Abstract
The article examines the use of texts by Church Fathers in esoteric constructions, specifically Tertium Organum, an early work of P. D. Ouspensky created in 1911 before his acquaintance with George I. Gurdjieff. The author analyzes fragments from The Philokalia, the well-known collection of texts by Orthodox ascetic writers of the Middle Ages. Despite the difference between the esoteric system developed by Ouspensky and the Orthodox tradition, the esotericist considers it possible to use the texts of this tradition to illustrate and confirm his own constructions. To do this, Ouspensky uses a special strategy of interpretation, which consists of the following: (1) selecting fragments of the interpreted text closest to his own constructions; and (2) rethinking the selected fragments within the framework of these constructions. As a result, the identity of various religious and philosophical traditions becomes vivid; these traditions turn out to be, to one degree or another, imperfect expressions of the doctrine being represented perfectly only in the esotericist’s own work. This strategy leads to the formation of doubles of interpreted texts and, more broadly, doubles of religious traditions to which the texts being interpreted belong.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Similar content being viewed by others
Data Availability
Not applicable.
Notes
According to A. G. Dunayev, in the preface to the Russian critical edition of the texts from the Greek Philokalia omitted by Theophan the Recluse, ‘the saint dealt with the collection not as if it was a monument that greatly influenced the revival of spiritual life in Greece and the Slavonic countries and was built on certain theological premises, but it was a guide for Russian monasticism of the nineteenth century’ (The Way to the Blessed Silence: Little-Known Works of the Holy Hesychast Fathers, 1999, p. 3).
Unfortunately, no full English version of Theophan the Recluse’s Philokalia is preserved. The English publishing house Faber & Faber published the first volume of a two-volume anthology of texts from The Philokalia based on the Russian text by St. Theophan the Recluse in 1951. The texts were translated into English by Evgenia Kadlubovskaya and an Orthodox Englishman, G.E.H. Palmer. This volume was titled as Writings from The Philokalia on the Prayer of the Heart. The second volume of the anthology came out in1954 titled as Early Fathers of The Philokalia.
After quotations, Ouspensky indicates pages from two editions at once — first from Superconsciousness and the Paths to Its Attainment by M. Lodyzhensky and only then directly shows the volume and pages of The Philokalia itself.
4 In The Philokalia, the texts of this Church Father are not included, but his snippet is not excluded from consideration in the present article, and the author does not search for the reasons for its inclusion in the collection by P.D. Ouspensky, since this does not affect the general conclusions of the study.
5 It should be noted that, in addition to this, immediately before addressing the authors of The Philokalia, Ouspensky quotes Dionysius the Areopagite (p. 204) and Clement of Alexandria (pp. 205–206). These authors, although not represented in The Philokalia, also belong to the Orthodox tradition. However, analysis of the use of their texts by Ouspensky is beyond the scope of this work.
Perhaps there is a dependence on M.A. Lodyzhensky, since P.D. Ouspensky selects excerpts from those already selected by the author of Superconsciousness and the Paths to Its Attainment, but taking into account the similarity of their views and methodological attitudes, this dependence does not seem to be of decisive importance for the present study.
Again, this is certainly characteristic of Ouspensky’s strategy of interpreting the Philokalia, but, as it is very widespread, it does not give us the understanding the specifics of this strategy.
Once R. Guénon was a close associate of Papius and was familiar with the occult revival of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries (Sedgwick, 2004).
References
Azize, J. (2020). Gurdjieff. Mysticism, Contemplation, and Exercises. Oxford University Press.
Blavatsky, H. (1877). Isis Unveiled: A Master-Key to the Mysteries of Ancient and Modern Science and Theology. Vol. 2. Theology. New York: J. W. Bouton, 706 Broadway. London: Bernard Quaritch.
Blavatsky, H. (1888). The Secret Doctrine: The Synthesis of Science, Religion and Philosophy. Vol. I. Cosmogenesis. London: The theosophical publishing company, Ltd.
Cassian, J. (1997). The Conferences. Paulist Press.
Deseille, P. (2006). Orthodox Spirituality and the Philokalia. Publishing House of St. Tikhon’s Orthodox University. (in Russian).
Eco, U. (1992). Interpretation and Overinterpretation. Cambridge University Press.
Florovsky, G. (1976 -1928). Creation and Creaturehood: Chapter III of The Collected Works of Georges Florovsky, Vol. III. Belmont, Massachusetts: Nordland Publishing Company, 43–78.
Guenon, R. (2000). Essays on Tradition and Metaphysics. St. Petersburg: Azbuka (in Russian).
Hanegraaff, W. (1995). Empirical Method in the Study of Esotericism. Method & Theory in the Study of Religion, 7(2), 99–129.
Hanegraaff, W. (2013). Western Esotericism: A Guide for the Perplexed. London New York: Bloomsbury Academic.
Hegel, G.W.F. (1993 [1837]). Lectures on the Philosophy of History. Vol. 1. Nauka (in Russian)
Lodyzhensky, M. (2002). Superconsciousness and the Paths to its Attainment. EKSMO-Press. (in Russian).
Louth, A. (2015). Modern Orthodox Thinkers. From the Philokalia to the Present. SPCK.
Ouspensky P. D. (1911). Tertium Organum: The Third Canon of Thought, a Key to the Enigmas of the World. Saint Petersburg: Printing House “Trud”, St. Petersburg Printing and Publishing Association (in Russian).
Panin, S. (2015). Kant’s Philosophy and the Idea of Renovation of Science in Esoteric Literature in the Second Half of the 19th and the Beginning of the 20th Century. Gosudarstvo, Religiia, Tserkov’ v Rossii i Za Rubezhom., 33(4), 135–151.
Prothero, S. (2010). God is not One: The Eight Rival Religions That Run the World — and Why Their Differences Matter. Harper One.
Pryor, A. (2011). Thinking Like a Mystic: The Legacy of P.D. Ouspensky’s Tertium Organum on the Development of Aldo Leopold’s ‘Thinking Like a Mountain.’ Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture, 5(4), 465–490.
Seamon, D. (2020). Understanding the Esoteric through Progressive Awareness. The Case of Gurdjieff’s Law of Three as Elaborated by J.G. Bennett’s Six Triads. Aries – Journal for the Study of Western Esotericism, 20, 81–107.
Sedgwick, M. (2004). Against the Modern World: Traditionalism and the Secret Intellectual History of the Twentieth Century. Oxford University Press.
Solovyov, V. (1880). The Critique of Abstract Principles. M. Katkov’s University Printing House in Strastnoy Bulvar. (in Russian).
Solovyov, V. (1994-1878). Lectures on Divine Humanity. Saint Petersburg: Publishing House “Khudozhestvennaya literatura” (in Russian).
The Oxford Handbook of Russian Religious Thought. (2020). Oxford. Oxford University Press.
The Philokalia, (1900). Enlarged second edition. Moscow: Vol. 3. Efimov’s Tipo-Litografiia (in Russian).
The Way to the Blessed Silence: Little-Known Works of the Holy Hesychast Fathers (1999). Ed. by A. G. Dunaev. Moscow: Publishing house “The Orthodox Brotherhood of St Philaret of Moscow”, 172 p. (in Russian).
Versluis, A. (2002). What is Esoteric? Methods in the Study of Western Esotericism. Esoterica, 4, 1–15.
Ware, K. (1977). The Debate about Palamism. Eastern Churches Review, 9, 45–63.
Webb, J. (1976). The Occult Establishment: The Dawn of the New Age and the Occult Establishment. Open Court Publishing.
Webb, J. (1980). The Harmonious Circle: The Lives and Work of G.I. Gurdjieff, P.D. Ouspensky, and Their Followers. New York: G.P. Putnam’s Sons.
Willmett, J. (2020). Tradition, Esotericism, Secrecy and Hiddenness in the Gospel Studies of P.D. Ouspensky and Maurice Nicoll. Aries – Journal for the Study of Western Esotericism, 20, 108–136.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Contributions
Sergei.S. Loginovsky contributed to the design and implementation of the research, to the analysis of the results, and to the writing of the manuscript.
Corresponding author
Ethics declarations
Ethical Approval
The article I have submitted to Sophia for review is original, has been written by the stated authors, and has not been published elsewhere.
The article is not currently being considered for publication by any other journal and will not be submitted for such review while under review by Sophia.
The article contains no libelous or other unlawful statements and does not contain any materials that violate anypersonal or proprietary rights of any other person or entity.
Consent to Participate
Not applicable.
Consent to Publication
Not applicable.
Competing Interests
The authors declare no competing interests.
Additional information
Publisher's Note
Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.
Rights and permissions
Springer Nature or its licensor (e.g. a society or other partner) holds exclusive rights to this article under a publishing agreement with the author(s) or other rightsholder(s); author self-archiving of the accepted manuscript version of this article is solely governed by the terms of such publishing agreement and applicable law.
About this article
Cite this article
Loginovsky, S.S. A Strategy for Interpreting the Philokalia by Peter D. Ouspensky in Tertium Organum. SOPHIA 62, 249–264 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11841-022-00943-y
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11841-022-00943-y