Hermetic Traditionalism in Spain

A new article: Mark Sedgwick, “Hermetic Traditionalism in Spain,” Aries (2026), available here. 

According to the abstract,

Traditionalism, usually associated with Sufism following the examples of René Guénon and Frithjof Schuon, took an unusual Hermetic form in Spain under the leadership of Federico González Frías (1933–2014). González, originally from Argentina, established the Barcelona-based Center for the Study of Symbology during Spain’s democratic Transition, when interest in spiritual alternatives flourished. Rejecting both Sufism and Schuon’s Maryamiyya, González developed a distinctive “Hermetic” Traditionalism that emphasized symbolism, alchemy, Kabbalah, and Western esoteric traditions. His teachings, consolidated in the Agartha Program, combined perennialist philosophy with Hermetic practice and were extended through Freemasonry, publications,  and initiatic theater. This article explores the origins, development, and reception of González’s movement, situating it as the only known case of Hermetic Traditionalism and assessing its relationship to Guénonian orthodoxy and Spain’s historical context.

Traditionalism in Argentina

A new book just published in Buenos Aires discusses Traditionalism in Argentina. The book is Gnosis y tradiciones sagradas : Ensayos y epistolario en torno de la obra de Francisco García Bazán, edited by Bernardo Nante and Leandro Pinkler (El Hilo de Ariadna, 2015). It is a Festschrift for Francisco García Bazán (pictured), a distinguished Argentinian academic and Argentina's most prolific and respected Traditionalist.

García Bazán represents the third generation of Argentinian Traditionalism, according to the short article "Tres generaciones de tradicionalistas argentinos" (Three Generations of Argentine Traditionalists), written by myself (Mark Sedgwick). The English text of this short article can be downloaded from academia.edu. It argues that Argentinian Traditionalism has always been Catholic, and that it was more influential in its first two generations, notably in the political arena, than it is today. Even though Traditionalism is not especially influential in Argentina today, however, it is taken seriously in academic and intellectual circles. In this Argentina matches Russia, and differs from the USA and most of Europe.

Three other articles deal with the influence of Traditionalism and of Eastern thought on García Bazán. One, "La recepción guenoniana en la obra de García Bazán" by the Spanish philosopher José Antonio Antón Pacheco argues, in effect, that García Bazán was what I would call a "soft" Traditionalist, if only because he attached more importance to Neoplatonism than Guénon did. Pacheco teaches at the University of Seville, and his contribution, which demonstrates a fine grasp of the work of both Guénon and García Bazán, shows that there are some European academics who take Guénon seriously at an intellectual level.

Dugin and Europe

A new book on Alexander Dugin's Eurasianism and Europe has been published, Eurasianism and the European Far Right: Reshaping the Europe-Russia Relationship (Lanham: Lexington Books, 2015), edited by Marlene Laruelle and supported by the Carnegie Council.

The book examines the three-sided relationship between the Russian government, European neo-nationalist parties and Eurasianism. As David Speedie notes in the foreword, one important thing that is going on is "Russia's rising soft power among European parties and countries that feel victims of the European Union 'technocracy.'" To this might be added the impact of globalization, to which many also feel victim. Eurasianism is not synonymous with Russian soft power, but is an aspect of it.

The book is a collection with ten chapters, two introductory and one by way of conclusion. The remaining seven chapters deal with Russia itself and with France, Italy, Spain, Turkey, Hungary and Greece. One introductory chapter is by Laruelle, and the other by Anton Shekhovtsov, who also wrote the conclusion. The other chapters are by scholars specializing in the countries they cover and/or in the New Right.

The chapters on Turkey and Hungary are among the most interesting. Vügar İmanbeyli charts and explains Dugin's initially enthusiastic reception in Turkey, a reception that became less and less enthusiastic over time. Umut Korkut and Emel Akçali show how what is in some ways a Hungarian version of Eurasianism, Turanism, gained influence within Jobbik and even, to a lesser extent, Fidesz.

Unfortunately lacking is a discussion of the current, as opposed to historical, importance of Traditionalism for Eurasianists and sympathizers outside Russia. Vadim Rossman recognizes the importance of Guénon and Evola for the Center for Conservative Research at the Moscow State University, which was until 2014 an important base for Dugin and colleagues, as well as of related thinkers such as Henry Corbin and the Neoplatonists. Beyond this, it is noted that Greece's Golden Dawn initially promoted paganism before shifting to Greek Christianity. Nothing more. Even so, the book is important.

Dugin and CEDADE

A Yale student, Emily Efland, is researching the relationship between Aleksandr Dugin and the Spanish group CEDADE (Círculo Español de Amigos de Europa) in the 1990s. Efland writes:

In the mid-1980s a group formed within CEDADE that devoted itself to esoteric Hitlerism and the study of the works of Miguel Serrano, whose works (and other esoteric Hitlerist texts) were published in the CEDADE-affiliated journal Excalibur. Amid internal factionalism in the late 1980s, members of this group left CEDADE to form their own more esoteric organization, which they called the Thule Group. In the beginning of the 1990s the Thule Group began publishing a journal entitled Hiperbórea. Dugin, presumably through his travels to Spain in the early 1990s, met members of the Thule Group and in 1991 published the Russian version of volume 1 of Hiperbórea, which he entitled Giperborea. I am wondering which members of the Thule Group Dugin was in contact with. I am also interested in receiving any information anyone might have on who was involved in the Thule Group, when it started, what its publications were and where I could find them, and any other information that exists on this faction. I can be reached at emily.efland@yale.edu.

María Zambrano

I have just stumbled across the work of María Zambrano, the Spanish philosopher and sometime poet who died in 1991.

Zambrano is interesting because she read and was influenced by Guénon in the 1930s and 1940s, during a period when Traditionalism seems otherwise to have had little impact on the Spanish-speaking world, and because she was herself a leftist--the daughter of a member of Socialist Workers Group, the wife of a diplomat of the Spanish Republic that lost the Civil War to Franco, who returned to Spain precisely because the war seemed lost, who left Spain for exile as Barcelona was about to fall to the Nationalists, not to return until 1984. Finally, she is interesting because she was a woman--there have been female Traditionalists, but all the major figures and writers have been male.

Zambrano is in fact so unusual in Traditionalist terms that a careful examination of her relationship with Guénon's work is required. There seems to be general agreement that she was a perennialist and that Guénon was important to her, and that the mystical is central to her work, but she of course had many other sources, from Plotinus to the Spanish tradition, in which some include Ibn Arabi. Zambrano was also involved with the circles around Eranos. Some of these issues are examined by Adele Ricciotti in "Método y simbología en la razón poética de María Zambrano,"Annales Universitatis Mariae Curie-Skłodowska 36, 1 (2011), pp. 27-39. But more work is needed.

For those who know Spanish,  a beautiful reading of a beautiful passage from Zambrano's Claros del Bosque (1977) is to be found on YouTube.

Other journals seeking new home

Following the successful re-housing of Études Traditionnelles, 1960-85, two other journals are looking for a new home. They are Symbolos: Arte, Cultura, Gnosis, 1990-2007, and Studies in Comparative Religion, 1970-84.

• Symbolos: Arte, Cultura, Gnosis: Complete run of nos. 1 (1990) through 32 (2007: ceased publication) in 20 volumes. Page counts from 190 pp. (no. 1) to 576 pp. (double no. 31-32). 
• Studies in Comparative Religion: Unbroken run from vol. 4, no.1 (1970) through vol. 17, nos. 1-2 ("1984"; actually some years later, and therewith ceased publication). Bound as six volumes in red library buckram. Plus loose numbers as follows: 1/1, 1/4, 2/1, 2/2, 2/4, 3/1, 3/2.

 On Symbolos, the anonymous donor writes:

Symbolos: Arte, Cultura, Gnosis was a Spanish-language periodical of Traditionalist (Guenonian), Hermetic, and Masonic inspiration, edited by Federico González. Published from Guatemala City and printed in Barcelona, this was the chief vehicle for Traditionalist scholarship, speculation, and controversy in the Spanish-speaking world, and González himself its most authoritative spokesman in that world, with many separate publications to his name. Symbolos carries extremely rich and serious articles and reviews by Spanish, Latin-American, and (translated) foreign authors, especially on historic (cyclical), artistic, symbolic, and geographical topics. The editorial approach is non-dogmatic, more sympathetic to Hermetic, Pythagorean currents than to the monotheistic religions, and more respectful of Guenon's than of Schuon's example. 

Would those interested in giving either or both of these journals a new home please email me (mjs@teo.au.dk) a few sentences describing the proposed new home--that is, who you are and what you will do with them. I will then pass your name and those few sentences to the donor, who will make the final decision.