Esotericism in Western Culture

<p><b>This accessible introduction by the world’s leading expert explains why the study of esotericism is not a marginal pursuit but belongs at the center of modern research in the humanities</b>. Reflecting updates in the field since the foundational publication <i>Western Esotericism: A Guide for the Perplexed </i>(2013), Wouter J. Hanegraaff demonstrates that the exclusion of “rejected knowledge” from normative accounts of Western civilization is the reflection of a narrow Eurocentric ideology that became the template for discrediting and ultimately destroying so-called “primitive” cultures associated with “superstition” and “pagan idolatry” during the global colonial age. <br><br>Rejecting this “rejection of rejected knowledge” means restoring the suppressed to its legitimate place in history and cultural analysis. Through this approach, Wouter J. Hanegraaff depicts a radically inclusive vision of the Greater West and its forgotten histories, from pagan antiquity through Jewish, Christian, and Islamic cultures up to secular modernity and beyond.</p>