/lit/ - Literature

>>15053436
>but also peddling mysticism horseshit.
The idea that Yoga is something that is supposed to be separated from any religious or spiritual context, or that Yoga when separated from this context is Yoga at all instead of simply being a series of stretching exercises is a sign of the intellectual degeneration and confusion of the modern era

>>15040341
No, because you will constantly be moving around, which is a distraction from contemplation

brothers..................................................................................................how can one man be.................................so........................................
fucking........................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................based...............................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................................guenon(pbuh)based thread for the brotherhood............................................................................................................................................................

what did he say about women?

>" It is almost as if the Greeks, at a moment when they were about to disappear from history, wished to avenge themselves for their own incomprehension by imposing on a whole section of mankind the limitations of their own mental horizon."

What did he mean by this?

>"We should also add that when we speak of the West, we also include Judaism, which has never exerted any influenced except in a westerly direction, and which may even have helped somewhat toward forming the modern mentality in general. In point of fact, the large part played in Bolshevism by Israelite elements is a serious reason for the Easterners, and for the Muslims above all, to be distrustful and to keep their distance; we are not speaking of certain agitators of the 'Young Turk' type. who are profoundly anti-Muslim, being not seldom also of Jewish origin, and not having the least authority. Bolshevism cannot penetrate into India either, because it is opposed to all the traditional institutions, and especially to that of the castes, from this point; from this point of view, the Hindus would see no difference between its destructive action and the destructive action that the English have long tried to carry out by every sort of means, and where the one has failed, the other would be no more successful"

René Guénon - East and West pg. 78

The Reign of Quantity and the Signs of the Times > Symbols of Sacred Science > The Multiple States of the Being > The Symbolism of the Cross > Crisis of the Modern World > Man and His Becoming According to the Vedanta > Perspectives on Initiation > Traditional Forms & Cosmic Cycles > Initiation and Spiritual Realization > Introduction to the Study of the Hindu doctrines > The Great Triad > Insights into Islamic Esoterism & Taoism > East and West > The King of the World > Spiritual Authority and Temporal Power > Studies in Hinduism > Insights into Christian Esoterism > The Esoterism of Dante > St. Bernard > Oriental Metaphysics > The Spiritist Fallacy > Theosophy: History of a Pseudo-Religion > Studies in Freemasonry and Compagnonnage > Miscellanea> Reviews

For Guénon, Florentine humanism corresponds to Luther’s schismatic rebellion but with a Latinate accent – an insight, one might add, that a calm re-reading of Pico’s famous Oration will support. Both movements position themselves resentfully as anti-Catholic and anti-traditional. Florentine neo-Platonism is of the very late, magical variety of Platonism, rooted less in The Symposium than in The Hermetica. As for Protestantism as such, The Crisis classifies it under the formula of “individualism as applied to religion.” Guénon puts it this way: “Protestantism, like the modern world, is built upon mere negation, the same negation of principles that is the essence of individualism.” It will be useful here to remark that Nicolas Berdyaev, Guénon’s Russian-born contemporary, who in exile made a new home in France, evaluated the Renaissance in almost the same terms; Spengler too thought that the Renaissance represented an “imbroglio,” as he put it.

Much of the refreshment in Guénon’s work comes from its author’s forthright judgment, his judgment of Protestantism furnishing an exemplum. A crisis, Guénon remarks, is etymologically a judgment or decision; and it is any situation that makes a judgment or decision necessary. In The Crisis, Guénon goes on to say that, once it had undergone the Protestant transformation, “the modern outlook was bound to reject all spiritual authority in the true sense of the word, namely authority that is based on the supra-human order, as well as any traditional organization.” One can easily imagine the faculty of a contemporary philosophy department squirming in response to Guénon’s words or bursting into a demonstration of outrage. The ire would be unanimous. But that is precisely the paradox that Guénon’s analysis of modernity reveals: in the universalization of the vaunted “individualism,” any noticeable individuality swiftly ceases to exist; a welter of contending subjects replaces it, the constituent persons of which, in their egocentric contentiousness, soon resemble one another indistinguishably and interchangeably. Guénon has the temerity to write: “Protestantism denied the authority of the organization qualified to interpret legitimately the religious tradition of the West and in its place claimed to set up ‘free criticism,’ that is to say any interpretations resulting from private judgment, even that of the ignorant and incompetent, and based exclusively on the exercise of human reason.” Having validated the subjective, the Protestant or modern mind has no criterion by which it might reject any opinion; so it embraces the opposite and declares a regime of mandatory relativism in ideas and moeurs. From this turn-around arises the social, cultural, and epistemological chaos of the modern age.

>When Rene Guenon was a young man in France, one night he set out for a long walk through the woods. During this exercise in “peripatetic contemplation,” a practice to which he had accustomed himself, he accidentally fell into a ditch that was so deep it was impossible for him to find a way out on his own.
>Stranded in complete darkness in this pit in the middle of the woods, with no one within sight to be summoned for help, Guenon thought he had finally met his end. As he prepared himself for what seemed to be an inevitable death, a hand appeared from above, seemingly out of nowhere, and pulled him out of the ditch.
>No sooner, however, had he been rescued by this unknown figure, that he took off and disappeared into the woods, as swiftly and mysteriously as he had appeared. While Guenon’s attempts to catch up to him to offer his heartfelt gratitude were unsuccessful, he did manage to get a clear look at his face. Many years later, while in Cairo, Guenon attended a Sufi gathering involving a majlis of dhikr, only to find the man who had rescued him years before in France seating at the center of the gathering.
>As Guenon went into a shock, ecstatically pointing at the man who he recognized from years before, the mysterious figure who happened to be Shaikh Salāma Ḥasan al-Rāḍī, a Sufi master, stood up, smiled and embraced Guenon, acknowledging their previous encounter. The miraculous nature of the incident — well-known to the members of the shaikh’s order — lay in that Shaykh al-Rāḍī had never stepped foot in France in his life. The charismatic power of the shaykh was so strong that he was himself not the member of any ṭarīqa, having instead founded his own.

Am I supposed to believe this story about Guénon? What was Arabian Sufi Master doing in rural france, roaming in the middle of night, only to rescue Guénon? These kind of stories sound like Blavatsky's babble about the Mahatmas saving her when she was younger.

Why is this Guénon story ever ridiculed here? It certainly sounds too stupid and unrational to be true

What do you think he thought about while he was having sex with his wife?

>tfw Rene died before he could produce a full-length work on Sufi metaphysics

feels bad man

I'm fucking crying /lit/.

I finally figured it out, I finally understand this madman.
After years of reading the Greeks, Hume, Kant, Hegel, Wittgenstein, Kripke, Quine, Nietzsche... I finally understand what's happening. I realize the pursuit of conventional truth is pointless. There's only the spotless Absolute and any other sort of truth, meaning or necessity only exists conditionally as a lesser reality. I am that same beginningless God existing everywhere who created this mirror to witness myself in.

That's it lads, that's it. All my life was a spook. Not anymore. I'm finally free.

>>11019738
>Did he delve too deep into the metaphysical?

To the contrary, he tried to substitute psychological explanations and similar nonsense for the truly metaphysical.