Bilaga 4. Stipendiater vid Donnerska institutet 2013–2020

Bilaga 4. Stipendiater vid Donnerska institutet 2013–2020

Bilaga 3. Donnerska institutets pristagare

Bilaga 3. Donnerska institutets pristagare

Bilaga 1. Förteckning över konferenserna

Bilaga 1. Förteckning över konferenserna

Bilaga 2. Styrelsen genom åren

Bilaga 2. Styrelsen genom åren

Mystik blir vetenskap

Den 29 mars 1956 i Dornach, Schweiz undertecknade Olly och Uno Donner ett donationsbrev som lade grunden för ett nytt forskningsinstitut i Åbo. De donerade sin egendom till Stiftelsen för Åbo Akademi för att grunda Donnerska institutet för religionshistorisk och kulturhistorisk forskning som en knutpunkt för forskningen kring religion och kultur, en mötespunkt för forskare, studerande och samhället i stort samt en utsikts­punkt mot stora världen, ny kunskap och nya idéer. Historiken ger en grundlig beskrivning av institutets uppkomsthistoria och de viktiga personer som under årens lopp bidragit till verksamheten. Den presenterar forskare och bibliotekarier, internationella symposier och kulturseminarier, forskningssatsningar och hyllkilometer av forskningslitteratur, forskarpris och stipendier, fester och vardag. Historiken speglar också den ämnesmässiga utveckling som skett inom religionsforskningen, både nationellt och internationellt, under den här tiden. Mystik blir vetenskap: Donnerska institutet 1956–2021 har skrivits av Nils G. Holm, professor emeritus i religionsvetenskap vid Åbo Akademi och långvarig styrelsemedlem vid institutet. Historiken är rikligt illustrerad med bilder från alla årtionden vid institutet.

Rumi, Sufi spirituality and the teacher–disciple relationship in Elif Shafak’s The Forty Rules of Love

In William Patrick Patterson’s Struggle of the Magicians, a detailed study of the relationship between the prominent figures of Western esotericism, G. I. Gurdjieff and P. D. Ouspensky, he writes ‘Only in a time as confused as ours could one think that the teacher–student relationship – an archetypal and sacred form – exists as an option, rather than a necessary requirement, a station on the way’ (1997: 92). My paper examines the numerous ways in which the famous teacher–disciple relationship that existed between Muhammad Jalal ad-Din, known to the anglophone world as Rumi, and his spiritual guide and mentor, Shams of Tabriz, is represented in Elif Shafak’s novel The Forty Rules of Love (2010) and how her depiction of this relationship is predicated upon her knowledge of, and belief in, the general principles of what can be termed ‘Western Sufism’. Although she had previously thematised elements of Sufi dialectics in her earlier fiction and clear, if minor, references to Sufi philosophy permeated novels such as The Bastard of Istanbul (2007), Shafak’s fascination with the teachings of Rumi and Shams of Tabriz reaches its culmination and most significant artistic expression in The Forty Rules of Love. Published in 2010, the novel situates a fictionalised representation of the relationship between Rumi and Shams at the centre of the narrative and provides an overt depiction of the emanationalist, perennialist and universalist ethics contained within Sufi dialectics. In addition, given that Shafak’s text represents one of the more prominent and commercially successful contributions to what Amira El-Zein (2010: 71–85) has called ‘the Rumi phenomenon’ my paper examines how, in privileging the aesthetics and the interests of American readers over conveying a more complete and more nuanced image of Sufism, Shafak succumbs to the oversimplification and decontextualisation of Rumi’s teachings perpetrated by the Western popularisers of his work.

Interpretations of Emanuel Swedenborg’s image of the afterlife in the novel Oneiron by Laura Lindstedt

This article discusses the relationship between Western esotericism and literature. As an example of a secular author who uses and benefits from esoteric texts, ideas and thoughts as resources in creating a literary artwork, the article analyses Laura Lindstedt’s novel Oneiron. A Fantasy About the Seconds After Death (2015). It contextualises the novel within the frames of Western esotericism and literature, focusing on Emanuel Swedenborg’s impact on discourses of the afterlife in literature. Laura Lindstedt’s postmodern novel indicates various ways that esoteric ideas, themes, and texts can work as resources for authors of fiction in twenty-first century Finland. Since the late eighteenth century Swedenborg’s influence has been evident in literature and among artists, especially in providing resources for other-worldly imagery. Oneiron proves that the ideas of Swedenborg are still part of the memory of Western culture and literature.

Sigurd Wettenhovi-Aspa, August Strindberg and a dispute concerning the common origins of the languages of mankind 1911–1912

This article is about the notions of history and language of a Finnish artist and writer Sigurd Wettenhovi-Aspa (née Sigurd Asp, 1870–1946), and the Swedish writer August Strindberg (1849–1912), and their interaction. Wettenhovi-Aspa and Strindberg knew each other from Paris, where both lived in the 1890s. In the 1910s they both published books and articles on their respective linguistic views. According to both of them, the languages of mankind had a common origin. Strindberg had a more traditional view, as according to him Hebrew was the original language of the world. For Wettenhovi-Aspa, the original language was Finnish. These ideas may seem eccentric, but I argue that they both reflect the intellectual currents of their own time and are connected with a long tradition as well.

New currents in the research on esotericism and mysticism

The current 29th volume of Scripta Instituti Donneriani Aboensis is based on a symposium arranged by the Donner Institute and the research project ‘Seekers of the New: Esotericism and the Transformation of Religiosity in the Modernising Finland’ at the University of Turku in June 2017, under the title: ‘Approaching Esotericism and Mysticism: Cultural Influences’. All the articles published in this volume were initially presented as papers at this conference and have, through a double-blind peer-review process, been selected for this volume.

Mysticism and esotericism as contested taxonomical categories

Esotericism and mysticism are two notoriously elusive concepts. Both are based on referential corpora of works that are so internally diverse as to defy any simple characterization. A definition of mysticism needs to encompass a range of empirical cases that include medieval Christian visionaries, Sufis, and Hindu gurus such as Ramakrishna. Similarly, the term esotericism denotes the work of individuals as diverse as Paracelsus, Swedenborg, and Carl Gustav Jung. Unsurprisingly, in a recent encyclopedia article (Nelstrop 2016) mysticism has been characterized as a ‘taxonomical black hole’, while esotericism has been described by a leading scholar on that topic, Wouter J. Hanegraaff (2005, 2012), as a waste-basket category for a range of currents that have little else in common than having been rejected by mainstream theologians and by rationalists from the Enlightenment to our own time. This article argues that the terms are not only laden with significant definitional problems, but that applying them to any particular phenomenon has little, if any, theoretical added value. Instead, this article advocates a higher-level taxonomy that sees the elements of both sets as examples of a more general category: religious phenomena which are supported by charismatic authority.