4,538 words
Part 1 of 4 (Part 2 here; Part 3 here; Part 4 here)
1. Introduction
This essay presents an “ontology of the individual.” The theory is new, though it has very old roots. “Ontology” is the branch of philosophy that studies being-as-such, or “being as being,” as Aristotle expressed it.[1] My argument is that the being of an individual person is bound up with that individual’s relation to his family or clan. (more…)
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Editor’s Note:
This is part four of a four-part essay that first appeared in Tyr: Myth, Culture, Tradition, vol. 4.
Franz von Stuck, The Wild Hunt, 1899
Franz von Stuck, The Wild Hunt, 1899
9,822 words
In the denazification atmosphere following World War II Carl Jung, founder of analytical psychology, found himself accused of having ‘Nazi’ sympathies. While Jung was a man of the ‘Right’[1] his essay explaining Hitlerism as an evocation of Wotan as a repressed archetype of the German collective unconscious put him on the long suspect list of intellectuals who were accused of being apologists for National Socialism.[2] He was fortunate to have been in a neutral nation in the aftermath of World War II.
La Pierre d’Odin, Gotland, Suède
La Pierre d’Odin, Gotland, Suède
10,423 words
English original here
Survol de l’anthropologie germanique
Qu’est-ce que la nature humaine ? C’est peut-être bien la plus importante question philosophique, parce que la philosophie elle-même est singulièrement humaine, et que les « problèmes » philosophiques se présentent seulement aux êtres humains. Tous les grands philosophes ont des réponses explicites ou implicites à cette question. (more…)
Odin Stone, Gotland, Sweden
Odin Stone, Gotland, Sweden
9,567 words
English original here
Dr. Collin Cleary tolkar här den germanska skapelseberättelsen (antropogenin) ur ett filosofiskt perspektiv. Vad säger Eddornas berättelser om hur Oden och hans bröder skapade människorna i Midgård utav två träd – Ask och Embla – om oss nordeuropéer, vår mänskliga natur, vår strävan och vår nuvarande situation? (more…)
2,275 words
Part 8 of 8
Gelassenheit
We can say that the plot of the Ring is simply this: Western man, in the person of Wotan, finally awakens to the destructiveness of his thumotic nature, and wills his own end. (See my review of Duchesne’s Uniqueness of Western Civilization for a discussion of how Western man is preeminently thumotic man.) (more…)
3,645 words
Part 7 of 8
Siegfried
If Wotan is the main character of the Ring, Siegfried is its hero. However, in dealing with the character of Siegfried we do not depart from our discussion of Wotan at all. This is because Siegfried, like many of the other characters in the Ring, is a kind of hypostatization of an aspect of Wotan himself. (more…)
2,707 words
Part 6 of 8
Das Rheingold
When the events of Das Rheingold begin, the Wotan-Loge relationship is already well-established, and the primeval crimes described earlier are long past. However, the opera begins with yet another crime against nature: Alberich’s theft of the Rhinegold. (more…)
2,522 words
Part 5 of 8
The story of the Ring involves four ages, similar to those taught in Tradition.
The Age of Titans is the period represented by figures somehow more primordial than the gods: Erda, the Norns, and possibly the Rhine daughters. Events in this age are not depicted in the Ring; they are merely referred to (primarily in Götterdämmerung).
2,783 words
Part 4 of 8
Wotan and the Faustian West
As noted in the Introduction to this essay, at the time of the Ring’s conception Wagner was an anarchist revolutionary. Major influences on his thinking included Bakunin, Feuerbach, Hegel, and possibly Marx (though of these only Bakunin was an anarchist). (more…)
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