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Bibliographic details:
Cloth Hardcover Edition
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Weight | 2.5 lbs |
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Ludwig Klages’ seminal monograph on the true elemental nature of Eros as a world-shaping power and its related states of intoxication and ecstasy was one of Theion’s past bestsellers. Highly in demand since it sold out and due to its importance to researchers and practitioners alike, we decided to make this influential work available again.
Theion Publishing is proud to release the first-ever English translation of one of the most important metaphysical works of the 20th century: Of Cosmogonic Eros by the German visionary Ludwig Klages. This monograph is dedicated entirely to an in-depth examination of the mysteries of Eros and the most powerful forms of ecstasy. Here Klages presents a pandaemonic vision of becoming which is inextricably linked to an Eros whose elemental power shatters everyday consciousness and mates the individual to the secrets of the cosmos. The author seeks to restore Eros to his true status and function by carefully distilling his essence against all falsifications and distortions. Showing how Eros is related to Thanatos and integral to every true cultus of the dead and ancestral worship, Klages leaves no doubt that only the Eroto-Gnostic holds the keys to authentic Life and the daemonic empowerment of the Cosmos.
Of Cosmogonic Eros is an indispensable work for anyone seeking a deeper understanding of the nature of Eros and ecstasies and the metaphysical conflicts we face in modern times. For researchers and practitioners of Esoteric Traditions and Eroto-Magical systems of spirituality, this book must be considered a treasure chest of insights and knowledge. It is a true rune of an Eros of whom Klages says that
“He can be roused while awake as if in the most stupefying dream. He celebrates his orgies beneath the breeze of spring storms, in the light of a star-studded heaven, in a hailstone shower, on a flaming mountain ridge, in the raging surf, in the lightning flash of “first love”, but not least in the embrace of fate that smites its carrier.”
Of Cosmogonic Eros greatly impressed and influenced thinkers and artists like Walter Benjamin and Alfred Kubin but also German esoteric circles and literaries such as the great Hermann Hesse who wrote that in this book “the nearly unutterable has been forged into words”. Spiritual teachers like the Tibetan Buddhist Anagarika Govinda and occult masters like David Beth received important impulses from this empowering work.
This first English edition of Of Cosmogonic Eros will also feature a substantial contextualized introduction by Professor Paul Bishop of the University of Glasgow and the first-ever English translation of parts of Alfred Schuler’s esoteric talks on the nature and essence of the Telesmatic Light directly relevant to Of Cosmogonic Eros. Alfred Schuler, who formed the core of the Kosmiker-Kreis with Klages, was a magician and mystagogue whose oracular language and visions provided much of the esoteric symbolism of Klages’ work. It was this vilified, feared but also admired correspondent of Papus and self-confessed ‘ultimus paganaorum’ (last pagan) who brought forth such mysterious concepts as Blutleuchte, the blood-lamp.
Anacreon once said, “Again Eros struck me like a blacksmith wielding an enormous hammer and bathed me in an ice-cold torrent.”
Ludwig Klages' seminal philosophical text elucidates what Eros-Phanes is (drive) but also what Eros is not (lust or Wolllust). This is not a sex magic book, but instead, one of a world-creating and primordial daimonic force.
“What liberates itself in ecstasy?” Klages asks; before further challenging the reader: “From what does it liberate itself?”
Samplings of Platonic gnosis abound throughout what can be considered a dense philosophical treatise that is wonderfully punctuated by a poesis often climaxing in lyrically-tangible beauty. While perhaps not for the beginner, a slow read whilst taking notes will yield new windows of exploration for the inquiring few.
Of Cosmogonic Eros is presented with a lengthy and detailed introduction by Professor Paul Bishop of the University of Glasgow.
The typesetting by Jessica Grote is classic Theion Publishing: scholarly with copious footnotes to guide the reader in their own research. Gorgeous Surbalin endpapers and a few black and white plates add brilliantly to the aura of this exquisite book.
David Beth is to be thanked for keeping Klages on the contemporary radar of inquisitive explorers who seek to liberate Soul from Spirit and into a visionary capacity of primal images.
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