Traditionalism (perennialism)

Traditionalism, also known as the Traditionalist School, is a school of thought within perennial philosophy. Originating in the thought of René Guénon in the 20th Century, it proposes that a single primordial, metaphysical truth forms the source for, and is shared by, all the major world religions. Unlike universalist forms of perennialism based on commonalities in religious experiences across cultures, Traditionalism posits a metaphysical unitary source known as Tradition which forms the basis for the major religions in their "orthodox" forms.

Tradition has exoteric and esoteric dimensions. The exoteric aspects of a tradition are primarily represented by its ceremonies, rituals, and rules, whereas the esoteric aspects are concerned with its spiritual and intellectual qualities. Traditionalists often compare the term "tradition" to the term "modern" or "modernity". While "traditional" refers to something that has a transcendent origin, "modern" signifies that which is disconnected from the transcendent. Traditionalists reject syncretism, scientism, and secularism and are sharply critical of the modern world, while praising the alignment with the transcendent dimension of reality they see as inherent in pre-modern religions and cultures.

The boundary between the terms "Traditionalism" and "Perennialism" is impercise and disputed, though they broadly represent distinct, but related, streams of thought. While some Traditionalists equate their philosophy with perennialism writ large and use the terms synonymously or interchangeably, not all perennialists consider themselves Traditionalists. Despite being seen as the founder of Traditionalism, Guénon rejected the label and referred to himself only as a perennialist. Aldous Huxley, who popularized the term "perennial philosophy" in his 1945 book, had a mystical universalist perspective distinct from that of the Traditionalist School.

Historian Mark Sedgwick identifies René Guénon, Ananda Coomaraswamy, Frithjof Schuon, Seyyed Hossein Nasr, Julius Evola, Mircea Eliade, and Alexandr Dugin to be the seven most prominent Traditionalists.Template:Sfn While Sedgwick identifies a politically quietist strand of Traditionalism rooted in the perspective of Guénon, Traditionalism's rejection of liberalism and modernity has inspired some thinkers to draw from it various political implications. These range from the environmentalism of Nasr,<ref>Template:Cite news</ref> to the patronage of traditional arts, crafts, architecture and philosophy by King Charles III,<ref>Template:Cite news</ref><ref>Template:Cite news</ref> to the far-right politics of Evola, Eliade and Dugin.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> While some far-right movements and thinkers cite Traditionalism (especially Evola) as an influence and draw on its language in their discourse, scholars dispute whether, or to what extent, these views can actually be reconciled to Traditionalist thought.

BackgroundEdit

EtymologyEdit

The word "tradition" is derived from the Latin term traditio, which means "to hand over."Template:Sfn Etymologically, the term tradition refers to the transmission of knowledge, practice, skills, laws, forms, and a variety of other oral and written aspects.Template:Sfn For Seyyed Hossein Nasr, tradition is analogous to a "living presence" that leaves its imprint but is irreducible to that imprint.Template:Sfn There are at least two levels of meaning here. First, tradition is defined as the passing down of knowledge from one generation to the next, which is reflected in the word's Latin etymology. Nasr considers the Arabic din and Sanskrit dharma to be roughly similar in meaning 'tradition,' while he recognizes that they do not correspond with the Latin root, which indicates the concept of transmission. Second, tradition entails some kind of "living force", and the mark it leaves behind, with the force "ontologically transcending the mark". This resembles a Platonic form whose appearance in the universe is only a shadow of its "true reality", but Nasr has spoken of something "living" and "present", which is a recurring theme in his works.Template:Sfn

PerennialismEdit

Template:See also According to representatives of the Traditionalist School, all major world religions are founded upon common primordial and universal metaphysical truths. The perspective of its authors is often referred to as philosophia perennis (perennial philosophy), which is both "absolute Truth and infinite Presence".Template:Sfn Absolute Truth is "the perennial wisdom (sophia perennis) that stands as the transcendent source of all the intrinsically orthodox religions of humankind". Infinite Presence is "the perennial religion (religio perennis) that lives within the heart of all intrinsically orthodox religions."Template:Sfn According to Frithjof Schuon,

The term philosophia perennis, which has been current since the time of the Renaissance and of which neo-scholasticism made much use, signifies the totality of the primordial and universal truths — and therefore of the metaphysical axioms — whose formulation does not belong to any particular system. One could speak in the same sense of a religio perennis, designating by this term the essence of every religion; this means the essence of every form of worship, every form of prayer, and every system of morality, just as the sophia perennis is the essence of all dogmas and all expressions of wisdom. We prefer the term sophia to that of philosophia, for the simple reason that the second term is less direct and because it evokes in addition associations of ideas with a completely profane and all too often aberrant system of thought.Template:Sfn{{#if:|{{#if:|}}
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The Traditionalist vision of a perennial wisdom is not based on mystical experiences, but on metaphysical intuitions.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn It is "intuited directly through divine intellect".Template:Sfn This divine intellect is different from reason, and makes it possible to discern "the sacred unity of reality that is attested in all authentic esoteric expressions of tradition";Template:Sfn it is "the presence of divinity within each human waiting to be uncovered".Template:Sfn According to Schuon:

The key to the eternal sophia is pure intellection or in other words metaphysical discernment. To "discern" is to "separate": to separate the Real and the illusory, the Absolute and the contingent, the Necessary and the possible, Atma and Maya. Accompanying discernment, by way of complement and operatively, is concentration, which unites: this means becoming fully aware — from the starting point of earthly and human Maya — of Atma, which is both absolute and infinite.Template:Sfn{{#if:|{{#if:|}}
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For the Traditionalists, perennial philosophy has a transcendent dimension – Truth or Wisdom – and an immanent dimension – infinite Presence or Union. Thus, on the one hand, "discernment between the Real and the unreal, or the Absolute and the relative", and on the other hand, "mystical concentration on the Real".Template:Sfn

Concept of TraditionEdit

According to Beverly J. Lanzetta, "tradition forms the backbone" of the perennial philosophy.Template:Sfn The term "tradition" as used by Nasr and other "traditionists" such as René Guénon, Frithjof Schuon, Titus Burckhardt, and Martin Lings, does not refer to custom, habit, or inherited patterns of life and thought. For them, tradition "is of sacred and divine origin", and it encompasses the continuation and transmission of the sacred message through time.Template:Sfn Used in this context, "tradition" refers to revelation and all forms of philosophy, art, and culture that are shaped by it, spreading the reverberations of revelation on earth and thereby reminding humans of the "Divine Center" and "Ultimate Origin".Template:Sfn

For Nasr, "tradition":

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Tradition, according to Nasr, is pure and divine, and it represents God's will. Similarly, tradition, as a sacred concept with its origin in God, is the only way to communicate with God, who fully encompasses the universe and is constantly present "in the very depth of all human beings". As a result, tradition is perfectly in harmony with the prophetic revelations, which represent the "highest order of reality", capable of elevating man to "higher altitudes of personality".Template:Sfn

Tradition and modernityEdit

Nasr and other "traditionists" refer to "tradition" as a reality that is as old as man himself. He believes that the contemporary usage of the term and references to the concept of tradition are, in some ways, an aberration necessitated by the anomaly that is the modern world as a whole. The purpose of using the term is therefore to raise consciousness of the underlying differences between reality represented by this specific sense of the term "tradition" and everything that lacks a divine origin but arises from the merely human and, at times, the subhuman.Template:Sfn

If "traditional" refers to something that is still connected to its transcendent origin and can be traced back to it, "modern" refers to that which is detached from the Transcendent, from the immutable principles that govern everything in reality.Template:Sfn Template:Sfn Modernism and modernity are thus the polar opposites of tradition, implying everything that is essentially human and, progressively, subhuman, as well as everything that is detached and disconnected from the Divine Source.Template:Sfn

Exoteric and esoteric dimensionsEdit

For Traditionalists, Tradition has two fundamental aspects, namely, exoteric and esoteric.Template:Sfn The exoteric aspect is predominantly manifested in its rites, rituals, and laws. It also comprises the theologies or doctrines that give a tradition its uniqueness and particularity. The esoteric or the inward dimension of tradition, on the other hand, encompasses "not only its spiritual substance, but also its intellectual qualities". Islam, for example, divides its exoteric and esoteric aspects into the Sharia and the Tariqa, respectively. The Kabbalah is considered esoteric in Judaism as opposed to the exoteric understanding of the Talmud. The esoteric aspect of tradition is considered its essence and its core. This aspect, it is claimed, is only accessible "to those who are able to appreciate the inward dimension of tradition."Template:Sfn Traditionalists insist on the necessity for affiliation to one of the great religions of the world, without which no esoteric path is possible.Template:Sfn Template:Refn

Together with various traditions and religions, Traditionalists also believe in the reality of a Primordial Tradition, which is said to encapsulate "all truths of all religions".Template:Sfn For Guénon, the Primordial Tradition represents "the unity of thought and action which, transcending the arbitrary rule of culture and society, serves as the one common denominator between men and leads them to an awareness of Unity, supreme and indivisible".Template:Sfn For Nasr, this Primordial Tradition "flows from an Absolute Truth that has been expressed in diverse ways through the ages".Template:Sfn Nasr holds that the existence of different religions is not evidence against the Primordial Tradition. The assumption that all religions hold a fundamental truth, contrarily, is supported by such variation when one approaches religions from an esoteric viewpoint.Template:Sfn According to Nasr:

All traditions...are earthly manifestations of celestial archetypes of the Primordial Tradition in the same way that all revelations are related to the Logos or the Word which was at the beginning and which is at once an aspect of the Universal Logos and the Universal Logos as such.Template:Sfn {{#if:Seyyed Hossein Nasr quoted in Adnan Aslan Religious Pluralism in Christian and Islamic Philosophy: The Thought of John Hick and Seyyed Hossein Nasr, 1998|{{#if:|}}
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For Nasr, "each tradition is based on a direct message from Heaven and cannot be seen simply as the historical continuation of the Primordial Tradition". Its acceptance does not imply that any of the revealed religions are devoid of divine origin. Rather, it is to affirm the "presence" that is inextricably linked to the sacred.Template:Sfn The Primordial Tradition is thus viewed as "a block of principles which were often revitalised through revelation". For him, all religions are united not just by a common source but also by a common substance, the Primordial Tradition.Template:Sfn

PeopleEdit

The ideas of Traditionalism are considered to begin with René Guénon. Other representatives of this school of thought include Ananda Coomaraswamy, Frithjof Schuon, Titus Burckhardt, Martin Lings, Hossein Nasr, William Stoddart, Jean-Louis Michon, Marco Pallis, Lord Northbourne, Huston Smith, Awadh Kishore Saran, Harry Oldmeadow, Reza Shah-Kazemi and Patrick Laude. Some academics include Julius Evola in this school, although Evola presents many differences in relation to those mentioned.<ref>Rose, Matthew. A World After Liberalism: Philosophers of the Radical Right. Yale University Press, 2021. pp.50-52.</ref> Another author linked to perennialism is Mircea Eliade, although Eliade's link is nuanced and often contested.<ref>Spineto, Natale. "Mircea Eliade and traditionalism." Aries, v. 1, n. 1, p. 62-87, 2001.</ref>

René GuénonEdit

A major theme in the works of René Guénon (1886Template:Ndash1951) is the contrast between traditional world views and modernism, "which he considered to be an anomaly in the history of mankind".Template:Sfn For Guénon, the world is a manifestation of metaphysical principles, which are preserved in the perennial teachings of the world religions, but were lost to the modern mentality.Template:Sfn For Guénon, "the malaise of the modern world lies in its relentless denial of the metaphysical realm".Template:Sfn Template:Refn

Early on, Guénon was attracted to Sufism, and in 1912 he was initiated in the Shadhili order. He left academia in 1923, after his doctoral thesis was rejected.Template:Sfn His works center on the return to these traditional world views,Template:Sfn trying to reconstruct the Perennial Philosophy.<ref group=web name="OUP-D-ATMW">Oxford University Press, Description: "Against the Modern World. Traditionalism and the Secret Intellectual History of the Twentieth Century"</ref>

In his first books and essays, he envisaged a restoration of traditional "intellectualité" in the West on the basis of Roman Catholicism and Freemasonry.Template:Refn He gave up early on a purely Christian basis for a Traditionalist restoration of the West, searching for other traditions. He denounced the lure of Theosophy and neo-occultism in the form of Spiritism,Template:Refn two influential movements that were flourishing in his lifetime. In 1930, he moved to Egypt, where he lived until his death in 1951.Template:Sfn

Ananda CoomaraswamyEdit

According to William W. Quinn, Coomaraswamy's idea of Tradition is similar to Guénon's Primordial Tradition. Coomaraswamy saw no difference between the concepts of Tradition and philosophia perennis.Template:Sfn For Coomaraswamy, their application differed, with philosophia perennis being used to represent a collection of interconnected metaphysical principles that could be explained either without reference to any particular Traditional culture or with reference to all of them, while the term Tradition was almost always used in relation to a specific culture.Template:Sfn

Frithjof SchuonEdit

Frithjof Schuon understood tradition "as being the semidivine and semihuman reality that provides mankind with a general climate conducive to the consciousness of the Absolute".Template:Sfn The word tradition appears in Schuon's writings frequently, usually in close proximity to the word religion.Template:Sfn Following in Guenon's footsteps, Schuon theorized the causes of the historical origins of a wide spectrum of religious traditions. For him, religions differ because human societies and cultures differ, and God's revealed truth adapts to the specificity of each society.Template:Sfn

Seyyed Hossein NasrEdit

According to Howard, Tradition has been amply defined by Seyyed Hossein Nasr, whose writings provide a comprehensive framework.Template:Sfn Nasr credits Guénon from whom he derives his idea of Tradition.Template:Sfn For Nasr, Tradition comes from the divine source and, in a traditional society, it affects all aspects of life. This divine source "is both the content and the means of revelation", which is "effected" by various "transmitting agencies". The revelation's guiding principles gave rise to a number of subsidiary sciences and arts, which were creatively enlarged to incorporate different elements of social, political, and cultural life. For Nasr, tradition is a repository of "Supreme Knowledge", which is another name for the philosophia perennis, and it provides "the means" for attaining supreme knowledge and spirituality.Template:Sfn

InfluenceEdit

In explaining the varied applications of Traditionalism, Sedgwick writes: "Traditionalism has been used to encourage respect for the environment, compose great music, and reduce hostility between followers of different religions. It has also been used to support very different causes, from the election of Donald Trump as President of the United States of America, to what many would call fascism and racism, not to mention terrorism."<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>

Sedgwick writes that "some Traditionalists read both Evola and Guénon and focus on politics, while some read both Schuon and Guénon, or just Guénon, and focus on religion and self-realization. Those who do not read Evola commonly regard him with the horror with which fascists are generally regarded in the post-war world."<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> Sedgwick further notes that in the 21st Century, some "post-Traditionalists" (notably Aleksandr Dugin) have drawn rhetorically on the "pair of traditional and modern" to advance the political agenda of the "radical right," while rejecting or downplaying perennialism.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>

In the Muslim worldEdit

Through its close affiliation with Sufism, the Guénonian Traditionalist perspective has had an influence in Asia and the Islamic world at large.Template:Refn

In Iran, it was introduced by Hossein Nasr as well as, earlier, by Ali Shariati, the intellectual considered the ideologue of the Iranian Revolution who recommended Guénon to his students. While it never acquired a mass following, its influence on the elite can be measured by the fact that when Ayatollah Khomeini organized the Supreme Council of the Cultural Revolution, out of the seven members designed to serve it, three were acquainted with Traditionalist ideas, namely Abdolkarim Soroush, Reza Davari Ardakani, and Nasrullah Pourjavady.<ref>Mark Sedgwick, "Traditionalism in Iran" in Politica Hermetica, n° 16 (2002), p. 137.</ref>

Hasan Askari, an important Pakistani writer and literary critic, was directly influenced by Guénon, and, through him, Muhammad Shafi and his son Taqi Usmani, some of the country's most influential Islamic scholars, integrated Guénon's works in the curriculum of the Darul Uloom Karachi, one of the most important madrassa or religious seminaries in the country.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref> Other important figures of Pakistan influenced by Traditionalism include A. K. Brohi, who was seen as close to General Zia-ul-Haq, and psychologist Muhammad Ajmal.

The Budshishiyya order of Sufism, based in Morocco, is known to have strands influenced by Traditionalism.Template:Sfn

Far-right and right-wing populist movementsEdit

Julius Evola was an Italian Traditionalist influenced by Guénon but from whom he departed on many points, which did not allow him to be assimilated to Guénonian Traditionalism.Template:Sfn Template:Refn The ideas of Evola have been associated with some far-right movements, such as the European Nouvelle Droite ("New Right"),Template:Sfn and Italian neo-fascists during the Years of Lead.Template:Refn

Similarly, the Romanian Traditionalist Mircea Eliade had been a supporter of the Romanian Orthodox fascist Iron Guard.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>

According to Benjamin Teitelbaum, Savitri Devi, the founder of Esoteric Hitlerism, was influenced by both Guénon and Evola.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref>

Alexander Dugin, an influential Russian far-right thinker, has been influenced by Guénon and Evola.

Mark Sedgwick's Against the Modern World, published in 2004, gives an analysis of political traditionalism:

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Critics of twenty-first century far-right populist movements have argued that various influential figures in these movements are adherents of Traditionalism, and often of Evola in particular. According to Benjamin R. Teitelbaum, these include Donald Trump's former adviser Steve Bannon, Aleksandr Dugin, the Brazilian writer Olavo de Carvalho, and Template:Ill, a one time adviser to the Hungarian Jobbik conservative political party. At various times all of these figures have made reference to Guénon, Evola or other Traditionalists. According to Teitelbaum, they have all interacted with each other based on those interests.<ref>Template:Cite book</ref> Carvalho denies this association.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>

EnvironmentalismEdit

Template:See also

Starting in 1966, Seyyed Hossein Nasr began to apply Traditionalist ideas to environmentalism. Template:Sfn He was one of the first philosophers to turn to this questionTemplate:Sfn and he is considered to be the founder of environmentalism in the Muslim world.Template:Sfn In several works he deals with the causes of the destruction of the planet and the restorative remedies.Template:Sfn Nasr summarizes his position thus:

That the harmony between man and nature has been destroyed is a fact which most people admit. But not everyone realizes that this disequilibrium is due to the destruction of the harmony between man and God.Template:Sfn{{#if:|{{#if:|}}
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Tarik Quadir argues that "the ecological crisis, for Nasr, is only an externalization of an inner malaise [...] due in large part to the various applications of modern [western] science. [...] Following the loss of the vision of the universe proper to medieval Christian worldview, [...] this science ignores or denies the existence of any reality other than that of the material aspect of nature".Template:Sfn It is "to modernism and its false presumptions about the nature of man and the world", that Nasr attributes "the destruction of the natural environment", in addition to "the disintegration of the social fabric",Template:Sfn and he deplores that all States, "from monarchies to communist governments, to revolutionary regimes, […] all want to copy avidly Western science and technology, without thought of their cultural, social and environmental consequences".Template:Sfn

Nasr believes that scientism is a major cause of ecological problems. He defines scientism as the conviction that "modern science provides if not the only, at least the most reliable means to true knowledge" and that it leads thereby "to human progress",Template:Sfn as imagined by those who evaluate a human society solely in terms of its economic growth.Template:Sfn Nasr corroborates the observation that the development of the current economic system rests largely on human passions, which it feeds in its turn, thus generating a continuous blossoming of new needs which, in reality, are only desires.Template:Sfn Finally, "if modern man destroys nature with such impunity, it is because he looks upon it as a mere economic resource".Template:Sfn

Quadir maintains that for Nasr, it is not by technology that environmental problems can be solved in the long term, being themselves the consequence of this technology.Template:Sfn According to Nasr, the critique of the extraordinary technological development is certainly necessary, but the real critique must start with the root of the problem, i.e. with oneself,Template:Sfn because in a desacralized West,Template:Sfn few are aware of what Nasr considers the raison d'être of human life and of nature.Template:Sfn This consciousness, for Nasr, is present in the wisdom of the various religious traditions,Template:Sfn "as well as in their cosmologies and sacred sciences".Template:Sfn And it alone makes it possible to rediscover "the sense of the sacred",Template:Sfn in particular with regard to nature,Template:Sfn because deprived of this sense, the human being remains immersed in the ephemeral, abandoning himself to his own lower nature, with an illusory feeling of freedom.Template:Sfn

Interfaith dialogueEdit

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King Charles IIIEdit

According to Mark Sedgwick, King Charles III, then Prince of Wales, was "more of an anti-modernist than a Traditionalist, though [...] Traditionalist influences [were] increasingly visible in some of his speeches".Template:Sfn His 2010 book, Harmony: A New Way of Looking at Our World shows the influence of Traditionalist thought applied to subjects such as environmentalism, organic farming, sacred art and architecture. The Temenos Academy, which has Charles as a patron, is associated with Traditionalism and perennialism. The Matheson Trust, an educational charity promoting interfaith dialogue and the study of comparative religion founded by Schuon's translator Donald Macleod Matheson, has published Charles' contributions to the Traditionalist journal Sacred Web. These include an article on "Building Bridges Between Islam and the West," and the transcript of a speech he gave introducing a Traditionalist academic conference in Canada.<ref>{{#invoke:citation/CS1|citation |CitationClass=web }}</ref>