As Favire recently passed away [December 20210], I have collected what I can, books by him, related reviews &c. I wrote to him in about 1986 – and he very kindly answered. His name appears in the Ernst Hakl, Eranos book – I will extract the references as well, in context. Material available on JSTOR. Samten de Wet..
Richard Smoley & Jay Kinney, What is Esotericism, The Gnosis Interview with Antoine Faivre, Gnosis Magazine, Number 31, Spring 1994.
Antoine Faivre and Karen-Claire Voss, Western Esotericism and the Science of Religions, Numen, Vol. 42, Fasc. 1 (Jan. 1995), pp. 48-77
Antoine Faivre, Access to Western Esotericism, SUNY Series in Western Esoteric Traditions, State University of New York Press, 1994
Description:
This is the first systematic treatment of esotericism to appear in English. Here is also a historical survey, beginning with the Alexandrean Period, of the various esoteric currents such as Christian Kabbalah, Theosophy, Alchemy, Rosicrucianism, and Hermeticism. Common characteristics of these currents are the notion of universal interdependency and the experience of spiritual transformation. The author establishes a rigorous methodology; provides clarifying definitions of such key terms as "gnosis," "theosophy," "occultism," and "Hermeticism;" and offers analysis of contemporary esotericism based on three distinct pathways. The second half of the book presents a series of studies on several important figures, works, and movements in Western esotericism--studies devoted to some of the most characteristic and illuminating aspects that this form of thought has taken, such as theosophical speculations on androgyny, rosicrucian literature, and Masonic symbolism. The book is completed by a rich and selective Bibliography conceived as a means of orientation and a tool for research.
Antoine Faivre, Christine Rhone, Western Esotericism: A Concise History, SUNY Series in Western Esoteric Traditions, State University of New York Press, 2010.
Description: An overview of Western esoteric currents since late antiquity, with an emphasis on the last six centuries.]
Antoine Faivre, Joscelyn Godwin, Eternal Hermes: From Greek God to Alchemical Magus, Phanes Press, 1995
Esoteric traditions are, well, esoterically complex as a rule, and that goes especially for Hermes Trismegistus, the emblematic figure representing--even personifying--the Western Esoteric tradition in its long and convoluted history. Who is he? Good question. Perhaps he's indeed a highly complex amalgam of the Egyptian god Thoth, the classical gods Hermes and Mercury, a priest in Alexandrian Egypt, and a legendary human sage roughly contemporary with Moses--among other things. God or man, angel or devil, master alchemist or proto-pharmacist, culture hero or trickster? Depends on who you ask. For anyone interested in this subject, then, it's all too easy to get lost without some guideposts of some sort.
And that's exactly what Antoine Faivre provides in "The Eternal Hermes" here. It's an excellently helpful overview, road-map, or starter kit, if you will. A collection of six separate articles, it gives the curious reader a good solid grasp of the general outlines of Hermes Trismegistus in a sympathetically objective scholarly tone. Chapter one, "Hermes in the Western Imagination" traces in as much detail as possible under the circumstances the varying influences contributing to Hermes' composite character and differing perceptions and characterizations of him throughout history from antiquity to the present. Chapter two, "The Children of Hermes and the Science of Man" attempts to define this figure's distinguishing orientations and spiritual traits (and of the movements which recognize him as their guardian and inspiration). Chapter Three, "From Hermes-Mercury to Hermes Trismegistus: The Confluence of Myth and the Mythical" focuses more on Hermes' slippery nature somewhere between deity and pseudo-historical personage, with obscure half-states in between.
Chapter four, "Hermes's Presence in the City" then remarkably demonstrates how the figure of Hermes, perhaps under other names but recognizable nonetheless, can be identified and analyzed in works of modern culture, both literature and film--in this case, Gustav Meyrink's novel "The Green Face", Luis Bunuel's film "Los Olvivados", and the sci-fi action movie "Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome". Places where one might not think to look at first, certainly. Chapter Five, "The Faces of Hermes Trismegistus" is a quick but illuminating survey of Hermes' iconography over time, as shown through 39 illustrations culled from any number of rare manuscripts and other cool sources. Finally Chapter Six, "The Inheritance of Alexandrian Hermetism: Historical and Bibliographical Landmarks" is perhaps the ultimate "further reading" list, lightly narrativized with commentary and infinitely helpful in creating order out of a chaos of sources.
Of course, if the book has one drawback, it's that, at under 200 pages, depth must be sacrificed to breadth. Faivre will often hint at what seem like mind-blowingly fascinating tales and legends only to seem pressed to move along without further ado. Furthermore, those for whom Hermeticism (or some related form of Western Esotericism) is a living spiritual path might find this book a bit dry and detached. Those coming at the subject with more academic and/or historical concerns in mind will be less distracted by this, naturally. Folks of either approach (and in-between) though will doubtlessly find this book to be enormously informative, and the manner in which it usefully lends a modicum of organization to what otherwise at first seems to be an impossibly confusing welter of stuff will facilitate further and deeper investigations according to one's own guiding lights.
Marco Pasi, Esotericism Emergent: The Beginning of the Study of Esotericism in the Academy. In A. D. DeConick (Ed.), Religion: Secret Religion, 2016, pp. 143-154. (Macmillan Interdisciplinary Handbooks). Macmillan. [HERE]
Nicholas Goodrick- Clarke, Aries, 10.2 (2010), pp. 272 - 301. [Book Reviews].
Nemanja Radulovic, Antoine Faivre and the Study of Fairy Tales, Aries, 14 (2014), pp. 190-214
Arthur McCalla, Antoine Faivre and the Study of Esotericism, Religion, (2001) 31, 435–450. [Book Review]
David S. Katz, The Occult Tradition: From the Renaissance to the Present Day, Aries 9.2 (2009), pp. 263 - 295. [Book Review]
Antoine Faivre, "Access to Western Esotericism", p. 5:
"'Esotericism' conjures up chiefly the idea of something 'secret,' of a 'discipline of the arcane,' of restricted realms of knowledge....Certainly it is not a question here of considering the use of the word 'esotericism' illegitimate for secret, 'restricted' teachings. But we want only to note that it is not especially operative, because it is much too exclusive. A large part of alchemy, for example, is not secret, when one considers the fact that since the sixteenth century, an abundant literature on alchemy has been continuously disseminated. The same is true of theosophy..... And when secrets do exist, they are generally open secrets. The etymology of 'esotericism' clarifies the idea of secret by suggesting that we can access understanding of a symbol, myth, or reality only by a personal effort of progressive elucidation through several successive levels, i.e., by a form of hermeneutics. There is no ultimate secret once we determine that everything, in the end, conceals a secret..."
AND A DEFINITION: [F esoterisme (1828), fr. LL adj. esotericus, fr. Gk adj. esoterikos, restricted knowledge or teaching (Aristotle)].
