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The Reawaking of Myth – Boris Nad (2020)

This is weird. I found this book because it is published by Prav Publising, but there is also a book with a similar title (The Return of Myth) available from Manticore Press (2016) which I could have read for that very reason, but apparently missed.

Boris Nad is a Serbian author, born in 1966. This collection of “meditations on Myth” (sometimes) has that ‘Russian tone’ and subjects of other Prav books.

It is a bit of an odd book. The texts vary wildly in subjects and tone. Some texts are well written and interesting, but there is also a lengthy piece of fiction and chapters that I find not very interesting.

The book opens with short chapters about mythology and mythologies. A red thread appears to be myths of Hyperborea. This culminates halfway in a lengthy “tale of Agartha”, a long piece of apparant fiction about a man who has visited the underground realm of the “king of the world”.

The latter is of course a theme that we find with René Guénon and Nad refers to Guénon and other Traditionalists more often. One of the more interesting texts of this book is a critique on Guénon though. Nad goes from comparitive myth, which can be interesting, to more speculative texts. Present is a hard view of modern life and “the crisis of the Western world”.

All in all I have to conclude that the book contains more texts that I found not too interesting and only a few that I did.

2020 Prav Publishing, isbn 1952671078

Einführung In Die Westliche Esoterik, Für Freimaurer – Jan Snoek (2011)

This is suprising. This book had been on my wish list for many years. Recently I ran into it while not looking specifically. Happily I read this little book of the eminent Masonic scholar Joannes Augustinus Maria Snoek (1946-) and while writing this review I find out that Salier Verlag has republished the book in June 2024 and it is now quite easy to obtain. (I got a first print.)

Snoek was born in Amsterdam, originally a biologist and chemist, he later studied comparative religion and he was the first professor to tutor Freemasonry in the Netherlands, but he also did the same in Germany.

Initiated in the Netherlands in 1971, Snoek became an avid scholar of Freemasonry both within and without Freemasonry. He is a member of (virtually?) every lodge of investigation in Europe and an active writer, publishing through academic publishing houses, but also Masonic publishers.

The Swiss lodge Modesta Cum Libertate (Alpina) in Zürich, asked Snoek to write an “introduction into Western esotericism, for Freemasons”. Snoek complied and wrote a 270+ page book which is published nicely with a linnen hardcover and with colour plates. A luxury small edition! Since the audience was probably small (members of the lodge?) the book was not easy to find, until recently.

As the title suggests, Snoek wrote an introduction to Western esotericism. After a general introduction, starting with the 2010 problems of the Dutch Bibliotheca Philosophica Hermetica, Snoek sets out to shortly introduce astrology, neoplatonism, Gnosticism, Alchemy, Kabbalah, Hermetism, the Astrea cult, Rosicrucianity, stone masons and occultism. As these are no new subjects to me (only Astrea I never really looked at), there is little really new here. Perhaps a bit too little, the author uses ‘the Masonic angle’, details of particular interest to Freemasons. The last chapter “Freemasonry and Western esotericism” is what the reader has been waiting for. Unfortunately Snoek does not really say how some elements found their way into Freemasonry.

All in all the book is exactly what the title promises: an introduction. I am glad that it is now available to a larger audience. An English edition would be even better as the book indeed is a basic introduction into Western esotericism for Freemasons and I think it might benefit a larger audience.

2011 Freimaurerloge Modestia Cum Libertate, republished 2024 Salier Verlag, isbn 3962850686

Eschatological Optimism – Daria Dugina (2023)

I was looking what other books Askr Svarte‘s publisher Prav Publising has available and I ran into Eschatological Optimism. The name of the author did not yet ring a bell.

From the introduction of translator and owner of Prav, Jafe Arnold, it soon became clear to me: here we have a book of Darya Aleksandrovna Dugina (1992-2022), the daugher of Alexander Dugin (1962-) who died in a car crash before she turned 30. The book is introduced by Arnold and Alexander Dugin himself.

Daria had studied philosophy and was so ‘Plato minded’ that she used the pseudonym “Platonova”. Obviously she was massively influenced by her father and the circle around him. I see several similarities with the writings of Askr Svarte (or would that be because they have the same translator?).

Dugina appears to have been an avid writer and lecturer and the book is a collection of lectures and essays. The book is divided in four parts. Two first two are -even though very philosophical- quite interesting. The last two interest me less. These last to parts are -very shortly- about the political side of Platonism and later philosophy.

The first part gave the book its title:

eschatological optimism is the consciousness and recognition that the material world, the given world which we presently take to be pure reality, is illusory: it is an illusion that is about to dissipate and end.

“Eschatology” is the acknowledgement that the material world is finite. The “optimism” part of the concept is not so much the being happy about that, but more the ‘riding the tiger’ attitude of Julius Evola: we are going down, let us make the best of the time that is left (but also: “live a life of unhappiness”).

Julius Evola represents an authentic revolt within Postmodernity. Guénon is even more fundamental. They show us the paths we can take. For myself, this path is, without a doubt, Orthodoxy and Edinoverie.

Explaining the latter term later in the book.

I belong to Edinoverie. This Edinoverie Church is somwhere between the Old Believers’ Rite and the ruling Church of the Moscow Patriarchate.

So quite like her father, Dugina is interested in philosophy, Traditionalism, politics and Russian Orthodoxy. Different from her father, Dugina was also a feminist, but I must say: of a very specific type that is completely different from our Western view of feminism and so we see that Dugina was also a thinker of her own.

Just like Svarte, Dugina’s writing frequently goes over my head, but it makes an interesting and often non-Western way of thinking inspite of being too philosophical for my liking. She sure was a thinker with great potential, so her early passing is certainly a shame. With an afterword of Daria’s mother Natalya Melentyeva the book has a tragic opening and closing, but it is good that also the Western audience now has a chance to read this young philosopher.

2023 Prav Publishing, isbn 1952671787

The Great Knowledge – Maria Kvilhaug (2023)

The Kindle version of this book turned out to be a strenuous read. The view is turned 90 degrees, shows on only half my screen, the letters are crammed together and not all pages have the same lay-out. And that for almost 800 pages!

The book is about “Fjölkyngi”, a term that Kvilhaug translates as “great knowledge” and which she splits in “Seiðr” and initiation. But “Fjölkyngi” is a very broad term as you will find in this book. The author goes from shamanism to witchcraft, various kinds of ancient magic of different peoples and along the way deals with subjects such as gender fluidity, gender roles, ‘souls’, mythology, folklore, etc. etc. etc.

As we know from her books, Kvilhaug presents her own translations of mostly saga texts in this case and she usually explains how she came to her translations. She returns a massive number of sagas highlighting elements such as magic or initiation. The result is perhaps an encyclopedia or the vast breath of the subject of magic within Northern sagas complete with source material.

Impressive, but perhaps it is wiser to buy the (expensive) physical version of the book.

2023 Three Little Sisters, isbn 1959350994

Eleusis to Florence – Nicola Bizzi (2019)

  • history

After a few of his smaller works, I picked up what appears to be Bizzi’s main work. The full title of this book is: From Eleusis to Florence: the transmission of a secret knowledge. Part A: the origin of the mysteries (Vol. 1).

As you may have guessed from my reviews of his other books, we here have an author who claims to be part of an initiation tradition that goes back to the dawn of time. As a matter of fact, Bizzi says that his branch of “Eleusinity” can be traced back to older Gods and the few other initiations that are left, stem from younger Gods.

The deepest roots of Eleusinity lie in the culture and civilization of the ancient Pre-Greek people who inhabited the Aegean lands;

In about 330 page Bizzi starts to sketch who ‘his’ initiation comes “from the Aegean-Minoan era to the entrance of the Elusinians in clandestinity”. In order to do so, you get a lot of ‘alternative history’ about antediluvian civilizations and archaeologists who neglect facts that do not fit their “paradigm”. Bizzi cites theories such as the Templar origin of Freemasony, the ideas of Graham Hancock and other authors which (in my eyes) do not really strengthen his point.

What also does not help, is that everybody that Bizzi admires, had to be an Elusean “Initiated”, such as Arturo Reghini. Now I happen to be reading material of Reghini and even though he frequently says he was a Freemason and he does refer to mysteries of Eleusis every now and then, he does appear to have seen Eleusis as something of the past and certainly does not place himself in that tradition.

So Bizzi sets out to prove that there are initiations thousands of years old, only now coming to the surface. The book is mostly historical. I would have preferred to learn a bit more about what the mysteries entail.

The essay by Nicola Bizzi, […] in the original Italian edition consists of three massive volumes of almost a thousand pages each. For reasons due to it vastness and complexity, Edizioni Aurora Boreale has decided to divide the English edition into several volumes. Each volume has three distinct parts, for a total of nine books, whose publication will continue over several years.

So I guess, five years after the first English volume, we still have got something coming. I am not sure yet if the first volume enthused me enough to buy the next volume when it comes out. We will see.

2019 Edizioni Aurora Boreale, isbn 889863546X

Albert Pike’s Esoterika – Arturo de Hoyos (2005)

Albert Pike (1809-1891) is perhaps the most famous of Freemasons and also one of the most influential ones, especially in the USA. Every so often I try to read his Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite (1871), but every time I get stranded in the gigantic amount of words that Pike used to make his point.

Morals and Dogma is not universally applauded, but more and more I see that (mostly American) Masons suggest Esoterika when somebody asks about the esoteric side of Freemasonry. Arturo de Hoyos made it available, so I decided to give the work a try.

Esoterika is not a work of Pike, but a compilation made by De Hoyos. The texts are about “Symbolism of the Blue Degrees of Freemasonry”, hence, symbols of the degrees of Entered Apprentice, Fellowcraft and Master Mason. Pike investigates the original words that often became garbled Hebrew in Freemasonry (Pike sees Samaritan as the actual language and the religion of Zoroaster as the basis of Freemasonry), talks about passwords, the lost word, the Hiram myth, etc. etc.

Here and there are some interesting angles, but overall I still have the idea that Pike talks a lot, but doesn’t say too much. Esoterika certainly is not the ‘deep esoteric’ approach to Freemasonry you may expect.

2005 / 2022 Scottish Rite Research Society

Towards Another Myth – Askr Svarte (2024)

Another 340 page book with essays by Askr Svarte / Evgeny Nechkasov. The full title goes: Towards Another Myth: A Tale of Heidegger and Traditionalism. Thematically this book continues with the last book of Svarte that I reviewed.

In 25 longer and shorter texts, Svarte investigates the relationship between Heidegger and Traditionalism. To do that he makes side steps into Northern mythology, poetry and of course philosophy and language and all that to come to “another myth”.

In recent years, more and more Traditionalists and right-wing thinkers have been trying to incorporate the thought of Martin Heidegger into theirs. Critical notes have already been made in Passages. Svarte takes this a step further. He dissects Evola’s erroneous critique on Heidegger, investigates the common and diverting points between the philosophy of Heidegger and that of Guénon and in order to do so, dives into Northern mythology, Advaita Vedanta.

As all of Svarte’s work, the present title is not an easy read, but he does once again come with interesting observations and explanations.

Amidst his general empathy and sympathy for mythos as an ontological principle of extreme importance in culture and thinking, Heidegger’s program nevertheless does not propose returning to one or another mythology, even the Greek, as a form of identity, state religion, or system of values. Instead, he speaks of the non-metaphysical, groundless (Ab-Grund) and poetic refounding of the whole of mythos and the holy on the horizon of Another Beginning. For Traditionalism, this means being compelled to seek out and tell forth Another Myth.

2024 Prav Publishing, isbn 1952671825

The Initiatory Ecstasy. From Giordano Bruno to Arturo Reghini – Nicola Bizzi (2024)

This is the title that brought me to Nicola Bizzi, but the third one that I read. It was merely accidental that I read them in chronological order. In his other works, Bizzi also refers to Reghini, but I found the current title first because it has Reghini in the title.

The Initiatory Ecstasy is different from the other two books that I reviewed in that it is less about a specific theme. The book is about philosophy, initiation and ‘wisdom’ and -as we are used to by now- from the perspective of the still existing “Mother Eleusis” current of initiation (see my review of Reflections on the Origin of Freemasonry).

Bizzi shares some ideas with Julius Evola, but is also critical. One time he calls a view of Evola “essentially incomplete and misleading”. Also he is no uncritical follower of Reghini, but as you may guess, there are references here to more than one Italian thinker. Especially interesting are references to authors and titles that I am unfamiliar with.

With a lot of Plato and neo-Platonists, Bizzi sketches a nice picture of “Philo-Sophia”. Of the three books that I read, this one is the most interesting so far. Again, it is but a small book (98 pages), but there are also some larger titles available from Amazon.

Just as in the other two books that I just reviewed, I cannot follow, or even disagree with some things that Bizzi writes, but on the other hand, it is never a bad idea to take note of different opinions. The present title is somewhat less pedantic than the other two. It works better for me when an author just gives a view rather than telling that others are wrong.

2024 Edizioni Aurora Boreale, isbn 979-1255044840

One Single Primordial Tradition? – Nicola Bizzi (2023)

In this little book (59 pages) Bizzi takes a stand against the Traditionalist idea that there is a “transcendent unity of religions; that there is one Source. He bluntly claims that:

the Mystery Traditions of the Eleusinian Mother branch has always vigorously opposed such a view. (Note: “Mother” means the purest and most original branch of the Eleusinian Mysterial tradition and its priesthood. Its derivations (such as, for example, the Orphic branch and the Samothracian branch) were conventionally called “Daughter”.

Yet, I find his reasoning unconvincing. It seems that Bizzi is of the opinion that long ago a rift occurred between “Titanic” and “Olympian” traditions. The “Olympian” version prevailed and Traditionalists talk about that “Olympian” source. Bizzi’s own Eleusinian organisation can be traced back to the “pre-Olympian, and therefor pre-Hellenic, Titanic” branch.

So yes, for us Eleusinians there is a Primordial and original Tradition.

Just not the same as that of the Traditionalists… They are talking about an “Olympian” tradition and Eleusinians are talking about a “Titanic” tradition.

In my opinion the entire discussion is flawed. When -with Traditionalists- you say that there is one Divinity (how can there be multiple?), then there is the one Source, is there not? Does it really matter if one or more traditions sprang from that Source, if these traditions split and split again or if at some point, there was a new, but direct link to the Source? So Bizzi’s Tradition is another (older) one than that of initiatic organisations or religious traditions of today, that does not really answer the question that is asked in the title.

That said, Bizzi’s approach to the subject is somewhat different and therefor ‘refreshing’. Even though I do not agree with everything he writes, the book is somewhat interesting.

2023 Edizioni Aurora Boreale, isbn 979-1255044178

Reflections On The Origin Of Freemasonry – Nicola Bizzi (2019)

It will be obvious what this little book (55 pages) is about. It is a bit odd that the back cover speaks of: “The historian, Freemason and Eleusinian initiate Nicola Bizzi” while in the book he only seems to say that his is an Eleusinian initiate (even though he does one time refer to “our Temples” in a Masonic context).

It is exactly because of that “Eleusinian” initiation that Bizzi claims that he knows the true origin of Freemasonry, while Masons and even Masonic scholars do not.

I agree with Bizzi that Freemasonry did not start in 1717, but in my view Bizzi is a bit too easy in concluding that the lodges formed the Grand Lodge of London and Westminster were part of a continuing esoteric tradition from times past and that later reforms continue to build thereon.

Apparently mostly based on the (in)famous The Temple and the Lodge (1989) of Baigent and Leigh, Bizzi sees the origin of Freemasonry in the Knight Templars. Following Thomas Paine (1737-1809) in a 1805 text (Origin of Freemasonry) the other origin is “Celtic-Druidic”. Does Bizzi really think that people interested in the history of Freemasonry do not know these works? Baigent / Leigh has been available for three decades by the time that Bizzi published his reflections; Paine’s text can be found online and much has been written since, but more debunking both claims that supporting them. It would have been nice had Bizzi presented something new to rekindle the theory that he puts forward.

All in all this publication only claims to know more than other publications, but there is nothing in it that helps people who are interested in the subject. It is somewhat refreshing to run into thinkers such as Guénon and Reghini, but claims such as: “But even with regard to the templar component of Freemasonry, as far as it is fully traceable and documentable” without adding anything to what is already publicly available is not really helpful.

Not a boring read, but also not something that ads anything to available literature.

2019 Edizioni Aurora Boreale, isbn 8898635788