Esoteric - Methodology

Methodology

Wouter J. Hanegraaff is Professor of “History of Hermetic Philosophy and Related Currents” at the University of Amsterdam (1999). The Universiteit van Amsterdam (UvA) is the world's first academic institution to have created a complete program for research and teaching in the field of Western Esotericism. He is also president of the European Society for the Study of Western Esotericism. Essential to Hanegraaff’s methodology is what he calls an “empirical” approach, with an informed, open, and, so much as possible, neutral mind. He makes a sharp division between a “religionist” perspective and an “empiricist” one.

“Empirical research must be based on methodological agnosticism with regard to religious and philosophical ‘first principles’, and must fully recognize the historicity of religious phenomena. This empirical perspective is applied to the newly emerging academic field of esotericism.”

Secondly, Hanegraaff follows a distinction between an “emic” and an “etic” approach to religious studies. The emic approach is that of the alchemist or theosopher as an alchemist or theosopher. The etic approach is that of the scholar as an historian, a researcher, with a critical look. An empirical study of esotericism needs “emic material and etic interpretation”.

“The principal theoretical tool to safeguard scientific legitimity in this situation is the distinction between emic and etic. Emic denotes the believer’s point of view. On the part of the researcher, the reconstruction of this emic perspective requires an attitude of empathy which excludes personal biases as far as possible. Scholarly discourse about religion, on the other hand, is not emic but etic. Scholars may introduce their own terminology and make theoretical distinctions which are different from those of the believers themselves.”

Pierre A. Riffard (Ph.D., University of the French West Indies) studies the method used by esotericists themselves (alchemists, magicians, Rosicrucians, Anthroposophists...). He examines some of their procedures. 1) Mythological origins. The esotericists trace the origins of their doctrine or practice to an extremely distant past. They situate the life of Hermes in times immemorial. 2) Cosmic cycles. For Gaston Georgel, “history is governed by cycles of 540, 1080 and 2160 years”. 3) The chains of initiation. Some Rosicrucians include Francis Bacon among their masters and trace their origins back to the time of Thutmosis III. 4) The secret books. Esotericists prefer to base their beliefs on secret writings, unknown to the majority of people and inaccessible to the uninitiated: for instance, among the Theosophists, The Book of Dzyan. 5) Spiritual interpretations. The esotericists are able to endow the most profane texts with an occult meaning. The alchemists discover within the Greek and Roman myths the Great Work of alchemy. 6) Magical uses. A book can be used as a talisman, a divinatory machine... The Sortes Sanctorum (Lots of the saints) were, in early Christianity, a divination which consists in taking passages of the Bible at chance, and drawing conclusions from them concerning future.

Arthur Versluis (Professor, Ph.D., Michigan State University) proposes the term “sympathetic empiricism” as the approach that he finds most amenable in the study of Western Esotericism.

“While I am convinced of the critical importance of historiography in the study of esotericism (and for this reason all of my academic books are firmly grounded in historical method) I do not believe that historiography is adequate in itself to convey the complex, multivalent nature of esoteric thought, traditions, or most of all, experience. Esotericism, given all its varied forms and its inherently multidimensional nature, cannot be conveyed without going beyond purely historical information: at minimum, the study of esotericism, and in particular mysticism, requires some degree of imaginative participation in what one is studying.”