Tage Lindbom: Mellan himmel och jord

Norstedts, 1970

Baksida:

LindbomI vår tid förkunnas en ny revolution: människan skall själsligt förvandlas. Hon skall bli fri icke blott i yttre mening, genom institutionella revolutioner, hon skall bli fri, förkunnas det, även i inre mening. Genom att befrias från normer, bud, auktoritära föreställningar skall hon bli i stånd till en harmonisk personlighetsutveckling, till ett “självförverkligande”, till en öppen, förtroendefull, mänsklig gemenskap på jämlikhetens grundval. Det är falskheten i denna förkunnelse och i dessa förhoppningar, som Tage Lindbom avslöjar i sina två senaste böcker, Sancho Panzas väderkvarnar (1962) och Otidsenliga betraktelser (1968).

Hans nu föreliggande bok Mellan himmel och jord är liksom de båda föregående ett debattinlägg av hög valör. Men denna gång lägger han icke tonvikten vid en kritik av människorikets falska frihets- och jämlikhetsförkunnelse, som endast visat sig leda till ett antagonistiskt kaos. Han går ett steg längre och har modet att lägga fram ett alternativ till den profana föreställningsvärlden, visa en väg, som under en högre makts ledning för till verklig sanning. I korta, laddade kapitel ställer han några väsentliga frågor: vem skall härska, Gud eller människan, vad är tro och vad är vetande, vad är auktoritet coh vad är frihet?

Vi står vid vägskälet, säger Tage Lindbom, och vi har att fritt träffa vårt val. Denna valfrihet är det stora, mänskliga privilegiet, som vi har att bruka och – missbruka.

Paul Brunton: Meditation

The Notebooks of Paul Brunton

Volume Four, Part 1

Larson, 1986

Amazon.com

Back Cover:

Meditation is really the mind thinking of the Soul, just as Activity is the mind thinking of the world.

The truth needed for immediate and provisional use may be learned from books and teachers, but the truth of the ultimate revelation can be learned only from and within oneself by meditation.

– Paul Brunton

Meditation is an inspiring invitation to the most intimate adventure of human spirituality – the direct experience of one’s own beloved soul. This first part of the fourth volume in The Notebooks of Paul Brunton series explains the purpose and importance of meditation. It provides an unusually rich variety of tested and proven techniques, and explains both what the potential dangers of meditation are and how they can be overcome or avoided. It will be highly useful to beginners and intermediates alike, and should also be welcomed by advanced meditators and teachers of meditation.

“…a person of rare intelligence…thoroughly alive, and whole in the most significant, ‘holy’ sense of the word.”

Yoga Journal

Gottfried de Purucker

Gottfried de Purucker (1874-1942) var Katherine Tingleys efterträdare som ledare för det teosofiska samfundets Pasadena-gren. Han använde ofta orden ockult och ockultism, som jag finner problematiska, men lika ofta de åtminstone bättre orden esoterisk och esoterism (båda är ju produkter av den distinkta västerländska, exoteristiska kulturmiljö som teosoferna var verksamma i).

Han skrev bl.a. Fundamentals of the Esoteric Philosophy, The Esoteric Tradition, The Path of Compassion, Golden Precepts of Esotericism, och Wind of the Spirit.

Eric D. Perl: Theophany

The Neoplatonic Philosophy of Dionysius the Areopagite

State University of New York Press, 2008     Amazon.com

Back Cover:

The work of Pseudo-Dionysius the Areopagite stands at a cusp in the history of thought: it is at once Hellenic and Christian, classical and medieval, philosophical and theological. Unlike the predominantly theological or text-historical studies which constitute much of the scholarly literature on Dionysius, Theophany is completely philosophical in nature, placing Dionysius within the tradition of ancient Greek philosophy and emphasizing, in a positive light, his continuity with the non-Christian Neoplatonism of Plotinus and Proclus. Eric D. Perl offers clear expositions of the reasoning that underlies Neoplatonic philosophy and explains the argumentation that leads to and supports Neoplatonic doctrines. He includes extensive accounts of fundamental ideas in Plotinus and Proclus, as well as Dionysius himself, and provides an excellent philosophical defense of Neoplatonism in general.

“This is, in many ways, the book for which teachers in the field have been waiting: a book that clearly and fully sets out the philosophical logic in Dionysius in a way accessible to undergraduate students and yet tackles the most vexed and controverted questions so strongly as to make it a necessity for graduate students and scholars in the field. Eric Perl has produced a remarkable unification of philosophy and accurate historical scholarship, something very rare.”  Wayne J. Hankey, author of One Hundred Years of Neoplatonism in France: A Brief Philosophical History

“Dionysius is an extremely important Christian Platonist in his own right and also for the enormous impact he had on medieval philosophy. Getting his metaphysics right is essential, and Perl has done an outstanding job articulating his philosophical genius.”  John Bussanich, author of The One and Its Relation to Intellect in Plotinus: A Commentary on Selected Texts

Eric D. Perl is Associate Professor of Philosophy at Loyola Marymount University.

Paul Brunton: The Quest of the Overself

Random House, 2003 (1937)     Amazon.com
Book Description:
BruntonThe Quest of the Overself shows Western readers how to achieve serenity of mind, control of thought and desire, and the power to use higher forces by means of simple exercises. These include breathing and visualization as well as mental control through meditation. These ideas, which the author gained by extensive travel in India, are as relevant to us today as they were when first published in 1937. Paul Brunton was a British philosopher, mystic and traveller. He left a successful journalistic career to live among yogis and holy men and studied a wide variety of Eastern and Western esoteric traditions. As he explains in the still fresh and fascinating The Quest of the Overself meditation and the inward quest are by no means exclusively for monks and hermits but also support those living everyday, active lives in the West.
Contents:
Part I:  The Analyses
I     Prefatory: A Writer on His Writings
II    The Mystery of Man
III   The Analysis of the Physical Self
IV    The Analysis of the Emotional Self
V     The Analysis of the Intellectual Self
VI    Beyond Time to Eternity
VII   The Genesis of Genius
Part II:  The Practices
VIII  The Spiritual Culture of Finer Feelings
IX    The Practice of Mental Mastery
X     The Path of Self-Enquiry
XI    The Mystery of Breath
XII   The Mystery of the Eye
XIII  The Mystery of the Heart
XIV   The Overself
XV    The Overself in Action
XVI   The Quest
Epilogue
Praise for Brunton (from an earlier, Rider edition):
“Paul Brunton was surely one of the finest mystical flowers to grow on the wasteland of our secular civilization. What he has to say is important to us all.”  George Feuerstein

“…a great gift to us Westerners who are seeking the spiritual.”  Charles T. Tart

“A person of rare intelligence…thoroughly alive, and whole in the most significant, ‘holy’ sense of the word.”  Yoga Journal

“Paul Brunton was a great original and got to a place of personal evolution that illumines the pathways of a future humanity.”  Jean Houston

“A simple, straightforward guide to how philosophical insights of the East and West can help create beauty, joy, and meaning in our lives…His keynote is balance, and his uplifting message encompasses all phases of human experience.”  East West Journal

“…sensible and compelling. His work can stand beside that of such East-West bridges as Merton, Huxley, Suzuki, Watts and Radhakrishnan. It should appeal to anyone concerned personally and academically with issues of spirituality.”  Choice

“Any serious man or woman in search of spiritual ideas will find a surprising challenge and an authentic source of inspiration and intellectual nourishment in the writings of Paul Brunton.”  Jacob Needleman

About the Author (from the same Rider edition):

Born in London in 1898, Paul Brunton published thirteen books between 1935 and 1952. He is generally recognized as having introduced yoga and meditation to the West, and for presenting their philosophical background in non-technical language. He died in Switzerland (where he lived for 20 years) in 1981.

JOB’s Comment:

See my earlier Brunton posts, in the References and Spirituality categories.

The Dawn Horse Testament of Heart-Master Da Free John

The Dawn Horse Press, 1985

Back Cover:

Master Da Free John says The Dawn Horse Testament is a c onversation he is always having with everyone:

“In making this book I have been bediating everykone, contacting everyone, dealing with psychic forces everywhere, in all time. It is a living conversation with absolutely everyone, personally.”

In his Dawn Horse Testament, Master Da Free John’s revelation of the Way of the Heartfinds ecstatic expression. It is a Blessed Covenant, his personal Testament to each and every person who would hear him. He addresses his listener as “Beloved” and, speaking from the Heart, he announces perhaps the greatest commitment to the Liberation of living beings by any Divinely Inspired personage – “This Is The Final Truth. You Are God, In God, Of God. My Devotee Is The God I Have Come To Serve.”

Heart Master Da’s Dawn Horse Testament is the meeting place of human longing and Divine Grace. It is the universal Upanishad for the Common Era, a Master-Teaching, profound in its meaning, yet simple to comprehend, beautifully articulating in the midst of our modern madness the ancient Love-Yoga of Communion with the Divine Being.

Mankind is indeed fortunate to be the recipient in such generous measure of the Blessings of the Heart-Master of the Dawn Horse, whose Testament Reveals the Exalted Poet, Truth-Realizer, and Love-Master, the Heart-Friend speaking Secrets, his Heart yearning for the meeting, indeed the marriage and final reconciliation, of human longing and Divine Grace.

Within the pages of this mighty book the reader will surely find one of the greatest and most beautifully written scriptural revelations of any age or faith. In exstasy Heart Master Da spoke his Dawn H orse Message to gatherings of devotees, and in ecstasy he wrote The Dawn Horse Testament, the “Eternal Conversation” through which he continues to speak to every one.

The Dawn Horse Testament abounds with the Mysteries of the Heart, which, previous to the Incarnation of Master Da Free John, have never been fully Revealed on Earth. There is an essential Wisdom in this book that will be lauded for centuries to come, or as long as th e Fire of Truth remains burning in this world. Indeed, in spite of our troubled times, The Dawn Horse Testament and Master Da Free John, who created it, are that Eternal Fire, Burning Bright.

“This Testament is my Intention to Awaken the Transcendental Self of every being to the Real Divine Condition. To read and understand this Testament is to be released from the egoic vision. Let it be so.” – Da Free John

Blurb by Ken Wilber:

The Dawn Horse Testament is the most ecstatic, most profound, most complete, most radical, and most comprehensive single spiritual text ever to be penned and confessed by the Human-Transcendental Spirit.”

Julius Evola: Révolte contre le monde moderne

Bibliothèque L’Age d’Homme, 1991

Amazon.fr

Résumé de l’éditeur:

Initialement paru en 1934, traduit en allemand un an après, Révolte contre le monde moderne est considéré comme l’ouvrage le plus important de Julius Evola (1898-1974). Ce livre prouve que déjá à cette époque, les bases d’une révolte globale entre la civilisation contemporaine avaient été posées, révolte en comparaison de laquelle la “contestation” qui s’est exprimée à la fin des années soixante apparaît chaotique et invertébrée. Au-delà des derniers aspects du monde moderne – hypertrophie de la technique, société de consommation, conditionnement de masse, etc. -, ce livre remonte aux causes, analyse les processus qui, depuis des siècles, ont exercé une action destructrice sur toute valeur authentique et toute forme supérieure d’organisation de l’existence, ont soustrait le monde des hommes aux influences spirituelles pour le livrer à l’individualisme, au materialisme, à l’irréalisme et à sa rhétorique spectrale.

La première partie du livre, “Le monde de la Tradition”, définit, à travers une étude comparée embrassant les civilisations les plus variées, une doctrine des catégories fondamentales du monde raditionnel: la royauté sacrée, la paix et la justice, l’Etat et l’Empire, le rite, la contemplation et l’action, l’initiation et le sacre, la guerre, les “jeux”, le statut de l’homme et de la femme, etc. Ainsi sont indiquées les voies qui conduisaient parfois au-delà de la condition humaine, ou bienqui lui assuraient une stabilité inébranlable. A l’inverse, l’homme moderne apparaît comme un cas aberrant d’être non plus relié aux forces d’en haut et emporté par la “démonie” du collectif vers de nouvelles formes de barbarie.

La deuxième partie du livre, “Genèse et visage du monde moderne”, développe une “métaphysique de l’histoire”, à travers l’exposition de la doctrine traditionelle des cycles, des considérations sur le symbolisme du pôle, l’habitat hyperboréen originel, la “Lumière du Nord” et la “Lumière du Sud”, le matriarcat, etc. Elle se poursuit par l’analy se des cycles de la décadence, depuis les grandes cultures préchrétiennes jusqu’à la Russie et l’Amérique contemporaines, en passant par le monde gréco-romain et le Moyen Age.

En 1935, le poète Gottfried Benn salua ce livre comme “une oeuvre dont l’importance exceptionelle apparaîtra clairement dans les prochanes années” et écrivit qu’en la lisant “on regardera l’Europe d’une autre manière”.

Cette nouvelle traduction française intégrale et précédée d’une introduction du traducteur consacrée aux sources d’Evola (notamment le mythologue J. J. Bachofen) et suivie d’une bibliographie française de Julius Evola, établie par Alain de Benoist.