The response to the Call for Papers for the inaugural conference of the ESSWE in Tübingen (Germany), 20-22 July 2007, has been enormous. The program committee and a selection committee have already begun to evaluate the more than 70 proposals and to work on a tentative program. The official deadline for submitting proposals is 31 December 2006. (See the Call for Papers under "Agenda".) The program committee is very glad about the overall good quality of proposals and the good mixture of accomplished scholars and graduate students. This conference will become a major event. Speakers in the main program will include Jan Assmann, Jean-Pierre Brach, Giulio Busi, Allison Coudert, Joscelyn Godwin, Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke, Wouter J. Hanegraaff, Moshe Idel, Andreas Kilcher, Jean-Pierre Laurant, Christine Maillard, Martin Mulsow, Monika Neugebauer-Wölk, Marco Pasi, Wilhelm Schmidt-Biggemann, Mark Sedgwick, Michael Stausberg, Kocku von Stuckrad, Steve Wasserstrom.

The Call for Paper for an international conference on "Western Esotericism" (15-17 August 2007), organized by the Donner Institute, Åbo (Turku), Finland, is out now. Although the Call for Papers is in Swedish, the conference language will be English. For more information, see "Agenda" or the conference website.

As of September 25, the ESSWE has 110 members. This is a great success indeed, and what is more, our members come from many different countries and represent both established scholars and students: Argentina 1 Australia 3 Austria 3 Belgium 2 Canada 4 Denmark 3 Egypt 1 England 19 Finland 2 French-Guyana 1 France 9 Germany 10 Italy 2 Monaco 1 Netherlands 25 Norway 3 Portugal 2 Russia 1 Spain 4 Sweden 1 USA 13 Gender: 68 male and 42 female. Membership status: Full members 70 Associate members 4 Students 36

In reference to the recent announcement of the creation of a chair for the study of esotericism in a Vatican university, a rectification seems to be necessary (prompted by one of our members, PierLuigi Zoccatelli). The official title of the chair is "Religions and unconventional spiritualities" ("Religioni e Spiritualità Non Convenzionali"). This means that the focus of the teaching is not particularly on esotericism, but on the phenomenon of new religious movements as a whole (which may, however, also include aspects of what scholars refer to as "Western esotericism"). The chair has been promoted by a Catholic anti-cult association, the GRIS (www.gris.org) and has been created at the Pontifical University of Saint Thomas Aquinas (also known as "Angelicum", www.angelicum.org). For an announcement of the creation of the chair, with a description of its goals, see the link below. Finally, the text on the New Age for which there was a link in the previous announcement (www.vatican.va/roman_curia/pontifical_councils/interelg/documents/rc_pc_interelg_doc_20030203_new-age_en.html) was not an article by the first holder of the chair, Prof. Michael Fuss, but a confessional analysis of the New Age produced by two official committees of the Catholic Church, the Pontifical Council for Culture and the Pontifical Council for Interreligious Dialogue.

First ESSWE Newsletter out now.

The first volume of the Aries Book Series has been published: Urszula Szulakowska, The Sacrificial Body and the Day of Doom: Alchemy and Apocalyptic Discourse in the Protestant Reformation. Leiden: Brill 2006 (119 EUR/ca. 155 USD). Members of ESSWE receive a discount on this publication (ca. 90 EUR/116 USD). This study positions Paracelsian alchemy, medicine and medical physiology within the apocalyptic discourse of the Protestant Reformation. A comparison is made between alchemical theory concerning the perfectibility of prime matter and Christian eschatological doctrine concerning human salvation through Christ's sacrifice in universal history and in the ritual of the mass. A detailed analysis is made of the engraved illustrations constituting an integral part of the alchemical medicine and physiology of Heinrich Khunrath, Stefan Michelspacher, Jacob Boehme, Abraham von Franckenberg and Robert Fludd. The book will be of interest to scholars of the history of western art, popular culture, medicine, alchemy and theology, specifically those working in the context of the late Renaissance and Reformation in the sixteenth and early seventeenth centuries. Urszula Szulakowska is a lecturer in art history at the University of Leeds. She has produced many publications on the history of alchemical illustration, including The Alchemy of Light (Brill, 2000)

The New York Open Center and Lapis Magazine Online host a conference titled: "An Esoteric Quest in Central Europe" from August 31 until September 8. The conference will be held at three differenct places in Central Europe, starting in the Czech Republic and moving to Weimar in Germany. The sessions include: "Jacob Boehme and His Theosophical Vision and The Hermetic Harvest of Goethe’s Alchemical Retreat, Nicholas Goodrick-Clarke "Oratory and Laboratory: Heinrich Khunrath’s Alchemy, Magic and Cabala", Peter Forshaw "Paracelsus/Goethe/Steiner", Dennis Klocek "Charting Rosicrucian Europe", Christopher McIntosh "Mystical Sisters: Images of the Alchemical Feminine", M.E. Warlick "The Esoteric Quest from Antiquity to the Renaissance", Leonard George "Ritual Illumination: The 'Higher' Masonic Orders, the Illuminati, and the Esoteric Quest", Jay Kinney

We are pleased to announce the inaugural conference of the ESSWE that will be held at the University of Tübingen (Germany), on 20-22 July 2007. The conference's overall topic is "Constructing Tradition: Means and Myths of Transmission in Western Esotericism". The deadline for submitting proposals is 31 December 2006. For a detailed description and the Call for Papers see the announcement under "Agenda".

Good news for long-distance users of the Bibliotheca Philosophica Hermetica (Ritman Library) Amsterdam: from today the catalogue of modern and pre-1800 printed books is online. The catalogue can be accessed via the ‘SEARCH CATALOGUE’ button on the library's website. The catalogue has a number of search options, including author, title, year, printers, but also names of former owners. A guide to the library is now available entitled Hermetically open which considerably enhances the transparency of the collection. The guide informs the reader about the subjects he can expect to find in the library and about the relationship between the various collecting areas (Available in English and in Dutch, € 5). A new exhibition is now showing under the same title showing more than 80 printed books and manuscripts. Visitors to the library will find a new information corner, with instructive panels, which also offers a power point presentation showing a selection of some 100 images focussing on the printed books and manuscripts before 1800.

On March 24, after fourteen days of being online, the Society has exactly 50 members! ESSWE members come from all over the world, from Australia to Ireland, from Canada to Russia, from Argentina to Finland, and from America to Egypt. At the moment they come from 18 different countries. We are delighted to have a good mixture of accomplished scholars and students among our members. The public response to the website is also encouraging indeed. The ESSWE site has already drawn visitors from a dozen countries all over the world, with an average of more than 100 visits and thousands of hits per day.