Constructing Tradition: Means and Myths of Transmission in Western Esotericism (Aries Book Series Texts and Studies in Western Esotericism)

491 Pages·2010·2.46 MB·English

by  Andreas B. Kilcher

Constructing Tradition
Aries Book Series
Texts and Studies in Western Esotericism
Editor
Marco Pasi
Editorial Board
Jean-Pierre Brach
Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke
Wouter Hanegraaff
Advisory Board
Roland Edighoffer – Antoine Faivre
Olav Hammer – Andreas Kilcher
Arthur McCalla – Monika Neugebauer-Wölk
Mark Sedgwick – Jan Snoek
Michael Stausberg – György Szo˝ nyi
Garry Trompf
VOLUME 11
Constructing Tradition
Means and Myths of Transmission in Western
Esotericism
Edited by
Andreas B. Kilcher
LEIDEN • BOSTON
2010
On the cover: Hieroglyphica, oder Denkbilder der alten Völker namentlich der
Aegytier, Chaldäer, Phönizier, Jüden, Griechen, Römer, u.s.w. Romeyn de Hooghe:
Amsterdam 1744.
This book is printed on acid-free paper.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Constructing tradition : means and myths of transmission in Western esotericism /
edited by Andreas B. Kilcher.
p. cm. — (Aries books series ; 11)
Includes index.
ISBN 978-90-04-19114-3 (hardback : alk. paper) 1. Occultism. 2. Tradition
(Theology) 3. Tradition (Philosophy) I. Kilcher, Andreas B., 1963– II. Title.
III. Series.
BF1439.C66 2010
135—dc22
2010033349
ISSN 1871-1405
ISBN 978 90 04 19114 3
Copyright 2010 by Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands.
Koninklijke Brill NV incorporates the imprints Brill, Hotei Publishing,
IDC Publishers, Martinus Nijhoff Publishers and VSP.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, translated,
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Koninklijke Brill NV provided that the appropriate fees are paid directly to
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Fees are subject to change.
CONTENTS
Introduction: Constructing Tradition in Western Esotericism ... ix
Andreas B. Kilcher
MASTER NARRATIVES OF TRADITION
Das verspätete Wissen. Zur epigonalen Disposition der
esoterischen Tradition .................................................................. 3
Andreas B. Kilcher
Note sur la transmission des traditions dans le contexte des
courants ésotériques occidentaux modernes ............................ 31
Antoine Faivre
Gewachsene Traditionen. Zur Formierung hermetischer
Überlieferungen im Mittelalter ................................................... 47
Matthias Heiduk
Die Überlieferung der Zukunft. Esoterische Traditionsbildung
als mantische Textfunktion .......................................................... 71
Philipp Theisohn
Western Esotericism in Enlightenment Historiography:
The Importance of Jacob Brucker ............................................... 91
Wouter J. Hanegraaff
The Coming of the Masters: The Evolutionary Reformulation
of Spiritual Intermediaries in Modern Theosophy .................. 113
Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke
Helena Petrovna Blavatsky’s Esoteric Tradition ............................ 161
Tim Rudbøg
vi contents
Tradition in zwei Gestalten? Wissenschaftlicher
Traditionsbegriff und esoterische Traditionslinien in der
deutschen Geschichtsschreibung des 19. Jahrhunderts ........... 179
Monika Neugebauer-Wölk
The Sociology of the Construct of Tradition and Import of
Legitimacy in Freemasonry ......................................................... 217
Henrik Bogdan
Secrecy as Social Capital ................................................................... 239
Kocku von Stuckrad
KABBALISTIC CONCEPTS OF TRADITION
Revelation and the ‘Crisis of Tradition’ in Kabbalah:
1475–1575 ....................................................................................... 255
Moshe Idel
Giovanni Pico and the Ideal of Concordia Discors:
Disharmony as a Way to Esoteric Wisdom .............................. 293
Giulio Busi
Spiritual Authority and the Transmission of Knowledge in
Christian Kabbalah: The Case of Guillaume Postel
(1510–81) ........................................................................................ 303
Jean-Pierre Brach
The Kabbalah as Primordial Tradition in Russian Secret
Societies ........................................................................................... 323
Konstantin Burmistrov
MYTHS OF ORIGIN
Traditionskonkurrenzen. Eine Kreditgeschichte offenbarter
Ursprungsgeschichten ................................................................... 343
Wilhelm Schmidt-Biggemann
Ägypten und der Ursprung der Esoterik. Zur Geschichte und
Genese eines Mythos .................................................................... 373
Jan Assmann
contents vii
Ex oriente lux. Zur Funktion Indiens in der Konstruktion der
abendländischen esoterischen Tradition im 19. und 20.
Jahrhundert ..................................................................................... 395
Christine Maillard
Sufis as Mythic Bearers of Esoteric Tradition ............................... 413
Mark Sedgwick
Athanasius Kircher’s Construction of the Hieroglyphic
Tradition .......................................................................................... 427
Joscelyn Godwin
Vom dämonischen Archetyp zur Konstruktion einer
Urtradition. Die Kontroverse über das Geschlecht der
Giganten an den barocken Universitäten .................................. 449
Bernd Roling
Index of Persons ................................................................................. 467

INTRODUCTION: CONSTRUCTING TRADITION IN
WESTERN ESOTERICISM
Andreas B. Kilcher
The question of constructing tradition, concepts of origin and memory
as well as techniques and practices of knowledge transmission are cen-
tral for culture in general. In esotericism and its literature, however,
such questions and techniques play an outstanding role and are widely
reflected upon. Esoteric paradigms not only understand themselves in
elaborate mytho-poetical narratives as bearers of “older”, “hidden”,
“higher” knowledge. They also claim their knowledge to be of a par-
ticular origin. And they claim this knowledge has been transmitted
by particular (esoteric) means, media and groups. Consequently, eso-
tericism not only involves the construction of its own tradition; it can
even be understood as a specific form of tradition and transmission.
This was precisely the topic of the inaugural conference of the Euro-
pean Society for the Study of Western Esotericism (ESSWE), which
took place in Tübingen between the 19th and the 22nd of July 2007
under the title Constructing Tradition. Means and Myths of Trans-
mission in Western Esotericism. / Die Konstruktion von Tradition.
Praktiken und Mythen der Überlieferung in der europäischen Esoterik.
The present volume contains a selection of the papers held at this
conference.
The topic of this conference and of the present volume needs to
be explained more accurately: in the construction of their own tradi-
tions, both pre-modern and modern esoteric paradigms—including
magic, alchemy, Kabbalah as well as occultism and theosophy—claim
to represent or restore an ancient, primordial wisdom tradition as
a kind of “secret knowledge”. The conceptualisation and realisation
of such claims places a major emphasis on ideas of tradition, passed
on either by oral transmission or by the discovery and dissemination
of mythic or absolute books. In this sense, the questions of heritage
and tradition, of origin and genealogy are crucial to the foundation
of any esoteric knowledge. It defines, and moreover legitimates itself,
through its origins, its ancestry, and its means of esoteric transmission.
In so doing, esotericism seeks to invent its own tradition, to map its