The Re-Enchantment of the West
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The Re-Enchantment of the West Volume I This page intentionally left blank The Re-Enchantment of the West Volume I Alternative Spiritualities, Sacralization, Popular Culture, and Occulture Christopher Partridge T8.T CLARK INTERNATIONAL A Continuum imprint LONDON • NEW YORK Copyright © 2004 T&T Clark International A Continuum imprint Published by T&T Clark International The Tower Building, 11 York Road, London SE1 7NX 15 East 26th Street, Suite 1703, New York, NY 10010 www.tandtclark.com All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the Library of Congress ISBN 0-567-08408-6 (paperback) Typeset by CA Typesetting, www.shefrieldtypesetting.com Printed on acid-free paper in Great Britain by CPI Bath For Sarah This page intentionally left blank CONTENTS Acknowledgements ix Introduction 1 Parti THE DISENCHANTMENT AND THE RE-ENCHANTMENT OF THE WEST Chapter 1 THE DISENCHANTMENT OF THE WEST 8 Types of Secularization 8 Max Weber and the Disenchantment of the World 8 What Secularization Is Not 11 Rationalization and Pluralism 13 Concluding Comments 16 Chapter 2 UNDERSTANDING NEW RELIGIONS AND ALTERNATIVE SPIRITUALITIES 17 Max Weber on Sectarianism and Charisma 17 Ernst Troeltsch on Churches, Sects and Mysticism 19 H. Richard Niebuhr on Sectarianism 22 Bryan Wilson on Sectarianism 23 Towards a Typology of the New Religious Life 24 Secularization and New Age Spiritualities 29 Chapter 3 THE RE-ENCHANTMENT OF THE WEST 38 Disenchantment as the Precursor to Re-Enchantment 38 Spiritual, But Not Religious: Non-Traditional Religious Vitality 46 De-Exotification and Contextualization 50 Concluding Comments 57 Part II THE SIGNIFICANCE OF OCCULTURE Chapter 4 OCCULTURE 62 The Cultic Milieu and Mystical Religion 62 Occulture 66 The Occult 68 viii Contents The Significance of the Self 71 The Priority of Experience and a Hermeneutic of Suspicion 75 Romanticizing the Premodern 77 Pagan Occulture 78 Concluding Comments 84 Chapter 5 EASTERNIZATION? 87 Turning East 87 East Meets West 89 The Significance of the 1893 World Parliament of Religions 92 A Revolution of Consciousness: The Sacralizing Significance of the 1960s 96 Western Teachers in Eastern Traditions 105 Easternization? Problems and Proposals 106 Quasi-Religion, Instrumental Activism, and Syncretism 112 Concluding Comments 117 Chapter 6 POPULAR OCCULTURE: LITERATURE AND FILM 119 Popular Culture as Religious Text? 120 The Dilution Thesis 121 The Significance of Popular Culture 123 Supernatural Horror: Vampire Fiction 126 Cool Occulture 131 Popular Sacred Narratives 136 Concluding Comments 141 Chapter 7 POPULAR OCCULTURE: Music 143 Adorno and Popular Music 143 The Occultural Significance of Popular Music 147 The Easternization of Popular Music 151 Festival Culture 156 Psychedelic Trance Culture 166 Chilling Out with Ambient and Dub 175 The Sacred Art of Dub 178 Concluding Comments 183 CONCLUDING COMMENTS: PREDICTING RELIGION 185 Notes 189 Bibliography 224 Discography 247 Filmography 249 Index 250 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS I began writing this book several years ago. In fact, to be honest, I began writing another book several years ago. The book I initially began writing was about contemporary Western Paganism. For encouraging me to write this abandoned book I am enormously grateful to Janet Joyce, who was then with Cassell. By the time Cassell became an imprint of Continuum my research had broadened. It had done so for several reasons. First, it became increasingly apparent that some fundamental sociological and cultural questions about the emergence and growth of contemporary Paganism in the West needed to be addressed. Secondly, I was also aware of literature which claimed that Paganism was a manifestation of a fairly superficial contemporary religious phenomenon and, indeed, may even be interpreted as part of the secularization process. Although initially persuaded by such arguments, it became increasingly clear to me that they needed to be chal- lenged and that this could only be done satisfactorily by broadening the scope of my research to examine the milieu to which Paganism belonged. Finally, several excellent studies of Paganism were quickly filling the gap I had initially identi- fied when I began thinking about the book in the mid-1990s. Although I had already read some superb treatments such as Tanya Luhrmann's Persuasions of the Witch's Craft: Ritual Magic in Contemporary England(1989), in 1997 two significant textbooks were published: Graham Harvey's Listening People, Speak- ing Earth and Lynne Hume's Witchcraft and Paganism in Australia. However, the book that finally settled the matter for me and led me to apply my efforts else- where was Ronald Hutton's seminal historical study, The Triumph of the Moon: A History of Modern Pagan Witchcraft (1999). That year also saw Helen Berger's fine sociological study, A Community of Witches: Contemporary Neo-Paganism and Witchcraft in the United States. Since then the flow of worthwhile mono- graphs, such as Sarah Pike's Earthly Bodies, Magical Selves: Contemporary Pagans and the Search for Community (2001) and Jone Salomonsen's Enchanted Feminism: The Reclaiming Witches of San Francisco (2002), as well as several important collections of essays, has increased. Although there is still much inter- esting work to be done in the area (such as the growing phenomenon of teen witchcraft - to which I know scholars, particularly Hannah Sanders, have turned their attention), and although I would like, at some point, to look at Paganism from a theological and philosophical perspective (particularly with reference to pantheism, panentheism and Pagan ethics), I am glad that I left that particular area of study when I did - and have since enjoyed reading the work of those with more specialist expertise than I. When I discussed this shift of focus with Janet Joyce she was, as ever, very encouraging and urged me to follow my inter- x Acknowledgements ests and continue my wider explorations. As both the project and the publisher grew, my much larger book transferred to Continuum's T&T Clark International imprint. As it did Philip Law became my main point of editorial contact. Again, I feel enormously fortunate, in that he too has been both helpful and encourag- ing, as have Lydia Newhouse and Slav Todorov at Continuum. I have also been fortunate to have T. W. Bartel as the copy-editor for this volume. I am indebted to his careful attention to detail and to his overall competence. Over the years of the project I have, of course, benefited from the ideas of those with whom I have had the pleasure of working. I am particularly indebted to the many kindnesses of those who agreed to talk with me and put up with my unimaginative questions about their beliefs, as well as to the minds of scholars with whom I have chatted over the years. The latter certainly include those who have so willingly contributed excellent essays and articles to books I have edited in the area, especially UFO Religions (2003) and The Encyclopedia of New Religions (2004). A big thank you also to the following who have, as a result of conversations or correspondence over the years, unwittingly contributed to my thinking in this area (in alphabetical order): Ruth Bradby, Eric Christiansen, George Chryssides, Andrew Dawson, Celia Deane-Drummond, Joan Evans, Theodore Gabriel, Ron Geaves, Andreas Grunschlofi, Graham Harvey, Paul Heelas, Steve Knowles, James Lewis, Gill McCulloch, Jo McRitchie, Sean O'Callaghan, Mikael Rothstein, Graham St John, Hannah Sanders, Bron Szer- szynski, and Dan Wojcik. I also want to acknowledge my gratitude to all my colleagues in the Department of Theology and Religious Studies who make University College Chester such an enjoyable place to work. Last, but by all means first, my wonderful family and close friends (you know who you are -1 hope!) make it all worthwhile. One family member deserves a particular mention, my partner Sarah, to whom I happily dedicate this book. Likewise, one friend, Rick Crookes, deserves particular mention for producing such an excellent cover for the book. Small portions of this book have appeared in the Journal of Contemporary Religion and Culture and Religion. INTRODUCTION This book is about the alternative spiritual milieu in the contemporary Western world. It is about the way spirituality is explored, why it is explored, and who explores it. It is about the variety of ways increasing numbers of Westerners are discovering and articulating spiritual meaning in their lives. It is not about organ- ized Christianity (or, indeed, any of the 'world religions'), about which there are more than enough books. If this had been the form of religion under discussion, the book might have been entitled The Disenchantment of the West (thereby suggesting the usual, narrow premise of such texts). But it is not. It is about the re-enchanting of what many assume to be an increasingly disenchanted part of the world. It is about new ways of believing in societies in which the old ways are inhibited and declining.1 To a large extent this book reflects my own development and interests, both spiritual and cultural: the happy hedonism of my teenage years, which were char- acterized by close friendships, music, psychedelic experiences, and an openness to paranormal ideas (I remember being particularly inspired by the writings of Carlos Castaneda); my idealistic early twenties, which included a year travelling East, living on a kibbutz, sleeping on beaches, and chatting with fellow travellers about Hinduism and Buddhism; my late twenties and early thirties, which were largely devoted to Christian theology and the study of religion, first at theological college and then at university.