Podcast episodes – The Secret History of Western Esotericism Podcast (SHWEP)

Proclus appears as a sage whose privileged status is marked by inspirations, epiphanies, omens and miracles, with an oversimplified summary of some important aspects of his metaphysics.

With Korshi Dosoo

Papyrologist Korshi Dosoo discusses the history, interpretation and makeup of the Greek Magical Papyri, starting in ancient Egypt and reaching all the way to Aleister Crowley and the Mormons.

With Dylan Burns

Dylan Burns, Copticist and scholar of Platonistic esotericism, discusses the Platonistic Sethian tractates and the movements behind them, covering ancient texts, methodological distinctions, cosmic catastrophe and salvation.

With Christian Hervik Bull

Christian Hervik Bull discusses the way of Hermes in antiquity in the final Hermetica-series episode, covering renunciation, immortalisation, hypercosmic ascent and animated statues.

With Bink Hallum

Bink Hallum, whose doctoral research centred on the Arabic Zosimean corpus, explores astral influences, daimones and demons, talismans and Enochic ideas in Zosimus of Panopolis.

The final flowering of polytheist Platonist philosophy, centred on Athens and Alexandria, is introduced through the history of the Academy and its teachers Plutarch of Athens and Syrianus, who taught Proclus.

With Mateusz Stróżyński

Mateusz Stróżyński discusses Plotinian anthropology and spiritual practices, from the stripping away of the illusory, bodily self to the luminous, all-encompassing sphere of the higher reality.

Simplicius, Philoponus and Olympiodorus were among the final generations of philosophical teachers at Alexandria; two counted as esoteric Platonists of the Golden Chain, one an upstart Christian, one possibly an alchemist.

With Frederico Fidler

Frederico Fidler on Sallustius' On the Gods and the World, a short manual of a popular nature outlining how Platonist metaphysics work and how traditional Hellenistic religion is thought to mirror those metaphysical realities.

Esoteric exegesis and the occult ontology of language occupy this episode, where signs and reality intertwine and everything means everything, but appropriately, through visionary semiotics and occult sigils.

Porphyry's Letter to Anebo and Iamblichus' responses to it are surveyed alongside the theological and practical approach of the De mysteriis, antiquity's greatest philosophic manifesto for addressative ritual practice.

Julian's esoteric religious and political formulation of Hellenism is discussed, reflecting on what happens when esoteric religions like Iamblichean theurgy and Christianity move from a small conclave into the corridors of power.

With Chris Brennan

Chris Brennan, Hellenistic astrologer and historian, offers theoretical and practical light on the realities of ancient astrology, aiming to help listeners get inside the subject.

With Matteo Martelli

Matteo Martelli discusses the life, work and thought of Zosimus of Panopolis, the greatest alchemist of late antiquity.

With Brian Alt

Brian Alt guides a journey through Iamblichean theurgy and the ritual acts behind the De mysteriis, tracing parallels in the Hermetica and magical papyri from Egypt and echoes in earlier and later Platonism.

Radcliffe G. Edmonds III discusses PGM IV 475-824, the 'Mithrasliturgie', covering immortalisation, divinisation, visionary cosmic ascent and magical crocodile-surfing.

With Danielle Layne

With Dylan Burns

Dylan Burns returns to discuss the life, works and philosophy of Proclus the Successor, summed up in the phrase all in all, but appropriately to each.

With Sara Rappe

Damascius, final scholarch of the Athenian Academy, discussed with Sara Rappe in a conversation that becomes very apophatic.

Esoteric elements in the Hermetica are concentrated on here through C.H. XIII and The Ogdoad Reveals the Ennead, two of the most esoteric Hermetica covered in the series.

Two world-building Hermetic texts, the Latin Asclepius and the Korê Kosmou, present Hermes as ancient esoteric sage, prophet of doom and cosmic planetary deity.

The Poimandres, perhaps the most extraordinary Hermetic document surviving from antiquity, is discussed as an apocalyptic vision granting gnôsis of how the world was created and how humanity came to be.

With Brian Copenhaver

Brian Copenhaver, translator of the Corpus Hermeticum, offers orientation on the ancient Hermetica, what they contain and what they are all about.

With Peter Struck

Professor Peter Struck discusses ancient techniques of esoteric reading needed to find esoteric wisdom in a text, covering fundamentals of esoteric hermeneutics more generally.

Synesius of Cyrene, Platonist philosopher, student of Hypatia of Alexandria and Orthodox bishop of Ptolemaïs, raises the question of whether he was a committed Christian or a pagan bishop.

With Jean-Marc Narbonne

Jean-Marc Narbonne, a leading scholar of the interconnections between Plotinus' thought and the Gnostics he disliked, discusses Plotinian texts and ideas that make more sense read in dialogue with the Gnostics.

Porphyry's reception of Greek and non-Greek wisdom is examined, along with the cultural locales where esoteric truth is said to be found, and Christianity, where it is said not to be.

With Gregory Shaw

Gregory Shaw discusses the phenomenology and meaning of theurgy, and how his publications on Iamblichus reposition these religious ideas as spiritual practices of late-antique philosophy, free of a century of scholarly opprobrium.

How the adept navigates the world set forth by the Chaldæan Oracles, through ritual, epiphanic visions, cognitive disciplines, talismans and leaving the body through breathing, is theurgy, and antiquity's esoteric religion changed for good.

Three homemade myths found in Plutarch's writings deal with the fate of the soul after death, place the land of the dead in the sky, and are exceedingly difficult to interpret.

Plato's Republic, widely regarded as his masterwork, complex and sly, is introduced here with a general look at the intricate structure of the text itself.

With John Finamore

John Finamore guides through the labyrinth of evidence about theurgy, covering the practices lying behind the descriptions in the De mysteriis and the theory behind Iamblichean theurgical practice.

Theurgy is examined for what, where, when and how, covering the Chaldæan Oracles and technical brutal death metal.

With Peter Adamson

With Heidi Marx

Sosipatra of Pergamum, an otherwise unknown late polytheist holy woman and philosopher, is depicted by her biographer Eunapius as a living goddess and teacher in the lineage of Iamblichus, amid the late Platonist resistance to Christianity in the fourth century.

With M. David Litwa

With Joel Kalvesmaki

Christopher Gill explains the basics of Stoicism, one of antiquity's least esoteric philosophical schools, yet one with a profound influence on western esotericism.

Hierocles of Alexandria, student of Plutarch of Athens, wrote an esoteric commentary on the Golden Verses of the Pythagoreans, covering good advice and the purification of the luminous subtle body.

Porphyry's universe, crawling with gods, powers and daimones, is surveyed for how a human being might navigate it, featuring discussion of metempsychosis and divine possession.

The ineffable in Plotinus is discussed: how it is deployed and esoteric, how scholars have handled it, and how one of its paradoxical functions is a call to the highest initiation.

The Chaldæan Oracles, one of the most extraordinary and influential texts of antiquity, is introduced with questions of authorship, whether Julian the Theurge, the Gods, or the Soul of Plato, and its mythic metaphysics.

Platonist philosophical teaching continued at Alexandria before and after Justinian's edict of 529, with cameo appearances from the fall of the western Roman empire and Horapollo's Hieroglyphika.

With Graeme Miles

Graeme Miles, part of the team translating Proclus' Republic commentary into English, on Proclus' commentaries on Platonic dialogues, the Chaldæan Oracles and the Homeric poems, and the kosmic-astrological reading of the Myth of Er.

Daniel Ogden, a specialist in ancient magical practice, leads a tour of magicians, ghosts, amulets and spells through the labyrinth of the Græco-Roman world's magic.

Iamblichus, known to later Platonists as the Divine and the Great Iamblichus, is introduced as a Platonist philosopher and wonder-working holy man, covering the Iamblichean corpus, levitation and miraculous apparitions.

Porphyry of Tyre, a prolific Platonist writer and thinker, is introduced through Platonist metaphysics, esoteric reading-strategies, exorcisms, divine possessions and a lost work on the River Styx.

The philosophy of Numenius shows the stirrings of a new apophatic discourse of transcendence that becomes definitive of late antique metaphysics and theology.

Thrasyllus, astrologer, power-player in the imperial Roman court of Tiberius and philosopher, also served as editor of the works of Plato.

The Pythagoreans were going through difficult times when last visited; this episode discusses what happened next, under the motto Pythagoreanism is dead, long live Pythagoreanism.

Plato looked up with his intellect toward the world of eternal truths located above the earthly realm; the accounts he gives of the journey there are examined here.

With Maya Alapin

Maya Alapin discusses the mathematical structures within Plato's Republic, showing how harmonic theory, music, ratios and proportions intertwine with textual meaning in his masterwork.

With Miguel Herrero de Jauregui

The elusive Orphics of antiquity continue to puzzle scholars after several centuries of debate and new evidence; Dr Miguel Herrero navigates the fascinating question of ancient Orphism.

Bridging middle-eastern astral science and the Hellenistic flourishing of Greek astronomy, this episode traces the road from Mesopotamian astronomy to the Greek world before true astrology's birth.

With Dorian Greenbaum

Dorian Greenbaum discusses astrology in Porphyry, situating it within third-century astrology and astrological world-views, and considering whether the oikodespotēs is the same figure as the personal daimōn.

Thrice-Greatest Hermes, sage of sages and barbarian philosopher of philosophers, is introduced here along with his copious literary output, the Hermetica, discussed in an introductory way.

Daniel Harris-McCoy as expert guide to Artemidorus' Oneirocritica, the west's earliest surviving manual of dream-interpretation, and the labyrinth of second-century divinatory dream-interpretation.

The little-studied contribution of Stoicism to esoteric reading, both of texts and of secret correspondences within the universe, gets sifted here.

With Marilynn Lawrence

Marilynn Lawrence, authority on Platonism and Hellenistic astrology, discusses Plotinus' theoretical writings on the science of the stars.

Plotinus on magic, in theory and in practice, is discussed here, covering magic as applied physics and the apotropaic chickens.

Plotinus, the greatest philosopher of late antiquity and a crucial thinker for the story of western esotericism, is introduced here through his philosophy and the basics of his biography.

Plutarch's tour de force of esoteric hermeneutics, On Isis and Osiris, brings Egyptian myth together with Greek esoteric Platonism, and something new is born.

With Graeme Miles

With Dylan Burns

With Christopher Gill

Christopher Gill, Emeritus Professor of Ancient Thought at the University of Exeter, explores Atlantis, one of Plato's most puzzling creations.

Hypatia of Alexandria, the Late Platonist philosopher, is introduced here through her life and notorious death, one of late antiquity's most evocative enigmas, alongside the Great Library at Alexandria.

Iamblichus' kosmic universe is populated by a host of fauna including archangels, angels, daimones, heroes, archontes and, weirdest of all, human beings.

Iamblichus' esoteric-literalist approach to the Platonic corpus and his complex metaphysics is explored, covering the realms of the One and the noetic-noeric levels of reality, featuring the Noeric Hebdomad.

Shannon Grimes fills in the historical, cultural and economic background of Zosimus' life and practice, with the economics of metallurgy, ancient Egyptian trade-guilds and the living statues.

With John Dillon

Professor John Dillon guides an exploration of what may be antiquity's single most crucial current for the development of western esotericism: Middle Platonism.

Plato's Timæus, the grandfather of western esotericism's single most influential dialogue, is introduced here as the work that set the scene for pretty much all subsequent esoteric thought.

Plato was long considered an esoteric author who hid true doctrines within his dialogues; the reasons for his reputation as esoteric author par excellence and modern debates on the esoteric question are examined.

In the final episode on Stoicism, the naturalistic physical theory of the Stoics and three key terms from Stoic physics reveal a surprising influence on esoteric spirituality and occult sciences.

With Nilüfer Akçay

Nilüfer Akçay, author of the only full-length English monograph on Porphyry's On the Cave of the Nymphs, discusses that text here.

Speculations about the properties of number, a major constituent of western esoteric traditions, are traced to first- and second-century Neopythagoreanism and the writings of Nicomachus of Gerasa.

The Phædo depicts Socrates' final hours in philosophical discussion with his circle of friends, arguing that the soul is immortal and the philosopher should rejoice to die, for mysterious reasons.

With Jeremy Swist

Jeremy Swist discusses Julian's synthesis of Iamblichean theology and metaphysics, traditional religions and politics, covering the pagan counter-church and transcendent solar metaphysics.

The Theolegoumena arithmeticæ, or Theology of Arithmetic, the most complete extant arithmological treatise from antiquity, sets out Neopythagorean theory of number in the Greek alphanumeric age, possibly written by Iamblichus, where the Dyad is Daring.

With Christian Wildberg

Professor Christian Wildberg discusses the poor state of the texts collected in the Corpus Hermeticum and proposes doing something about it.

Numenius of Apamea, one of Middle Platonism's most enigmatic figures, has his esoteric practice investigated in this episode.

With Richard Seaford

With Wouter Hanegraaff

Wouter Hanegraaff has read the Poimandres with great attention, covering the visionary encounter with the divine nous and cosmogenesis as a love story.

Initiation, central to western esotericism, has origins in the mystery-cults of the Græco-Roman world; the route from ancient ritual practices to a transcendent kind of knowledge or wisdom runs via Plato.

Matteo Martelli, editor of the first critical edition of its fragments, discusses the Pseudo-Democritus, the earliest-known work of alchemy and the roots of the alchemical tradition.

Aspects of the esoteric found in Porphyry's Life of Plotinus and in Plotinus' own writings are examined, asking whether the esoteric Platonist exegete and the late pagan holy man are the same person.

With Anna van den Kerchove

Anna van den Kerchove, a leading voice reclaiming ancient Hermetism from outside the realms of respectability, discusses Hermetic texts and the milieux in which they may have circulated in antiquity.

The greatest philosopher of the western world was a trickster; Plato, the father of western esotericism, is introduced here alongside his importance to the esoteric traditions.

Plato's Republic, the world's first utopia, is compared with the other invisible worlds of western esoteric traditions, the otherworlds and inner worlds, in a survey of types of esoteric space.

The life, work and legacy of Vettius Valens, second-century astrologer and author of the Anthologies, the most practical handbook of astrological practice surviving from antiquity.

The greatest musician of antiquity was also the founder of mystery-rites, author of curious theological poetry and the most famous man to journey to the underworld alive; the myth of Orpheus and the Orphic myths are examined.

With Richard Seaford

Aristotle, Plato's greatest student, might not spring to mind among esoteric heroes, yet his figure had an esoteric afterlife to rival that of Plato himself.

Pythagoras of Samos is revered in the western esoteric traditions as founder of mathematical mysteries, discoverer of musical harmony and esoteric philosopher par excellence, examined here as the ancient mystagogue and psychagogue who may have founded philosophy.

Heraclitus, a combative, obscure, grumpy philosopher who thought everyone was stupid, was a pioneer of esoteric discourse, the earliest philosopher to write in riddles, with crucial contributions to western esotericism.