The Legacy of Henry Corbin: News from Egil Asprem

"...the Imagination (or love, or sympathy, or any other sentiment) induces knowledge, and knowledge of an 'object' which is proper to it..."

Henry Corbin (1903-1978) was a scholar, philosopher and theologian. He was a champion of the transformative power of the Imagination and of the transcendent reality of the individual in a world threatened by totalitarianisms of all kinds. One of the 20th century’s most prolific scholars of Islamic mysticism, Corbin was Professor of Islam & Islamic Philosophy at the Sorbonne in Paris and at the University of Teheran. He was a major figure at the Eranos Conferences in Switzerland. He introduced the concept of the mundus imaginalis into contemporary thought. His work has provided a foundation for archetypal psychology as developed by James Hillman and influenced countless poets and artists worldwide. But Corbin’s central project was to provide a framework for understanding the unity of the religions of the Book: Judaism, Christianity and Islam. His great work Alone with the Alone: Creative Imagination in the Sufism of Ibn ‘Arabi is a classic initiatory text of visionary spirituality that transcends the tragic divisions among the three great monotheisms. Corbin’s life was devoted to the struggle to free the religious imagination from fundamentalisms of every kind. His work marks a watershed in our understanding of the religions of the West and makes a profound contribution to the study of the place of the imagination in human life.

Tuesday, February 28, 2017

News from Egil Asprem

From HETERODOXOLOGY:

Problem of Disenchantment in paperback

Soon with a new cover – and nicer price tag.

Today I have signed a contract for the paperback version of my second book, The Problem of Disenchantment: Scientific Naturalism and Esoteric Discourse, 1900–1939. With a list price of $240, the hardback (Brill, 2014) hasn’t exactly been a coffee table book. (Content-wise it probably still isn’t.) The paperback will appear with SUNY Press (who also published my first book, Arguing with Angels), and hopefully we can cut the price close to 1/10th of the existing edition. Publication date still to follow.

Why should one eagerly await this book? If you don’t trust the blurb, there have been a few reviews that tell you why. There has also been a roundtable discussion, and even some controversy. That can’t hurt, right?