Talk:Eric Voegelin

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I find parts of your (chief drafter's) critique of Voegelin's overly broad use of the term gnosticism to be correct, however I think that some of the paragraphs have the wrong tone for a Wikipedia entry. Wikipedia should be an open-ended resource for knowledge, and not simply a receptacle for this or that particular thesis. In this spirit, I have added some language to the conclusion to attempt a more balanced approach. I hope you'll respect the variety of views on this thinker (and not assume we're also 'smart idiots'... ha, there would be some irony in that...). Anyway, the thrust of your viewpoint is still fully in place. Thank you, and thank you for taking the time to draft the entry in the first place.

If you remove critical views on Voegelin, they will be reinserted. You must account for Voegelin's Gnostic conspiracy and not try to hide it. Nixdorf 16:48, 11 Mar 2004 (UTC)

OK, instead of just scrapping you contribution (which I will reinstate anyway) isn't it better if we try to iron out a unified view on Voegelin's views of the Gnostics? I am not a hopeless person, so please expand you views on this issue so we can agree on the form of that particular piece of text. Nixdorf 17:29, 11 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Ernst Cassirer
Who is Paul Cassirer and how can you relate him to Voegelin?


 * Your text only mentions a certain "Cassirer" which I never heard of. I made a quick search in the Wikipedia to find him, and that was the only Cassirer mentioned. Please introduce the correct Cassirer guy, and if you have the time, write up an entry on him/her too as it is to me a completely unknown person. Nixdorf 17:22, 11 Mar 2004 (UTC)


 * Some research gives at hand that you are probably refering to Ernst Cassirer, so I'm putting that in... Nixdorf 12:07, 12 Mar 2004 (UTC)


 * Paul Cassirer is mentioned upon http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paul_Cassirer, as being some adept of Karl Kautsky. Now, upon http://www.marxists.org/archive/kautsky/1908/christ/ , there is Kautsky's writing upon Christ as a socialist revolutionary, claiming that Jesus Christ was a socialist rebel, whose revolution failed to instaurate socialism, but otherwise created a time-enduring organization. This text is full of references to the Essenes, which were the elite of the Pharisees (the elite within the elite), which were somewhat like a monastic movement, with very deep occult teachings and occult rituals. Rudolf Steiner wrote about that, but I cannot find a reference about it. Cf. http://www.anthroposophy.org.uk/book/chapter11.html . One could look at http://www.google.nl/search?q=rudolf+steiner+essenes or http://www.google.nl/search?q=rudolf+steiner+essenes+jesus or http://www.google.nl/search?q=rudolf+steiner+essenes+christ to further investigate this claim. tgeorgescu


 * So, Kautsky was concerned with some Messianic movement (a movement which anticipated and seeked to prepare the coming of Messiah). This movement has many attributes similar to Gnosticism (as described in Wikipedia). Namely, it is (to some extent) contemptuous of material world and material richness, promotes a monastic way of life imbued with elements of ascetiscism (but not necessarly implying that one should not marry and have children), with elements of spiritual quest, and with an organization form similar to secret religious orders. tgeorgescu


 * Therefore, I guess that linking Paul Cassirer with Voegelin is not a priori flawed, since both were concerned with the political implications of some sort of Gnostic cult (Gnostic avant la lettre or apres la lettre) tgeorgescu

Critique of Voegelin's Prose Style
Again, in my usual diplomatic style, I would suggest rephrasing of certain overly polite phrases such as this one:


 * Assessing it is further complicated by a style which employs uncommon erudition while relying on a great deal of previous exposure to this knowledge on the reader's part. Moreover, Voegelin was often compelled to introduce new technical terms or new uses for existing ones.

Which in my book translates to: it was unpedagogically and self-referentially written, so it is hard to read. I know this line of writing is very common in academic literature, but in my opinion it is not clear and informative. Nixdorf 17:40, 11 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Like Nixdorf, I think the sentence in question obfuscates rather than clarifies. However, I think Nixdorf jumps to misleading conclusions in his proposed revision. Familiarity with Voegelin's ontology and an eye for the trajectory of his formal argument will go along way toward making his ideas comprehensible and his otherwise elegant style enjoyable. Nixdorf raises a fair point on the matter of self-reference. Voegelin can be difficult to understand without an appreciation of his concept of gnosticism (and by extension, his theory of symbols and immanence). Even Bob Dahl had trouble wrapping his head around the New Science of Politics because he never thoroughly analyzed Voegelin's premises. However, I have to raise two objections to the consequences that Nixdorf deduces from self-reference. First, Voegelin's thought on gnosticism appears early in his career and recurs throughout, making it quite accessible. Anyone wishing to understand what he's driving at with "gnosticism" can do so without sifting through extensive arcana. Second, calling his style "unpedagogically and self-referentially written, so it is hard to read" misleads. Voegelin employs a very rigorous style of argumentation that, if anything, could be accused of being overly-pedagogical. Because he lays out his arguments so thoroughly, at times he comes across as "slow." However, his ability to couch rigorous formal argumentation in elegant prose makes most of his work quite readable (I'll concede that the books on race can be laborious, but his major works are readily comprehensible). As such, I'm willing to keep with the idea that Voegelin can be too self-referential, leading many readers to forsake his work prematurely. I would also add that, compared to contemporaries like Carl Schmitt or Leo Strauss, Voegelin seems to belabor points, making for a slower cadence. But I can't accept calling his work "unpedagogical" or "hard to read" as the first has no grounding in the texts and the second seems too subjective. Finally, returning to the initial sentence, by the standards of his contemporaries (again, think Strauss and Schmitt) Voegelin was neither uncommonly broad in his references nor excessively inclined to creating/using jargon. Therefore, I propose removing the text in question and replacing it with an acknowledgment of his systematizing inclination and a critique of its consequential self-referentiality. The sentence might read something like this:

''Because Voegelin works within an elaborate ontological system of his own creation, his writings contain a significant level of self-reference. As a result, an understanding of his major terms is a prerequisite for understanding his ideas. Moreover, Voegelin's parsimonious argumentation can bog down the pace of his writing, making it seem dense and impenetrable to the casual reader.''

Sorry - forgot to log in before I wrote the above. --LTTYGS

The Gnostic Theme
Your invitation to further discussion is kind, but I don't believe this discussion would be fruitful.

Instead I return your generosity by recommending that you avoid the posture of authority on Eric Voegelin when your ignorance regarding him and his context is so great that you have never even heard of Ernst Cassirer. If you would like a more informed view of Voegelin, the three links I introduced will quickly lead you to all of the pertinent online resources. If he were still to appear wanting in your estimation from such a vantage point, you could offer an informed critique here. After all, it is not as though Voegelin cannot be faulted. Indeed, you would undoubtedly be interested in the criticism of Voegelin's Gnostic theme which appears in the secondary literature and, in fact, in the author's own work. However your critique is simply inaccurate as it stands now.

This being Wikipedia, you may of course have your way with my text.


 * Being elitist and arrogant will not help you dude, that part is ignored. I'm interested in constructive work here.


 * Please discuss the issues at hand and suggest better wording of the stance on Gnostics if you do not like it. You are simply avoiding the fact that you wrote up a large biography of Voegelin without outlining his philosophy. Your statement above gives the impression that his works are so esoteric that only certain people are to be informed, through his own writings, of their contents.


 * That is a consequence of the fact that Voegelin (like Leo Strauss in whose company on bookshelves he is so often found) has very little to say that can be put in clear terms and still look meaningful. Which in turn is why Voegelin (again like Strauss) is a "philosopher" read little or not at all by actual philosophers, though frightfully dear to conservative zealots.


 * This is an encyclopedia, so plese help us out with a rough presentation of his philosophies that can actually help readers understand Voegelins thought. If you do that, and include his stance on the Gnostics, I migh very well drop my harsh words at the end. Nixdorf 12:07, 12 Mar 2004 (UTC)

Historical versus Theoretical Gnosticism
In surveying these remarks - many of which, admittedly, went up some years ago - a missing or under-emphasized distinction strikes me that I think may offer some clarity to this discussion. First and foremost, Voegelin's discussion of gnosticism should not be conflated with Gnosticism, by which I mean that his theoretical instrument is not the same as the historical phenomenon with which it shares a name. To do so is to mix a proper noun with a categorical descriptor. Voegelin looked at Gnosticism (the historical phenomenon) and noticed a tendency to invert the conventional hierarchy of the sacred and the profane. He then examined contemporary mass movements and noticed a similar phenomenon, though in this case with a specifically political content. He then looks for past iterations of this politicized inversion of the sacred and the profane - what he calls political religion - and traces it through a series of unconnected instances. Thus, when Voegelin refers to "political gnosticism" or "political religion", he is driving at the politicized inversion of the sacred and profane, wedded to an apocalyptic teleology that can be expedited by human intervention. None of this has anything to do with the historical phenomenon of early Christian Gnosticism, other than that it serves as the source of Voegelin's "gnosticism". Whether Voegelin was wise to call this inversion "gnosticism" may be debated, but any assertion that he advocates a continuous trajectory between early Christian Gnosticism and the gnosticism of twentieth-century mass movements is quite wide of the mark. —Preceding unsigned comment added by LTT - YGS (talk • contribs) 16:39, 16 August 2008 (UTC)

Controversies around Voegelin
Any hope the expunger might explain what was wrong with these passages, or say why they are not controversies?

The writer of this sentence considers the idea that Voegelin's work is representative of a conspiracy theory of history to be ludicrous, so I suppose that is a controversy. Conspiracy theories of history are usually understood to imply, not that there are no successful conspiracies - consider the American, French and Russian Revolutions - but that history is determined by a conspiracy or by the wars between conspiracies. Voegelin does not think that. If anyone reads that into Voegelin they are seeing his idea of 'gnosticism' as a movement, rather than as a recurrent spiritual sickness.

More standard controversies around Voegelin focus on whether he was a Christian or not, and whether he was a political Conservative. The arguments for both positions are equivocal. Probably the truth is that Voegelin does not fit in easily within any pre-existent in-group.

To deal with the Christianity controversy first. This might seem irrelevant to many people, but as Voegelin argues that society is based on a perception of transcendental order, it becomes important for believers to ask whether he thought Christianity was successful or not. The arguments and anecdotes are best covered in Federici's book and Wagner's essay. It is true Voegelin believed in something which we can call 'God' (see especially the essays in CW 12) but that does not mean he was a Christian. He did at the time of the Gnosticism essay think that the advent of Christianity was important for world history, but that is possibly a position he later abandoned (See What is History). He considered Thomas Aquinas an important philosopher, but his attitude to doctrine, that it is useful but can also be harmful when fossilised, suggests that he would not be happy with any dogmatic Christianity. Anecdote suggests that he called himself a pre-Nicene Christian - ie one from the period before dogma become enforced. St. Paul is criticised as at least partly gnostic in The Ecumenic Age. He criticises churches both Protestant and Catholic for their actions and philosophies, and it is clear in the book on 'Hitler and the Germans' that he considers that belief in Christianity is not sufficient to make a person resist racism or state terror, if it does not effect them. It seems probable that Voegelin respected Christianity as the best symbolisation of the divine ground of being available to Westerners, without necessarily believing in all the dogmas of the various churches.

Voegelin's political ideas are equally hard to gauge in actuality, partly because he did not often comment on contemporary politics in the USA. In his youth, it was clear that Voegelin opposed totalitarian fascists, Marxists in general and racism. In the rest of his life he opposed classical liberalism. These are positions which could be taken by people of either the left or right. It is true that leftists tend to see some value in Marx's critique of capitalism and rightists tend to see some virtue in racism or think it doesn't exist or can be cured by ignoring it, but these positions are not inevitable. Voegelin was also probably an elitist, thinking that the divine ground of being could not be experienced by everyone, but needs to be disseminated by an elite - again another reason why epistemological questions cannot be avoided. But there have been communist and fascist elites, and even democratic and liberal elites. Voegelin's respect for order does not mean that he did not think being open to new visions of order was not important. So he had no dogmatic respect for tradition. Despite his acquaintance or friendship with Mises and Hayek he was aware of the now lost Conservative Critique of Capitalism, and was able to support government intervention in the economy. He could even make what sound like neo marxist statements such as: "When society differentiated into capitalist and worker, the model of the society of free, equal citizens was overtaken by a reality that pressed toward the crisis of class struggle. There arose the social-ethical problematic, which after long political struggles led to the massive introduction of socialist elements into the liberal economic structure" (CW 12: 96). Anecdote suggests that he like Walt Kelly's 'Pogo' cartoon strip, which has often been condemned as Liberal.

It seems that Voegelin must be read without adherence to contemporary political divisions, which probably have no particular reference to the truth of being in themselves.

''Freedom and Serfdom: An Anthology of Western Thought, edited by Alber Humold. (D. Reidel, Dordrecht, Holland, 1961), p. 280.'' Eric Voeglin:
 * The phrase "political divisions" triggered recall of a quote from Eric Voegelin that impressed me greatly when I was in high school forty years ago:

''Once an argument has been classed as "positional," it is regarded as having been demolished, since the "position" attributed to it is always selected with a perjorative intent. The choice of the position selected is an expression of the personal antipathies of the individual critic, and the same arguments can therefore be attributed to any one of a variety of "positions," ccording to what comes most readily to the critic's hand. The wealth of variations afforded by such tactics is well exemplified by the variety of classifications to which I have myself been subjected. On my religious "position" I have been classified as a Protestant, a Catholic, an anti-Semite and as a typical Jew; politically, as a Liberal, a Fascist, a (Nazi) and a Conservative; and on my theoretical "position," as a Platonist, a Neo-Augustinian, a Thomist, a disciple of Hegel, an existentialist, a historical relativist and an empirical skeptick; in recent years the suspicion has frequently been voiced that I am a Christian. All these classifications have been made by university professors and people with academic degrees.''

Taxonomy is both a useful and a limiting tool in learning.Naaman Brown (talk) 11:13, 18 July 2008 (UTC)

Voegelins use of sources regarding Gnosticism
Can anyone list the sources Voegelin used on Gnosticism? I am under the impression that he never read or cited the Nag Hammadi library which is the primary source on Gnosticism, so that he rather relied solely on secondary sources?

''Look in the preface and the first couple of pages of Science politics gnosticism. Voegelin used the best sources and scholarship from before the Nag Hammadi library's publication''


 * Which ones? I was under the impression that he used, to a large extent, mainly the German philosopher Hans Jonas who's writings on Gnosticism are deeply colored by his existentialist view on the subject. Nixdorf 10:05, 19 September 2005 (UTC)

''I've taken the libery of moving your paragraph closer to the begining of the section as it interupted the flow between the gnosticism section and the next section. I've also expanded the secondary references. The issue of translation of the Nag Hamadi texts is probably irrelevant as Voegelin always tried to read the originals. He also apparently claimed that Quispel, the editor of the Nag Hammadi finds, was an "old friend", so he probably had some idea of what was going on, but who knows?.''


 * Any direct knowlegde of Nag Hammadi should have been noted I believe, but needs to be confirmed. Anyway, very nice edit. Nixdorf 08:24, 20 September 2005 (UTC)


 * Also, yes it is strange that he didn't read the originals, but it could be that they were physically inaccessible. As I remember it Voegelin could read Greek well, so coptic shouldn't have been so hard. Nixdorf 08:28, 20 September 2005 (UTC)

"And thus Nazism becomes 'gnostic' because it suggests we can have a 'pure' race when the racially inferior are exterminated."

Where did you get this - What is the base for this statement?

This argument is evident in Voegelin's works. That is the basis of that statement. Read Voegelin's writings if you want an in depth explanation of this argument, and don't expect wikipedia to spend forever outlining philosophical reasoning.

A critical comment on Voegelin's approach to Gnosticism
To make heaven on earth within history is to deny Devil's right to domination within material world. A Gnostic is fully aware of this scriptural standpoint (Sola Scriptura, see Isaiah 45:7 and http://members.home.nl/tgeorgescu/bible-speaks-2.html ). Therefore, the Gnosis itself proclaims that one should not attempt to do what is impossible. It follows that a Gnostic would never seek to immanentize the eschaton, since this is contrary to his Gnostic science. Therefore, Voegelin is wrong that Gnosis implies imanentizing the eschaton. Perhaps only a crippled and flawed version of Gnosis would attempt such madness. So, the problem lies not with Gnosis, but with a crippled version of it, which pretends to be the full Gnosis. tgeorgescu


 * This would be consistent with Voegelin. The "gnostics" he was referring to, would in order to qualify into his definition of "gnostic", would seek through "secret knowledge" (untested and or unchallenged ideas read opposite of tradition) to either change themselves and or the world. To seek to improve oneself and or the world is not bad and not the problem. The problem is that knowledge is reductionistic and therefore "limited" (see Friedrich Hayek, Michael Polanyi and Philosophy of mind). Hence the fallacy that the key to anything is strictly (immanent) knowledge (knowledge alone has never sufficed this is the very spiritual sickness of gnosticism), but rather the correct way is that knowledge is but one of many essential components. The cult or cults of knowing. Purely immanent knowledge = materialism = gnosticism. God is gnosis in immanence yes, but not in essence, because God transcends (as Mankind should) "knowledge" or gnosis. Or more precisely via Kenosis God transcended itself/being. Gnosticism is hence consciousness out of balance. If you have read Jung you know this was his problem with gnosis too (see the Undiscovered Self) though Jung uses the word "reason" instead of knowledge. And I bet Richard Noll would relate to what Voegelin was saying [ http://www.amazon.com/Jung-Cult-Origins-Charismatic-Movement/dp/0684834235/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1198158997&sr=8-1 ] [ http://www.amazon.com/Aryan-Christ-Secret-Life-Carl/dp/0679449450/ref=pd_bbs_sr_2?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1198158997&sr=8-2 ]. A gnostic in the false sense is one who reduces all to knowledge. Not everything is knowable. Since logic ends in paradox because knowledge is an abstraction of experience, by the mind (see dialethia or taoism's relationship to legalism). Consciousness to Voegelin was the mind interpreting the data of experience and then the brain via logic and reason organizing the abstracted experience (see German idealism/idealists-Kant) into ontological "data/knowledge/memory" (again idealism and or the philosophy of the mind). Voegelin's bad Gnostics (though all who desire to reduce everything to knowledge are bad and "gnostic" by his standard) are cut off from the real world because they vilify it. They are not dreamers per se but rather afraid (according to Voegelin) for not facing reality as it is. By not accepting the transcendent and or the "beyond logic" (randomness, chaos, dischord) component of it. This "component" via kenosis is needed in order for mankind to have freewill. To gnostics any type of chaos or disorder is an expression that the material world's creator is and was limited in ability therefore not the highest and or truest God (see dystheism and the problem of evil). This is in contrast to the east that teaches that to vilify the world also is to deny the immanent of God in the world (since material is evil any God in the material would be evil). Both ideas (there is no true transcendent because it's knowable and that the immanence or providence of God and it's creation are evil) being again dualistic (to one another) rather then sequential, ontologically. Greek and Christian differentiation (in contrast to agon) and contrast here (in opposition to gnosticism) do not connotate conflict or opposition by specifying the difference between things.

Philosophy's tendency to mechanize God, makes God a tyrant

 * Simply it is that God is knowable in his essence or that God can be reduced to knowledge, logic, data -machine or god of the machine, deus ex machina the infinite can be reduced to the finite via knowledge. Coupled with the specific duality of body, world =evil. Soul, spirit = good. This means the argument of the problem of evil is a fallacy because it projects onto all of God, mankinds' created essence (again to immanentized the transcendent, trigger the apocalypse to Immanentize the eschaton).
 * To paraphrase Voegelin- gnostics oversimplify reality for the sake of manipulating it (hence magic).
 * But as logic ends in paradox Gnostics then make things harder by trying to not face reality as it is (One Single Organic Whole, in contrast to a strict analytical knowledge or subjective knowledge that masquerades as intuitive/organic whole understanding), but how they think it should be, hence it is a form of Greek Idealism (conflict as narrative -man versus whatever)or Greedy reductionism (due to making any knowledge the panacea) if you will,- (see hermetics or perspective and all perspectives are equally true). For if the gnostics win against their opponent they reduce the opponent to ambigious removing anything of the target that makes the target unique (hence the paradox that keeps knowledge from the being the absolute truth). Now when the experiment(s) fails the society (Guinea Pigs/mark whatever) falls into chaos and or violence. This is the out of order that Voegelin was talking about restoring. On a social scale (say if an entire society embraces the essences of gnosticism- to reduce all to knowledge) then you get World Wars and a global scale degree of violence. LoveMonkey (talk) 17:14, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

The Statesman
If a Gnostic goes political, he/she would indeed use his Gnostic knowledge, but he/she would prove far more tactful than Voegelin suggests, and would never attempt to produce a regime he/she knows from the very beginning that it will collapse, since it is untenable due to not taking into account the inherent evilness of the material world. tgeorgescu


 * This is conjecture and speculation. This is also addressed in Plato's Statesman. If?? Knowledge is power, politics is THE game of power. According to Voegelin gnosticism creates cults and establishes the idea that they are victims (hence elite/special/alienation) to gain a large following. Gnostics believe (according to Voegelin) they are disenfranchised and have never been accepted. This duality of "us against them" is the very essence of what breeds the killing and violence that Voegelin states is a by product of the gnostics. Duality as in duel. Gnostics engaging in revenge and retribution for perceived past injustices. This is the very heart of the violence that Marx's poor against the rich and Hitler's German puppets to the Jewish conspiracy is all about. This is also why Voegelin attacks Nietzsche. According to Voegelin's gnostics, the Jews and Greeks worship the devil and or demiurge (Plato's personal creative, freewill, psychological component) who seeks to keep the disenfranchised repressed via conspiracy and the use of religion as a tool to control the individual. This very important point of Voegelin which is the most hardest to articulate is that gnosticism creates false knowledge because in it's core it is Utilitarian and Egalitarian and it believes that it is the truth already and that any truths that come in opposition to it are from evil and therefore to be undermine or ignored no matter how true (questioning and inquiry are strictly forbidden, hence hidden or secret). This is why Voegelin matched gnosticism with sophistry meaning truth is power, power is truth, truth is nothing beyond utility. Voegelin saw in gnosticism the expression of violence in how it responded almost pedantic violent like to criticism think of the behavior of modern cults and organizations like the Stazi (read paranoia). Voegelin saw as the essence of Gnosticism the idea of a lone hero against the World who was ultimately a puppet of Power hunger sophists. Man then reduced to machine and slave to policy or procedure. That the gnostic was lying to themselves (read cult leaders like Hitler, Stalin, Mao). And they refused to face the truth of being and or their existence and or reality as it actually is/was (hence full consciousness through experience rather then to wake up via "knowledge" of an experience). The fallacy of trying to obtain gnosis (knowledge of an experience) from gnosis (Hence the fallacy that by obtaining knowledge of an experience one then has the experience=reducing all to knowable or knowledge).Voegelin says gnostics as very violent opinionated people (ego driven) who engaged in destructive behavior and had no facilities to reign themselves in, this of course is consistent with Augustine and his critique of Manicheanism and how he lost control of himself (when a gnostic) by blaming the world or cosmos or God for his sins (hence ethical- antinomianism).

LoveMonkey (talk) 17:25, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

What the word pessimism means in contrast to optimism
A Gnostic is aware thereof, and he/she would try to produce not the best regime, but the least evil regime. The perspective of cultural pessimism from the Book of Daniel, chapter 2, implies that as the time goes by, the worldly regimes decay and the political situation gets worse (therefore, progress is an illusion). This is just another argument that a Gnostic would project the regime which is probable to bring the least increment of evilness and decay, instead of seeking to make true some vision from never-never land. tgeorgescu


 * This is flawed (see Political religion). Voegelin covers both sides, hence if the gnostic believes that there is no God then religion is a repressive evil that must be stamped out (see see post atheism). If the gnostic believes that the Jews and Greeks worship the devil then they (Jews and Greeks) are a bain that ultimately must be dealt with. If the gnostic believes their group are victims they will seek through whatever means to right any percieved wrongs. If the gnostic believes that the cosmos is fallen and that it is useless to try and repair it then they run the risk of psychosis. If the gnostic believes that they can fix correct and or properly lead society but then fail then what will they do to maintain their power? They will do what every human does. Because gnostic or not human is human. The flaw of human is not corrected by knowledge. Anymore then a junkie can think or reason himself out of addiction. There is no piece of knowledge or information you can give the junkie that will empower him to not be a junkie anymore. The junkie has to find the ability to stop themselves or they will die. Such are many examples of how Jungian psychology fails and the concept of gnosis is not all encompassing. To paraphrase Voegelin cults are cults
 * rather that be political, religious or racists, whatever.

LoveMonkey (talk) 17:36, 19 December 2007 (UTC)

To quote Fritjof Capra, "In the East, a virtuous person is therefore not one who undertakes the impossible task of striving for the good and eliminating the bad, but rather one who is able to maintain a dynamic balance between good and bad." The Tao of Physics, p. 158, III. The Paralllels, Flamingo, HarperCollins, London 1991. tgeorgescu


 * So why is there a dispute now in the section of Voegelin and Gnosticism since this quote really isn't addressing anything.LoveMonkey (talk) 17:36, 19 December 2007 (UTC)


 * Well, my argument, presented as a whole, has been split into some pieces distributted among some chapters of this talk page. The quote from Capra presents the character of the true Gnostic (a person of equilibrium between good and evil) as compared to that of a mainstream Christian (a world improver by any means). You have presented Voegelin's standpoint, but you did not answer my objection. Voegelin understands by "Gnostic" a knowledge-junkie, which is a distorted charicature of the original Gnosticism, as presented by the Nag Hammadi scrolls and similar texts and Gnostic Gospels. In short, Voegelin presented a straw man of Gnosticism, which he knocks down very easy, since it is nothing else than a straw man (read: sophism). Tgeorgescu (talk) 17:29, 1 September 2008 (UTC)
 * I beg to differ, Voegelin was only reflecting on the phenomenon or manifestation of gnosticism. Although you could just read him for yourself since I dare say he specifically addresses the gnostics "motives" (first 11 pages of ORDER AND HISTORY (ISRAEL AND> REVELATION) as you have specifically construed not being in existence.

LoveMonkey (talk) 19:29, 1 September 2008 (UTC)


 * ""With a view to action experience seems in no respect inferior to art, and men of experience succeed even better than those who have theory without experience. (The reason is that experience is knowledge of individuals, art of universals, and actions and productions are all concerned with the individual; for the physician does not cure man, except in an incidental way, but Callias or Socrates or some other called by some such individual name, who happens to be a man. If, then, a man has the theory without the experience, and recognizes the universal but does not know the individual included in this, he will often fail to cure; for it is the individual that is to be cured.) But yet we think that knowledge and understanding belong to art rather than to experience, and we suppose artists to be wiser than men of experience (which implies that Wisdom depends in all cases rather on knowledge); and this because the former know the cause, but the latter do not. For men of experience know that the thing is so, but do not know why, while the others know the 'why' and the cause. Hence we think also that the masterworkers in each craft are more honourable and know in a truer sense and are wiser than the manual workers, because they know the causes of the things that are done (we think the manual workers are like certain lifeless things which act indeed, but act without knowing what they do, as fire burns,-but while the lifeless things perform each of their functions by a natural tendency, the labourers perform them through habit); thus we view them as being wiser not in virtue of being able to act, but of having the theory for themselves and knowing the causes. And in general it is a sign of the man who knows and of the man who does not know, that the former can teach, and therefore we think art more truly knowledge than experience is; for artists can teach, and men of mere experience cannot."

LoveMonkey (talk) 12:43, 12 September 2008 (UTC)

Religious Science
Why the occult? Well the whole thing boils down to the ideas of determinism (Uroborus ) versus freewill (true infinity, Absolute Infinite). Either God and the Universe are a machine and we are destined or fated to salvation (as an elite of the Sethian, enlightened, knowing) and do not have to answer to freewill. Or we are responsible for our actions within the opportunity of existence in the Universe. Determinism as such being "the ends justifies the means" (making the idea then synonymous with utilitarianism) and being deterministic in that we create our finite lives, they are temporal and an illusion and have no infinite value or weight (this is in contrast to soteriology). Voegelin allotting that the characteristics of gnosticism are really just "tools" or "arguments" to deny people freewill. These "tools" or "ideas" are now quite famous and it is under them that one may begin to see the manifestation of cult devotion that is the destroyer of freewill. It was Christianity that taught freewill as a corner stone to existence. It was gnosticism (in its attempts through it's various sects) that tried to deny freewill and or attack it as evil. Claiming the God of freewill (Yahweh) as the devil. That because the universe has both chaos and order that both do not facilitate freewill but rather they evoke tragedy. This denial of existence and or turning away from existence as it is. Voegeling expressed in the New Science of Politics. Politics now modeling their ideas to gain power after the "utopia" or "a piece of blue sky" or "pie in the sky" cult qualities, sales pitches. Or as Dostoevsky stated in the The Grand Inquisitor they will claim to teach logic or reason and offer land (the world or power over it), bread and freedom but it will end in slavery. Or simply ""Anyone who can appease a man's conscience can take his freedom away from him." LoveMonkey (talk) 12:56, 16 March 2008 (UTC)

Voegelin' argument in essence is Nihilism and Gnosticism are one and the same
Voegelin in his critique of Auguste Comte states Auguste Comte is "a spiritual dictator of mankind". FER 74-75 That along with other eighteenth century figures like d'Alembert, Voltaire, Diderot, Bentham, and Turgot, Comte and his accomplices "have mutilated the idea of man beyond recognition." Hence the only truth is no truth and that all is nothing but a meaningless illusion with no value toward ones salvation. Therefore we can deny truth and make our own truth. Since truth is a priori and can not be really eliminated. Therefore, ultimately there is no truth but man and since man is empty or a machine then, there is no truth in existence, hence nihilism which is the manifestation of Misotheism. From the vantage point of Voegelin's perspective of a symbolist, artist or creator, cults are to their respective hosts (religion, science, politics) - Kitsch or poshlust (they are a distortion of "one must live for ones soul not ones' self") they're fake or false (according to Voegelin) cheap knock offs that have no substance and serve no purpose but distraction from the ennui or anxiety of existence (Voegelin called this ersatz). Hence false gnosis is nothing but the "knowledge" of the demagogue. The tricks of the trade for the conman, because who could be as such and still believe in a higher truth, hence such a person's truth is sophistry a belief in nothing (since what is after power and life but the nothing of death). Reality can be a system for God, but it cannot be so for any human individual, because both reality and humans are incomplete, and all philosophical systems imply completeness. False infinity, false knowledge (thats usually hateful or racist or antisemitic again Hitler, Stalin) and also false apophatism.

Occult and nihilism in a Russian sense
Hence to immanentize the transcendent (claiming to know the unknowable) and or anything of the infinite or divine (yes the eschaton) or the uncreated (knowledge of the uncreated/infinite/divine is true gnosis), most obviously knowledge as an end in itself, as being synonymous with human existence and human experience. Magic is to manipulate the supernatural for greedy and selfish aims. To reduce God, art, human existence and human experience and the supernatural to formula (2+2=4) "all to knowledge" is the gnosticism that Voegelin speaks of. "In the end all corruption will come about as a consequence of the natural sciences" (see Sociological positivism). But such a scientific method becomes especially dangerous and pernicious when it would encroach also upon the sphere of spirit. Let it deal with plants and animals and stars in that way: but to deal with the human spirit in that way is blasphemy (of the Holy Spirit), which only weakens ethical and religious passion. Even the act of eating is more reasonable than speculating with a microscope upon the functions of digestion.....A dreadful sophistry spreads microscopically and telescopically into tomes, and yet in the last resort produces nothing, qualitatively understood, though it does, to be sure, cheat men out of the simple, profound and passionate wonder which gives impetus to the ethical..The only thing certain is the ethical-religious." This above is the lesson of gnosiology. Discovery (guided by truth) is most precious, however over simplification and or aping/hijacking power (sophistry is, truth is power truth is what works) to push an agenda (wanting to be God or a cult leader) is the essence of evil. Gnosticism is the by product (the most cynical or pessimistic/nihilistic) outcome of the ennui of existential crisis. It is the belief that this existence (immanence/hypostasis) is tyrannical or evil (see Plotinus and Neoplatonism and Gnosticism). Man becomes, a god wihout God. LoveMonkey (talk) 16:48, 21 December 2007 (UTC)

In the East this would be a loose definition of a gnostic.......... "There is another kind of selfishness which violates the hierarchy of values much more: some agents who strive for perfection and the absolute fullness of being and even for the good of the whole world are determined to do it in their own way, so that they should occupy the first place and stand higher than all other beings and even the Lord God himself. Pride is the ruling passion of such beings. They enter into rivalry with God, thinking that they are capable of ordering the world better than its Creator. Pursing an impossible aim, they suffer defeat at every step and begin to hate God. This is what Satan does. Selfishness separates us from God in so far as we put before us purposes incompatible with God's will that the world should be perfect. In the same way selfishness separates an agent in a greater or lesser degree from other agents: his aims and actions cannot be harmonized with the actions of other beings and often lead to hostility and mutual opposition." This in contrast to sobornost. In the East, gnosticism is a heresy specific to the ascetic traditions. It is a distortion of the ascetic ideals. To Dostoevsky the greatest thing to overcome in life is oneself. The greatest freedom was to get over oneself. This is to say that kenosis was more important then gnosis. LoveMonkey (talk) 16:53, 27 December 2007 (UTC)

What Voegelin meant by stating infinite things were being hypostasize
John Searle in Intentionality writes:

My own approach to mental states and events has been totally realistic in the sense that I think there really are such things as intrinsic mental phenomena which cannot be reduced to something else or eliminated by some kind of re-definition. There really are pains, tickles and itches, beliefs, fears, hopes, desires, perceptual experiences, experiences of acting, thoughts, feelings, and all the rest. Now you might think that such a claim was so obviously true as to be hardly worth making, but the amazing thing is that it is routinely denied, though usually in a disguised form, by many, perhaps most, of the advanced thinkers who write on these topics. I have seen it claimed that mentals states can be entirely defined in terms of their causal relations, or that pains were nothing but machine table states of certain kinds of computer systems, or that correct attributions of Intentionality were simply a matter of predictive success to be gained by taking a certain kind of "intentional stance" toward systems. I don't think that any of these views are even close to the truth ..."pg 262 As Dostoevsky states 2+2=5 is a far better thing in that it fights the manifestation of tyranny, tyranny established through its scientific justifications just like Zamytin and his novel We stated. LoveMonkey (talk) 16:07, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Influences
I wonder if any of the Voegelin or Arendt scholars here know if she had any particular influence on or was influenced by Voegelin. As I recall, Voegelin does mention in some of his non-academic writing either lecturing in a few of Arendt's courses or bringing her into his as a guest lecturer (perhaps while she was at the New School or while he was at LSU, though I can’t seem to find the references). As some of their main topics of study have close overlap, as did some of their circle of contemporary influences, did either ever specifically attribute significant lines of their own thought to the other. If so, she may be worth adding in the influenced / influenced by boxes.

Also, the Oxford Natural Law legal philosopher John Finnis makes several references to Order and History, sometimes in depth, in his Natural Law and Natural Rights. Though Voegelin was not a natural law theorist per say, perhaps Finnis should be listed in the "influenced" box. Aurelius89 (talk) 04:23, 20 February 2009 (UTC)

Conclusion
Since evil is in the East the concept of turning mankind against his, demiurge\creator\life\existence. This as nihilism is, the very essence of negation of life. A selfishness devoution, devoid of humility unwilling to submit to a higher truth. A nous or common sense interruption of Voegelin would be...The ends never justify the means because.. The road to hell is paved with good intentions. Gnosticism and or cults if you will, is the devil's managing, planning and bankrolling of the project (to build the road to hell, that is). It is the evil's theology. Gnosticism/nihilism is the vilification of existence or, "life in its completeness". LoveMonkey (talk) 20:14, 13 February 2008 (UTC)

Unreferenced statements
I removed the following from the section on Gnosticism. They have been fact-tagged more than long enough for someone to have cited them.


 * According to Stephen McKnight, after 1970 Voegelin began to take issue with the tendency of his readers to place special emphasis on the concept of gnosticism. He was now more inclined to stress apocalypticism, hermeticism, and neoplatonism as being equally important in the constitution of modernity and to see an undue emphasis on gnosticism as obscuring important problems. However, McKnight's view is not universally accepted.


 * Ultimately, Voegelin's analysis of the disorder of the West and the rise of totalitarianism suggests that the primary cause is spiritual pathology rather than social disorganization, or rather that the first inevitably leads to the second.

Anyone have a source for these? ---  RepublicanJacobite  The'FortyFive' 04:04, 24 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Eugene Webb and Eric Voegelin and Literary Theory,” in Politics, Order and History: Essays on the Work of Eric Voegelin, ed. Glenn Hughes, Stephen A. McKnight, and Geoffrey L. Price. Sheffield: Sheffield Academic Press, 2001. Pls understand I have nothing to do with the section you posted above. You should not have removed the Mary Lefkowitz or the comments on cults. Professor Ellis Sandoz has covered that. LoveMonkey (talk) 04:46, 24 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Nothing stays unless it's sourced. ---  RepublicanJacobite  The'FortyFive' 14:37, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

Hey I like the article without McKnights comments. But there is the problem of understanding. Or to be more direct.. What Voegelin have you read? Since I have not sourced sentence for sentence but sections. Tell me what parts you'd like sourced per se. And again what Voegelin have you read? Since if you are not familiar with the subject matter how might you discern it's validity, since I can not directly quote or it will be removed as copyright violation. And what I might take from 3rd party could be biased and inaccurate.LoveMonkey (talk) 14:51, 24 July 2009 (UTC)

Criticism
Vögelins standpoint should be very heavily criticized by philosophers and theologicians by now, according to my gut feelings: there must be sources out there essentially claiming that Vögelin essentially shoe-horns facts into the label "gnostic" meaning "ultra-heretic". This should be clear from only reading Irenaeus, since Irenaeus claims that gnostics where not out for salvation for the whole humanity, nor any act to erect an otherwordly regime here on earth, while Vögelins standpoint instead says (section Voegelin on Gnosticism):
 * The second is the desire to implement and or create a policy to actualize the speculation, or Immanentize the Eschaton, i.e., to create a sort of heaven on earth within history.

Needed in the article is opposing statements, and sources for those. Anyone inclined to, are invited to start. I'll also have an eye open for such debunkals to be inserted.

IMHO, Vögelin describes the extrovert cults very good. ... said: Rursus ( m bork³ ) 11:08, 31 October 2009 (UTC)


 * Googled afu:
 * Further Remarks on Eric Voegelin and Gnosticism, claims that Vögelins definition of "Gnosticism" met heavy criticism from the start,
 * Politics and the Occult: The Left, the Right, and the Radically Unseen by Gary Lachman, claims that Vögelin mislabels "apocalyptic visions" as Gnosticism,
 * What is Gnosis from The Gnosis Archive (i.e. Hoellerites/Valentinians) claims that Vögelin makes "A Political Confusion",
 * Viljans triumf (Swedish only (sob)!!) by Per Ericson, claims that Vögelin introduces a "foreign/strange apparatus of conceptions" ("främmande begreppsapparat"),
 * ... said: Rursus ( m bork³ ) 11:30, 31 October 2009 (UTC)

Why not paraphrase and summarise the contents of the above and put them in a section of their own? The Sound and the Fury (talk) 20:34, 13 September 2010 (UTC)

Recommended readings
This passage is interesting and useful, but it seems to fall far outside what should appear in Wikipedia:


 * People generally recommend beginning with CW 5 Modernity Without Restraint, which includes 'The Political Religions', 'New Science of Politics' and 'Science, Politics, and Gnosticism'. Some however suggest starting with "Immortality: Experience and Symbol". Those more interested in his empirical work however might prefer Hitler and the Germans (CW 31) or Order and History vol.2: The World of the Polis (CW 15). Those of a more philosophical bent might prefer Order and History vol.3: Plato and Aristotle (CW 16).  After that, people should embark on the Philosophy of Consciousness phase with Anamnesis CW 6. If you are still reading, the two final volumes of Order and History, The Ecumenic Age and In search of Order, are worth the effort, as Voegelin attempts a new formulation of the problem.

I'm not sure if there is some other way to include these recommendations. The Sound and the Fury (talk) 20:32, 13 September 2010 (UTC)
 * Its tied to Michael P. Federici. And for the record I say remove it. I didnt write it and it is kinda of a opinion thing that people would draw more accurate Voeglin from Ellis Sandoz, instead. The Federici stuff is excellent and is a very very good overview but considering the controversy over Voegelin it is better to stay as academic as possible. As Voegelin kinda left out some super important stuff and was mostly giving a take on the aspect of "gnosticism" that wanted the the old order and against Judeo-Christianity sought to re-establish that society or old order. In my opinion Voegelins ultimate goal was actually achieve by James Billington. Billington's work about the (Turkish on the sly) French and Russian Revolutions in his book Fire in the Minds of Men, does everything Voegelin was shooting for in his theory.


 * Voegelin doesn't really cover the whole metaphysics thing like he should. You see he doesn't understand the social context within the debate on what matter is and how that is used by the old Pagan Mystery religion guard (via Gnosticism) to invalidate the Judeo-Christian God and get people to believe in the old Gods. Thats really really really really what gnosticism is. That is why the whole use of the term is kind of silly, but hey Voegelin's idea has teeth. Funny enough he almost gets it in his depiction of cult and culture. A better way to understand gnosticism is what is called religion and how relgion was destroyed by Judeo-Christianity (hence all of the attacks on Christianity as teaching nothingness, atheism (creation ex-nihilo etc etc). The Roman Catholic war on mysticism against the Eastern Orthodox church (Essence–Energies distinction, theoria etc etc) shows just how much Western and specific European Christianity never knew what was going on and how they made all this funny stuff up. Its a good read though, ain't it. I mean if you want to understand it's not really that hard to explain.  LoveMonkey (talk) 14:05, 22 October 2010 (UTC)


 * Just so that there is at least a starting point for thrashing. Let me say this in a Greek Orthodox way so that it might be attacked for what it is. Roman Catholic mysticism equates (from an Eastern Christian perspective) to agnosticism. Faith in Western Christianity is the word used to justify an embracing of agnosticsm which is a "just in case there is a God approach". Eastern Orthodox mysticism calls itself Orthodox gnosiology. The gnosticism as pagan metaphysical relio-systems based on the Mystery Religions mystic systems, structures are deterministic and fatalist (yes even the term libertarian metaphysics is wrong and not really correct just like say Bardaisan-ism). One will find that the arguments presented in the Kabbalah do not validate free will and are nothing but a slight of hand just like Bardaisan. Modern Gnosticism and their movement are cults that make money and have almost zero to do with Ptolemy and his buddies. The Nomenklatura and the New class are manifestations of this type of cult (culture). And yes the devil in the East is called the tyrant and his goal to destroy life and existence after of course the devil makes life an evil thing. According to the pagan cults there was no such evil, so the "problem of evil" debate as is seen by the Eastern Orthodox is a pagan context and not a Judeo-Christian one. And yes Judeo-Christianity very well (At least Eastern Orthodoxy) teaches that God is freedom (Orthodox is Orthodox in its protection of free will i.e. it is libertarian) meaning everyone has a right to freedom, free will)and that against the determinism of pagan culture Mystery religions, Greek philosophy man is to rebel against the World and seek freedom from it. The gnosticism of back then loved to misquote and distort that message to make what Christians said look like they where lunatics who taught atheism and hatred against nature and their bodies. But this more correctly is pagan asceticism's attitudes and not Christian ones. LoveMonkey (talk) 14:55, 22 October 2010 (UTC)
 * I'm impressed by your erudition... but have no unique response of my own. I guess you didn't need one. The Sound and the Fury (talk) 02:32, 29 November 2010 (UTC)

Reassessment

 * 1) Suitably referenced, with inline citations where necessary.
 * 2) Reasonably covers the topic, and does not contain obvious omissions or inaccuracies.
 * 3) Defined structure.
 * 4) Reasonably well-written.
 * 5) Contains supporting materials where appropriate.
 * 6) Presents its content in an appropriately understandable way.

After reviewing the current assessment, I've downgraded the article to C-Class, as it does not currently pass the B-Class criteria. Further discussion may be fruitful, but I can see that the problems have been previously addressed in the above threads with no improvement forthcoming. I'm also concerned about the image source, as I tried to track it down and could not; the image also appears to have been edited in a strange way with a glowing outline added to the head, neck, and shoulders. This is unusual for a biographical image. Viriditas (talk) 00:59, 18 January 2011 (UTC)

That's a shame. Voegelin is a hugely important thinker. I will add some of his vision of the premodern polity to this article later. The Sound and the Fury (talk) 02:35, 29 May 2011 (UTC)

File:Eric Voegelin.jpg
The above picture doesn't resemble those in non-free sources such as this. Looks like a case of misidentification.Autarch (talk) 21:05, 21 February 2012 (UTC)
 * Has anyone asked those good folks whether they'd part with their Voegelin image? Release is to the public? The Sound and the Fury (talk) 21:47, 21 February 2012 (UTC)

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Voegelin's earlier years, fascism and the authoritarian State
In my opinion the description of Voegelin's early development in the English wikipedia artice on Voegelin from December, the 4th, is inaccurate. I had added some changes a two weeks ago, but they have quickely been reverted. Therefore, I'd like to explain my reasons for the changes here, and propose them again.

Voegelin on race theory
When saying that the wikipedia-article in its present (December, the 11th 2017) form is inaccurate, I mean in particular the statement that Voegelin's two books on race theory where directed against racism is wrong.

Quite the contrary, Voegelin's books on race theory advocate a particular brand of racism, namely, a racism that takes body and soul into account, and analyses and also criticises another brand of racism, nameley a racism that relies exclusively on biological features like blood ties. The brand of racism that Voegelin advocates draws strongly on authors such as Othmar Spann, Ferdinand Clauß and Carl Gustav Carus, all of which are disucssed very favorably in Voegelin's books. Thus Voegelin's race books were meant by its author as a critical constructive contribution to the racist discourse at the time of their publication. Unsuprisingly, Voegelin's book "Race and State" received favorable reviews in Nazi Germany. (The same is true for Voegelin's other race book, though it did receveive fewer reviews.) But it did not receive favorable reviews throughout the Nazi camp and it also received favorable reviews from reviewers that were no Nazis (like Helmut Plessner, for example). How is that to be explained? Well, obviously, the book were not well received by those Nazis that insisted on a purely biological version of racism, while those Nazis that were more flexible in their racist creed could find them quite acceptable.

But how is it too explained that Voegelin's book also received some positive reviews outside the Nazi camp. In my opinion there are two possible reasons:

1. In spite of its being racist itself, the book still delivers a critical analysis of certain brands of racism and their social function that readers found worthwhile that did not share the books positive racist stance. Voegelin's book analyzes race theories as a kind of political mythology, and his analysis can - if read against the grain - potentially be used to critize racism. Voegelin, to be sure, did not object to political mythologies. Quite the contrary, in his fascist phase he considered a political mythology as a necessary ingredient of the intellectual foundations of a nation state. Therefore, he did not object to racism merely on the grounds that it was a political mythology rather than a scientific theory. As long as it wasn't too narrowly biological, Voegelin did not mind racism.

2. In an intellectual climate where the most outrageous racist ideologies thrived, Voegelin's book could still appear as a relative moderate form of racism.

Nonetheless, it is racism. And when Voegelin was asked by Ernst Krieck, then a leading Nazi intellectual and obviously impressed by Voegelin's book on the "History of the Race Idea", for his curriculum vitae and list of publications, Eric Voegelin hastened to oblige and in his reply to the Nazi-professor he did not fail to mention his perfectly aryan ancestry. (Krieck hadn't read Voegelin's other race book "Race and State" yet, but was eager to do so.) This clearly shows, that Voegelin did not even consider the book as anti-racist himself at that time, because otherwise would have clarified the misunderstanding in his answer to Krieck rather than emphasizing his aryan ancestry. Another Nazi scholar that Voegelin had contact with around 1933 / 34 was Alfred Baeumler.

These connections have carfully been examined and most clearly been presented by Emanuel Faye in a recent (2016) paper: The paper also contains transripts of the correspondance between Voegelin and Krieck. A detailed examination of Voegelins race books has been published by Wulf. D. Hund recently: Those, who do not understand these papers because they are written in German language, will find a very clear assessment of Voegelins racist and pro Nazi-views in Aurel Kolnai's book "The War against the West": (see pages 187ff., 315, 447ff., 458f.) Kolnai considers "Professor Voegelin" as "a fascist savant of rare acumen and coolness" (p. 447). He couldn't do otherwise. Kolnai's book was published in 1938. Being a contemporary of Eric Voegelin, he did not know that Voegelin would turn against facism later. And by that time all of Voegelin's major books except "On the Form of the American Mind" have had an obvious fascist tendency. (Kolnai probably hadn't read Voegelins "Political Religions" which appeared in the same year as Kolnai's "War against the West".) Again, if Voegelin's two race books and Voegelin's Authoritarian state had really been directed against National Socialism as Ellis Sandoz maintains, how could an enlightended catholic and critical observer of National Socialism like Aurel Kolnai be so mistaken about their content?

In support of the assertion that Voegelin's race books were directed against racism or Nazism, the wikipedia article cites Voegelin's autobiography. But this is an unrealiable source. Gennerally, autobiographies are not the most reliable historical sources. And Voegelin's autobiography is highly unrealible with respect to his prewar engagements.

All of this is by now well established in the secondary literature about Eric Voegelin. Unfortunately, with the exception of Kolnai's today hardly remembered "War against the West" the scientific discussion about Voegelin's early development has taken place more or less exclusively in the German speaking countries and the related papers have been published in German language, wherefore these findings so far have remained largely unknown in the English speaking world.

Nonetheless, I do believe that the historical facts should be representented properly in wikipedia, and in this respect it just does not work to say that Voegelin's race books are anti-racist or anti-Hitler. They are not. It suffices to read the race books to understand that they are not. Luckily, both books have been translated to English as part of the Collected-Works-Edition of Eric Voegelin. (And for those whe lack background knowledge about Voegelin's influences and the ideological scene and fascist thinking in Central Europe in the 1930s in general, Kolnai's "War against the West" provides a good source.) Therefore, I propose the following changes to this wikipedia article:

Not untyptical for a young academic in a German speaking country at that time, Voegelin began to embrace fascism in the late 1920s. The most obvious product of his fascist phase are two books on race theory, where Voegelin defended an esoteric and anti-materialist racism in the footsteps of Carl Gustav Carus, Ferdinand Clauß and Othmar Spann against a   purely biological racism. His books on race theory where well received in Nazi-Germany and Voegelin tried for some time to find a job in Nazi-Germany. It was only after his emigration to the U.S. that he critizsed racism as a political ideology.

Where does this leave us? And most importantly, does this make Voegelin a racist? I don't think it does, or at least not for more than a few years, because Voegelin seems to have dropped the race topic soon after publishing his race books. In a later article, pubished in the U.S. in the 1940s Voegelin clearly speaks out against the race ideology. However, taking Voegelins flirt with facism and racism in the 1930s into account can give us a much more nuanced picture of Voegelin's intellectual development. It is not true, as Voegelians would have it and as it is suggested by Voegelin's autobiography that Voegelin had known all along that National Socialism was dangerous. He hadn't, but he learned it, and by the time he published the "Political Religions" he knew it was dangerous. And he was to learn it the hard way, too, because soon nafterwards he had to flee from the Gestapo.

Voegelin's "Authoritarian State"
While racism was not a lasting ingredient in Voegelin's mindset, Voegelin's authorian political convictions proved to be deeper rooted. This is another point that is grossly misrepresented in Voegelins autiobiography and, ensuingly, in some of the literature on Voegelin. In 1936 Voegelin published a book on the "Authoritarian State" of Austria. In that book he justified the military coup that brought a facist regime to power in Austria in 1933/34 as a legitimate transition of power. In fact, the process was described by him as a transformation from a purely administrative state (as he disdainfully characerized the ancien regime and even more so the liberal democracy that had followed it after World War I) to a proper statehood.

In his autobiography Voegelin later maintained that he had advocated the authorian state, because, in the situation of the time, he saw an authoritarian state as the only chance to rescue democracy. Well, this is an obvious self contradiction, because an authoritarian state is not a democracy and therefore cannot be a means to save a democracy. But maybe what Voegelin meant was that in the situation of the time democracy didn't stand a chance in Austria and an authoritarin state was the lesser evil compared to National Socialism? Nope! There is no indication in that book that Voegelin cared about democracy or saw National Socialism as the danger. Quite the contrary, the form of government that Voegelin argues against is not facism or National Socialism but liberal democracy. And the philosophy that Voegelins most strongly critizes in this book is not that of Moussolini or Carl Schmidt - both of which are discussed and, as it seems, apreciated in the book on the "Authoritarian State", but the postivist philosophy of law and liberal political outlook of Hans Kelsen.

Again, the secondary literature in English language does not betray these connections, but it suffices to read the English translation of the book to get the message. Of course, just as with Voegelin's race book, some background knowledge on Central European political and intellectual history is required to understannd the book and properly place its message into the context of the time. I have also summarized some of my onw findings, most of which have been published in German, in a short essay connecting Voegelin's earlier fascist and authoritarian convictions the his later theological-political outtlook as in the "New Science of Politics". Unfortunately, I did not have the leisure to sufficiently polish it to get it published. But for those to whom German texts are not accessible, it may still be helpful: http://eckhartarnold.de/papers/2011_political_theology/Voegelins_Authoritarian_Political_Theology_V2012.pdf

Since the wikipedia article in its present form is, as I believe, insufficient concerning Voegelin's firmly authoritarian stance in the 1930s, I recommend the following additions:

In his book on "The Authoritarian State" 1936 Voegelin then took side with the clerico-fascist regime in Austria and harshly critizes the liberal democratic outlook and positivist legal philosophy of his former academic teacher Hans Kelsen. When the Nazis started closing in on the Austrian Government, however, Voegelin came to see National Socialism as a danger. His book on the "Political Religions" (1938) is Voegelins first attempt to deal with the phenomenon of totalitarism and his only major work before his emigration to the U.S. that was directed against National Socialism.

I am looking forward to the discussion about the proposed changes. If there are no serious critical objections I am going to add those changes myself within a few weeks. Pantar3i (talk) 07:28, 12 December 2017 (UTC)

List of "Influenced" and "Influences" in infobox
How many of these people should we list in the infobox? From Template:Infobox philosopher, it says the following: "Entries in influences, influenced, and notable ideas should be explained in the main text of one of the articles. Those that are not mentioned in the main text may be deleted."

I don't know much about this person, so I do not know which of the people listed was actually influenced by him or influenced him. Natg 19 (talk) 17:09, 18 July 2018 (UTC)

for more discussion By these standards, most of them should be removed. I am not sure I have the energy to incorporate them into the text. If writing a book about someone and teaching about him in a university is not sufficient, then many of those listed should be removed. Most of them have their own web pages. Twenty-one of them are dead scholars. Some of them are on Wikis in Norway, France, Germany, and perhaps more. I am trying to figure out what to do. Perhaps a complete rewrite of the whole page and put it up all at once? What do you suggest? Also, I have a question: every functioning organization has a hierarchy. How is that organized at Wikipedia? Atty Frederick Wagner (talk) 17:58, 18 July 2018 (UTC)
 * I am dubious about the two unsourced influence lists--who made that up??  There are numerous scholarly studies -- university press books listed in the bibliography--that should be the standard--I would include a mention of influenced-by-Voegelin ONLY if it is specified in one of them.  ditto influences on him. Rjensen (talk) 19:36, 24 July 2018 (UTC)

Face value
seems to take Voegelin's autobiography at face value. That's not how Wikipedia works. See de:Wulf D. Hund for credentials. Voegelin's autobiography is what he tells about himself, it's a WP:PRIMARY source. It's not what independent, secondary WP:RS tell about his life. Tgeorgescu (talk) 17:22, 24 July 2018 (UTC


 * How do we know the secondary sources are valid? The ones cited in the parts that I tried to modified are written by people who are not known in the Voegelin community. It seems that the use of secondary sources lends wikipedia entries to academic agendas rather than a neutral perspective. In any event, I've tried to provide balance to these entries but lack the time to continue this struggle. It reminds one what Philip Roth had said of this website. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Trepani1 (talk • contribs) 18:33, 24 July 2018 (UTC)


 * Inside Wikipedia we rarely discuss about true or false, only in very clear-cut cases. For the rest we discuss about the reputation of the authors, the reputation of the journal, the reputation of the publishing house, retraction, what experts say about that source and other clear and objective parameters that may affect the trust we have in the reliability of that source. When there is no way to know WP:THETRUTH or WP:RS/AC, all notable mainstream opinions should be rendered. E.g. for neoconservatism being a Straussian conspiracy we have WP:RS which say it's a conspiracy theory. For Hund's view we do not have such sources. Tgeorgescu (talk) 20:42, 25 July 2018 (UTC)


 * …but you have an anglophone paper from a refereed journal now (with a lot of primary and secondary sources) – see Wulf D. Hund: The Racism of Eric Voegelin. In: Journal of World Philosophies, 4, 2019, 1, pp. 1-22 https://scholarworks.iu.edu/iupjournals/index.php/jwp/article/view/2670 — Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.137.244.248 (talk) 12:51, 30 August 2019 (UTC)

Eating your cake and still having it
One cannot keep the WP:RS while denying what they say. WP:VER is the very opposite of that. Tgeorgescu (talk) 16:13, 12 January 2019 (UTC)

Excessive ELs
Under WP:ELNO and WP:NOTDIR, I've moved these here for now. If they're useful as references, then they're still here: - David Gerard (talk) 20:12, 10 March 2024 (UTC)
 * VoegelinView
 * Brief Excerpts from Eric Voegelin's Works
 * Stephen Mcknight "Gnosticism and Modernity: Voegelin’s Reconsiderations Twenty Years After The New Science of Politics
 * Intellectual Conservatives Greatest Works No 23
 * The suggestion of pneumopathological consciousness as the proper term of Voegelin's intended Gnosticism