Still Seeking the Magic Mushroom: R. Gordon Wasson and the Complex Origins of Psychedelic Scholarship on Mysticism
January 1, 2025 Hugh B. Urban
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Hugh B. Urban
3 papers in the library · publishing 2001-2025
Papers
From the Songs of Ecstasy
Songs of Ecstasy December 13, 2001 Hugh B. Urban
The Bhāver Gīta, the main song text of the Kartābhajās—a Bengali Tantric sect in colonial Calcutta—is presented in a series of select translations. The author organizes the most significant songs under thematic headings: Company songs, Songs of the marketplace, Songs of mystical belief and esoteric practice, Songs of lust and love, and Other songs of faith and worship. Each set is introduced by explanatory text, offering insight into the sect's esoteric practices and worldview.
"Magia sexualis": sex, secrecy, and liberation in modern western esotericism.
Journal of the American Academy of Religion. American Academy of Religion January 1, 2004 Hugh B. Urban
Though Eros and magic have long been connected in Western esoteric traditions, a substantial body of literature on sexual magic emerged only in the nineteenth century. This article examines the rise of sexual magic in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries within the context of Victorian-era American and British discourse on sexuality. Focusing on the teachings of Paschal Beverly Randolph, Aleister Crowley, and Pierre Bernard, and following Michel Foucault, the author argues that this literature was part of a broader Victorian explosion of discourse on sex, particularly its deviant forms. Sexual magic both reflected and subverted mainstream Victorian sexual values, while these figures also foreshadowed the modern American obsession with sex and its liberation.