Please read the full call for papers here: https://theosophicalhistoryconference.eu/?page_id=3344

Modern Theosophy is renowned for its reception of ancient Asian traditions, but the Theosophical movement and related esoteric currents have also enthusiastically reinvented ancient Egyptian, Ptolemaic, and Hellenistic traditions. During the 18th and 19th centuries, the Theosophical interest in the ancient world was part of a larger movement. Egypt was eagerly embraced as a powerful topic in art, fashion, and literature, and Egyptology emerged as an academic discipline. Theosophy and related esoteric traditions did not stand on the outskirts of these expressions; but formulated their perspectives in a dialectical relationship with broader trends and vice-versa. Occasionally, the receptions, conceptions, relationships, and entanglements were so pronounced that it was difficult to clearly distinguish between Egyptology, Egyptomania, and Egyptosophy. During the same period of time, there was a renewed and continued interest in the ancient world, ancient philosophies, ancient mythology, and ancient religious traditions, which constituted an integral aspect of both Theosophy and the ‘occult revival’ at large.

Key-Note Speakers:

– Professor Henrik Bogdan

The Lure and Romance of Ancient Egypt: John Yarker, Helena Petrovna Blavatsky, and the Ancient and Primitive Rite of Freemasonry

– Professor Eleanor Dobson

Egyptians on Mars: Science, Science Fiction and the Theosophical Imagination at the Fin de Siècle (online key-note lecture)

Conference Committee:

– Conference Chair: Prof. Tim Rudbøg (Associate professor, Science of Religion, director of the Copenhagen Centre for the Study of Theosophy and Esotericism, University of Copenhagen);

– Prof. James Santucci (Professor Emeritus of Religious Studies at California State University, Fullerton);

– Paulina Gruffman (PhD candidate in History of Religions, Lund University, Sweden);

– Erica Georgiades (MRes Religious Experience Cand, University of Wales Trinity Saint David; PgD Merit Ancient Religions UWTSD; BA, Hons, Philosophy and Psychological Studies OU).

Please read the full call for papers here: https://theosophicalhistoryconference.eu/?page_id=3344

This conference is organised by Centre for Comparative Studies of Civilisations and Spiritualities in collaboration with Dr. Giuliano D’Amico, Associate Professor at the University of Oslo and director of the research network Esotericism and Aesthetics in the Nordic Countries, and Dr. Marco Pasi, Associate Professor at the University of Amsterdam and director of the Centre for the History of Hermetic Philosophy and Related Currents.

The osmosis between esoteric/occult and artistic discourse, which scholars have termed “occulture”, has mainly been studied from a national perspective and drawing upon case studies from the last 60 years. Such lack of comparative knowledge and studies is somewhat surprising if one takes into account the impact of esoteric and occult materials from a wider “South” (including not only Southern Europe, but also Northern Africa and the Mediterranean Basin) that has made its way in Northern Europe since at least the end of the 19th century, focusing, but not limited to, Sufism, Egyptosophy and Freemasonry, or, conversely, about the continuous forms of inspiration that Nordic alternative spirituality has had on artistic production in Southern Europe (e.g. with the proliferation of Nordic paganism in occultural discourse). The proposed conference aims at filling this scholarly gap, open up avenues of research and discussing new ways of approaching and conceptualizing occultural phenomena with a North-South perspective as a starting point. We understand “North” and “South” as including, respectively, the Nordic, Baltic, German and English-speaking countries in Europe, and Southern European, Mediterranean, and African countries/areas.

Website:

https://www.cini.it/en/news/call-for-papers-occultural-transfers-between-north-and-south

This advanced summer programme provides a venue for enthusiasts of ‘othered knowledge’ to take a deep dive into the study of esotericism and the occult. Participants will gather at the University of Amsterdam and join experts at the Centre for the History of Hermetic Philosophy and Related Currents, the world’s leading institution for academic research and teaching in esotericism, to broaden their knowledge in a wide variety of topics.

Students will explore important movements in esotericism in the past, as well as how various traditions reverberate in the present. Making use of flexible yet rigorous scholarly frameworks, participants will encounter various traditions (from occultism and alchemy to gnosticism and psychedelic culture), diving into primary texts as well as film, music, and other forms of cultural expression.

Programme website: Arcane Worlds: New Frontiers in the Study of Esotericism | Housing and scholarships available | Starts in: July | Duration: 3 weeks | Early admission deadline: 1 February 2023 | Regular admission deadline: 15 March 2023 | Questions? Email: summer-info-gsss@uva.nl

The ESSWE Board welcomes applications for organizing the Tenth Biennial International ESSWE Conference, to be held in 2025. The application should include a description of the host institution, a preliminary budget, a suggested theme for the conference, and CV of the applicant/s. The application should be sent to the ESSWE Secretary Henrik Bogdan (henrik.bogdan@lir.gu.se) no later than June 1, 2023.

Henrik Bogdan

Secretary of the ESSWE

Organisers: Centre for Contemporary Buddhist Studies and the Copenhagen Centre for the Study of Theosophy and Esotericism

Venue: Department of Cross-Cultural and Regional Studies, University of Copenhagen

Deadline for abstracts: 1st of February, maximum 250 words

This 2-day conference will explore the ways that Buddhist modernism and the spiritual movements of the fin de siècle (as exemplified by the Theosophical Society), both reacting to and enacting the dynamics of colonialism, continue to transform spiritual and ecological movements within and beyond the 21st century.

We invite papers that explore questions such as:

• How are the legacies of Buddhist modernism and esoteric movements still active in modern environmentalist discourse?
• In what ways are the kinds of dualisms or oppositions active within the ideas of the fin de siècle, such as spiritualism/materialism and evolution/reversion, embedded within or resisted by contemporary environmental movements?
• How have Buddhism and spiritual movements been influenced by changing ecological conditions and understandings of the planet? By such phenomena as biodiversity loss, pollution, and the climate crisis?
• Could a critical return to esoteric source materials from the fin de siècle provide fresh understandings or insights into the current ecological crises?

If you are interested in contributing to this conference, please send your abstract (max. 250 words) and author details to ccbs@hum.ku.dk by 1st of February 2022.

https://ccrs.ku.dk/research/centres/centre-for-contemporary-buddhist-studies/calendar/call-for-papers-a-dynamic-legacy/

Call for paper proposals for a SNASWE panel at two upcoming conferences 2023:

ESSWE (Malmö 2023) and EASR (Vilnius, 2023)

If you would like to be a part of a SNASWE panel (Scandinavian Network for the Academic Study of Western Esotericism) at one or both of the following two conferences next year, please send the following information to the head of the SNASWE network, Tim Rudbøg timrudboeg@hum.ku.dk no later than by the end of Saturday 12 November 2022.

1. the name of the conference you wish to join a panel at (see the details below, your proposal should match the conference theme)
2. a title of your paper proposal
3. a short abstract (max 150 words)
4. short bio

SNASWE represents Nordic scholarship on esotericism and/or deals with esotericism in Nordic contexts. Rudbøg will see if there is potential to create one or more panels for each of the two conferences along these lines.

You will receive a message by the end of Sunday 13 November about your proposal: if it can become a part of a panel and what the possible panel theme will be. If your proposal is accepted for a SNASWE panel, it is expected that you will reply quickly to any emails as the deadline for submitting panels to both conferences is 15 November.

ESSWE details:

https://www.esswe.org/current-conference

EASR details:

https://www.easr2023.org/

https://www.easr2023.org/call-for-panels/

Dear student members of ESSWE,

I hope message finds you well. It is time to elect a new student representative to the board of ESSWE. The elected representative is the admin of the Student Network of the ESSWE (SNoESSWE). S/he is also an ex-officio member of the ESSWE board and the ESSWE ethics committee. If you want to nominate yourself, please write a short statement describing why you would be a good student representative (approx. 500 words). Please include your name, affiliation, and research interests in the statement (an additional 150 max.). The statement will be sent to all student members of the ESSWE, who may then vote for the new student representative.

Please send your statement to me via M.Mukhopadhyay@uva.nl. The deadline for sending your nomination is 18 November 2022.

Under the current rule, the student representative is usually a PhD candidate and student member of ESSWE, elected only by the student members.

If you have any questions, do not hesitate to contact me. I will get back to you as soon as possible.

All the best,

Mriganka Mukhopadhyay

Outgoing student representative

ESSWE Members are hereby invited to submit nominations for a new ESSWE Board Member. The nominees need to be affiliated with a European university and we are especially looking for women scholars.

Please submit your nominations to the ESSWE Secretary Henrik Bogdan (henrik.bogdan@lir.gu.se) together with a brief motivation for the nomination. The deadline for submitting nominations is December 15, 2022, and the election will be held online in January 2023.

Henrik Bogdan

Secretary of the ESSWE

Nominations are invited for the ESSWE PhD Thesis prize, awarded by the European Society for the Study of Western Esotericism.

Prize: The prize will be given for an outstanding PhD. thesis defended in 2022 on any aspect of Western Esotericism. Candidates for the prize must be members of the ESSWE. The thesis must have been approved formally by the nominee’s thesis committee, but the degree need not have been formally awarded. The prize will not be awarded if no submissions are deemed qualified.

Notification & Certification: The prize-winner will be notified in April 2023 and will receive an award of €500 and a certificate, to be presented at the ESSWE conference in Malmö, Sweden 26-28 June 2023. The ESSWE will also make a substantial contribution to travel expenses and lodging costs, and the conference fee will be waived.

Publication: The thesis will also be recommended for publication in the ARIES Book Series, though the final decision on publication will be taken by the ARIES Book Series editorial board.

Nomination: Nominations must be made by email to the Chair of the Prize Committee, Jenny Butler (University College Cork, J.Butler@ucc.ieJ.Butler@ucc.ie) by 15 January 2023. The nominator must be a faculty member at the institution that awards the nominee’s PhD degree, or a member of the nominee’s thesis committee. Each nominator may make only one nomination. The applications should consist of pdf files of the following material:

1. A one-page description of the thesis and motivation why it is nominated for the prize
2. The nominee’s thesis
3. Documentation to show that the thesis has been approved

Item 1 needs to be in English, whereas items 2 and 3 can be in English, French, German, Italian, or Spanish.

The Prize Committee consists of: Jenny Butler (Chair), University College Cork, Ireland; Andreas Kilcher, Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule Zürich, Switzerland; Nemanja Radulovic, University of Belgrade, Serbia.

Henrik Bogdan

Secretary of the ESSWE

Vol. 3, n. 1, May 2024

The intellectual and spiritual legacy of Muḥyiddīn Ibn ʿArabī (d. 1240) has been the object of multiple socio-political and religious interpretations. The fact that his thought is at the same time intensely innovative and deeply rooted in the tradition may explain in part why it had such a lasting influence, both among followers and detractors (Knysh 1999). His ideas became – even if this is not always explicitly acknowledged – the common conceptual background of a variety of spiritual movements and textual traditions, in both erudite and popular Sufism (Morris 2001; Knysh 2017). Moreover, in the words of Morris, “Ibn ʿArabī has constantly provided (and still does today) an indispensable and powerfully effective theologico-political instrument for defending and supporting creative spiritual movements of all sorts in predominantly Islamic cultural and political settings” (Morris 2001).

In the West, Ibn ʿArabī appears today as a central reference in contemporary debates concerning Islamic spirituality, and his thought is one of the main sources of inspiration of the proponents of various creative adaptations of traditional Sufism in contemporary societies, ranging from the most conservative forms to openly New Age and syncretic movements (Morris 1986 ; Sedgwick 2017). Beyond this, Ibn ʿArabī is also regularly quoted by contemporary Muslims in theological debates regarding creed, ritual practice, or religious normativity, as for example in the question of the imamate of women and the emergence of a feminist Islamic scholarship (Shaikh 2012 ; Geoffroy 2021). Ibn ʿArabī’s inspirational and poetical oeuvre has also been used by various artists and performers, whether as a source of ideas and vision, or as the central focus of their work itself.

This special issue aims to explore and analyze contemporary cases of the use of Ibn ʿArabī’s thought, and to shed light on the motivations, dynamics and methods underlying its interpretations. In order to better understand the variety of appropriations and to distinguish between the common links and the peculiarities of those cases, we would like to address various questions, including: What precise needs does Ibn ʿArabī’s thought answer for various types of actor? What are the most important conceptual and hermeneutical tools that they find in his thought to address contemporary issues? How do different types of actor relate to the same texts or doctrines of Ibn ʿArabī, from their own perspective and with their own objectives? What aspects of Ibn ʿArabī’s multi-layered and often paradoxical thought are emphasized, or on the contrary minimized, by those actors? How is Ibn ʿArabī’s thought integrated or not in the larger spectrum of the Islamic intellectual tradition? And how is it on the other hand integrated or not in modern and contemporary Western philosophical and spiritual thought?

We invite scholars from all backgrounds in the humanities and social sciences, as well as social and political actors and artists, to propose contributions focusing on Ibn ʿArabī in connection with one or more of the following topics:

• Sufism, Sufi institutions, and the spiritual path
• Theology, metaphysics, and epistemology
• Anthropology, cosmology, and world vision
• Normativity, Islamic law, and rituals
• Ethics, ecology, and politics
• Social issues, gender, and diversity
• Art, media, and creativity

Guest Editors:

• Mark Sedgwick (Aarhus University)
• Gregory Vandamme (Université catholique de Louvain)

Abstracts and Timetable:

You are invited to submit a brief proposals (title and max 500 words), accompanied by a CV by the 5th of January 2023 to religiographies@cini.it. A notification of acceptance will be forwarded by the 30th of January. Following the notification of acceptance, we will ask you to send us the manuscript (between 6,000 to 10,000 words in length) by the 1st of November 2023. The manuscripts will be sent to blind peerreview and, after suitable revision, published in May 2024.

You can download the CFA pdf document from here.