Postmodernism, globalism & the New Age -- Who are the traditionalists? -- What is the New Age? -- New Age authorities : a divided house -- The shadows of God -- The war against love -- Ufos & traditional metaphysics : a postmodern demonology -- Vigilance at the eleventh hour : a refutation of The only tradition -- Comparative eschatology -- Facing apocalypse.

The Reign of Quantity gives a concise but comprehensive view of the present state of affairs in the world, as it appears from the point of view of the 'ancient wisdom', formerly common both to the East and to the West, but now almost entirely lost sight of. The author indicates with his fabled clarity and directness the precise nature of the modern deviation, and devotes special attention to the development of modern philosophy and science, and to the part played (...) by them, with their accompanying notions of progress and evolution, in the formation of the industrial and democratic society which we now regard as 'normal'. Guénon sees history as a descent from Form (or Quality) toward Matter (or Quantity); but after the Reign of Quantity-modern materialism and the 'rise of the masses'-Guénon predicts a reign of 'inverted quality' just before the end of the age: the triumph of the 'counter-initiation', the kingdom of Antichrist. This text is considered the magnum opus among Guénon's texts of civilizational criticism, as is Symbols of Sacred Science among his studies on symbols and cosmology, and Man and His Becoming according to the Vedanta among his more purely metaphysical works. (shrink)

The malign figure of the Antichrist endures in modern culture, whether religious or secular; and the spectral shadow he has cast over the ages continues to exert a strong and powerful fascination. Philip C. Almond tells the story of the son of Satan from his early beginnings to the present day, and explores this false Messiah in theology, literature and the history of ideas. Discussing the origins of the malevolent being who at different times was cursed as Belial, Nero (...) or Damien, the author reveals how Christianity in both East and West has imagined this incarnation of absolute evil destined to appear at the end of time. For the better part of the last two thousand years, Almond suggests, the human battle between right and wrong has been envisaged as a mighty cosmic duel between good and its opposite, culminating in an epic final showdown between Christ and his deadly arch-nemesis. (shrink)

A work of Nietzsche's later years, The Antichrist was written after Thus Spoke Zarathustra and shortly before the mental collapse that incapacitated him for the rest of his life. The work is both an unrestrained attack on Christianity and a further exposition of Nietzsche's will-to-power philosophy so dramatically presented in Zarathustra. Christianity, says Nietzsche, represents "everything weak, low, and botched; it has made an ideal out of antagonism towards all the self-preservative instincts of strong life." By contrast, Nietzsche defines (...) good as: "All that enhances the feeling of power, the Will to Power, and power itself in man. What is bad?-All that proceeds from weakness. What is happiness?-The feeling that power is increasing,-that resistance has been overcome." In attempting to redefine the basis of Western values by demolishing the formative influence of the Judeo-Christian tradition, The Antichrist has proved to be highly controversial and continuously stimulating to later generations of philosophers. (shrink)

The ambivalent status of Nietzsche as both genius and madman is the greatest myth of modern philosophy. In The Gay Science of 1882, he presented the parable of the madman seeking God and attesting his death (GS 125), and less than seven years later, only a few days before he was admitted to the Basel mental asylum, he wrote to Meta von Salis that “[t]he world is transfigured, for God is on Earth” and signed the letter “The Crucified” (KGB III:5, (...) 1239). It is not surprising that scholars consider notes like this, penned by the harshest critic of Christianity, as symptoms of Nietzsche’s insanity or pathological megalomania.However, with this excellent study, Der Antichrist und der Gekreuzigte: Friedrich Nietzsches .. (shrink)

Conversations with the Calabrian abbot Joachim of Fiore had a way of turning to the imminent advent of Antichrist: “Antichrist was coming very soon,” Joachim might say, or “Antichrist was already born in Rome,” or “the age culminating in Antichrist's persecutions will begin in a mere four years.”’ It is hence not surprising that Joachim became most famous in his own lifetime as a prophet of Antichrist. But how exactly did Joachim's warnings concerning Antichrist's (...) imminent advent fit in with his overall view of the history of salvation? Joachim's contemporaries had more difficulty in understanding this larger issue than they had in grasping his urgent message that Antichrist was coming soon, and central questions concerning the nature of Joachim's Antichrist thought still have not been resolved by modern scholarship. Above all, two problems of interpretation remain outstanding: Given the certainty that Joachim actually believed in the coming of many Antichrists, which of these several was for him the “real and true” one? Given that Joachim's “real and true” Antichrist can indeed be identified, how did his conception of this eschatological villain compare with that of prior medieval tradition? In seeking to answer both questions I hope to show concurrently that Joachim's Antichrist theology was enormously innovative, daring, and subtle, as his thinking was in so many other regards. (shrink)

Im Zentrum der Abhandlung steht Nietzsches Entscheidung, den Antichrist schliesslich als vollendete Umwertlung aller Werthe zu betrachten. Merkwürdigerweise wurde bisher nie näher nach dem Zustandekommen und dem Sinn dieser Entscheidung gefragt. Sie geschieht im Zuge von Nietzshes Arbeit an Ecce homo, d.h. im Rückblick auf sein Leben und seine philosophische Entwicklung. Entscheidend dürfte dabei seine ;Wiederbegegnung' mit Zarathustra gewesen sein. In diesem Werk sieht Nietzsche den 'Begriff des Dionysos' - der seine 'positive' Philosophie subsumieren soll - in unüberbietbarer Weise (...) schon gegeben. 'Dionysos' verkörpert dabei eine höchste Form der Bejahung, die insbesondere auch die Lust am Verneinen und Vernichten mit einschliesst bzw. das Neintun nicht vom Jasgen zu trennen weiss. Insofern aber dann Nietzshe seine antichristlich Umwerthung selbst als Ausdruck und Beweis seines positiven Gegen-Ideals verstehen.The paper details with Nietzsche's decision to view The Antichrist as teh complete Revaluation of all Values. Oddly enough, it has never been asked now Nietzsche came to this decision and whether he had good reasons for it. The Antichrist became the complete Revaluation in the course of Nietzsche's work on Ecce homo, when the looked back on his life and philosophical development. His rereading of Zarathustra thereby seems to be most important. in this work Nietzsche sees his 'notion of Dionysos' - under which his 'positive' philosophy should be subsumed - already presented in an unsurpassable way. 'Dionysos' is incorporating a highest form of life-affirmation, including the pleasure in denying and destroying i.e. not knowing how to separate No-doing from Yes-saying. In this sense however Nietzsche can understand his antichristian Revaluation itself as expression and evidence of his positive counter-ideal. (shrink)

I argue that the rarely discussed Antichrist can serve as perhaps the best guide to Nietzsche’s mature ethical theory. Commentators often argue or assume that while Nietzsche makes many critical points about traditional morality, he cannot be offering a positive ethical theory of his own. This, I argue, is a mistake. The Antichrist offers a substantive ethical theory. It explicitly articulates Nietzsche’s positive ethical principles, shows why these principles are justified, and uses them to condemn traditional Christian morality. (...) The chapter reviews and explains Nietzsche’s ethical theory. It also considers why commentators so often assume that Nietzsche cannot have an ethical theory: I argue that commentators tend to be driven by the assumption that all ethical theories embrace seven commitments. These commitments are, I suggest, definitive of Enlightenment ethical theory, but not of ethical theory as such; Nietzsche’s rejection of them in no way precludes his having a positive ethical theory of his own. (shrink)

Betr. u.a. die letzten Briefe Friedrich Nietzsches an Jacob Burckhardt.

The Antichrist is the most powerful criticism ever offered against modern values and beliefs. In earlier books Nietzsche had announced, “God is dead,” and in The Antichrist he seethes with contempt for Christianity’s imposition, upon humanity, of its perverse and unnatural vision. Nietzsche contends that values offered by Christianity are created by people who are not qualified to create such values and ideals. These meanings and goals are unnatural distortions of reality provided by people who are themselves divorced (...) from reality, and who seek to instill in others the same dissatisfaction with this world which infects them. (shrink)

Esta contribución plantea una sola pregunta: ¿quién es el Anticristo de Nietzsche? A partir de la figura del Nuevo Testamento en el Evangelio de Juan y las indicaciones apocalípticas en la Segunda Epístola de Pablo a los Tesalonicenses, estudia al Anticristo en el libro de 1888 como una inversión del anatema de Lutero contra Roma y el papado en 1520, ahora vuelto contra el cristianismo mismo. Una lucha tan despiadada tiene el significado de Reino y redención como apuesta única.

This is a literary assassination of Christianity by the 'philosopher with a hammer' at the height of his power, vitriol, and some say, madness. Soon after completing The Antichrist, Nietzsche collapsed and never fully recovered, dying two years later. Negating not only the Bible and its teachings but also reinforcing Nietzsce's insistence on man's survival by the Will to Power, these words a century on still hammer home the devastating, uneluctable message: God is dead! Includes the previously untranslated Fragments (...) From a Shattered Mind. (shrink)

It is well known that Hegel’s earliest explicit mention of Adam Smith is to be found in the first set of the Jenaer Systementwurfe, a text previously known under J. Hoffmeister’s title Jenenser Realphilosophie I. In this text, Hegel sums up the example by which Smith illustrates the division of labor: the manufacturing of pins. In a marginal note to this exposition, the name “Smith” appears with a page reference. It is quite significant that his first reference to Smith is (...) not to some marginal or merely historical point of Smith’s analysis, but to the crucial treatment of the division of labor, upon which, as a modern commentator put it, “the discipline of economics was nurtured.” Other indications of the importance which Hegel ascribed to Smith’s treatment are. (shrink)

An exploration into the reciprocity between Nietzsche's drug use and his philosophy.

It is well known that Hegel’s earliest explicit mention of Adam Smith is to be found in the first set of the Jenaer Systementwurfe, a text previously known under J. Hoffmeister’s title Jenenser Realphilosophie I. In this text, Hegel sums up the example by which Smith illustrates the division of labor: the manufacturing of pins. In a marginal note to this exposition, the name “Smith” appears with a page reference. It is quite significant that his first reference to Smith is (...) not to some marginal or merely historical point of Smith’s analysis, but to the crucial treatment of the division of labor, upon which, as a modern commentator put it, “the discipline of economics was nurtured.” Other indications of the importance which Hegel ascribed to Smith’s treatment are. (shrink)

Antonin Artaud's novelised biography of the 3rd-century Roman Emperor Heliogabalus is simultaneously his most accessible and his most extreme book. Written in 1933, at the time when Artaud was preparing to stage his legendary Theatre of Cruelty, Heliogabalus is a powerful concoction of sexual excess, self-deification and terminal violence. Translated by Alexis Lykiard and with an introduction by Stephen Barber.

A most sensible exposition of Nietzsche's philosophy.

In Proverb. Vat. IV. 3 the proverbial σιδειον γρας is somewhat darkly explained as follows: ριστοτλης ν ρχομενων πολιτεα δς τετφθαι φησ τν σοδον κα πιγ἗μματος τοδε τνχεν. Χαρε, δς βσας κα δς τον ντιβολσας, σοδ′, νθρποις μτρον χων σοης.