Oddcast episode
We discuss Philippe-Jacques (or âPhilip Jamesâ) de Loutherbourgh, accomplished eighteenth-century painter, polyglot socialite, alchemist, Occultist, healer, and inventor of the cinema.
Podcast episode
In an extended interview, Paul Pasquesi discusses the Makarian Homilies â an influential set of texts which is one of the key ingredients in the cultural synthesis later known as âChristian mysticismâ â the work of Isaac of Ninevah, and many other texts and ideas from the late-antique Syriac ascetical movement.
Podcast episode
We go through a number of case-studies of early Christian magic with Korshi Dosoo. Come for the queer Christian love-spell and unlooked-for cameo appearance by the Gnostic Barbelo, stay for the Satan-Unicorn.
Podcast episode
We dive more deeply into the enigmatic corpus of late-antique Jewish âincantation bowlsâ from Mesopotamia with the help of researcher Daniel Waller. We discuss the bowls as material objects, functional technology, and their place in late-antique Jewish culture.
Oddcast episode
We let the tape roll and discuss some more fascinating byways of dualist Christianity in the middle ages. Come for the Cathar connections, stay for the addressative magic and visionary ascent practices.
Oddcast episode
We speak with Dr Bojana RadovanoviÄ on the Bogomils, a widespread Christian âheresyâ â dualist, demiurgic, docetist, ascetic, and esoterically-structured â arising in the tenth-century Balkans and spreading into such unlikely places as Constantinople and even the monastery of Mt Athos. We discuss the who, what, and when of Bogomilism, animadvert as to the why, and even speculate intriguingly on the how.
Podcast episode
When we look at the origins of Greek philosophy, we rightly emphasise man's desire to understand the world and his place in it. But there was much more to it than that. Western philosophy begins with revelation, myth, and poetry.
Podcast episode
We keep the tape rolling and explore the fascinating byways leading off from Iamblichus' engagement with Egyptian culture, finding that the fiction Ă©gyptienne is not as fictive as Hellenophile scholarship has led us to believe. Featuring a cameo appearance from Basilides of Alexandria.
Podcast episode
In a very special episode, we dive into the parameters of Weird Platonism with Danielle Layne. Come for the Iamblichean divine signatures, stay for the erotology of the Indefinite Dyad.
Podcast episode
We discuss Orpheus, Abaris the Hyperborean, Aristeas of Proconnesus, Epimenides of Crete, Hermotimus of ClazomenĂŠ, Pythagoras, and Empedocles, the soul-manipulating healer-seers of ancient Greece. Come for the out-of-body soul-journeying, stay for the katabatic descents.
Podcast episode
We formally introduce the âsubtle bodyâ, the mysterious tertium quid which, alongside the soul and the physical body, occupies a central place in the anthropologies of many esoteric traditions. Featuring the triumphant return of Doctor Strange to the podcast.
Podcast episode
We speak with NilĂŒfer Akçay, author of the only full-length English monograph on Porphyry's On the Cave of the Nymphs.
Oddcast episode
In Part I of a two-part series, we interview Dr Dylan Burns of the Universiteit van Amsterdam on the subjects of providence and fate in Greek philosophy, early Christian philosophy, and a number of esoteric currents partaking of both in late antiquity.
Podcast episode
We discuss PGM IV 475-824, the famous âMithrasliturgieâ, with Radcliffe G. Edmonds III. Come for the immortalisation, divinisation, and visionary cosmic ascent, stay for the magical crocodile-surfing.
Oddcast episode
Professor Dillon returns to the SHWEP to talk about the life and times of Stephen MacKenna â Irish radical, Modernist literateur, amateur of the concertina, and the first and greatest translator of Plotinus into English.
Podcast episode
We discuss all the amazing astral imagery associated with Mithraic temples, the extraordinary testimonies to ascent of the Mithraic soul given by Celsus and Porphyry, and ask what it all means. Salvation, astral ascent, initiatory mysteries, and weird planetary orderings abound.
Oddcast episode
We continue our conversation with Dr Hallum, exploring some fascinating manuscript detective work revealing some unsolved mysteries of transmission, the Jewish and East Roman medieval magic-square traditions, early-modern translations and adaptations of the material, and much more.
Oddcast episode
We discuss those âmagic squaresâ that we find in esoteric texts from Indonesia to London, curious grids of numbers often used as astral-magical talismans with integrated alphanumeric mysteries. Bink Hallum has done the research, and lays out the story of the magic square from China to Agrippa.
Oddcast episode
Fakhr al-DÄ«n al-RÄzÄ« was a Persian universal scholar and theologian, particularly well-known for his tafsÄ«r or work of Qur'Änic interpretation, a mainstay of Sunni Islam to this day. Less well-known is his work of addressative, astral, talismanic ritual, The Hidden Secret. Michael Noble has published a study of this work in the context of RÄzÄ«'s thought and of the larger intellectual currents in which he swam. Come for the enduring legacy of staunch, but philosophically-rich, Sunni theology, stay for the orgies and severed heads.
Podcast episode
We discuss Plotinus' controversial doctrine that some aspect of the human being never descends into the materialised kosmos, but remains eternally in the noetic. More importantly, we discuss Plotinus' descriptions of what it is like to be that higher aspect of the human being. Dig eternity!
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