where should the sun be located? The most fitting place was the center of the universe, the only position compatible with its dignity as a divine symbol.
We detect a touch of this neo-Platonized Christianity in the writings of Copernicus, Kepler, and other champions of heliocentrism. In his writings, Copernicus quoted neo-Platonic literature hailing the sun as “the Visible God.” He described the sun as “the Lamp, the Mind, the Ruler of the Universe [who] sits as upon a royal throne ruling his children the planets which circle around him.” In a similar vein, Kepler wrote that the sun “alone appears, by virtue of his dignity and power, suited for this motive duty and worthy to become the home of God himself.”
Thus the concept of heliocentrism arose not so much for empirical reasons as for philosophicaland spiritual reasons.24
Among the early chemists, neo-Platonic dualism led to the conviction that every natural
substance consists of matter (called the passive element) combined with an internal divine spark or vital force (called the active element). The active element in any substance was thought to be the source of its potency—which is why the labels on medicine bottles still list the “active ingredients.” Paracelsus, one of the founders of the chemical approach to medicine in the sixteenth century, decided that the active or spiritual ingredients could be discovered by heating and distillation. For example, alcohol was referred to as the “spirit of wine”—which is why alcoholic drinks are still sometimes referred to as spirits.
Even the great Isaac Newton retained elements of neo-Platonism, especially in his theory of gravity. The mechanistic scientists of his day taught that causes and effects must have direct physical contact—just as a billiard ball can cause another ball to move only by colliding with it. But Newton’s concept of gravity works without any physical contact. The earth does not physically push and pull the moon to keep it in its orbit. Instead it exerts an invisible, intangible force. To mechanistic thinkers, that sounded like magic, not science. They reacted the way we might react to a movie scene when blue lightning zigzags out of a Jedi’s finger and causes a spaceship to rise.
Where, then, did Newton get his idea of force? From a neo-Platonized Christianity which suggested that invisible spiritual forces—active elements—represented God’s immanent power working in and through the created order. As one historian explains, the concept of force “served for Newton as a manifestation of the divine in the sensible world.”
Given this brief background, we can understand why the Romantics still considered neo-Platonism a live option for buttressing a spiritualized view of nature.
https://www.amazon.com/Saving-Leonardo-Secular-Assault-Meaning/dp/1433669277
One more comment–the relation of Hegel to neo-Platonism. From my book Finding Truth:
When the Romantics reached out for conceptual tools to
defend their spiritualized conception of the world, they revived
neo-Platonism, a version of idealism with roots in the third century.
University courses in philosophy often skip neo-Platonism.
(I did not have a course on it until graduate school.) Yet it had a
significant influence on Western history.25
As the name suggests, neo-Platonism started out with Plato’s
thought, which was patched together with bits and pieces from
other Greek schools of thought and then spiced with Eastern pantheism.
From these diverse sources, neo-Platonism crafted a “big
tent” worldview. You might think of it as the New Age movement
of the ancient world, combining elements from both East and
West.
The central tenet of neo-Platonism was that the world is an
emanation of a spiritual substance called the One or the Absolute.
Like a fountain cascading down through multiple levels, the One
emanated a descending series that flowed down through several
levels: from spiritual entities to human beings, then to sentient
creatures (animals), living things (plants), and finally material
things (rocks). This was called the ladder of life or the great chain
of being. The goal of the spiritual life was to re-ascend the ladder,
escape from matter, and reunite with the One.26
What attracted the Romantics to neo-Platonism was the
idea that nature is permeated by soul or spirit. For the idealists,
says Eagleton, the Absolute served “as a form of secularized
divinity.” This was not a personal God who thinks, feels, wills, and
acts. It was a non-personal spiritual essence or substance. Ralph
Waldo Emerson called it the Over-soul: “the soul of the whole …
the eternal ONE.”27
Hegel’s Evolutionary Deity
Neo-Platonism was given a novel twist by the philosopher Hegel,
who added the concept of historical development or evolution.
Until then, the ladder of life had been static. It was a fixed list
or inventory of the things that exist in the universe. But with
Hegel, the ladder became dynamic. To picture the change, you
might think of the ladder tilting over to become an escalator, with
the entire universe progressing upward through a series of stages.
Hegel called his pantheistic deity the Absolute Spirit or Universal
Mind. And because it was the soul of the world, it was said to
evolve along with the world.28
What Hegel was offering was a spiritualized version of evolution.
(Nietzsche even said that “without Hegel, there would
have been no Darwin.”) The difference is that Hegel applied the
concept of evolution not to biology but to the world of ideas. His
claim was that all our ideas—law, morality, religion, art, political
ideals—result from the gradual “actualization of the Universal
Mind” over the course of history. Everything is caught up in a vast
historical process advancing toward a final perfect state.29
For many people, the law of historical progress functioned as
a substitute for divine Providence. “When science seemed to take
God out of the universe, men had to deify some natural force, like
‘evolution,’” explains Randall.30 A goal-oriented version of evolution
comforted people with the hope that every event has a reason,
a purpose, within the upward progress of the universe as a whole.
https://www.amazon.com/Finding-Truth-Principles-Secularism-Substitutes-ebook/dp/B00QN345NG
Give us the 20 minutes. Marxism isn’t that hard to understand, nor is WOKE. Just call it Confusion and Evil on a large scale. I love listening to you, but say it in less words…..
Sorry to have to say it.
Lenin enabled Marx’s rescue from obscurity in the early 20th Century.
https://mobile.twitter.com/PhilWMagness/status/1608506473142697986
https://watergate.info/1960/08/21/nixon-the-meaning-of-communism-to-americans.html