/lit/ - Literature

[Anonymous No.12034247]

Does taking the /guenonpill/ require converting to Islam eventually? Should I just convert right away?

[Anonymous No.12034276]

>>12034247
That's ultimately a very personal choice that you should not decide based on what people on 4chan say. I really like guenon but feel no compulsion to convert. The only thing that tempts me towards are these thot muslimahs wearing lip gloss and tight clothing.

[Anonymous No.12034286]

>>12034247
Sufism, to be more specific, and no, it's not the only path. There's also Advaita-Vedanta and maybe Taoism.

[Anonymous No.12034291]

>>12034247
Do you believe that Islam is the true religion? Do you know the articles of faith, the things which all Muslims believe? If you declare that there is none worthy of worship except for Allah, and that Muhammad is a messenger of Allah. You've to believe it yourself firstly and then profess it outwardly. Do not come to Islam if you do not believe in Islam, belief is first. You are free and invited to embrace Islam at any time, whenever you're ready, all you've to do is actually say the shahada

[Anonymous No.12034299]

>>12034286
and if that doesn't work you can always kill yourself

[Anonymous No.12034304]

>>12034247
Taking the Guenonpill involves realising that nearly everything that Guenon wrote was wrong.

[Anonymous No.12034306]

>>12034286
What about systems that are more in spirit with western culture?

[Anonymous No.12034323]

>>12034247
No, it requires embracing a true tradition, it doesn't have to be Islam. I find Roman Catholicism to be an apt way to interact with the tradition. But you will have to read Guénon first and then decide what path you want after researching them all for yourself.

[Anonymous No.12034328]

>>12034306
Islam and Christianity are the two closest religions to each other. Not to imply that western values == Christian values, that's an whole other digression

[Anonymous No.12034334]

>>12034323
This is true. Traditionalism as a school of philosophy is not in any way exclusively Islamic

[Anonymous No.12034339]

>>12034334
I also want to add to avoid Schuon or his fake Tariqah OP if you do consider conversion to Islam. You will find a lot of dubious shit about schuon and Guénon wrote a letter to schuon in his later years criticizing what he knew about schuons transgressions.

[Anonymous No.12034342]

>>12034306
Sufism is the most accessible tradition to westerns. Unless you're of Native American descent who can join a tribe, or a jew who can be inducted in Qabbalah, there's no other way. All of the other traditions the West has to offer are either decaying, like Christianity, or larps.

[Anonymous No.12034348]

>>12034342
This is not true, Christianity and Freemasonry are still valid paths. As is the Hermetic path. Read 'Perspectives on Initiation'.

[Anonymous No.12034358]

>>12034348
>freemasonry
sweaty noo

[Anonymous No.12034362]

>>12034342
Sufism only exists within Islam. There's no Sufism outside of the religion. There is not such a thing as a non-Muslim practitioner of Sufism. Just so that's clear :^)

[Anonymous No.12034376]

>>12034362
I never said it was outside of Islam. You're point being?
>>12034348
Guenon gave up on Christianity as a valid path, and though he said Freemasonry was also valid, it was warped. Read 'Studies in Freemasonry'.

[Anonymous No.12034379]

>>12034247
No, You could also convert to Taoism

[Anonymous No.12034409]

Is Crisis of the Modern World a good place to start with him?

[Anonymous No.12034421]

>>12034291
I desire religion, I'm a monotheist, but I don't believe the Quran is the divine word.
I like the Muslim lifestyle and approach to daily life. You don't think if I start practicing an Islamic-inspired existence, including regular prayer, that belief could follow?

[Anonymous No.12034554]

>>12034421
only a hypocrite practises externally that which he does not believe internally.
In a sense there are 3 divisions of mankind: believers, non-believers, and hypocrites.

No, you should not call yourself a Muslim if you do not believe that which all Muslims believe.

If you want to believe, just pray to God sincerely that He guides you to the right path. That's all you've to do, just pray. Put your trust in God, He has promised that He will put whomever asks with sincerity to the straight path. The invitation has already been sent

[Anonymous No.12034594]

>>12034554
What would you make of the people who "just pray" and then are led into non-Muslim faiths?

[Anonymous No.12035030]

>>12034421
Belief would likely follow, but I don't see why you would pray if you don't believe

[Anonymous No.12035164]

Islam is a shit religon. Also wtf is gueno? Is that a spanish word? I speak arabic and idk what it means

[Anonymous No.12035197]

>>12034348
>>12034376
What is the Sufism equivalent in Christianity?

[Anonymous No.12035311]

Take the /devipill/.

[Anonymous No.12035377]

>>12034247
Listen. Guenon was a great and accomplished scholar in many respects, who can give some fantastic impetus for learning about the world’s different mystical paths and seeing the hidden core lying at their heart of extinction of the ordinary surface self and immersion in the universal self, but he wasn’t a perfect man. He wasn’t totally right in anything. And he wasn’t a completely balanced figure, either: he had a heavy emphasis on the intellectual, without much focus on the emotional or physical.

He disparaged Gurdjieff, for example, but Jeanne de Salzmann (one of the students Gurdjieff most respected and brought into his confidence) talked to him later in his life about it and reported that Guenon came to the conclusion that Gurdjieff was indeed “Traditional” and he was wrong to say “Flee Gurdjieff like the plague.” In fact, Gurdjieff is quite like a lot of “mad” Sufi masters in the Sufi tradition Guenon was supposedly part of, and Gurdjieff did receive extensive Sufi training, which is obvious if you look into the scholarship and history around him. So it’s not like everything Guenon said or judged was perfect.

He also did a similar about-face for Buddhism, which he tended to discount as anti-Traditional until someone else, again, discussed it and he realized he was misinterpreting it.

If you revere Guenon, you are a weak-minded person looking for a guru and too readily easily to submit yourself to one. I’m sorry if it sounds harsh, but that’s the truth. You have to be really weak-minded to take a guy who did not even set himself up as a guru/teacher, did not even take any students, as some infallible guru. A person can have spiritual attainments and great knowledge without being perfect. I read Gurdjieff AND Guenon, and appreciate them both, allow me to say that. But people have a desire to be cult followers and may find this weird, because, “Hey, didn’t Guenon say he didn’t like Gurdjieff? Hey, aren’t their philosophies incompatible on the surface?” Stop being a herd follower. Make your own path,

[Anonymous No.12035396]

>>12035164
Guenon, more commonly referred to as GUANO by REAL INTELLECTUALS, is a """traditionalist"""" (whatever that means) who believes in fairy tales and a man in the clouds

[Anonymous No.12035428]

>>12035396
You are a pathetic and narrow-minded person who will be exterminated all-too-soon without ever having found out what all this is about, because you like to conform to your social conditioning as if it were your conscious thought and deliberately arrived at free-will when it is really just herd instinct. I pity you.

[Anonymous No.12035502]

>>12034348
Not according to Monsieur Rene, who only accorded them validity in the virtual sense. And the latter only as far as exoterism is concerned.
The thing about Rene Guenon is that his private letters are far more revealing of his thinking than his published works. He privately supported the islamisation of Europe, and encouraged his correspondents to convert to Islam. Some preferred masonry. He did not give any credence in the existence of hermetism, except maybe in very isolated and degenerated instances.
>>12034379
Which Guenon said was the most difficult path of all, and very difficult for westerners to access in any case.

[Anonymous No.12035505]

>>12035377
>Jeanne de Salzmann (one of the students Gurdjieff most respected and brought into his confidence) talked to him later in his life
source? I call b/s on this. Guenon was a rather proud and vindictive man and I doubt he would have revised his judgement over Gurdjieff. Evola, on the other hand, wrote an article more or less in praise of the chap.

[Anonymous No.12035563]

>being guenonian
you guys should be burnt at stake

[Anonymous No.12035575]

>>12034247

[Anonymous No.12035577]

>>12035563
heh, even Maritain couldn't prove him wrong.

[Anonymous No.12035941]

>>12035197
I suppose just "mystic Christianity." This is a rather broad category though, and it includes everything from dogmatic Christians sometimes spending moments in silent contemplation, to "heretical" attempts at gnosis and ontological reunion with God.

Out of all the major Christian traditions, the one with the most prominent active mystic tradition is Eastern Orthodoxy, which has an incredibly strong emphasis on theosis and mystic prayer called hesychasm. Most devout Orthodox practioners would call you a heretic if you said humans could reunite with God, however, or would agree but say that God still somehow remains "superior."

[Anonymous No.12035970]

>>12034421
>>12034594


Belief in the Qur'an authenticity develops over time and it starts with praying as the other anon said. Once you pray, humbly, and open your heart with sincerity, God draws Himself near to you and the Qur'ans Truth because so obvious you'll probably laugh at yourself for having been a kafir. As for if you pray and God leads you to a different religion, well, I've never heard of that personally. If you're looking towards Islam and praying to God with Islam in mind, chances are, he'll lead you to Islam. The fact that you even took that first step at all is a sign. And as we say, "You take one step towards God, He takes ten steps towards you" and that is the plain truth. Good luck if you are trying to come to Islam. It's a very beautiful religion, albeit strict, but the rules are good for you once you understand their purpose, however, that does take some time. But if you're about hard discipline, piety, traditional values, and nobility, then I'd say Islam is right for you. But it's not by any means easy to be Muslim.

[Anonymous No.12036010]

>>12034304
>>12034304
>>12034304

[Anonymous No.12036103]

>>12034247
I think Schuon disagreed with Guenon about the possibility of Christianity still being traditional.

[Anonymous No.12036113]

>>12035970
>>12034554
Mer7aba brothers

[Anonymous No.12036115]

>>12034247
no it doesnt

[Anonymous No.12036120]

Lmao spooks

[Anonymous No.12036128]

>>12036103
you mean still possessing esotericism, rather than being 'traditional' but that does not matter: Schuon was an awful wanker. You ever seen his n00ds?

[Anonymous No.12036144]

>>12035563
ummm... sweetie..

[Anonymous No.12036159]

Bros: http://praxisresearch.net/

[Anonymous No.12036175]

>>12034362
Just to be clear as well, sufists are widely considered infidels because they came with something else other than what was bestowed on Mohammed.

[Anonymous No.12036188]

>>12034247
Yes brother, join Islam you won’t regret it

[Anonymous No.12036194]

>>12035577
>Maritain
lol

[Anonymous No.12036252]

Every single convert I've met was a true blue loser

[Anonymous No.12036334]

>>12034342
>All of the other traditions the West has to offer are either decaying
i see, because le poo poo rebranded gnostic frenchman recognizes that wh*toids prefer gay anal sex over the religion that has formed their civilization makes christendom invalid and jesus christ is no longer logos incarnate woa whoopsie ok got it

[Anonymous No.12036351]

>>12036252
To Islam? I’m a white Muslim, make a shitload of money go to parties and have a girlfriend. Suck my fucking cock infidel. You lose

[Anonymous No.12036363]

>>12036351
Bait

[Anonymous No.12036371]

[Anonymous No.12036372]

>>12034276
>The only thing that tempts me towards are these thot muslimahs wearing lip gloss and tight clothing.
Convert them to Christianity instead.

[Anonymous No.12036377]

>>12036351
tell the kaffirs what time it is Abdul!

[Anonymous No.12036425]

>>12036363
Not bait
>>12036377
Whatever man, you have to understand being a loser is not my statement

[Anonymous No.12036436]

>>12035311
>schizo roasties as spiritual guidance
no thanks

[Anonymous No.12036469]

>>12036351
Oh so you're one of those muslims who don't read the Qur'an and are only in it for the persecution status.

[Anonymous No.12036485]

>>12036351

Salam brother, please don't boast about your participation in haram activities. I don't want to be rude or commanding, but you should be embarrassed of your sin and work to refining yourself, not bragging about it to people who don't care. I'm sorry if this is condescending at all, but it is very important that you hold up the character of a Muslim both anonymously and in real life, you have no one to impress here. Allah knows best. Allahumma barik lahu.

[Anonymous No.12036514]

Don't take the Guenon pill Anons you will end up agreeing with ISIS

[Anonymous No.12036533]

>>12036351
>t. albanian gangster rapper from switzerland

[Anonymous No.12036561]

>>12034306
Islam, then.

[Anonymous No.12036897]

>>12034304
Yeah, after reading all the cunt's books, I want to agree. The diagnostics in Crisis of the Modern World and Reign of Quantity. But his unhelpful conclusions as far as practice are concerned islamophilic in the extreme.

[Anonymous No.12036899]

>>12036897
>The diagnostics in Crisis of the Modern World and Reign of Quantity are valid and useful.

[Anonymous No.12037606]

>>12035505
>>12035505
Kathleen Ferrick Rosenblatt, who wrote a good biography of Rene Daumal, early 20th-century surrealist poet and novelist, interested in Hinduism since youth and student of Gurdjieff when older, says:

“
I discuss this in my book "Rene Daumal: The Life and Work of a Mystic Guide" [SUNI Press] and in French, Rene Daumal: au dela de l'horizon [Jose Corti, Paris]. I spent 20 years on and off interviewing Rene's colleagues and Madame de Salzmann and her son Michel who grew up knowing Rene. I feel it is conclusive that Madame did have the opportunity to clear the air with Guenon. Gurdjieff's work is the essence of traditional if it means getting to the original kernel of truth. There is a photo of Guenon, the only photo to lack an accompanying blurb below. 3 chapters on Daumal and Hinduism”.

Something like an idea of the equivalence of Brahman and Atman Guenon finds as crucial to really “Traditional” stuff is definitely to be found subtly in Gurdjieff’s work/system if you dig it out. For instance, to his student Maurice Nicoll, he made the comment, “Behind real ‘I’ lies God.”

[Anonymous No.12037669]

>>12037606
Thanks for the citation, but I call hogwash on this. See RG's correspondence,

"Quant à votre question au sujet de Gurdjieff et de Lanza del Vasto, je puis sans aucune hésitation vous répondre d’une façon tout à fait négative. Le premier qui doit être maintenant en Amérique (du moins je n’ai pas entendu dire qu’il soit revenu en Europe), a constitué, à l’aide de ce qu’il a pu apprendre dans ses voyages en Orient, une sorte de méthode d’entraînement psychique assez fantaisiste, qui semble même n’être pas sans danger, et qui en tout cas ne se rattache absolument à rien d’authentique."

"Je croyais que Madame de Salzmann était toujours à Genève, où elle avait une école de culture physique avant la guerre ; si Gurdjieff, dont son mari était autrefois un des principaux assistants, est revenu en France, c’est sans doute ce qui l’aura ramenée également."

"Gurdjieff est d’un tout autre genre, mais il n’est pas moins inquiétant ; il exerce sur ses disciples une véritable fascination, qui témoigne assurément d’une force psychique peu ordinaire, mais qui, spirituellement, est un signe très défavorable ; du reste tous les prétendus « maîtres » qui ne relèvent d’aucune forme traditionnelle déterminée sont par là même à éviter purement et simplement."

Letters to Eric Ollivier and Louis Cattiaux, 1946 and 1949. http://www.index-rene-guenon.org

[Anonymous No.12037692]

>>12034247
Convert only if you plan on following the Quran only. We don’t need more heretics.

[Anonymous No.12038501]

>>12037692
t. doesnt pray

retard quranist

[Anonymous No.12038570]

>>12036897
> islamophilic in the extreme

He doesn't seem that way to me. He writes in East and West that the two likely outcomes were that the West could eventually rediscover that kind of knowledge within itself and that if it couldn't it would eventually become islamic. At one point he in a straight forward manner mentions the latter option would have more risks because it would result in ethnic tensions. His tone in the book seems to be that of a disinterest spectator, I have no doubt he considered Islam the best option for a westerner seeking genuine initiation, but as for the separate topic of what is better for the society as a whole he basically says it would be less of a problem if the west could rediscover that kind of knowledge within itself. He explicitly talks about intellectuals studying eastern texts and then using that knowledge to study the early western texts to discover the same truths in them.

He was known to have not closely studied Eastern Orthodoxy but with it's Neoplatonic leanings (which he regarded as 'traditional') and its Theosis it seems to be much closer to what he considers the eternal truth. If what Guenon says turns out to be true i wonder if E.O. will be the way the West accepts mysticism into the heart of its being again. One future I could picture is most of the prot/cath Anglosphere and western Europe becoming Islamified while only the Orthodox countries (and Poland) remaining mostly Christian.

[Anonymous No.12038731]

>>12036175
Infidels are universally considered infidels. There's only 3 kinds of people: Muslim, Kafir, Munafiq. Be wary of calling out entire groups of people who consider themselves to be Muslim. I am familiar with people that you may call Sufists, and they uphold the sharia, and there is no fault in their creed, and they follow the established fiqh. It would be spiritually dangerous to call these people kafir.

My thoughts on the matter of calling out Sufism, or Tassawuf, as a bid'ah and as something outside of Islam, lean towards it being a psyop. The same for the sunni-shia conflict, it became a thing after the US invasion of Iraq and it's not necessary. The sunni-shia division is not a matter for war.

Islam as a religion, as a faith, is not so complicated. It's easy to recognize fellow Muslims. We greet each other with salaam, we pray the same way, we eat the same meat, we are like-minded.

[Anonymous No.12038749]

>>12038731
>>12036485
>>12035970
You sure are one preachy mofo, you sound like that muslim character from Oz

[Anonymous No.12038807]

>>12036175
Absolute horseshit. That may be the case today, but even during the earliest days of Islam most of its prominent thinkers were very devout Sufis. There have been periods of Sufi repression, of course, but the idea that all true Muslims throughout history have been dogmatic Quranists is just fundamentalist revisionism.

[Anonymous No.12038852]

>>12038749

I'm not >>12038731

I'm just trying to help people out who are interested in Islam and look out for brothers who don't seem to be upholding our virtues. I'm not great my self, but it is common, if not encouraged, to look out for brothers, kindly, if they do things to their own chagrin. If you don't like that then ok, but i'm not trying to harm anyone.

[Anonymous No.12038879]

>>12038749

Do you like to play poker? My favorite is Razz, during H.O.R.S.E
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Razz_%28poker%29?wprov=sfla1

[Anonymous No.12038971]

>>12038807
>fundamentalist
Islamic fundamentalism should really be: the 6 articles of faith, the 5 pillars, the sunnah, the sharia, the jurisprudence. I don't agree that the takfiri is upholding this if he is yelling innovation and disbelief at everything he doesn't understand. But, there you go, we are in an age where gay doesn't mean happy and the rainbow is perceived as the champion of the sodomites

>>12038749
pic related

[Anonymous No.12039753]

>>12038570
>He doesn't seem that way to me.
private correspondence tells a different tale...

[Anonymous No.12040180]

>>12039753
source? I've already read a lot of it and I don't recall anything like that

[Anonymous No.12040233]

>>12040180
You can take a look at his secretary's memoirs, for starters: http://dossierschuonguenonislam.blogspirit.com/files/Dossier%20confidentiel%20inedit.pdf
I posted the link to his online works, including letters, above.

[Anonymous No.12040261]

>>12038570
East and West is quite a terrible book, frankly ("Japanese are not Asians", among other things).
Privately, RG saw no hope for a Christian restoration, as it were, but had to include that possibility for various reasons, and to avoid coming across as a proselyte for Islam at a time when that was not exactly a popular idea.
He also worked - again, privately, - towards re-establishing some sort of "traditional Masonry", but that ended in pathetic failure.
On a practical level, Evola's works, maligned as they are, are much more useful.

[Anonymous No.12040554]

>>12040233
>http://dossierschuonguenonislam.blogspirit.com/files/Dossier%20confidentiel%20inedit.pdf
Damn Schuon went full retard. It hurts to read this. Power can corrupt even the very best it seems.

[Anonymous No.12040574]

>>12040233
Why do you know so much about an obsucre French philosopher?

[Anonymous No.12040606]

>>12040554
I can't read French, can you summarize anything important in there?

[Anonymous No.12040630]

>>12040606
baguette weewee croissant

[Anonymous No.12040637]

>>12040630
xd

[Anonymous No.12040695]

>>12040606
so Schuon was appointed as a kind of spiritual lieutenant by as sunni sheikh, but later decided to proclaim himself shekih. This is never allowed, and is definitively NOT trad. He ruledhis own initiatic order where he mass-produced muslim-initiates.There was also a personality cult around him, and his teachings were syncretic. Guénon ended up condemning this before his death.

[Anonymous No.12040779]

>>12034304
His views on Hinduism were sympathetic (with caveats) but he had a strong interpretive bias towards his own monist view, which he called orthodox. For Guenon, there was a true, primal, "orthodox" religion which can broadly be called perennialist and monist. In his view, anything that deviated from that supposed orthodoxy was a corruption of the original religion and should be discarded, so he branded huge swathes of classic Indian philosophy as heretical and essentially chose Advaita Vedanta as the "orthodox" form of Hinduism. I think this bastardises the enormous plurality of Hinduism into a Christian-style dichotomy of orthodoxy vs heresy.

[Anonymous No.12040783]

>>12040574
hehe.
>>12040695
it gets a lot worse. there were a couple of major court cases a few years back which involved his n00ds getting scrubbed from the interwebz.

[Anonymous No.12040911]

>>12037669
Oh, thanks for telling me. That’s interesting. I don’t care either way since I like learning from both. I think Guenon is a bit of a chauvinist with his emphasis on any master not belonging to an established traditional form being safely disowned. If you research it well, it seems evident Gurdjieff came from some secret perennialist tradition/school in Central Asia within Sufism, which doesn’t necessarily want to outright make itself known.

[Anonymous No.12041015]

>>12040911
I think you are probably right. But it is all a moot point for me now, at any rate. I read Gurdjieff when I was younger, and enjoyed the Peter Brooke film too.

[Anonymous No.12041098]

>>12038501
t. hasn’t read the Quran

Everything is written in it, even the way we’re supposed to pray. You fucking retarded piece of shit, you fucker actually believe our Prophet was a pedo who used to drink camel piss.

[Anonymous No.12041450]

>>12040779

That's a distorted portrayal of his understanding of Hinduism, which greatly simplifies his thoughts on it and also leaves out important context. First off it's indisputable that some form of non-dualism/monism/unity is one of the main messages of the Upanishads. The principal Upanishads are replete with passages stating that Atma is Brahman, that you are 'all this', that there is only One without second, that 'all this is but the Self' and so on. This is combined with passages that condemn the perception of multiplicity and talk about how it's bound up with fear and rebirth. This is not limited to the Upanishads but other centrally important smriti texts like the Mahabharata, Bhagavad-Gita and even the Laws of Manu also mention non-dualistic teachings and doctrines. Is Shankara's classical Advaita the perfect formulation of the doctrine of the Upanishads and a more correct understanding than Vishishtadvaita, Shuddadvaita or any other type that posits some kind of partial unity? (even Hare Krishna), That comes down to personal opinion but that a general non-dualism/monism (of whatever type) is taught in the Upanishads is obvious. The commentaries of Madhva that Dvaita Vedanta is based on are a series of elaborate mental gymnastics that involve Madhva contorting himself over and over again trying to explain how a certain Upanishad verse means the exact opposite of what it clearly says. As evinced by their mention in many texts and commentaries dualism (like non-dualism) as a school of thought long precedes its formalization into a school of Vedanta but that it took until the 13th century, nearly 2,000 years after the composition of the oldest Upanishads is a testament to how illogical and counterintuitive of an interpretation of the texts that it is. It has never held significant sway among Hindus, pure dualism is a small minority in comparison to all the various sects of full or partial non-dualism that the vast majority of Hindus belong to.

Guenon did not impose his own Abrahamic notions of Orthodoxy onto Hinduism but Hinduism has always considered adherence to the Vedic texts to be the measure of orthodoxy. Sure this is not a black and white distinction and there is a history of the lines being blurred but that doesn't change the fact that this is a defining feaure of Hinduism. Hindu thought by and large considers the Sruti to be the final word on orthodoxy, and the Upanishads to be the final words on the import of the Sruti. Given that Advaita and highly-similar schools of other types of non-dualism like Vishishtadvaita have over history been the predominant interpretations considered by Hindus to be traditional and orthodox it's hardly a stretch to say non-dualism in general is orthodox. This is not to say that Dualists are not real Hindus or they are a separate religion but simply that non-dualism is much closer to the spirit and correct interpretation of the foundational texts.

[Anonymous No.12041456]

>>12040779
>>12041450

> In his view, anything that deviated from that supposed orthodoxy was a corruption of the original religion and should be discarded, so he branded huge swathes of classic Indian philosophy as heretical and essentially chose Advaita Vedanta as the "orthodox" form

This is doubly wrong, he never wrote that anything in Hinduism should be discarded and he never claim huge swathes of Indian philosophy were heretical. He writes about how certain Darshanas interacted with eachother and critiqued eachother and that in the process of this mixing Hindu themselves determined what was orthodox or not. Not once does he claim to know better what is Darshana is orthodox or not than Indian Hindus, he simply notes that certain schools like Nyaya and Vaisheshika had some of their ideas accepted and others rejected by the other schools that came to be more influential. This is not an idiosyncratic presentation of Hinduism but represents a fairly standard view of a traditional medieval-era Hindu who would see the darshanas as an integrated whole more or less completed by (their preferred type of) Vedanta. You also seem to be exaggerating his views on Advaita, he goes out of his way to mention that Vishishtadvaita is another way of teaching the same thing which differs mostly in emphasis, he also says Tantra is just another way of teaching the same doctrines as the Upanishads; not to mention how he regards a wide array of traditions from Daoism and Sufism to Neoplatonism as also being different ways of teaching this same doctrine. Really anything which speaks of a divine/transcendent unity he accepts as valid. Yes he regarded Advaita as more 'pure' but he accepted many other doctrines too, the idea that he considered everything outside Advaita as heterodox is completely wrong.

There are some things with his intro book that could be improved but not for the reasons you list. He explains Hinduism through the lenses of a traditional medieval-era Vedantist, which is not a problem in itself for among other reasons because once you have that perspective under your belt it makes it easier to appreciate and understand a lot of other Hindu ideas. IMO the areas where he could have improved it are that he doesn't sufficiently explain Tantra and that he does not take the time to explain the prominence of Bhakti and other popular practices and how these relate to the canonical basis of the religion. The main flaw is not that he presents an Vedantic view but that he does not illustrate how this connects to the larger picture. He indirectly mentions it and doesn't say anything that contradicts this but he leaves it up to the reader to do the research/reading needed to fill the gaps. Aside from that it's a decent intro.

[Anonymous No.12041782]

>>12040695
I was asking specifically about his thoughts on the Islamization of Europe because another poster said in his private correspondence he supported it more than his books would let on. I was already aware Schuon was brilliant but also a perverted hack and possibly a sociopath.

[Anonymous No.12041840]

>>12041782
You must recall the era in which he wrote, and the audience also: more or less right wing and conservative, more less catholic, more or less upper-middle-class intellectual types, despite his insistence otherwise. They would never accept a foreign religion, therefore masonry was acceptable to some non-catholic types, while his public acceptance of some form of christian mysticism - or the possibility of a catholic revival - helped the pill go down easier for the catholics. Remember this is Action Francaise era, and Maritain and co. could not accept his conclusions one way or another on anything that would diminish the Church in their eyes. His "super-religion for initiates" seemed like an occultist fantasy for most religious types anyhow.

[Anonymous No.12042398]

>>12041840
It seems like you're really reading into his motives and assuming quite a lot. As I said, I have no doubt he thought Islam was the best path on an individual level, as far as the entire west goes I have not seen any writing in his books or otherwise that suggested he wanted the west to become Islamic over another option. It wouldn't even greatly surprise me if he did but he wrote a few things which made him seem more neutral and so I'll wait until I see actual proof before considering him a shill for Islamization.

[Anonymous No.12042412]

>>12042398
>see actual proof
read the letters instead of waiting, friendo

[Anonymous No.12042659]

>>12042412
Yes, I've already read all the ones I could find online that are in English. I didn't remember anything like that from them. I don't know if there are other letters I missed, I was hoping you could provide a link to the actual letter which contains those sentiments so I can see what you are talking about.

[Anonymous No.12042886]

>>12041098
I have read it. I know the quranism sentiment, but you cant sense of it without some hadith assisstance.

[Anonymous No.12042913]

If you're going Muslim you might as well go real Muslim instead of that hippie shit.

[Anonymous No.12042943]

>>12042913
>the American girl is well acquainted with her body's seductive capacity. She knows it lies in the face, and in expressive eyes, and thirsty lips. She knows seductiveness lies in the round breasts, the full buttocks, and in the shapely thighs, sleek legs – and she shows all this and does not hide it
Based sandnig desu

[Anonymous No.12042953]

>>12042943
>The American is primitive in his artistic taste, both in what he enjoys as art and in his own artistic works. "Jazz" music is his music of choice. This is that music that the Negroes invented to satisfy their primitive inclinations, as well as their desire to be noisy on the one hand and to excite bestial tendencies on the other. The American's intoxication in "jazz" music does not reach its full completion until the music is accompanied by singing that is just as coarse and obnoxious as the music itself.

[Anonymous No.12042959]

>>12042953
Reminds me of thing observation by Jung:

>Another thing that struck me in the American was the great influence of the Negro, a psychological influence naturally, not due to the mixing of blood. The emotional way an American expresses himself, especially the way he laughs, can best be studied in the illustrated supplements of the American papers; the inimitable Teddy Roosevelt laugh is found in its primordial form in the American Negro. The peculiar walk with loose joints, or the swinging of the hips so frequently observed in Americans, also comes from the Negro.[3] American music draws its main inspiration from the Negro, and so does the dance. The expression of religious feeling, the revival meetings, the Holy Rollers and other abnormalities are strongly influenced by the Negro. The vivacity of the average American, which shows itself not only at baseball games but quite particularly in his extraordinary love of talking – the ceaseless gabble of American papers is an eloquent example of this – is scarcely to be derived from his Germanic forefathers, but is far more like the chattering of a Negro village. The almost total lack of privacy and the all-devouring mass sociability remind one of primitive life in open huts, where there is complete identity with all members of the tribe.

[Anonymous No.12043051]

before muslim mass immigration into europe was a thing, there was a small group of european conservatives that liked to larp about muslim mysticism for edge points, did i understand the traditionalist school correctly?

[Anonymous No.12043223]

>>12043051
before muslim mass immigration into europe was a thing, there was a small group of european conservatives that liked to larp about muslim mysticism for edge points, did i understand the traditionalist school correctly?

No. Guenon was completely apolitical and if anything only can be seen as being a reactionary in the vein of De Maistre and even then largely only because De Maistre's defenses of monarchy also apply to non-Christian theocracies/monarchies at all times and places in the history of man. Religions other than Islam were followed and written about just as much as Islam and there were Hindu and Christian traditionalists. Everything they wrote about was the opposite of larping and they take pains to stress receiving an authentic instruction by a qualified someone from that culture if possible; their entire body of work is about how if you don't actually learn the language, live there and receive instruction there that you are basically larping (but not that you can't still benefit from studying it). Only Evola can be accused of seeking edge points. Schuon was a wacko but that's a different flaw. The other ones were largely all humble, lived simple lives, did not try to promote themselves as intellectual celebrities, Rene lived an almost anonymous life in Egypt.

[Anonymous No.12043240]

>>12043223
>only can be seen as being a reactionary in the vein of De Maistre
which is about as reactionary as it is possible to be lol.

Im not taking issue with the rest of your post but that was a weird choice of phrasing

[Anonymous No.12043251]

>>12043240
cry me a river bitch nigga

[Anonymous No.12043263]

>>12043223
>Rene lived an almost anonymous life in Egypt.
His neighbor in Egypt was a fan of Guenon's work, but she had no idea she was living right next to him since he went by Abd al-Wāḥid Yaḥyá.

[Anonymous No.12043890]

>>12040261
>("Japanese are not Asians", among other things).

He basically wrote they were forcibly westernized from the top-down by their government and that it would have been interesting to see what turned out otherwise. It's undeniable that's what happened with the Meiji Restoration.

[Anonymous No.12044058]

>>12043890
so in the space of a few decades, an entire people magically changed mental race or something? I don't buy it.

[Anonymous No.12044671]

>>12041450
>>12041456
You've just done the same thing Guenon did, assume that Advaita Vedanta is normative and say that it's the correct interpretation of the Upanishads (as if they're the only Hindu texts). His view was that of a unified orthodox view, with the closely related Vishishtadvaita as just a different way to emphasise the same beliefs.

>Given that Advaita and highly-similar schools of other types of non-dualism like Vishishtadvaita have over history been the predominant interpretations considered by Hindus to be traditional and orthodox it's hardly a stretch to say non-dualism in general is orthodox
The orther orthodox darshanas debated vehemently with Vedanta, there were several conflicting views within Hindu orthodoxy. Guenon's whole thesis that Advaita is THE normative orthodoxy is false. Samkhya philosophy is explicitly dualist and is very influential, Patanjali's Yoga philosophy is an application of Samkyha, and has influenced almost all Hinduism practiced today. The Samkhya enumeration of universal constituents (tattvas) was adopted by many movements, an extant example is Saiva Siddhanta, which has a large non-dualist sect.

[Anonymous No.12045468]

>>12034286
Sufism is just the study of spiritual matters within Islam. Tariqats (Sufi orders) are akin to schools of thought in jurisprudence.

[Anonymous No.12045471]

>>12042913
Qutb was influenced by some Sufi thought though. He was definitely not a modern Salafi in any case. He was Ash'ari Shafi'i.

[Anonymous No.12045474]

>>12044058
1868-1824 when he published it is quite a long time actually. They had very rapid industrialization as well as a complete reorganizing of society.

[Anonymous No.12045567]

>>12044671
>You've just done the same thing Guenon did, assume that Advaita Vedanta is normative and say that it's the correct interpretation of the Upanishads
Did you even read my post? You just accused me of doing the exact opposite of what I actually did. I specifically said that the only thing that's not debatable is that the Upanishads in general come down more on side of some sense of unity/oneness/non-dualism but that past this it just becomes a matter of personal opinion which school explains it best, this is explicitly saying that we can't say for sure whether Advaita is best. Non-dualism (not advaita specifically but anything which posits a unity) in general is normative because one iteration of it or another has generally been the most common belief despite at times there being popular sects with dualist beliefs. The majority of Hindus belong to a sect that teaches that the Atma/Jiva is in some way the same as Brahman. This is taught by Advaita, Vishistadvaita as well as any form of Bhedabheda Vedanta including Gaudya Vaishnavaism.

>Guenon's whole thesis that Advaita is THE normative orthodoxy is false.
That's not what he thought, he considered Advaita, Sufism, Daoism, Mahayana Buddhism, Neoplatonism to be adaptations of the same timeless doctrine for various peoples according to their circumstances. The common element he focused on was the unity of everything including god and the self, he praises Advaita but never says Advaita specifically is normative orthodox.

[Anonymous No.12045577]

>>12044671
>The orther orthodox darshanas debated vehemently with Vedanta, there were several conflicting views within Hindu orthodoxy. Samkhya philosophy is explicitly dualist and is very influential, Patanjali's Yoga philosophy is an application of Samkyha, and has influenced almost all Hinduism practiced today.
They did debate vehemently with Vedanta and Samhkya and Patanjali are very influential ... but your posts ignores that the other darshanas were largely merged into Vedanta over the course of the medieval period and afterwards in the sense as Vedanta came to form the basis of most popular sects, most people in that sect accepted what that Vedanta school had to say about the other darshanas and studied them through that lenses instead those darshanas having lots of people studying them for their own sake. For example Ramanuja in his works clarifies where he stands of the subject of Yoga and explains how he regards some of their ideas as right and other incorrect, and he goes onto explain how when Krisha speaks of Yoga in the BG how what he says is actually in line with Ramanuja's interpretation.

A Vaishnava sect basing itself on his understanding will generally teach the same thing and teach of Yoga but in doing so they are implicitly claiming to have the correct understanding of it (established by Ramauja), even moreso than the school of Yoga itself. The people who belong to that sect will generally accept what it says about Yoga even when it contradicts the ideas of the Darshana of Yoga itself, and it is in this sense the Vedantist position (of whatever school) came to be more or less normative; all of this applies to the other Darshanas too. This is standard stuff in academia too, they all agree about Vedanta coming to dominate the understanding of everything. Because of a desire to come across as objective they generally don't take one view or another about which Vedanta school is correct but they never dispute that Vedanta itself is dominant.

[Anonymous No.12045624]

>>12045567
>>12045577
Your argument comes down to Vedanta being popular, that doesn't make it the one Hindu orthodoxy. And yes, Guenon absolutely emphasised orthodoxy, by which he meant monism, as you said, he considered other monist theologies like Sufism to be orthodox as well. But there are non-dualist and non-Vedanta Hindu sects extant today, which shows that you are wrong.

[Anonymous No.12045736]

>>12045624
>Your argument comes down to Vedanta being popular, that doesn't make it the one Hindu orthodoxy.
I never said it was you brainlet, are in you incapable of responding to me without misrepresenting everything I say? I never said that Vedanta itself was the one orthodoxy. Hindus themselves over 2500+ years determined among themselves what was orthodox. They themselves decided to go mostly with an understanding of Vedanta accepts all of the other schools in principle as orthodox while still critiquing them and while claiming to complete them in Vedanta.

>And yes, Guenon absolutely emphasized orthodoxy, by which he meant monism, as you said, he considered other monist theologies like Sufism to be orthodox as well. But there are non-dualist and non-Vedanta Hindu sects extant today, which shows that you are wrong.
That there are non-Vedanta and dualist sects Hindu sects does show that I am wrong you retard, I'm not even denying that they are Hindu. To the extent that Hindus themselves overwhelmingly consider the meaning of orthodox to be in alignment with the Vedas and particularly the Upanishads, sects espousing pure dualism are heterodox insofar as they contradict the many areas where the Upanishads condemn dualism and espouse non-dualism/monism. That's fine though, they may align with the Vedas in other ways and even if they are heterodox, as with many religions over time there will inevitable arise a wide range of groups some completely heterodox, some straddling the line, some more in one direction than another but still not totally orthodox.

[Anonymous No.12045886]

>>12045736
>sects espousing pure dualism are heterodox
No, that's your purely Guenon-inspired viewpoint. A south Indian non-dualist Saiva Siddhanta is an orthodox Hindu, you don't get to decide that he isn't. This is my problem with Guenon's view, and that of his fanatical followers. You've taken as given that the Upanishads are the only scriptures worth considering, and assume that an advaita reading of them is correct. Madhva was an orthodox Hindu, and you simply dismiss his views as "mental gymnastics." You've dismissed all dualist thought in Hinduism as heterodox and implied that all of Hinduism agrees with Advaita Vedanta. That fact that at least two orthodox darshanas were non-dualist (Visheshika and Samhkya) should be enough to change your mind, but you haven't taken that on board.

It ends up being circular: "Vedanta is orthodoxy, therefore orthodoxy is Vedanta." Where's the entry point to this circle? The only additional argument you've provided is the false notion that Vedanta is accepted by all Hindus. When confronted with Hindus who don't accept Vedanta or Advaita, you resort to called them heterodox, and we're back in the circular argument.

[Anonymous No.12046381]

>>12045474
>quite a long time actually.
and that is enough to change the soul of a people? Doubt it. Actually, Monsieur Rene's "explanation" had less to do with modernisation, and more to do with wooly racialist ideas such as that the Japanese were a hybrid of Indonesians (or something) and Asians!

[Anonymous No.12047009]

Guenon flowchart, anybody?