Studies in Dante and Christian Esoterism

<p><span style=color: rgba(0 0 0 1)>René Guénon (1886-1951) was one of the great luminaries of the twentieth century. His extensive writings now finally available in English are a providential treasure-trove for the modern seeker: while pointing ceaselessly to the perennial wisdom found in past cultures ranging from the Shamanistic to the Indian and Chinese the Hellenic and Judaic the Christian and Islamic and including also Alchemy Hermeticism and other esoteric currents they direct the reader also to the deepest level of religious </span><em style=color: rgba(0 0 0 1)>praxis</em><span style=color: rgba(0 0 0 1)> emphasizing the need for affiliation with a revealed tradition even while acknowledging the final identity of all spiritual paths as they approach the summit of spiritual realization. One of René Guénon's lifelong quests was to discover or revive the esoteric initiatory dimension of the Christian tradition.</span></p><p></p><p><span style=color: rgba(0 0 0 1)>Especially since the Renaissance some in Western Christendom have suspected that the deeper dimension of their tradition has somehow been lost and have therefore sought to discover or create an esoteric or initiatic Christianity. In the middle of the nineteenth century two scholars Gabriele Rossetti and Eugène Aroux pointed to certain esoteric meanings in the work of Dante Alighieri notably </span><em style=color: rgba(0 0 0 1)>The Divine Comedy</em><span style=color: rgba(0 0 0 1)>. Partly based on their scholarship Guénon in 1925 published </span><em style=color: rgba(0 0 0 1)>The Esoterism of Dante</em><span style=color: rgba(0 0 0 1)>. From the theses of Rosetti and Aroux Guénon retains only those that prove the existence of such hidden meanings; but he also makes clear that esoterism is not heresy and that a doctrine reserved for an elite can be superimposed on the teaching given the faithful without standing in opposition to it. A collection of related articles was published posthumously in 1954 under the title </span><em style=color: rgba(0 0 0 1)>Insights into Christian Esoterism.</em><span style=color: rgba(0 0 0 1)> In these articles Guénon undertakes to establish that the three parts of </span><em style=color: rgba(0 0 0 1)>The Divine Comedy</em><span style=color: rgba(0 0 0 1)> represent the stages of initiatic realization exploring the parallels between the symbolism of the </span><em style=color: rgba(0 0 0 1)>Commedia</em><span style=color: rgba(0 0 0 1)> and that of Freemasonry Rosicrucianism and Christian Hermeticism and further illustrating Dante's knowledge of traditional sciences unknown to the moderns: the sciences of numbers cosmic cycles and sacred astrology. Guénon also touches here on the all-important question of Medieval esoterism and discusses the role of sacred languages and the principle of initiation in the Christian tradition as well as such esoteric Christian themes and organizations as the Holy Grail the Guardians of the Holy Land the Sacred Heart the Fedeli d'Amore and the 'Courts of Love' and the Secret Language of Dante. The present volume brings both works cited above together with a separate study on Saint Bernard. </span></p><p></p><p class=ql-align-justify><span style=color: rgba(0 0 0 1)>It was Guénon who taught me to seek and love the truth above all else and to be unsatisfied with anything else. -Fr Seraphim Rose</span></p><p></p><p><span style=color: rgba(0 0 0 1)> Encountering Guénon's work is akin to being struck by lightning: a dazzling initiation into a hitherto unknown way of seeing reality that reclaims the original integrity of the human condition. -Samuel Bendeck Sotillos</span></p>