The Secret Tradition of the Soul

216 Pages·2011·1.36 MB·English

by  Patrick Harpur

Praise for Mercurius
“An authentic spellbinder.”
—The Guardian
“Harpur cannot now avoid the credit for the most full and profound
philosophical exposition of our times. It has made a deep and permanent
impression on me, and I have received a vast benefit for which I shall be
ever grateful.”
—John Michell, author of The View over Atlantis, City of Revelation, and
The Dimensions of Paradise
“Surely one of the most persuasive evocations, ancient or modern, of
genuine alchemists at work.”
—Joscelyn Godwin, author of The Theosophical Enlightenment; Arktos: The
Polar Myth in Science, Symbolism, and Nazi Survival; and Harmony of the
Spheres: A Sourcebook of the Pythagorean Tradition in Music
“Extraordinary and brilliant … the work is a classic and will be
recognized as such.”
—Charles Nicholl, author of The Chemical Theatre, The Reckoning, and
Leonardo da Vinci: Flights of the Mind
“Mercurius is a splendid celebration of the spiritual intellect and the
soul’s imagination. I will keep and value it as a moving (and beautifully
told) story and as a lucid and provocative manductio to the Art.”
—Lindsay Clarke, Whitbread Prize–winning author of The Chymical
Wedding, Alice’s Masque, and The War at Troy
“Fascinating … absorbing … the kind of book I deeply enjoy.”
—Colin Wilson, author of The Occult, Mysteries, and The Outsider
“Mercurius is a book written at least as much to elucidate as to entertain.
It is probably the most explicit account of the alchemical art ever
published—it presents a strong argument for the perfectibility of man
and against the species of bloodless asceticism which drives a wedge
between spiritual and corporeal love.”
—The Literary Review
“Mercurius is no lightweight, New Age, fantasy fluff. It is a serious,
mature work demonstrating the skill of a brilliant writer and
metaphysical investigator.”
—Justin Erik Farrow, editor of www.gnostics.com
Praise for The Philosophers’ Secret Fire
“A sublime read …”
—The Guardian
“Once we believed that truth was ‘out there,’ now we hold that it’s ‘in
here,’ but if Harpur is right then it lies in the line of vision between the
two … In his casual brilliance he evokes the boldness of the stallion in
the book of Job, who hears the crying of the captains, and is not
afraid …”
—The Independent on Sunday
“One of the many things I admire about this timely book is the engaging
way it offers something to upset just about everybody. And how should
it be otherwise when it is the author’s considered intention to explode
the peculiar perspective on which the prevailing forces of modern
consciousness rely? … If you’re a hard-nosed materialist with little time
for a countervailing vision of the mythical realities we inhabit, then all
the more reason to read this book, for Harpur is a serious man with
some serious questions to put to you.”
—The London Magazine
“It would be hard to overestimate the value of Harpur’s book or to praise
it too highly. Packed with fabulous detail at which I can only hint at
here, it convinces us once again that everything is soul. We’re offered a
timely reminder to recall our larger mystical selves, to conceive of
possibilities of transformation, to remove the constraints from our
limited notion of reality and celebrate life’s infinite and sacred
inventiveness.”
—Rosie Jackson, Resurgence
Praise for Daimonic Reality: A Field Guide to the Otherworld
“Witty … disturbing … beautifully and intelligently observed.”
—The Sunday Times
“A brave, thought-provoking book … hats off to Harpur … thank heaven
there are people like him to rejuvenate our vanishing sense of wonder.”
—The Daily Mail

Copyright © 2011 by Patrick Harpur. All rights reserved. No portion of this book, except for brief
review, may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any
means—electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise—without the written
permission of the publisher. For information contact Evolver Editions c/o North Atlantic Books.
Published by Evolver Editions
Evolver Editions’ publications are distributed by
North Atlantic Books
P.O. Box 12327
Berkeley, California 94712
Art direction and cover design by michaelrobinsonnyc.com
The Secret Tradition of the Soul is sponsored by the Society for the Study of Native Arts and
Sciences, a nonprofit educational corporation whose goals are to develop an educational and
cross-cultural perspective linking various scientific, social, and artistic fields; to nurture a holistic
view of arts, sciences, humanities, and healing; and to publish and distribute literature on the
relationship of mind, body, and nature.
North Atlantic Books’ publications are available through most bookstores. For further
information, visit our website at www.northatlanticbooks.com or call 800-733-3000.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Harpur, Patrick.
The secret tradition of the soul / Patrick Harpur.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references.
eISBN: 978-1-58394345-8
1. Soul. I. Title.
BL290.H37 2011
202′.2—dc22
2011007183
v3.1
To my aunts, Cicely and Boobela
CONTENTS
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
Introduction
Soul and Body
ONE
Soul and Psyche
TWO
Soul and World-Soul
THREE
Soul and Mana
FOUR
Soul and the Unconscious
FIVE
Soul and Myth
SIX
Soul and Daimon
SEVEN
Soul and Spirit
EIGHT
Soul and Ego
NINE
Soul and Initiation
TEN
Soul and Afterlife
ELEVEN
Soul and Otherworld
TWELVE
Endnotes
Selected Bibliography
INTRODUCTION
It is notoriously difficult to talk about the soul. If we believe that we
have a soul, we tend to picture it vaguely—as some essence of ourselves,
some core of our being that constitutes our “real” selves or our “higher
selves.” Even if we are not specifically religious—Christians, for instance
—we can all still resonate with the notion that there is some part of us
that should not be sold, betrayed, or lost at any cost. We can understand
the idea that we can “lose our souls” and still go on living, just as we can
lose our lives but retain our souls. We still use the word “soul” to mean
something real or authentic. Whenever music, dance, architecture, food
—anything, really—is said to have soul, we mean that it is the real
thing, that it speaks to the deepest part of ourselves. It is not a tangible
reality, of course, but it is felt to be more real than ordinary life. So the
first attribute of soul is as a symbol of depth and authenticity. Wherever
it slips in it stirs in us a sense that there is more to this world than meets
the eye, something more than human behind mundane events. It stirs, in
other words, a religious feeling, regardless of any religious
denomination.
The notion of soul is also oriented toward death. If we believe that
some part of ourselves lives on after death, that part is the soul. Despite
what modern materialists tell us—that we are only our bodies—we
persist in feeling that, in fact, we inhabit our bodies. We persist in
feeling that the most real moments of our lives occur when we—perhaps
our souls—temporarily leave our bodies, whether in joyful or agonized
passion. For example, we are “outside” of ourselves when we are deeply
engaged with a landscape or a lover, when we are “lost” in a piece of
music or dance. Conversely, when we are in heightened states of rage or
fear, we spontaneously say: “I was beside myself!” “I wasn’t myself!” “I
was out of my head!” The Greek root of the word “ecstasy” means to
“stand outside (oneself).” Such feelings enable us to experience the
reality of what most, if not all, cultures have always asserted: that when
we step outside ourselves for the last time, at death, the body rots—but
this essential, detachable part of ourselves, our soul, goes on.
While the soul is obviously connected with our sense of depth, of
religion, and of death—it is also connected with the question of life, and
of life’s purpose. “Where am I? Who am I? How did I come to be here?”
asked the philosopher and “father of existentialism,” Søren Kierkegaard.
“How did I come into the world? Why was I not consulted? … And if I
am compelled to take part in it, where is the manager? I would like to
see him.”1 There are times when we have all echoed Kierkegaard’s
indignation with our own questions to the manager: “What is my
purpose in life? What am I here for? Where do I go when I die?”
Those who are lucky enough to have found their purpose on Earth
know that they have done so because they feel fulfilled. They may have
found their purpose in some job or in some person—a “soul mate”—but
they are convinced that it is “meant to be.” Their lives are not
necessarily free of suffering, but they are full of meaning. Those of us
who are not so lucky nevertheless feel that we should search for a
purpose, as if for our own souls. It might be that the search itself is our
purpose.
The poet John Keats considered such questions too, suggesting that
although people have “sparks of divinity” in them, they are not “souls”
until they acquire an identity: “till each one is personally itself.” “Call
the world if you please ‘The vale of Soul-making,’ ” he wrote in a letter
to his siblings. “Then you will find out the use of the world.”2 The
question of our paradoxical condition—that we are born with souls yet
also, in another sense, have to “make” them—is at the center of this
book about the soul, its nature and destiny.
This book is therefore for people who are wondering what we consist
of—what our essential nature is—and what happens to us when we die.
It is for people who are skeptical of materialistic claims that we consist
only of our bodies, skeptical of rationalist claims that the only reality is
one that is subject to narrow empirical definitions. It is also for people
who are disenchanted with the major religions—and especially
Christianity—for squabbling over liturgy, gender issues, and so forth,
and neglecting the one thing religion is founded on: knowledge of the
individual soul and its relationship with God. It is for people whose
supernatural longing leads them to the East—to Buddhism and Taoism,
for instance—only to be downcast by the difficulty of entering