Introduction to the Study of the Hindu Doctrines

René Guénon (1886–1951) was one of the great luminaries of the twentieth century, whose critique of the modern world has stood fast against the shifting sands of intellectual fashion. His extensive writings, now finally available in English, are a providential treasure-trove for the modern seeker: while pointing ceaselessly to the perennial wisdom found in past cultures ranging from the Shamanistic to the Indian and Chinese, the Hellenic and Judaic, the Christian and Islamic, and including also Alchemy, Hermeticism, and other esoteric currents, they direct the reader also to the deepest level of religious praxis, emphasizing the need for affiliation with a revealed tradition even while acknowledging the final identity of all spiritual paths as they approach the summit of spiritual realization.

René Guénon’s first book, Introduction to the Study of Hindu Doctrines, came like an abrupt intrusion into the modern world of a body of knowledge and a perspective utterly alien to the prevalent climate and worldview. Here Guénon established the criteria that formed the basis of his later works and set the tone for the “Traditionalist School” that came after him. It offers a comprehensive overview of Hinduism, which Guénon saw as the most ancient and complete spiritual tradition on earth, embracing the most profound and explicit metaphysics. As such, it serves as an introduction to all his later works, especially those which, like Man and His Becoming according to the Vedanta, The Symbolism of the Cross,The Multiple States of the Being, and Studies in Hinduism, expound the more profound aspects of metaphysical doctrines in greater detail. Part One clears away prejudices inherited from the “Renaissance.” Part Two establishes the fundamental distinctions between various modes of thought, bringing out the real nature of metaphysical or universal knowledge, an understanding of which is the first condition for the personal realization of that “Knowledge” which partakes of the Absolute. Part Three presents a more detailed examination of the Hindu doctrine and its applications, leading up to the Vedanta, which constitutes its metaphysical essence. Part Four resumes the task of clearing away current misconceptions, but this time is not concerned with the West itself, but with distortions of the Hindu doctrines that have arisen as a result of attempts to graft onto them modern Western conceptions. The concluding chapter lays down the essential conditions for any genuine understanding between East and West, which can only come through the work of those who have attained, at least in some degree, to the realization of “wisdom uncreate”—that intellective, suprarational knowledge called in the East jñana, and in the West gnosis.

“Guénon established the language of sacred metaphysics with a rigor, breadth, and intrinsic certainty that compel recognition as a standard of comparison for the twentieth century.” —Jean Borella

“Guénon gave proof of a universality of understanding that for centuries had had no parallel in the Western world.” —Frithjof Schuon

“It was Guénon who taught me to seek and love the truth above all else, and to be unsatisfied with anything else.” —Fr Seraphim Rose

“Encountering Guénon’s work is akin to being struck by lightning: a dazzling initiation into a hitherto unknown way of seeing reality that reclaims the original integrity of the human condition.” —Samuel Bendeck Sotillos

“Guénon’s mixture of arcane learning, metaphysics, and scathing cultural commentary is a continent in itself, untouched by the polluted tides of modernity.” —Jocelyn Godwin

“No modern European writer was more significant than René Guénon, who expounded the universal metaphysical tradition that is the indispensable basis for any civilization deserving to be so called.” —A. K. Coomaraswamy

Author Bio: René Guénon (1886–1951) was one of the great luminaries of the twentieth century, whose critique of the modern world has stood fast against the shifting sands of intellectual fashion. His extensive writings, now finally available in English, are a providential treasure-trove for the modern seeker: while pointing ceaselessly to the perennial wisdom found in past cultures ranging from the Shamanistic to the Indian and Chinese, the Hellenic and Judaic, the Christian and Islamic, and including also Alchemy, Hermeticism, and other esoteric currents, they direct the reader also to the deepest level of religious praxis, emphasizing the need for affiliation with a revealed tradition even while acknowledging the final identity of all spiritual paths as they approach the summit of spiritual realization. René Guénon, of whom Jacob Needleman wrote in The Sword of Gnosis that ‘no other modern writer has so effectively communicated the absoluteness of truth,’ is gradually being recognized by deeper thinkers as one of the few who have truly penetrated the seductive veil of the modern age. As an expositor of pure metaphysics and its application to the science of symbols, Guénon is without peer; and his extraordinarily prescient critique of the modern world is attracting more and more attention among cultural commentators. Little known in the English-speaking world till the recent appearance of his Collected Works in translation, Guénon has nevertheless long been recognized as a veritable criterion of truth by a vanguard of remarkable writers who evince that rare combination: intellectuality and spirituality. After a lonely childhood, often interrupted by ill health, Guénon navigated the seductive half-truths of occultism toward a deeper, unified vision offering a way out from the confusion and fragmentation of our time. Regarded by leading scholars as the first truly authentic interpreter of many Eastern doctrines in the West, Guénon never tired, in face of the seemingly inexorable process of dissolution in the twentieth century, of pointing to the transcendent unity of all religious faiths and the abiding Truth that contains them all.