Body and Soul
Body and Soul

Author: Robert S. Cox

Publisher: University of Virginia Press

Published: 2003-09-29

Total Pages: 304

ISBN-13: 0813923905

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A product of the "spiritual hothouse" of the Second Great Awakening, Spiritualism became the fastest growing religion in the nation during the 1850s, and one of the principal responses to the widespread perception that American society was descending into atomistic particularity. In Body and Soul, Robert Cox shows how Spiritualism sought to transform sympathy into social practice, arguing that each individual, living and dead, was poised within a nexus of affect, and through the active propagation of these sympathetic bonds, a new and coherent society would emerge. Phenomena such as spontaneous somnambulism and sympathetic communion with the dead—whether through séance or "spirit photography"—were ways of transcending the barriers dissecting the American body politic, including the ultimate barrier, death. Drawing equally upon social, occult, and physiological registers, Spiritualism created a unique "social physiology" in which mind was integrated into body and body into society, leading Spiritualists into earthly social reforms, such as women’s rights and anti-slavery. From the beginning, however, Spiritualist political and social expression was far more diverse than has previously been recognized, encompassing distinctive proslavery and antiegalitarian strains, and in the wake of racial and political adjustments following the Civil War, the movement began to fracture. Cox traces the eventual dissolution of Spiritualism through the contradictions of its various regional and racial factions and through their increasingly circumscribed responses to a changing world. In the end, he concludes, the history of Spiritualism was written in the limits of sympathy, and not its limitless potential.

The Unknown Philosopher
The Unknown Philosopher

Author: Arthur Edward Waite

Publisher: SteinerBooks

Published: 1987-01-15

Total Pages: 475

ISBN-13: 1621510654

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This book, the substance of the doctrine of the most enlightened, most liberal, most truly catholic of the later Christian transcendentalists of the last decades of the 18th century, provides a clear introduction to the theosophical system of Louis Claude de Saint-Martin. He was popularly known as the "Unknown Philosopher" because none of his writings were published under his name during his lifetime. His fame is based on being a true mystic, on his literary abilities to express this true mysticism, and on his passionate search for higher wisdom. Saint-Martin's belief that "the most important problem of all human thinking is to understand man as a free personality, whose very foundation is himself," has an important and significant place in the history of modern man's struggle toward freedom.

The Spirit Book
The Spirit Book

Author: Raymond Buckland

Publisher: Visible Ink Press

Published: 2005-09-01

Total Pages: 522

ISBN-13: 1578593085

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Never say die! Can the living communicate with the dead? Many believe that spirits are constantly about us and that it is possible, through a variety of means, to speak to them and to have them speak to us. The Spirit Book: The Encyclopedia of Clairvoyance, Channeling, and Spirit Communication looks at these methods of communication, their history, and the personalities involved throughout the past three hundred years of this eternal quest. The fascinating history of Spiritualism is coaxed into the material realm as the object of this perceptive and sweeping overview by that legendary author of the occult and supernatural, Raymond Buckland. Drawing on decades of research, writing, and transcendence, he describes sundry methods of channeling, events associated with Spiritualism, including séances and exorcism, organizations focused on clairvoyance, and a colorful host of mortals—famous and infamous—who delved into Spiritualism. Nostradamus, Helena Blavatsky, and Edgar Cayce receive their due, as well as Joan of Arc, William Blake, Susan B. Anthony, Winston Churchill, Arthur Conan Doyle, Mahatma Gandhi, Harry Houdini, and Mae West (look up and see her sometime). The Spirit Book explores Qabbalah, Sibyls, Fairies, Poltergeists; phenomena such as intuition and karma; objects useful in the attempt to cross the divide, including tarot cards, flower reading, and runes; and related practices such as Shamanism, transfiguration, meditation, and mesmerism. This comprehensive reference also reports on investigations of contemporary manifestations, including electronic voice phenomena and spirit appearances on TV screens, plus channeling, fraud, psychic research, and possession. Containing more than 500 entries and 100 illustrations, this fun, fact-filled tome is richly illustrated. Its helpful bibliography and extensive index add to its usefulness.