THE MAGIC ORDER OF DRAGON ROUGE 1.3 Earlier Research In this section I present the literature relevant for my topic and used in the present study. I have divided the presentation into three parts; literature on Dragon Rouge, literature on magic and Western esotericism and literature on spirituality and meaning-making. In section 1.3.1 I treat the academic research on Dragon Rouge, as well as non-academic works, that in some way refer to or deal with Dragon Rouge. Section 1.3.2 gathers the relevant research in the field of Western esotericism and the history of magic. In the same section I also introduce works on alchemy, occultism, eastern esotericism and neopaganism, when the research in question is of relevance for this study. In section 1.3.3 I present literature dealing with meaning-making in relation to spirituality. I have also included more general works on meaning-making where these works have relevance for the present study. 1.3.1 Research on Dragon Rouge Research on Dragon Rouge is basically non-existent, at least when it comes to higher academic research. The most comprehensive and serious study of the organization is my master’s thesis from Åbo Akademi University written in the fall of 2000 (Granholm 2000). This work is, however, outdated and deals mostly with the classification of Dragon Rouge, while still offering a basic insight into the teachings and practice of the organization. Henrik Bogdan’s article Västerländsk esoterism i svensk ungdomskultur [Western Esotericism in Swedish Youth Culture] in the anthology Talande Tro [Meaningful Faith] deals mainly with Dragon Rouge, although it also gives a short presentation on the academic study of Western esotericism and a brief description of Western esotericism in general (Bogdan 2003a). Bogdan’s article is a good introductory description of the order and its key characteristics, although, because of its length, it is by necessity on a very basic level. Liselotte Frisk’s work Nyreligiositet i Sverige [New Religiosity in Sweden] contains a short chapter on Dragon Rouge (Frisk 1998: 142-147). Although this text is very short, it is still among the best published academic accounts of Dragon Rouge. The article by Bogdan draws to a large extent on Frisk’s book but the author has also done an interview with the founder of the order. Both of these works, although good pieces of academic writing, are, because of the limited number of pages available, general and cursory in character. Other writers who have mentioned the organization are Karl- Erik Nylund and Håkan Arlebrand (Nylund 1998: 239-242; Arlebrand et al. 1995: 137; Arlebrand 1998: 112-113; Wallin & Arlebrand 2001: 211). Both Nylund’s and Arlebrand’s accounts are biased, however, and the authors’ purposes, especially Nylund’s, seem to be to warn their readers about the order. Therefore, both Nylund’s and Arlebrand’s contributions are more useful as a general account of the more polemic attitudes towards Dragon Rouge, than as actual accounts of the nature of the order. The writers make their statements from a Christian, and anti-occultist, point of view. Nylund’s book includes quite a blatant attempt to discredit Thomas Karlsson, the founder of the organization (see Nylund 1998: 239). Arlebrand’s works do however have merit with regard to descriptions of phenomena and movements “further away from home”. His accounts of, for example, the Theosophical Society and Anthroposophy are quite valid. Dragon Rouge is also mentioned in a work by the Finnish anti-Satanist, Riku Rinne (Rinne 1998: 13-16). Dragon Rouge is also briefly referred to in an article by Martin Holmberg in the book Att se det dolda [To Perceive the Hidden] (Holmberg 1998: 256), in Jan Svanberg’s Master’s Thesis (Svanberg 1994: 33), in Olav Hammer’s work on ‘New Age’, written prior to his doctoral thesis (Hammer 1997: 128) and in Henrik Bogdan’s doctoral thesis (Bogdan 2003b:238). In all these works Dragon Rouge is only mentioned in passing in the context of other subjects (neopagan magic in the case of Holmberg and Hammer, Scandinavian neoshamanism in the case of Svanberg and Western initiatory esotericism in the case of Bogdan). Due to the very short and limited accounts of the order in these studies, it is very difficult to base any assumptions on them. The vast amount of different spiritual phenomena with which Dragon Rouge is associated in these texts is, however, an interesting fact. It underlines the difficulty of defining and classifying the order. I have also acquired some unpublished academic undergraduate papers dealing with Dragon Rouge. Andrei Marin’s paper The Dragon and the Northern Star: An Anthropological Insight of a Magical Order in Northern Europe (Marin 2000) is an attempt to formulate Dragon Rouge philosophy, practice and organizational structure for an academic audience. The paper argues quite strongly for the magico-pagan approach to the world and contains many quotations from the Dragon Rouge homepage. One of the best pieces of work dealing with the order and related subjects is Margareta Nobell’s paper, Den vänstra handens väg: Om mörkmagiker, satanister, djävulsdyrkare och konstruktion av identitet och karisma på nätet (The Left Hand Path: On Dark Magicians, Satanists, Devil Worshippers and Construction of Identity on the Web) (Nobell 2002). Her work deals with the Left Hand Path as manifested in Western, in particular Swedish, magic orders, and discusses Dragon Rouge to some extent. Nobell’s work is insightful and treats subjects often neglected in more established academic works. I have not used the undergraduate studies dealing with the order to any larger extent. 1.3.2 Magic and Western Esotericism The subject of magic orders in general, as well as in particular, is also a largely neglected field of study in comparative religion and religious studies. One may find some works dealing with the likes of Eliphas Lévi (Alphonse Louise Constant), Aleister Crowley and the latter’s involvement in magical orders (The Golden Dawn, Ordo Templi Orientis and the Church of Thelema), but most of these accounts are more or less written from an insider’s perspective or as polemics (see Howe 1972). With regard to Aleister Crowley, the works more often than not focus on unwarranted details of the man’s personal life, most of which seem to have little relevance to an academic study of his teachings and practice. The works of Frances Yates from the 1960s onward are considered to have instigated the birth of Western esotericism as a field of academic study (Bogdan 2003b: 9). As Bogdan notes, the research dealing with Western esotericism prior to this had mainly focused on certain elements, not on Western esotericism as a specific form of thought. Yates’s book, Giordano Bruno and the Hermetic Tradition (Yates 1964), is a groundbreaking study, due to the fact that it takes a new approach and attitude to the study of Western esotericism (see Bogdan 2003b: 11-13), even though there are problems with the study (see Hanegraaff 2001). Another researcher who has contributed vastly to, and who in some ways can even be seen as the founding father of, the academic study of Western esotericism is Antoine Faivre. His book Access to Western Esotericism (Faivre 1994) may be considered compulsory reading for the researcher dealing with Western esotericism. In this work he presents a framework for identifying and analysing esoteric movements. Other works to which Faivre has contributed and that are used in this study are Modern Esoteric Spirituality (Needleman & Faivre 1993), Gnosis and Hermeticism from Antiquity to Modern Times (Hanegraaff & van den Broek 1998) and Western Esotericism and the Science of Religion (Hanegraaff & Faivre 1998). Other important scholars in the field of Western Esotericism are Wouter J. Hanegraaff, Olav Hammer and Jacob Needleman (Hammer 1997; 1999; 2001; Hanegraaff 1996; 1998; 2001; 2004; Hanegraaff & van den Broek 1998; Needleman & Faivre 1993). Although Hanegraaff and Hammer follow in the footsteps of Faivre, they deal mainly with the ‘New Age Movement’. The Swedish academic Henrik Bogdan’s research has focused on Western esoteric initiatory movements and his studies have also been of use in this work (Bogdan 2003a; 2003b; 2004). The majority of the useful studies on magic focus on the history of magical thought in the west. Authors such as Francis King, Richard Cavendish and E.M. Butler have written extensively on magic from medieval times to the early 20th century (Butler 1949; Cavendish 1968; 1975; 1977; King 1970; 1971; 1975). Although these works are old, they are not outdated. With reference to my study Ellic Howe’s, The Magicians of the Golden Dawn (Howe 1972), has also been insightful. The Hermetic order of the Golden Dawn has influenced many of today’s magical societies and was also the incubator of many likewise influential magicians such as Aleister Crowley, Dione Fortune, E.A. Waite and W.B. Keats. In the research into magic and occultism many studies focusing on alchemy, qabalah and mysticism have been carried out. Concerning alchemy, Betty Jo Teeter Dobbs’ The Foundation of Newton’s Alchemy (Dobbs 1975) is a good study, giving a history, description and context of the art as well as showing the connections between alchemy and the emergence of the new materialist-scientific worldview. Influential works on the Jewish qabalah have been written by Gershom Scholem and Moshe Idel (Idel 1997; Scholem 1987; 1991). ‘New Age’ spirituality is a very interesting phenomenon, which relates to my studies, and here Paul Heelas and Michael York, as well as the abovementioned Wouter J. Hanegraaff and Olav Hammer, have provided important insights (Heelas 1996; York 1995). Neopaganism and ‘New Age’ are often linked, and as Dragon Rouge can be considered a part of the neopagan milieu, studies dealing with ‘New Age’ and neopaganism are important. In addition to the authors mentioned above, works by such scholars as Graham Harvey, James R. Lewis, Ingvild Saelid Gilhus and Lisbeth Mikaelsson have also been of use (Harvey 1997; Lewis 1996a; 1996b; Mikaelsson 1996; Mikaelsson & Gilhus 1998; 2003). As stated earlier, most of the research on esotericism focuses on Western traditions, while Eastern esoteric currents are not really dealt with to the same extent. Eastern esotericism, mainly Tantrism and Tantric Yoga, have, however, become increasingly popular in Western esoteric movements. Dragon Rouge is no exception to this. Therefore, I have also read existent studies on these subjects. Left Hand Path Tantrism is not really dealt with at length in purely academic research and hence I have, at times, had to draw on works that are more popular-scientific in character. I have studied the works of the likes of Mircea Eliade, Georg Feuerstein, John Woodroffe, Julius Evola and Benjamin Walker (Eliade 1958; Woodroffe 1958; 1959; 1960; Walker 1982; Evola 1992; Feuerstein1998). A good source of academic study on Tantrism is Run Gröndahl’s PhD Thesis Den gudomliga kroppen [The Divine Body], which deals specifically with Tantrism and Shaktism (Gröndahl 2000). 1.3.3 Spirituality and Meaning Making Studies on meaning-making, both in the religious sphere, and outside it, are numerous. The theoretical frameworks range from sociological through social-psychological to purely psychological, and in all of these one can find a multitude of different approaches. In the more humanistically oriented psychology of religion, depthpsychology based on Freudian psychology and, in the Nordic context, integrated role-theory and symbolic reality construction, based on Hjalmar Sundén’s work as presented by Nils G. Holm, have had an important standing (Holm 1997; see also S. Illman 1992; R. Illman 2004). The Jungian psychoanalytic approach has not had such a strong position in the Psychology of Religion, but much more in the interpretive frames of ‘New Agers’ and other neo-spiritually inclined believers (see for example Hanegraaff 1998: 496, 496-513; Bogdan 2003b: 19). A more positivist approach is taken in the cognitive science study of religious thought3. 3 The exponents of this view often base their work and theories on sociobiological models and argue that the origin of religion can be sought in the evolution of the human animal. Notable scholars in the Cognitive science school are Dan Sperber and Pascal Boyer (Sperber 1996; 2000; Boyer 1993; 1994; 2001). Another scholar worth mentioning is Stewart Guthrie who attempts to explain the birth of religion with human anthropomorphic projections on natural objects and subjects (Guthrie 1993). Thomas E. Lawson and Robert N. McCauley have taken a slightly different approach and have studied the ritualistic elements of religion (McCauley & Lawson 1990; 2002). The cognitive approach in the psychology of religion has quite a strong standing in Finland, and here authors such as Ilkka Pyysiäinen and Tom Sjöblom have taken this approach (Pyysiäinen 1996; 2001; Sjöblom 2000). Claudia Strauss’s and Naomi Quinn’s A Cognitive Theory of Cultural Meaning is, although not explicitly dealing with religion, an I have chosen to take a social constructionist approach to meaning-making. My theoretical base draws mainly on the works of Kenneth J. Gergen, as presented in his books An Invitation to Social Construction and Social Construction in Context (Gergen 1999; 2001). In addition to Gergen’s books I have also used Vivien Burr’s An Introduction to Social Constructionism (Burr 1995). These scholars have a very similar view on social constructionism, but Gergen in particular identifies many different forms of constructivism and emphasizes the focus on language as a tool for reality construction in Social Constructionism. I have also chosen to focus on language and other symbol-systems as meaning-making systems, and especially on discourse as reality-forming. Few academic works dealing with Western esotericism and meaning-making have been published. One major work is Olav Hammer’s Claiming Knowledge, in which he discusses the main epistemological strategies employed by esotericists to legitimize their worldviews (Hammer 2001). Hammer deals with esoteric movements from Theosophy in the late 1800s to ‘New Age’ in our day. While Hammer’s work is important and very thorough, I am rather unhappy with the underlying tone of the work. Hammer’s intent seems to be to discredit the movements he has studied and to show that their foundations are based on historically incorrect facts. As true as this often is, I fail to see the productive merits in falsifying the claims and beliefs held by ‘New Age’ supporters. I will give two examples from the conclusions of Hammer’s thesis. First, when discussing the origin of the esoteric tradition in Enlightenment thought, and concluding that the tradition has left out much of that which was essential to the era, Hammer comments: “In a sense, the positions of the Esoteric Tradition studied here are the results of the Enlightenment gone astray” (Hammer 2001: 507). Furthermore Hammer points to the similarities between the tradition and the ways of thought of the preceding Romantic era, and goes on to state: “However, whereas the Romantic conception was capable of producing works of the greatest beauty, the literary, interesting work in the cognitive approach to meaning-making (Quinn & Strauss 1997). Michael Tomasello criticises what he views as a too biologically determined cognitive science and points to the role of human culture in the formation of cognitive agency (Tomasello 1999). musical and artistic products of the New Age are sometimes indistinguishable from religious kitsch” (Hammer 2001: 508). Of course, these examples are just isolated excerpts uprooted from their contexts, but this is the tone expressed throughout the work. The works on religious reality construction by Peter Berger and Thomas Luckmann (Luckmann & Berger 1966; Berger 1969) have been very influential in the academic study of religion. Although both works were originally written in the 1960s they are still relevant studies in religious meaning-making. I have, however, chosen not to use the works of Berger and Luckmann as much as the works of more recent discourse analysts. In the in-depth analytical section in chapter 7, my main theoretical framework is based on discourse analytical theory and method. Different theorists have different views on discourse and therefore the method has been used in various ways. Marianne Winther Jørgensen and Louise Phillips discuss three main schools of discourse analysis: discourse theory, critical discourse analysis and discursive psychology (Phillips & Jørgensen 2000:25-28). Discourse theory was developed by Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe and is not as practically based as the other two schools (Phillips & Jørgensen 2000:31). The primary goal in critical discourse analysis is to explore the relation between discursive practice and socio-cultural change (Phillips & Jørgensen 2000:66). Important critical discourse analysts are, among others, Norman Fairclough, Lilie Chouliaraki and Teun van Dijk (Fairclough 1992; 1995a; 1995b; Fairclough & Chouliaraki 1999; van Dijk 1987; 1997; 2001). According to Phillips and Jørgensen, discursive psychology was initially developed in social psychology as a critique of, and a response to, cognitive science (Phillips & Jørgensen 2000:97). Important discursive psychologists are Jonathan Potter, Margaret Wetherell, Derek Edwards and John Shotter (Potter 1996; Potter & Edwards 1992; Shotter 1993; Wetherell & Potter 1989; 1992; Wetherell et al. 2001). Discursive psychology is very much influenced by the philosophy of Ludwig Wittgenstein (Phillips & Jørgensen 2000:97). A major difference between the three schools concerns views on the role of discourse in the constitution of reality. The views range from the rather moderate social constructionism in critical discourse analysis, where discourse is seen as both constituted by non-discursive elements and as constituting the non-discursive; to the radical social constructionism in discourse theory, where discourse constitutes everything, that is to say everything is discursive. Discursive psychology falls in between discourse theory and critical discourse analysis (Phillips & Jørgensen 2000:97). I have taken a discursive psychological approach but have tried, following the example set by Phillips and Jørgensen (Phillips & Jørgensen 2000:131-154), to integrate the different views on discourse as much as possible and have used works from both discursive psychology and critical discourse analysis. The discourse theory of Laclau and Mouffe is not a part of my theoretical framework. Good general works on discourse analysis and examples of the method in practice are provided by Louise Phillips and Marianne Winther Jørgensen, Arja Jokinen, Kirsi Juhola, Eero Suoninen and Barbara Johnstone (Phillips & Jørgensen 2000; Suoninen, Juhola & Jokinen 1993; 1999; Suoninen 1997; Jokinen & Juhola 1996; Johnstone 2002). In addition to works dealing with meaning-making in general, I have also used works by social scientists and social philosophers, dealing with recent social change and characteristics. Zygmunt Bauman and Anthony Giddens have written extensively on the latemodern, or postmodern, period of Western societies (Bauman 1992; 1994; 1997a; 1997b; 2000a; 2000b; Giddens 1990; 1996). I have also used works dealing with identity construction written by Stuart Hall, Anthony Giddens and Richard Jenkins (Hall 1996; 2002; Giddens 1996; Jenkins 1996). Globalization theories represent a third major trend in contemporary sociology and sociology of religion, and I have mainly employed works by Roland Robertson, Malcolm Waters and Ulf Hannerz (Robertson 1992; 1995; Waters 1995; Hannerz 1996). In linking all of this to religion and spirituality, as well as in dealing with the re-enchantment of the world, I have used works by Paul Heelas (Heelas 1996; 2002).
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