Leave blavatsky to me

since no one really seems to know what they're talking about in this thread, i'm going to dump some info on guenon. here is the 'guenon' entry from hannegraaf's dictionary of gnosticism

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this is the subsection on traditionalism within the 'tradition' entry in hannegraaf's dictionary
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>hannegraaf's
isn't he a modernist pleb?

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depends what you want him. for history and contextualization, i think he's as good as anyone

here's the intro to western sufism from rawlinson's 'enlightened masters'—ill post a different link another user found if i can find it about guenon, nasr and the neocon establishment

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here's the article i mentioned:
wahidazal.blogspot.com/2017/08/shills-spooks-and-sufis-in-service-of.html

it's a little different than the original with some added context, but it's not hard to find the original as well

here's the entry on guenon in the same rawlinson book

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also, here's some videos of prince charles on traditionalism:
youtube.com/watch?v=hnnXKmGQ4nI
youtube.com/watch?v=zITpU225cG4

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sorry for all the bumps, this is the last thing

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Because even in better times, those who could have high level spiritual realizations by their own self were a tiny minority, he never excludes this but doesnt talk about it much.

To have a high level spiritual initiation without a particular Tradition to initiate you, you literally have to be either a prophet chosen by God or a divine being yourself...

He wrote a while ago, and was a bit too optimistic. Valid initiatory organizations nowadays are about as rare as somebody having spiritual realizations all by themselves was in the past

i think that's basically why evola takes it in the direction he does

Metaphysics is the logos of hierarchy which can be summed up by the concept of succession. Respect your elders. They are older. They know better.

Elders nowadays certainly do not know better

>t. never gonna make it

t. thinks baby boomers will help him achieve a spiritual awakening

I think Müller shat on Blavatsky to greater effect

>Claim to have super secret esoteric Buddhist text from some person from somewhere in the Himalayas
>Top expert in Buddhism and Sanskrit looks at it and says its obviously bogus
>Mystics get buttflusteted

If you're a millenial, then you're even deeper in modernity than the average boomer. But I am not here to argue. I just think that traditional metaphysics is based off a concept of genesis (same root word as genetic) that implies historical succession and inheritance and re-gifting existence to the next generation. It's a very rootless cosmopolitan postmodern thing to presume we are totally existentially free of contingency and historicity and that we are smarter than our elders and we should only worry about our own stuff.

I dont see how this post is relevant, and I dont think you know what Traditional metaphysics is

Respecting the average "elder" today is retarded, you can't fix a messed up civilization by respecting the people who created it.

Initiation is primarily a way of transitioning from childhood to adulthood. If you can't see how a notion of lineage and succession comensurate with that then I think you have an immense failure of vision.

Not to mention, lol @ ur >wahhhh muh baby boomers ruined everything!

You really think the average person, boomer or otherwise, has any power or control over our global situation? All you're doing is scapegoating and other-izing so you can have a unique and edgy identity.

Grow up, kiddo.

Yeah but if you're reactionary and anti-boomer you're only respect an even older generation. There's still the need and respect for hierarchy.

t. doesn't know what Traditional initiation is

and no, I dont. Stop arguing against your imagination

Of course, but I never implied or said anything that contradicts that

>t. so deep in the kali yuga he will argue definitions of initiation without having been initiated himself

The beginning of wisdom is to call things by their proper name
-Confucius

The name that can be named is not the eternal name.

I think I read somewhere that because it's the kali yuga, it's easier to initiate yourself than ever before if you possess the drive. Evola's recommendation of riding the tiger can be seen as an auto-initiatic experience.

A lot of what Guenon wrote is actually justified by eastern texts themselves but Blavatsky just threw a bunch of random shit into the melting pot without rhyme or reason and tried to dress it up with esotericism.

You will never know the true names if you think "initiation" is some desacralized coming-of-age right of passage to be come an adult

Thats why understanding what Traditional initiation is is important, its the first step

>tfw the ultimate bane of stem-fags was a stem-fag in his youth

You will never know the names of the naming if you refuse to receive the names given by those who have gone before. Coming of age is one aspect of initiation. Not all of it but certainly part of it.

I’ve only read Guenon’s ITTSOFTHD and I’m wanting to delve further into metaphysics but not sure where to go next. I’ve just started reading Sri Sankaracharya’s commentary on the Bhagavad Gita. What else can I into to get a better understanding?

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he has a book called perspectives on initiation deaing with that subject

LMAO i love how gurdjieff is the next entry

why

>3 A.M. is really dark
>therefore 6 A.M. must be even darker
lmaoing at your logic right now

he's a major quack, it's funny to see him put side by side with someone the caliber of guenon

Yugas last immense stretches of time. You think we're near the end?

yeah, although i think a lot of people would say the same of guenon

I have some problems understanding what he even means by metaphysics, if I recall correctly he says that it is beyond mere logic and rationality and must be understood with ''intuition of the intelligence''.

Kali Yuga is close to the end, yes

>guenon isn't a hack but Gurdjieff is
Get a load of this guy

good thing truth isn't a democracy

I mean, if you go by the actual calculations of the Hindus, I think we still have something like a couple hundred thousand years left.

The piano ruins the whole painting, it makes me want to vomit

By delving more into 'metaphysics' in the Trad meaning of the term there is really just the option of reading more Trad analysis of metaphysics (e.g. guenon's Man and his becoming+symbolism of cross+multiple states, also Coomaraswamy) or studying other eastern texts themselves.

I'm the dude who recommended Adi Shankara to you in the other thread. His commentaries are good but are very heady and take a long time to read. If you want some texts that are shorter and get to the point faster maybe I'd recommend Tao Te Ching, Zhuangzi, Ashtavakra Gita, Yoga Sutras, any of the major Buddhist sutras like Heart, Diamond, Lotus etc. If you are interested in non-dualism specifically but Adi Shankara seems too dry there are also Kashmir Shaivism texts like the Shiva sutras etc.

Read Plotinus.

No, those numbers were symbolic

do you unironically believe in 'ages' and shit? fucking why

Ok, let's say they are. How then can you or anyone know when the Kali Yuga will actually end? For all we know it might be even LONGER than that "symbolic" number.

Not him, but time is qualitative as much as it is quantitative. There are different qualities inhering in different periods. Ages are real.

in terms of retroactively applying names to them, not in any ontologically real way...

Because one who is knowledgeable on the subject can tell... duh

Its just another cycle, and can be predicted like all others by those who are knowledgeable on the subject

Its like asking how scientists "know" that the sun will eventually turn into a red giant and then blow up or whatever

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>Because one who is knowledgeable on the subject can tell... duh
There's a ton of divergent opinions on this though...all by knowledgeable people.
nice, good post

I would go there if hte level of discussion was more intelligent, they are the Veeky Forums equivalent of young adult fiction readers

Charcoal burners and neo spiritualists

>There's a ton of divergent opinions on this though...all by knowledgeable people.
False

Ok, you're obviously not serious.

All actual Traditionalists agree on this subject, you are obviously ignorant.

>ITT: /pol/babies mistake fanciful mystics for serious philosophers

By "Traditionalists" do you mean the people directly or indirectly influenced by Guenon. It could be, I haven't read all of them. But if you mean all the authentic representatives of Hinduism (the Yugas are a Hindu theory) then you're wrong. I still think you're trolling me, though.

His criticism of post Cartesian philosophy and "scientism" is damn good, though.

Tell me about these "authentic representatives of Hinduism", most Hindus known in the west and even most popular ones in India are full of shit

Also, its not just a Hindu theory, every tradition speaks of the ages and the cycles. The Hindu terminology is just used more often because it is less confusing I guess

What are some real traditions today with a *true* initiation then?

Gurdjieff is definitely unconventional but I think Guenon was wrong to entirely write him off. The man wasn't infallible and sometimes would change his mind as evinced by Marco Pallis and Evola influencing him to eventually consider Buddhism a legitimate tradition as opposed to his earlier view that it was basically an anti-traditional kshatriya revolt against the brahmins. It's true that Gurdjieff was a known womanizer, heavy drinker, manipulative, somewhat of an self-aggrandizer etc but exhibiting unwholesome behaviors and personality traits is not mutually exclusive with realizing/receiving some genuinely valuable teaching and wanting to pass it to others.

Gurdjieff traveled throughout central Asia which is full of Sufis, Ismailis, and all sorts of small gnostic/neoplatonist/buddhist/manichean/esoteric islamic influenced sects and groups. It's not hard to imagine that he could have come into contact and been initiated into various groups. Not to mention that a key tenet of Traditionalism is that the metaphysical tradition 'Sanatana Dharma' exists on it's own and that anyone (however rare this might be in practice and despite initiation being much more preferable and reliable) is theoretically capable of tuning into it like a radio station.

Even though Gurdjieff was not 'Traditional' I think that it's fair to judge that however flawed his teachings were when compared to established religions that they were in part derived from metaphysical principles and that his teachings were just a 19th-century Armenian-Greeks idiosyncratic way of understanding them. It's noteworthy that a non-insignificant group of people were heavily influenced by him and spoke of his teachings as life-changing and later went on to achieve major successes like Frank Lloyd Wright for example. Pic related is a book considering Gurdjieff as a part of Tradition which was written by a close friend and associate of Guenon who spent time with him in Egypt.

Evola also wrote approvingly of Gurdjieff.

counter-currents.com/2011/08/mr-gurdjieff/

Sufi and Hermetic orders that are secret and that nobody knows about

Thanks again mate. Yes, I am particularly interested in nondualism. I think I will stick to finishing Adi Shankara’s commentary. Although the explanations are heavy they’re definitely valuable and I am learning a lot. I’m screen shotting these texts for later c:

>Tell me about these "authentic representatives of Hinduism"
Dude, there's a lot of them.
>Also, its not just a Hindu theory, every tradition speaks of the ages and the cycles
Ok, but we were specifically discussing the Hindu theory and the numbers they give.

I think you've gravely misunderstood the Traditionalists. The only thing universal to all the Traditions is metaphysics, i.e. pure knowledge. Cosmological questions are disputed and disagreed upon by many.

Vedanta

which ideas of gurdjieff's do you find valuable

>When you've been memed by a Manchurian hentai community to place more value in people who prefer to quibble over semantics and theories of knowledge instead of placing value in actual direct knowledge and the accompanying understanding of higher states

>Leave Snoke to me

Uh, have you ever read Gurdjieff? He was
>an atomist
>philosphical materialist
>overly emphasized mere psychology
>hypnotist
>believed the goal of "spiritual" ascesis was opening up the subconscious
>taught a system aimed at "developing man's latent powers"
>was a syncretist
>taught a method that was primarily "experimental" (i.e. he didn't actually know what he was doing)
>believed in Cartesian mechanism
etc. he literally hits all the red flags

guenon's stuff about psychoanalysis as counter-intitiation is something i'd never heard before

I was going to read pic related seeing as I practice Iyengar Yoga everyday.

It makes sense since almost all traditions make a distinction between spiritual and psychic, but psychoanalysis reduced everything to psyche.

Knowledge of metaphysics entails knowledge of cycles

All traditions agree on the basics at least on the esoteric level, Hesoid, the historical ancient Hindus and Aztects(i think) all said they were in the last and most degenerate age

why do you practice yoga (genuinely curious)

Cosmology is an application of metaphysics, hence why people agree on the "basics". When it comes to details there is a ton of divergence. You can't just handwave that fact away.

Your assertions mean nothing. There is no divergence on the fact that the Kali Yuga is going to end in the next few thousand years among actual Traditionalists

How do you actually do that? you have thousands on the internet claiming that kind of things but if you listen to them then it's obvious that they are full of shit, if you ask most serious practitionners they will pretty much admit never having experienced something and will scold anyone claiming among them claiming otherwise as crazy, deluded or attention-seeking except maybe for some legendary monks or gurus who look scammy or just merely wise anyway.

Good book

>among actual Traditionalists
Again, do you mean people directly/indirectly influenced by Guenon, or do you include authentic representatives of the Hindu tradition? In any case, if you're so confident about this "fact" you should be able to demonstrate it without appeal to authority.