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Guides for the Perplexed
Western Esotericism: A Guide for the Perplexed
Western esotericism has been a pervasive presence in Western culture from late antiquity to the present day, but until recently it was largely ignored by scholars and surrounded by misconceptions and prejudice. This accessible guide provides readers with the basic knowledge and tools that will allow them to find their way in this bewildering but fascinating field.
What is it that unites phenomena as diverse as ancient gnosticism and hermetism, the "occult sciences" of astrology, alchemy, and magic, rosicrucianism, as well as Christian theosophy, occultism, spiritualism, and the contemporary New Age spiritualities? What can the study of them teach us about our common cultural and intellectual heritage, and what is it that makes them relevant to contemporary concerns? How do we distinguish reliable historical knowledge from legends and fictions about esoteric traditions? These and many other questions are answered clearly and succinctly, so that the reader can find his way into the labyrinth of Western esotericism and out of it again.
What is it that unites phenomena as diverse as ancient gnosticism and hermetism, the "occult sciences" of astrology, alchemy, and magic, rosicrucianism, as well as Christian theosophy, occultism, spiritualism, and the contemporary New Age spiritualities? What can the study of them teach us about our common cultural and intellectual heritage, and what is it that makes them relevant to contemporary concerns? How do we distinguish reliable historical knowledge from legends and fictions about esoteric traditions? These and many other questions are answered clearly and succinctly, so that the reader can find his way into the labyrinth of Western esotericism and out of it again.
224 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2013
139 people are currently reading
1166 people want to read
About the author
Wouter J. Hanegraaff
32 books91 followersWouter J. Hanegraaff (1961) studied classical guitar at the Municipal Conservatory at Zwolle (1982-1987) and Cultural History at the University of Utrecht (1986-1990), with a specialization in alternative religious movements in the 20th century. From 1992-1996 he was a research assistant at the department for Study of Religions of the University of Utrecht, where he defendedhis dissertation New Age Religion and Western Culture: Esotericism in the Mirror of Secular Thought on 30 november 1995 (cum laude). From 1996 to 2000 he held a postdoctoral fellowship from the Dutch Assocation for Scientific Research (NWO), and spent a period working in Paris. On 1 september 1999 he was appointed full professor of History of Hermetic Philosophy and Related Currents at the University of Amsterdam. From 2002-2006 he was president of the Dutch Society for the Study of Religion (NGG). From 2005-2013 he was President of the EuropeanSociety for the Study of Western Esotericism (ESSWE). In 2006 he was elected member of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences (Koninklijke Nederlandse Academie van Wetenschappen, KNAW); since 2013 he is an honorary member of the European Society for the Study of Western Esotericism.
Editorial Activities
From 2001-2010 Hanegraaff was editor (with Antoine Faivre and Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke) of Aries: Journal for the Study of Western Esotericism (Brill publ.) and from 2006-2010 editor of the " Aries Book Series: Texts and Studies in Western Esotericism" (Brill publ.). He is member of the editorial board of the journals Aries (Brill), Numen (Brill), Religion Compass and Esoterica , and of the advisory board of Journal of Contemporary Religion (Carfax) and Nova Religio (University of California Press).
Editorial Activities
From 2001-2010 Hanegraaff was editor (with Antoine Faivre and Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke) of Aries: Journal for the Study of Western Esotericism (Brill publ.) and from 2006-2010 editor of the " Aries Book Series: Texts and Studies in Western Esotericism" (Brill publ.). He is member of the editorial board of the journals Aries (Brill), Numen (Brill), Religion Compass and Esoterica , and of the advisory board of Journal of Contemporary Religion (Carfax) and Nova Religio (University of California Press).
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 40 reviews
September 29, 2019
This is an introductory textbook, aimed primarily at university students. As such it takes a thoroughly outsider position on the practices of magick, hermeticism, esotericism, etc. That was precisely why I read it: to get a different viewpoint on a field where I'm a practitioner. I found it interesting and often refreshing.
Chief among the book's refreshing aspects is its historicism. Indeed, this is the main thrust of Hanegraaff's argument throughout. While he is concerned to establish Western esotericism as a focus for interdisciplinary research, he explicitly insists that all scholars, in whatever discipline, should take a historicist approach. I found this particularly refreshing because I am constantly exasperated (on my blog here, for example) by some practitioners' wild and silly claims about the "ancientness" of recently invented practices and the "continuity" of traditions that have none. Hanegraaff paints compelling portraits of the historical emergence of specific traditions, and even of the idea of the "esoteric" as a whole.
That being said, the book has some shortcomings. Given its length, it can't help but be very schematic. It attempts to compensate by devoting the final chapter to an annotated bibliography for the reader to follow up particular topics for herself – but bibliographies inevitably go out of date sooner or later.
More seriously, the book is extremely badly written, with the usual academic-ese (why can so few academics write well?) compounded by the facts that (a) English is not the author's first language and (b) it seems not to have been proofread properly. I don't mind if I have to reread a sentence several times because it contains new concepts or complex ideas. I do mind having to reread a sentence that just doesn't make sense because it uses the wrong prepositions.
I picked up the book after hearing Hanegraaff being interviewed on an early episode of SHWEP. I'm glad I did, but I'll stick with SHWEP rather than going in search of any more of his books for now.
Chief among the book's refreshing aspects is its historicism. Indeed, this is the main thrust of Hanegraaff's argument throughout. While he is concerned to establish Western esotericism as a focus for interdisciplinary research, he explicitly insists that all scholars, in whatever discipline, should take a historicist approach. I found this particularly refreshing because I am constantly exasperated (on my blog here, for example) by some practitioners' wild and silly claims about the "ancientness" of recently invented practices and the "continuity" of traditions that have none. Hanegraaff paints compelling portraits of the historical emergence of specific traditions, and even of the idea of the "esoteric" as a whole.
That being said, the book has some shortcomings. Given its length, it can't help but be very schematic. It attempts to compensate by devoting the final chapter to an annotated bibliography for the reader to follow up particular topics for herself – but bibliographies inevitably go out of date sooner or later.
More seriously, the book is extremely badly written, with the usual academic-ese (why can so few academics write well?) compounded by the facts that (a) English is not the author's first language and (b) it seems not to have been proofread properly. I don't mind if I have to reread a sentence several times because it contains new concepts or complex ideas. I do mind having to reread a sentence that just doesn't make sense because it uses the wrong prepositions.
I picked up the book after hearing Hanegraaff being interviewed on an early episode of SHWEP. I'm glad I did, but I'll stick with SHWEP rather than going in search of any more of his books for now.
December 20, 2015
This was a good overview of the subject, building on the many articles Hanegraaf has put out over the years. (He is very prolific.)
The book is unapologetically polemical: Hanegraaff wants to introduce and defend a relatively new field of study, that of Western esotericism, which he admits is kind of a grab bag of topics, from Renaissance Hermeticism to NeaoPlatonism to Crowleyian magic to (parts of) science fiction.
Part of Hanegraaff's point is to explain exactly why the field is a grab bag. In his telling, there's a grand narrative to Western religion: early Christianity defined itself against Paganism; the Reformation defined itself against Paganism, and the infusions of Paganism in earlier Christian cultures; and the Enlightenment defined itself against the "superstitious" elements it found within Christianity (not necessarily against Christianity itself). These things that comprised the other in each confrontation, these became varieties of esotericism. (Though Hanegraaff admits that term is limited, and not really descriptive of the many practices, it is the term scholars have agreed upon.)
It isn't that people stopped believing in and practicing these various forms of esotericism--they just became neglected as the academic disciplines congealed in the 18th and 19th centuries. Looking at these subjects was considered bad form--it was all superstition, the worst impulses of human culture. It was neglected, or forgotten knowledge. (As it happened, official dismissals of these various ideas helped to make them even more tempting to some people--no fruit tastes as good as the forbidden one.)
Eventually, by the mid-20th century some scholars did start to turn their attention to these subjects, particularly Frances A. Yates. (Hanegraaff doesn't spend much time on her, dismissing her work as riddled with errors.) As he sees it, though, the motivating factor of these early researches was ahistorical: what he calls religionist. The authors argued that there was a transcendent religious impulse in humanity that explained the pull toward esotericism. This explanation especially made sense in the 1960s and 1970s, when scholars were puzzling over why the secularization thesis had not worked out: why religion had not died away and, indeed was seeing a revival, both in terms of fundamentalism but also what was called the "occult revival." (Hanegraaff is surprisingly positive about the work of James Webb.)
We are now entering a third era in the study of esotericism, the one that Hanegraaff defends and defines. That is seeing esotericism not as a transcendent impulse, but as a historical category, a set of ideas and practices that change over time in relationship to the wider culture. Thus esotericism renovates in response to the Protestant Reformation, the Enlightenment, the development of professional science in the 19th century, and the triumph of instrumental reason in the 20th. The book, in part, charts these changes.
It is a short book, so many of these changes are just glossed. There are also some confusions of terminology--with Hanegraaff applying the categories "Theosophy" and "naturphilosophie" to much older traditions than I am used to seeing. He is very learned, and ranges across a wide array of cultural changes over a long term, and some of that ranging makes me nervous: it is often difficult to accept that dynamics laid down in the sixteenth century are still playing themselves out three hundred years later, for example. Nonetheless, it is all interesting and worth pondering.
Hanegraaff has a very categorical mind: it's what makes him easy to read, and his papers easy to follow. And this is shown in the second part of the book, chapters four through seven. The chapters themselves take up various themes, and these are broken down by category. Thus, in chapter four, he looks at world views inherent to esotericism--there are the two types of radicalism, monistic and dualistic, the second of which is more common. Then there are the ideas about what mediates between the dual spheres of the material and spiritual realms, NeoPlatonic sense that humans exist on a Great Chain of Being, between the animalistic and the divine; and the alchemical sense that transformation can bring the human closer to the divine. These various world views, of course, change over time.
He then turns to the various ways knowledge is created--which is a more recent innovation in scholarship, coming in these last thirty years, allowing that esotericists have defined methods of knowledge-making, even if they are not widely accepted. The methods are reason--not something exclusive to science--faith--which is also part of science, since many scientific principles are accepted on faith--and gnosis, which involves access to realms beyond the ability of humans to communicate and often rely on alterations in consciousness to reach.
Practices he divides into eight categories: (1) Control; (2) Knowledge; (3) Amplification; (4) Healing; (5) Progress; (6) Contact; (7) Unity; (8) Pleasure.
The penultimate chapter represents a third section of the book, taking these various structural elements and showing how they change over time in a process he calls "modernization"--but which dates to the Enlightenment. (The Enlightenment, for Hanegraaff, is a major dividing line.) He again divides the chapter into various categories. The first is correspondences, and he argues here, as he has in some of his papers, that while the theory of correspondences was held together by a belief in a central divine figure in pre-Enlightenment times, it is more arbitrary in later forms of esotericism. (I would have liked to see him engage with Alex Owen's work here, but it is never referenced.) A second transformation deals with the expanding horizons of religion, which in the past he has somewhat associated with secularism: by his lights, secularization means that Christianity becomes one of many different religious options, and in terms of this category he looks at how esotericists, especially in the 19th century, turned to other religions, especially those in the East. (He does not mention that many of these so-called religions, such as Buddhism, were not understood as religions within their own cultures.)
Evolution also becomes important; the 18th century bequeathed to us moderns the ideas that there could be spiritual progress and development. Evolution, as an idea, of course gets worked into esotericism in many ways---think of the Theosophists with their seven root races, for example. The development of psychology also plays a huge role in the history of Western esoteric traditions, as the interior or the mind becomes a place to explore, and the self something to realize. He ends this section with the idea of the "religious supermarket": that in the current environment, we are all free to choose are own religion, and shape it in ways we want. He offers some defintiional guides to understanding these practices, and makes some references to the most current forms of esotericism which completely negate the division between fact and fiction.
A final section is a useful, but incomplete, review of literature on the various topics he has covered. The annotated bibliography is heavy on European scholars of earlier periods, and light on research of more recent forms of esotericism. (Which may reflect Hanegraaff's idea, implied in the book, that the fragmentation of esotericism--the supermarket of faiths--means the the study of the phenomena needs to be taken up by various and separate disciplines.)
All in all, a good guide.
The book is unapologetically polemical: Hanegraaff wants to introduce and defend a relatively new field of study, that of Western esotericism, which he admits is kind of a grab bag of topics, from Renaissance Hermeticism to NeaoPlatonism to Crowleyian magic to (parts of) science fiction.
Part of Hanegraaff's point is to explain exactly why the field is a grab bag. In his telling, there's a grand narrative to Western religion: early Christianity defined itself against Paganism; the Reformation defined itself against Paganism, and the infusions of Paganism in earlier Christian cultures; and the Enlightenment defined itself against the "superstitious" elements it found within Christianity (not necessarily against Christianity itself). These things that comprised the other in each confrontation, these became varieties of esotericism. (Though Hanegraaff admits that term is limited, and not really descriptive of the many practices, it is the term scholars have agreed upon.)
It isn't that people stopped believing in and practicing these various forms of esotericism--they just became neglected as the academic disciplines congealed in the 18th and 19th centuries. Looking at these subjects was considered bad form--it was all superstition, the worst impulses of human culture. It was neglected, or forgotten knowledge. (As it happened, official dismissals of these various ideas helped to make them even more tempting to some people--no fruit tastes as good as the forbidden one.)
Eventually, by the mid-20th century some scholars did start to turn their attention to these subjects, particularly Frances A. Yates. (Hanegraaff doesn't spend much time on her, dismissing her work as riddled with errors.) As he sees it, though, the motivating factor of these early researches was ahistorical: what he calls religionist. The authors argued that there was a transcendent religious impulse in humanity that explained the pull toward esotericism. This explanation especially made sense in the 1960s and 1970s, when scholars were puzzling over why the secularization thesis had not worked out: why religion had not died away and, indeed was seeing a revival, both in terms of fundamentalism but also what was called the "occult revival." (Hanegraaff is surprisingly positive about the work of James Webb.)
We are now entering a third era in the study of esotericism, the one that Hanegraaff defends and defines. That is seeing esotericism not as a transcendent impulse, but as a historical category, a set of ideas and practices that change over time in relationship to the wider culture. Thus esotericism renovates in response to the Protestant Reformation, the Enlightenment, the development of professional science in the 19th century, and the triumph of instrumental reason in the 20th. The book, in part, charts these changes.
It is a short book, so many of these changes are just glossed. There are also some confusions of terminology--with Hanegraaff applying the categories "Theosophy" and "naturphilosophie" to much older traditions than I am used to seeing. He is very learned, and ranges across a wide array of cultural changes over a long term, and some of that ranging makes me nervous: it is often difficult to accept that dynamics laid down in the sixteenth century are still playing themselves out three hundred years later, for example. Nonetheless, it is all interesting and worth pondering.
Hanegraaff has a very categorical mind: it's what makes him easy to read, and his papers easy to follow. And this is shown in the second part of the book, chapters four through seven. The chapters themselves take up various themes, and these are broken down by category. Thus, in chapter four, he looks at world views inherent to esotericism--there are the two types of radicalism, monistic and dualistic, the second of which is more common. Then there are the ideas about what mediates between the dual spheres of the material and spiritual realms, NeoPlatonic sense that humans exist on a Great Chain of Being, between the animalistic and the divine; and the alchemical sense that transformation can bring the human closer to the divine. These various world views, of course, change over time.
He then turns to the various ways knowledge is created--which is a more recent innovation in scholarship, coming in these last thirty years, allowing that esotericists have defined methods of knowledge-making, even if they are not widely accepted. The methods are reason--not something exclusive to science--faith--which is also part of science, since many scientific principles are accepted on faith--and gnosis, which involves access to realms beyond the ability of humans to communicate and often rely on alterations in consciousness to reach.
Practices he divides into eight categories: (1) Control; (2) Knowledge; (3) Amplification; (4) Healing; (5) Progress; (6) Contact; (7) Unity; (8) Pleasure.
The penultimate chapter represents a third section of the book, taking these various structural elements and showing how they change over time in a process he calls "modernization"--but which dates to the Enlightenment. (The Enlightenment, for Hanegraaff, is a major dividing line.) He again divides the chapter into various categories. The first is correspondences, and he argues here, as he has in some of his papers, that while the theory of correspondences was held together by a belief in a central divine figure in pre-Enlightenment times, it is more arbitrary in later forms of esotericism. (I would have liked to see him engage with Alex Owen's work here, but it is never referenced.) A second transformation deals with the expanding horizons of religion, which in the past he has somewhat associated with secularism: by his lights, secularization means that Christianity becomes one of many different religious options, and in terms of this category he looks at how esotericists, especially in the 19th century, turned to other religions, especially those in the East. (He does not mention that many of these so-called religions, such as Buddhism, were not understood as religions within their own cultures.)
Evolution also becomes important; the 18th century bequeathed to us moderns the ideas that there could be spiritual progress and development. Evolution, as an idea, of course gets worked into esotericism in many ways---think of the Theosophists with their seven root races, for example. The development of psychology also plays a huge role in the history of Western esoteric traditions, as the interior or the mind becomes a place to explore, and the self something to realize. He ends this section with the idea of the "religious supermarket": that in the current environment, we are all free to choose are own religion, and shape it in ways we want. He offers some defintiional guides to understanding these practices, and makes some references to the most current forms of esotericism which completely negate the division between fact and fiction.
A final section is a useful, but incomplete, review of literature on the various topics he has covered. The annotated bibliography is heavy on European scholars of earlier periods, and light on research of more recent forms of esotericism. (Which may reflect Hanegraaff's idea, implied in the book, that the fragmentation of esotericism--the supermarket of faiths--means the the study of the phenomena needs to be taken up by various and separate disciplines.)
All in all, a good guide.
June 25, 2021
Wouter J Hanegraaff’s Guide for the Perplexed is intended to provide a lucid and accessible overview of the relatively young (academic) field of Western Esotericism and the currents that gave it rise. I found the book to accomplish just that. Hanegraaff’s text is methodical, organized and thorough as far as an introductory text. His practical and unadorned prose keep the eye and mind gliding along without undue effort, which is a feat considering that he pays heed to many of the predominant ambiguities: internal and external conflicts of interest and thought that occur within the field whilst also managing to contain them within a rather concise volume. Guide for the Perplexed provides a sturdy and articulate skeleton upon which the flesh of further studies might be hung.
November 5, 2024
Maybe I wasn’t the intended audience for this book since I can see it as beneficial for an introduction to western esotericism class for a philosophy course. However, I didn’t really learn much at all. The author doesn’t go into any detail whatsoever about specific western esoteric schools or traditions — the only detailed part was categorising certain schools of thought into Platonic/Alchemical/metaphysical worldviews. Much of the book is dedicated to talking about the study of Western esotericism which I think was too long.
It’s odd that there were no details about specific traditions/schools yet at the end of the book there is a list of academic works for each major school of Western esotericism yet there’s not even a blurb about what these schools believed in and rarelyare the actual primary sources for each tradition recommended, just academic secondary literature.
Overall a waste of time for someone who was expecting summary of each major school or tradition making up the so-called Western Esoteric tradition.
It’s odd that there were no details about specific traditions/schools yet at the end of the book there is a list of academic works for each major school of Western esotericism yet there’s not even a blurb about what these schools believed in and rarelyare the actual primary sources for each tradition recommended, just academic secondary literature.
Overall a waste of time for someone who was expecting summary of each major school or tradition making up the so-called Western Esoteric tradition.
November 23, 2025
Seriously, start here
March 28, 2021
This is a truly excellent overview of a fledgling academic discipline covering an ancient (some, not Hanegraaff, would say perennial) topic. Hanegraaff all but forged the current approach to western esotericism himself, which is often obvious given the scores of footnotes citing his other works. In fact, it can feel like you're getting a "lite" version of his scholarship, given all the links to his deeper works.
Above all else, Hanegraaff is a careful scholar, and therefore an eminently trustworthy guide. He is not wont to give himself over to speculative fancies or an unseemly interest in the metaphysical subject of his studies. He has two overarching principles here: demonstrate that there is a body of knowledge loosely bound together by its character as "rejected" which runs through western thought, and historicize that body of knowledge to show that it is dynamic, evolving, and, from the start to the present, prone to efforts by enthusiasts to mythologize it as perennial, unchanging, and unitary. He is extremely persuasive on both these points.
The structure of the book is a little odd. It begins with a historiographical overview, proceeds to a lightning-round historical survey, then loops back with more thematic chapters that highlight certain threads from the larger story. He concludes with a rich and useful annotated bibliography that will provide wonderful jumping-off points for various topics. It's clear on every page that Hanegraaff is positively swimming in this stuff, and the reader here is getting but a small taste of his vast erudition. It is fascinating, tantalizing, and probably not satisfying on its own to those with an interest in this field. Nonetheless, this is an excellent introductory survey of a vast and amorphous field that touches on almost every part of the western intellectual tradition.
Above all else, Hanegraaff is a careful scholar, and therefore an eminently trustworthy guide. He is not wont to give himself over to speculative fancies or an unseemly interest in the metaphysical subject of his studies. He has two overarching principles here: demonstrate that there is a body of knowledge loosely bound together by its character as "rejected" which runs through western thought, and historicize that body of knowledge to show that it is dynamic, evolving, and, from the start to the present, prone to efforts by enthusiasts to mythologize it as perennial, unchanging, and unitary. He is extremely persuasive on both these points.
The structure of the book is a little odd. It begins with a historiographical overview, proceeds to a lightning-round historical survey, then loops back with more thematic chapters that highlight certain threads from the larger story. He concludes with a rich and useful annotated bibliography that will provide wonderful jumping-off points for various topics. It's clear on every page that Hanegraaff is positively swimming in this stuff, and the reader here is getting but a small taste of his vast erudition. It is fascinating, tantalizing, and probably not satisfying on its own to those with an interest in this field. Nonetheless, this is an excellent introductory survey of a vast and amorphous field that touches on almost every part of the western intellectual tradition.
June 10, 2024
Not so much an overview of Western Esotericism as an overview of the study of the academic field of Western Esotericism. Very much focused on the “western” (I mean, it’s right there in the title), by which the author means European and European American, from the Greco-Roman to the NRMs of the past 20-30 years, with acknowledgements of the foundational underpinnings provided by Egyptian, Persian, Islamic, Judaic, and more recently the north and south Asian influences from India, China, Japan, and other traditions. Heavily locked onto the Christian (and Catholic in particular) handling of esotericism. This isn’t so much a narrative as a map of where you might start if you want to dig into this topic. This definitely not a “how-to,” unless of course that how to is “how to begin studying western esoteric traditions.” This can be a bit dry in spots, but I was nevertheless engaged and underlining throughout. This topic is, as the author points out, “rejected knowledge,” but also as he points out, there is much we don’t know and understand about science, medicine, mathematics, etc because we haven’t been taught how intertwined those fields once explicitly were with esoteric and occult thought. A great intro text.
December 15, 2024
Excellent outline of the diverse esoteric traditions rich with sources and historical context to better understand these concepts. Much of esoterica is clumped together and it becomes difficult to distinguish each for its purpose or trace its origins; most just dismiss it as some kind of pagan rituals but Hanegraaff in a lovely manner traces this bias to Christian history.
Big thanks for not having a 'believer vs skeptic' divide - this quite literally is a history book minus the "you won't get it" snobbery and unnecessary detail about Hermes Trismegistus and Rosicrucianism. I mean, the guy was able to clarify Aleister Crowley for me, while most other sources are just too afraid to engage with his idea or rituals
Big thanks for not having a 'believer vs skeptic' divide - this quite literally is a history book minus the "you won't get it" snobbery and unnecessary detail about Hermes Trismegistus and Rosicrucianism. I mean, the guy was able to clarify Aleister Crowley for me, while most other sources are just too afraid to engage with his idea or rituals
February 25, 2013
As the vulgata apocrypha attributed to some twentieth-century occultist: 'I'm perplexed.'
August 12, 2021
Very good, I was somewhat relieved of my perplexion
October 27, 2023
A postmodern "guide" to "esotericism," full of polemical dialectics aimed at delegitimizing the transhistorical and transcultural logic of religious experience.
December 20, 2020
What is Western esotericism? You may well ask, and the author, a distinguished Dutch academic, spends the first chapter trying to answer the question and worries away at it in asides throughout the book. Perhaps the best way of describing it, now, is marginal knowledge: the bits that don't fit neatly under the tags of arts or science. But perhaps a better way of expressing it, which Hanegraaff does not say in his book, is that esoteric knowledge bears the same relationship to human understanding that professional sportsmen do in comparison to amateurs. Let me explain. Back in the 14th, 15th and 16th centuries, when the Western esoteric tradition was taking form as an agglomeration of knowledge drawn from sources as diverse as Platonism, Hermes Trismegistus, Christian mysticism, Kabbalah, Pythagoreanism and early natural philosophy, there was a legitimate question as to the nature of knowledge, namely, could everyone understand it? Once some piece of knowledge was uncovered, did it then become open to all, like opening Tutahkhamun's tomb. Or was the knowledge accessible only to those who had trod the path to its attainment? To make this clearer, I can play cricket. I know how to play a cover drive, a backward defensive, and so on. But no matter how much I practise, I will never make a professional cricketer, let alone ascend to the ranks of an all-time great such as David Gower (I can still remember the first time I saw the teenage Gower bat in a Sunday League match on Sunday on BBC2 when, in the golden light of a September evening, he seemed a curly haired god bestriding the world of mortals, sending the ball where he willed with the merest flick of his wrists: that is the mark of true greatness in any field, be it sporting or artistic). In some fields, mastery is beyond all but a small elite of people. The question in the early modern period was whether knowledge was like that. The answer we went for, the answer of the modified form of natural philosophy that became modern science, was no. It might take an Einstein to discover relativity but having made his way up the mountain of knowledge he can bring its fruits down to the rest of us. However, western esotericism holds that there are some forms of knowledge that can only be gained by those who climb the mountain: they cannot be shared, only seen. Another analogy would be my knowledge of the colour red. The only way I can truly share this with you, if you have never seen red, is to give you a tomato and say, "Look, this is red."
That is western esotericism. Hanegraaff is one of a number of scholars now working in this previously little studied field and he is a fervent advocate of studying it in a historical manner, tracing influences, lineages, and developments in its history. What he is adamant scholars should not do is engage in any evaluation of the truth of what the esotericists claim. This, Hanegraaff claims, goes outside the purview of scholarship in this field. However, by deliberately laying aside questions of truth, when Western Esotericism is fundamentally a search for truth, is like trying to study music without listening to any music. Yes, you might learn something about music, from its development to biographies of its practioners to some simple musical theory perhaps, but you will miss the heart, the key, the life; you will miss the music itself. Hanegraaff's approach misses the music.
So, overall, the book provides a good overview of Western esotericism, clarifies some of the people and schools involved in its various traditions, while remaining little more than an exercise in classification. On a completely separate note, the book has one of the ugliest covers I have ever seen, and one that has really no connection to the subject. The paper the front cover is made from also feels peculiarly unpleasant to the touch. Overall, an interesting but limited approach to the subject.
That is western esotericism. Hanegraaff is one of a number of scholars now working in this previously little studied field and he is a fervent advocate of studying it in a historical manner, tracing influences, lineages, and developments in its history. What he is adamant scholars should not do is engage in any evaluation of the truth of what the esotericists claim. This, Hanegraaff claims, goes outside the purview of scholarship in this field. However, by deliberately laying aside questions of truth, when Western Esotericism is fundamentally a search for truth, is like trying to study music without listening to any music. Yes, you might learn something about music, from its development to biographies of its practioners to some simple musical theory perhaps, but you will miss the heart, the key, the life; you will miss the music itself. Hanegraaff's approach misses the music.
So, overall, the book provides a good overview of Western esotericism, clarifies some of the people and schools involved in its various traditions, while remaining little more than an exercise in classification. On a completely separate note, the book has one of the ugliest covers I have ever seen, and one that has really no connection to the subject. The paper the front cover is made from also feels peculiarly unpleasant to the touch. Overall, an interesting but limited approach to the subject.
July 9, 2025
Read it twice in two days.
why not 5 stars?
he's missing too many chunks, relying on too few resources. not meant to be exhaustive, i realize.
some of his categorizations are useful others, others much less so, i suspect because he's himself an agnostic materialist so nothing rings as deeply true or possible actions in magic/God/etc (very ME projecting i know)
humorously makes islam and persia/iran and egypt into the exotic and unknowable "east/orient"
making the "western" in the title levant tribes, greece, rome, catholic and then protestant europe. maybe that's how academia splits the baby but that's hilariously reductionist, imo.
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okay okay those are mostly minor quibbles. he's stuck in academia, trying to drag this un-academic subject into his co-workers version of acceptability. (good luck bro) all in all it's a good book. solid. covers extensive ground in some particular areas (italy/bruno/pico for one).
the third chapter (the meat of i assume his own thinking on the historicity of things) is FAR and AWAY the best bit. Maybe his decent metaphors near the very end being useful as well (gardener vs botanist etc).
why not 5 stars?
he's missing too many chunks, relying on too few resources. not meant to be exhaustive, i realize.
some of his categorizations are useful others, others much less so, i suspect because he's himself an agnostic materialist so nothing rings as deeply true or possible actions in magic/God/etc (very ME projecting i know)
humorously makes islam and persia/iran and egypt into the exotic and unknowable "east/orient"
making the "western" in the title levant tribes, greece, rome, catholic and then protestant europe. maybe that's how academia splits the baby but that's hilariously reductionist, imo.
__
okay okay those are mostly minor quibbles. he's stuck in academia, trying to drag this un-academic subject into his co-workers version of acceptability. (good luck bro) all in all it's a good book. solid. covers extensive ground in some particular areas (italy/bruno/pico for one).
the third chapter (the meat of i assume his own thinking on the historicity of things) is FAR and AWAY the best bit. Maybe his decent metaphors near the very end being useful as well (gardener vs botanist etc).
April 28, 2019
什么是西方神秘学？在西方人文科学发展时，有一种文化元素，它完全以意识作为自己的研究领域，在意识层面探究个人精神与非物质宇宙之间的关系，并且渗透，影响着哲学、宗教、科学发展，这个文化元素叫隐秘知识，研究隐秘知识对文化产生影响的学科叫西方神秘学。
相比“可交流可观察可证伪”的科学和“可交流不可证伪”的神学，注重个人意识体验的“不可交流不可证伪”的神秘学自然而然的被传统学科排斥。然而不在科学的研究范围内，不代表这种文化元素就不存在，就对世界没有影响，就是彻底的胡说。如果说世界是一个花园，那么学者应该成为这个花园中的生物学家，而不是成为园丁。而很多“园丁”在把人类文化世界中的杂草与蘑菇去掉，这就导致了大家对神秘学的误解。
隐秘知识其实在18世纪之前从未脱离宗教而独立存在（往往作为某种宗教的对立面），无论是赫尔墨斯主义、柏拉图神智学说还是琐罗亚斯德哲学观或者是印度教的婆罗门哲学观。但自从启蒙运动开始后，随着社会的发展，宗教世界逐渐向“宗教超市”的方向发展，这导致18世纪的隐秘知识可以独立存在，在这段时间内，威廉·布莱克的神秘艺术就已经开始自己创造神话了，因此也成就了洛夫克拉夫特创作的后世的克苏鲁神话体系。
神秘学影响体现在西方文化的各个方面，从符号学到无线电，从性仪式到探究外星文明，都是隐秘知识的探究区域。同时，随着西方神学研究逐渐精英化，隐秘知识也将大量的东方文化带入西方。在当代隐秘知识的影响下，恐怖片、邪典电影、近代的魔戒、克苏鲁小说等流行文化，都在蓬勃发展。因此神秘学已然成为一门不再“无家可归”的人文科学学科。
相比“可交流可观察可证伪”的科学和“可交流不可证伪”的神学，注重个人意识体验的“不可交流不可证伪”的神秘学自然而然的被传统学科排斥。然而不在科学的研究范围内，不代表这种文化元素就不存在，就对世界没有影响，就是彻底的胡说。如果说世界是一个花园，那么学者应该成为这个花园中的生物学家，而不是成为园丁。而很多“园丁”在把人类文化世界中的杂草与蘑菇去掉，这就导致了大家对神秘学的误解。
隐秘知识其实在18世纪之前从未脱离宗教而独立存在（往往作为某种宗教的对立面），无论是赫尔墨斯主义、柏拉图神智学说还是琐罗亚斯德哲学观或者是印度教的婆罗门哲学观。但自从启蒙运动开始后，随着社会的发展，宗教世界逐渐向“宗教超市”的方向发展，这导致18世纪的隐秘知识可以独立存在，在这段时间内，威廉·布莱克的神秘艺术就已经开始自己创造神话了，因此也成就了洛夫克拉夫特创作的后世的克苏鲁神话体系。
神秘学影响体现在西方文化的各个方面，从符号学到无线电，从性仪式到探究外星文明，都是隐秘知识的探究区域。同时，随着西方神学研究逐渐精英化，隐秘知识也将大量的东方文化带入西方。在当代隐秘知识的影响下，恐怖片、邪典电影、近代的魔戒、克苏鲁小说等流行文化，都在蓬勃发展。因此神秘学已然成为一门不再“无家可归”的人文科学学科。
December 1, 2025
3.5 stars out of five, rounded up to four. A solid introduction to Western Esotericism and the historical context behind its development. The writing leans heavily academic, which makes the delivery a bit dry at times.
Given the scope of the subject, it’s understandable that a book of under 200 pages can only offer a broad overview, but I appreciate the orientation it provides and the grounding it’s given me in the broader historical evolution of these ideas.
Given the scope of the subject, it’s understandable that a book of under 200 pages can only offer a broad overview, but I appreciate the orientation it provides and the grounding it’s given me in the broader historical evolution of these ideas.
April 2, 2019
Very short, concise and to the point. Scholarly. If you are looking for something sensational, stay away. Very much a work of academia. Talks almost as much about the study of esotericism as esotericism itself. Yeah, I guess it's more of a study guide. In that sense it does work as a primer before diving in.
June 21, 2020
As an introduction to the field of esotericism, this works fine. However, it is fairly heavy reading an requires a bit of background knowledge in sociology and anthropology. This is an academic piece of writing - despite the inviting title!
July 29, 2020
A fascinating introduction to the topic of the occult, or esotericism as Hanegraaff calls it. It suffers from some pretty obvious lack of objectivity, and seems far too brief on a lot of topic, but it still remains well worth a read to anyone interested in the subject.
August 17, 2021
Great introduction to this topic, does a nice job of giving the history and background of philosophy on the topic without urging the reader to begin practicing magic or anything crazy. You could read this and come to the conclusion that it's all BS and still have learned a lot.
March 31, 2024
Meu Deus não acredito que esqueci de atualizar. Bem, foi um ótimo guia inicial, e além disso me deu um norte para outros estudos e artigos, combinado com uma escrita fácil de acompanhar. Então achei ótimo
July 12, 2024
A thorough guide to the academic discipline of Western Esotericism. It is good to have a proper academic and general approach in this field rather than overexcited misunderstandings. Not the most exciting book in the world but does its job comprehensively.
July 13, 2024
I guess it's one of the best to get a solid introduction to esoterism.
This book starts with just presenting every hot point in this field, from its definition to how esoterism evolved, changed etc in Western world.
Highly recommend if you're a fan of Esoterica on YouTube
This book starts with just presenting every hot point in this field, from its definition to how esoterism evolved, changed etc in Western world.
Highly recommend if you're a fan of Esoterica on YouTube
January 7, 2019
Maybe a little more academic than I was expecting, focusing on trends in scholarship, etc ... but I'm glad I read it.
September 30, 2020
That's my teacher!
January 27, 2021
for schooooool
February 1, 2022
Fascinating!
June 4, 2022
阅读体验一般般，思辨性很强但是比较枯燥体验不到神秘学的乐趣
September 18, 2023
Good primer on the Western Esoteric Tradition.
December 20, 2024
A great intro into the subject, will help you orient yourself and give you guidance for further study - should that be something you’re interested in.
January 2, 2025
Very clear with big ideas
I loved the first half which was filled with big ideas. The second half was a bit drier and more textbook-like.
I loved the first half which was filled with big ideas. The second half was a bit drier and more textbook-like.
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