The Occult Roots of Wokeism
Part 2: The Mother Strikes Back

3,492 words

Satana – Fidus, 1896

Part 1

For thousands of years, it seemed like a natural law that men should have the final say in society, but thanks to the diligent work of Johann Jacob Bachofen, professor of Roman law at the University of Basel, the truth would finally come to light: long ago, sovereignty belonged in fact to women, and especially to mothers. At least, that was the firm conviction of this exceptionally gifted, prodigious man, who undoubtedly loved his mother dearly.[1]

A Christian Obsessed with Pagan Funerary Symbols

Bachofen was born into an old, wealthy patrician family in Basel in 1815, the year Napoleon was finally defeated and traditional feudal rule was restored in Europe. From a young age, he had a keen interest in antiquity. He was an exceptionally gifted student and became professor of Roman law at the University of Basel in 1841, at the age of only 26, but almost immediately resigned from that position to continue as a typically German Privatgelehrter (private scholar). In 1842, he traveled to Italy to, as he put it, “see his spiritual homeland with his own eyes.”[2] There, he was overwhelmed by the discovery of the crucial importance of funerary evidence for the study of antiquity. Indeed, the discovery of the ancient cult of the dead was a religious experience for Bachofen. He called the dead “the reservoir of life.”[3]

Greece and Rome dominated Bachofen’s life. In 1848, a year in which major revolutionary uprisings broke out across Europe, Bachofen attempted to understand his era by drawing a comparison with Roman history,[4] which he would later develop enormously in his publications. He firmly sided with hereditary monarchy against the idea of popular sovereignty.[5]

Bachofen was an avid scholar, beginning his studies as early as four o’clock each day. Over seventeen years, he collected a vast amount of literary and archaeological data, which he ultimately published (or rather a small portion of it) in two major works that are inextricably linked: in 1859, Versuch über die Gräbersymbolik der Alten (“Study on the Funerary Symbolism of the Ancients”) and in 1861, Das Mutterrecht: Eine Untersuchung über die Gynaikokratie der Alten Welt nach ihrer religiösen und rechtlichen Natur (“Mother Right: An Inquiry into the Gynaicocracy of the Ancient World According to Its Religious and Legal Nature”). Bachofen believed that it was the symbols in funerary art that could reveal the true essence of antiquity—and of religion in general.

Unlike his legal publications, Bachofen’s studies of antiquity were strongly rejected by the scholars of his time as speculative “romantic mythology.”[6] In contrast, Friedrich Nietzsche, who was often a guest of the Bachofen family during his time as a professor in Basel, was deeply impressed. He borrowed Bachofen’s book on funerary symbolism when writing his Geburt der Tragödie, and Bachofen, in turn, is said to have approved of Nietzsche’s first major work.[7]

Bachofen lived a secluded life, but traveled frequently, primarily to Greece and Italy, and published a series of books and articles. He also worked as a judge and as a church elder of the French Reformed Congregation. He remained in his parents’ home until he was fifty. Then he resigned from all public positions and married the thirty-year-younger noblewoman Louise Burckhardt, with whom he promptly fathered a son. Funerary symbolism continued to fascinate him until his death, and he tirelessly collected texts and artifacts. In the final weeks before his death, he was still working on the book Römische Grablampen nebst einigen andern Grabdenkmälern vorzugsweise eigener Sammlung (“Roman grave lamps along with some other grave monuments, mainly from our own collection”).

A Cyclical View of History

During the 19th century, we see a shift in the perception of historical development. During the Enlightenment, the prevailing idea was that history developed linearly toward ever higher levels, moving away from the darkness of Mediaeval ignorance toward an enlightened, rational future. This optimism, however, was undermined by the numerous massive, bloody wars, beginning with the Napoleonic Wars, the constant revolutionary threat, and urbanization and industrialization, which destroyed traditional bonds and ravaged nature. Among artists and philosophers in particular, the suspicion grew that history was in a downward spiral.

A related idea was the organic view of history, with cultures emerging, flourishing, withering, and sprouting again like plants. In other words, it was a mythical explanation of history.[8] There is no reason to assume that history develops in this way rather than randomly and contingently, but the organic image was appealing because, on the one hand, it offered an explanation for the malaise that was being experienced and, on the other hand, it also offered the prospect of a better future. The rise and fall of the (Western) Roman Empire served as the prototype for this mythical course of development. The work of Edward Gibbon (1737-1794) was certainly influential in this regard, with his thesis that the Roman Empire collapsed because wealth, luxury and Christianity undermined the martial character of the Empire. Well-known examples of this “organic philosophy of history” are Julius Evola’s Revolt against the Modern World (1934) and Oswald Spengler’s Der Untergang des Abendlandes (1922). However, it seems no exaggeration to say that they derive all their fundamental ideas from the now forgotten Bachofen.[9] At most, their value judgements differ slightly from those of our worthy Swiss grave robber.

Thinking about history in terms of organic development suited Bachofen perfectly. Already in his conception of law, he saw existing legislation as a historically developed expression of the spirit of a people, and rejected the rationalist idea of an ahistorical philosophical natural law that could criticise historical law.[10] It was therefore only natural for him to interpret history in general in organic terms. What does not fit in with his historical-contingent approach is that he assumes a universal course of history that repeats itself everywhere and at all times, because human nature is supposed to be the same everywhere and subject to the same laws.[11] That is why he draws material to support his theses from all over the world, although his starting point remains clearly ancient Greek civilisation.

Typical of the legal scholar Bachofen is that he divides the phases of history according to the prevailing legal form, and more specifically according to who holds sovereignty, the ultimate decision-making power.[12] He is not directly concerned with the form of government, but with the sex of the sovereign, and this leaves only two possibilities (whatever today’s gender ideologues may claim). To explain the development of both legal systems, Bachofen focuses on religious thinking, because it is religion, he believes, that determines history. This religious thinking takes shape through symbols that, according to certain fixed laws inescapably appear in history (xxiv).

To ascertain the meaning of these symbols, Bachofen turns to mythology. Following Georg Friedrich Creuzer, he sees the function of mythological stories as indicating, through a series of narrated actions, what these symbols embody “in their deep, impenetrable silence.”[13] Bachofen then structures the symbols into groups and assigns these groups to the different phases of a culture’s development process. Crucially, he not only distinguishes between “feminine” and “masculine” symbols but also links this to a contrast between “material” and “spiritual.” Bachofen creates three groups of symbols, thus arriving at three eras.

As we shall see, Bachofen was steeped in the Philhellenismus that prevailed in Germany at the time. Not only did he derive all the symbols he used from the ancient Greek world, but his sketch of the peak of civilisation he posited displays all the characteristics of the edle Einfalt und stille Größe (noble simplicity and quiet grandeur) that Winckelmann swooned over. And the corruption, of course, comes from “barbaric,” Oriental influences. Yet Bachofen devotes to these influences far more pages in Das Mutterrecht:[14] an unconscious fascination? In keeping with Philhellenismus, but nevertheless striking for Bachofen as a Christian, Christianity is hardly mentioned in his work.

Mother is Here

Das Mutterrecht is Bachofen’s most famous and influential book. It is a monument to the renowned German scholarship: phenomenally gründlich (thorough) and highly unreadable, also because Bachofen incorporated his torrent of references in the text itself rather than in footnotes. This article will therefore focus solely on the introduction, in which Bachofen outlines his vision. The pages of the introduction are indicated in the text with Roman numerals.

Bachofen distinguishes three phases or Kulturstufen in the development of a culture. The first is “hetaerism” (after the hetaerae, the famous Greek courtesans), which he describes as an “unworthy childhood” (xviii). Society consists of nomadic hunter-gatherers, and there is a licentious freedom, since everything is communal property, including the women. According to Bachofen, this is due to people’s total attachment to the materiality of the earth. The central symbol is therefore the earth, and the “chthonic” or “telluric” symbols associated with it, such as the snake. The ruling deity is an early form of Aphrodite. Due to the prevailing promiscuity, the paternity of a child was unknown, but the descent through the mother was known (xxi). Therefore, the mater familias was the basis of any claim to power by the children, both within the family and the tribe. She therefore had the ultimate decision-making power. Bachofen calls this Gynaikokratie (Greek: rule of women), but nowadays the word “matriarchy” is more commonly used.

The second phase begins because, according to Bachofen, women become exhausted by the lust of all those men to whom they are supposedly helplessly subjected (xix). Furthermore, according to Bachofen, women naturally desire elevation, order and good morals more and earlier than men, and are also better capable of these (xvii). For as a childbearing creature, woman is entirely subject to the material and to the phenomena of natural life, and therefore she gladly devotes herself to the beautification of material existence, and the ordering of natural life (xvii). Through her gentleness and radiant appearance, she is able to transform the wild times of hetaerism into harmony and love (xiv-xv). Sometimes, however, her aspirations manifest themselves in a desire for revenge and belligerence (xxiv-xxv), with the Amazons as the most extreme form: female warriors who force men into a subjugated position.

After the uprising by these Ur-suffragettes, the legal form emerged from which Bachofen’s book derives its title: Das Mutterrecht, or more precisely: marital gynaikocracy, symbolised by an early form of the goddess Demeter. The moon is the cosmic body that rules this era.[15] Marital chastity is the highest law of the religion of this phase, so that this period is marked by strict sexual discipline (xix). Bachofen paints an idyllic picture of this era. The physically stronger man grants power to the woman because of her connection to the divine and the cult, and her natural tendency towards piety (eusebeia) (xiv). The warriors of the tribe resemble the knights from mediaeval “courtly love,” who combine bravery with a voluntary recognition of this female power (xiii). Chthonic mystery cults develop and the mother peacefully exercises her power with mild charity. She promotes piety, peace and prosperity, with agriculture at the centre. Our Johann, who lived with his mother until he was fifty, writes lyrically:

How easy for us to understand the exclusive emphasis on the mother in Hesiod’s description,[16] her never-ending careful care and the eternal immaturity of the son, who, growing up more physically than spiritually, rejoices in the peace and abundance that the agricultural life offers, at his mother’s hand, until his old age. (xi)

Father Comes Home

However, the phase of matriarchy does not last, and this has to do with two phenomena. On the one hand, women take their assertiveness to the extreme in the ideal of the Amazons, for which Bachofen can muster quite some sympathy (xxv), but the grandeur of this ideal was unnatural for women,[17] and in any case, extremism inevitably leads to barbarism (xxii). Then there is the appearance of the god Dionysus. He will bring about the transition from matriarchy to patriarchy. Dionysus, as lord of exuberant natural life, seduces the strictly ascetic Amazons through the sensual, surpassing glory of his masculine-phallic nature back towards motherhood but also towards hetaerism (xxii). The strict gynaikocracy suddenly shifts from resolute resistance to total surrender to Dionysus. The Amazons, who first fought against the god, become his greatest champions. (“Well, female nature has difficulty exercising restraint,” Bachofen sighs (xxii)).

Our devoted scholar sees in the Dionysian religion a regrettable “Oriental” influence, a relapse into materiality.[18] The power of this new religion rests on the fact that it satisfies both sensory and supersensory needs in equal measure (xxiii). The symbol of the chaste ear of corn with seed that sacrifices itself in the earth so that new grain can sprout is replaced by the juicy grape, with its intoxicating wine, which induces the Rausch (ecstacy) of sensual lust. The matriarchal social order is coming under increasing pressure, which is expressed in a striving for democracy, freedom and equality (xxiii). While the strict Demeterian gynaikocracy promoted male strength, the influence of Dionysus leads to weakness and degradation of men, whom women themselves ultimately turn away from in disgust (xxiv).

Nevertheless, Dionysus’ reign marks the beginning of an entirely new form of society in which sovereignty lies with the man and the father: the era of the god Apollo. According to Bachofen, the struggles of the Greek mythological hero Orestes symbolise the struggle that elevated fatherhood above the mother principle (xxvii). Orestes had a rather boisterous family life: on the orders of the god Apollo, he murdered his mother Clytemnestra, who had killed his father Agamemnon because he had sacrificed her daughter Iphigenia in the Trojan War to ensure favourable winds.[19] Under matriarchy, Orestes would have had to pay for the murder of the sovereign, inviolable mother with his life. Now however, he is acquitted.[20]

In the patriarchy that is now emerging, the bond between child and mother is increasingly losing importance, and Bachofen sees this as a development towards a higher, more spiritual vision. For the bond between mother and child is material, immediate, directly perceptible to the senses, a natural truth. In contrast, at birth the father’s bond with the child is only indirect, via the mother. Their relationship is more distant, more fictitious and spiritual. By focusing on the bond with the father, the mind detaches itself from natural phenomena and directs its attention to the spiritual male potentia that produces the child. In Bachofen’s cosmic symbolism, the human gaze now rises from earth to heaven (xxvii). At the pinnacle of patriarchy stands the purely spiritual procreation, without any connection to the mother, namely adoption (xxviii), as Augustus was adopted by Caesar.

In matriarchy, humans expect salvation from the mother, who gives herself as the seed falls into the earth, dies, and then bears many fruits. In patriarchy, man strives to achieve everything himself (xxviii). Immortality is no longer a gift from the birthing mother, but is to be found in the creative male principle (xxviii). Bachofen welcomes this as a victory of the spirit over the body, of culture and reason over nature and instinct, and of the patriciate over the plebs. On the flip side, it also meant a victory of arbitrary power over freedom, and of hierarchy and violence over community spirit and peace. For Bachofen, Alexander the Great was the finest embodiment of the masculine-spiritual principle (xxxi), but he above all reveres the Roman Republic, which triumphed over the “Oriental” threats of Carthage and Cleopatra (xxii).

Mother Returns

However, the patriarchal phase is not definitive either, because every time the last phase of a cycle is reached, the first phase will impose itself again (xxiv). Patriarchy will inevitably be undermined and destroyed by the fatal return of gynocratic and Dionysian ways of life. Thus, in Delphi, Greece’s most important oracle site, Dionysus and Apollo had formed an alliance, in which Apollo initially seemed to exalt himself above Dionysus with his unchanging calm, purifying clarity and spiritual beauty. But ultimately, Dionysus prevailed with his phallic exuberance and sensuality (xxx). Bachofen writes:

“The new victories which the mother principle has now been able to achieve, even over the revelation of the purely spiritual fatherhood, show how difficult it is for human beings at all times and under the domination of the most diverse religions, to overcome the weight of material nature and to reach the highest goal of their destiny, the elevation of earthly existence to the purity of the divine father principle.” (xxxii).

Was everything now lost? No, there was one thing left that had withstood the onslaught of the Great Mother. One last bastion of patriarchy still stood proudly with its towers reaching towards the sky: the Roman state principle of the masculine empire, which even in the most chaotic female times was a pillar of support for the virile spiritual principle (xxx). The religion of Apollo proved too weak to prevent the return to feminine materiality. Salvation came from the Roman state idea, with the implementation of its legally strict forms in all areas of life (xxxi). In other words: there was no god but Roman law, and Bachofen was its prophet (or at least his professor).

Conclusion

Bachofen thus envisions history not only as an organic cycle, but crucially also links the phases of the cycle to a struggle between “masculine” and “feminine,” and furthermore interprets this as a dualism between the transcendent “spirit” and immanent “matter”, with transcendence as the ultimate goal (can we already hear in the distance Julius Evola lamenting the “effeminate” character of Italian opera?). The philhellenic, Christian and conservative Bachofen feared the return of Dionysus and the Great Mother, but his friend Friedrich Nietzsche would in fact throw himself into the arms of Dionysus, and Alfred Schuler would worship the Great Mother as a symbol of the return of the Golden Age. Let us therefore now turn our attention him and to the delightful Munich of the late nineteenth century.

Notes

[1] Bachofen’s mother, Valeria Merian, came from one of the most prominent families in Basel. He dedicated his major work, Das Mutterrecht, to her. Bachofen did not marry until he was 50 and continued to live with his parents until then. His lyrical descriptions of marital gynaicocracy cast doubt on his professed preference for patriarchy.

[2] Justin Stagl, ‘Johann Jakob Bachofen, “Das Mutterrecht” und die Folgen’ in: Anthropos. 85:1/3 (1990), 11, JSTOR 40462111 (https://www.jstor.org/stable/40462111).

[3] Georg Dörr, Muttermythos und Herrschaftsmythos. Zur Dialektik der Aufklärung um die Jahrhundertwende bei den Kosmikern, Stefan George und in der Frankfurter Schule, Königshausen & Neumann: Würzburg 2007,  289, footnote 1271.

[4] Gerhard Plumpe, Alfred Schuler. Chaos und Neubeginn. Zur Funktion des Mythos in der Moderne, Agora Verlag: Berlin 1978, 54.

[5] Alfred Schuler. Chaos und Neubeginn, 55.

[6] Erik Wolf, ‘Bachofen, Johann Jakob’ in: Neue Deutsche Biographie 1 (1953), 502-503.

[7] Robert A. Yelle, ‘The Rebirth of Myth? Nietzsche’s Eternal Recurrence and Its Romantic Antecedents,’ Numen, 47:2 (2000), 188.

[8] Christianity and Marxism also have a mythical view of history, but these are not based on the organic development of a plant.

[9] Evola translated Bachofen’s work and explicitly acknowledges Bachofen’s influence in his own work. Alain de Benoist cites Bachofen as an influence on Spengler, alongside Herder, Goethe, Nietzsche and others. However, he does not mention Alfred Schuler, to whom Spengler initially wanted to dedicate his work. Cf. https://institut-iliade.com/oswald-spengler-une-introduction-par-alain-de-benoist.

[10] Alfred Schuler. Chaos und Neubeginn, 51.

[11] Bachofen, Das Mutterrecht: eine Untersuchung über die Gynaikokratie der alten Welt nach ihrer religiösen und rechtlichen Natur. Verlag von Krais und Hoffmann: Stuttgart 1861, vi.

[12] Cf. Carl Schmitt in his Politische Theologie: the sovereign is the one who determines on the state of exception. It is striking that sovereign power is characterised as the hereditary relationship between parent and child, be it mother or father. Of course this is fitting for a proponent of hereditary monarchy such as Bachofen.

[13] Like Carl Gustav Jung and Friedrich Nietzsche, Bachofen was clearly influenced by Georg Friedrich Creuzer’s Symbolik und Mythologie der alten Völker (1822).

[14] Patriarchal Classical Greece is covered in only 43 of the 420 pages of text.

[15] Just as matriarchy lies at the centre of history, so the moon lies at the centre of the ancient cosmos: the lowest of the heavenly bodies, and the purest of the telluric (xxx).

[16] Hesiod was a Greek poet from the Archaic period (around 700 BC) who wrote about the creation of the cosmos and provided guidelines for everyday life.

[17] “The stricter the law of motherhood had prevailed, the less it was possible for woman to permanently maintain the unnatural greatness of her Amazonian lifestyle.” (xxii).

[18] Bachofen speaks of “the subjugating magic of southern natural abundance” (xxiii). According to myth, Dionysus came from Asia. But we now know that he is an very ancient indigenous god: his name appears in the linear B texts from the Mycenaean period (roughly 1450-1200 BC).

[19] Bachofen sees the Trojan War itself as a struggle between hetaerism and Mutterrecht, between Aphrodite and Demeter-Hera. A struggle against the violation of marital fidelity by oriental Troy (xxi).

[20] Through the intervention of the goddess Athena, who, important in this context, is a motherless goddess. She is born adult and in full armor (!) from the head of the supreme god Zeus. This contrasts with matriarchy, where the child is essentially fatherless.