Talk:René Guénon

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This article is mainly a paraphrasing of the first two listed sources (mostly the first). Most of these spend more time praising the man, sharing personal anecdotes about the man, or discussing the accepted details of his philosophies, rather than the person himself, due to their closely interested POV. I tried to exclude the POV stuff, or at least present it NPOVly.

This was a requested-for-one-year article, and I feel that what I put out will at least provide some explanation of the person, if not perfect.

Also, the book list is admittedly incomplete, and I'm at a loss to find dates of writing or publication for all of them (so I just left them out for now).

KeithTyler 00:10, May 29, 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Feigned humility

"contrary to popular opinion, he was not the founder of any school of thought" This is just an utterly vacuous and unsupported piece of feigned humility.

This is not humility, feigned or not. Guenon never found any school of thought. Some people may acknowledge their intellectual orientation strongly oriented by Guenon's writings, but the fact is that he never found anything close to what is called a "school of thought". TwoHorned 15:30, 23 October 2006 (UTC)

[edit] False statements corrected

Some false statements corrected:

• "During the period of the 1920's, Guénon got marginally involved with the proto-fascist Action Francaise"... Guenon never got involved with Action Francaise, as it is written falsely. As a matter of fact, Guenon never got any connection with a political organization. The only thing is that Guenon commented some books of Leon Daudet. Chacornac's biography reads in fact like this (P.87 of the french edition):

"It does not seem doubtful that existed then, at some various degrees, some sympathy between Guénon and certain leaders of the Action Francaise. We say: at various degrees since it is quite clear for us that Daudet was, of all these leaders, the most capable of understanding Guénon and of admitting, at least partially, his viewpoints. It is nonetheless as evident that between Guénon and Mauras, the sympathy was mitigated".

• The following sentence: "Guénon was increasingly influenced in his intellectual and political outlook by the extreme reactionary French Catholic philosopher and defender of the Inquisition, Joseph de Maistre, whom he often quotes positively in his various tomes" is utterly false. Guenon was never influenced by De Maistre. Guenon quoted him sometimes as a reference to someone who had a status in regular freemasonry, in relation with the 1648 treaty, which marked the terminal rupture between the West and certain esoteric ramifications which were still alive at that time. De Maistre is quite insignificant in Guénon's writings, and he his only quoted in reference to few historical events.

• Regnabit was not "right-wing Catholical", it was a periodical that represented a mainstream Catholical perspective at that time.

• "Guénon's writings on traditionalism had a great influence on the Italian fascist occultist Julius Evola" is another misleading sentence. Guenon and Evola exchanged correspondence but Guenon never indulged into Evola's political affiliations, nor he supported them. There is even a correspondence of Guénon in which he gives some indications of the relations between Mussolini's facist forces and a certain "dark masonry of completely irregular nature". Moreover, there was an important divergence between Evola and Guénon about some key doctrinal points.

The previous sentences (which I cancelled) contained quite a malicious intent as presenting Guenon from a political perspective.

TwoHorned 16:58, 4 November 2006 (UTC)