Hermes Explains: Thirty Questions about Western Esotericism

by Wouter J. Hanegraaff (Editor), Peter Forshaw (Editor), Marco Pasi (Editor)

This volume seeks to make the modern study of Western esotericism more widely known beyond specialist circles, while addressing a range of misconceptions, biases, and prejudices that still tend to surround it.

336 pages, Hardcover

Published July 2, 2019

About the author

Wouter 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).

Reviews

[Tiina Mahlamäki · Rating 4 out of 5]

Kirjoitin teoksesta arvion blogiini: https://tituma2.wordpress.com/2019/08...

[Philippe · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a fun and interesting book for readers looking for an entry into the growing field of contemporary esoteric studies. The book was published to mark the 20th anniversary of the University of Amsterdam's Center for the History of Hermetic Philosophy and Related Currents (HHP). The Center has been a major driving force behind the establishment and acceptance of serious scholarship on the complex cultural and intellectual phenomenon of Western esotericism. In a way, it is amazing that we have had to wait so long for the emergence of this field of research. It certainly testifies to the doctrinaire spirit of the kind of orthodox academic research that has failed to live up to its own standards of rationalism and open-mindedness. This book is somewhat unusual in that it is composed as a collection of thirty short chapters, written in response to an equal number of "journalistic" questions. The list of authors amounts to a who's who of contemporary scholarship in the field.
The questions go in many directions and traverse past and present, East and West, secularism and religion, popular and high culture. Some examples of chapter titles: "Is occultism a product of capitalism?", "Can superhero comics really convey esoteric knowledge?", "Esotericism, that's for white people, right?", "Isn't alchemy a spiritual tradition?". ... I didn't read all the chapters, but jumped back and forth and picked up interesting ideas in almost every section. Antoine Faivre's chapter on "imagination" was a bit lightweight. I expected more from the éminence grise in this field. All in all, the book is a successful attempt to highlight the fantastic diversity and cultural significance of esotericism in (predominantly) Western culture.

[Goran · Rating 3 out of 5]

Scholarly, but not a book. It's more so a book full of 30 essays..