| Description |
1 online resource (xiii, 310 pages) : illustrations |
| Series |
Oxford studies in Western esotericism |
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Oxford studies in Western esotericism.
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| Contents |
Cover -- American Aurora -- Copyright -- Dedication -- Contents -- Acknowledgments -- Introduction: "Strange Things Happening Every Day" -- "Phoenomena, Meteors, Stars and Various Colours of the Skei" -- The Crisis of Piety -- Environment and Apocalypse -- Global Crisis -- 1. "No Wisdom in Nature": Esotericism, Enthusiasm, and Ecology in Early Modern Europe -- Extraordinary Heavenly Phenomena -- The Crises of Early Modernity -- Enthusiasm, Esotericism, and Ecology -- Hermeticism and Alchemy -- Hermetic Protestant Environmental Knowledge |
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"No Wisdom in Nature" -- Metamorphosis of the Metaphysics -- Vita I. "Strange Things of the Invisible Worlds": Kelpius in Europe, 1667-1693 -- 2. "Gone into the Ancient Forest": Hermetic Protestantism and Environmental Knowledge in Early Pennsylvania -- Pastor Schuhmacher's Apocalypse -- Early American Hermetic Protestantism -- "All of It Is Only Forest" -- Holy Experiments -- "Every Plant Praises and Extols God" -- "Moves Nature in a Jumping Fit / According to His Pleasure" -- "The Genius of the Americans Is Bound Another Way" |
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Vita II. "I Cannot Pass beyond My Homeland": Kelpius in Rotterdam, London, and the Atlantic, 1693-1694 -- "The Poor People Call'd Pietests" -- "I Cannot Pass beyond My Country" -- 3. "The Woman in the Wilderness": Kelpius and Company on the Ridge of the Wissahickon, 1694-1707 -- The Woman in the Wilderness -- "For Wilderness Signifies Hidden" -- The Wissahickon Hermits -- The Keithian Schism -- "Everything Too Spiritual and Too Heavenly" -- "The Rooms in My Father's House" -- "Contemplation of the Stars" -- The Lamenting Voice of the Hidden Love -- "An Antient Hermit Who Lives in a Lone House" |
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4. The Threefold Wilderness State: Ascetic Alchemy and the Technology of Self-Negation -- The Threefold Wilderness State -- The Sources of the Threefold Wilderness State -- The Technology of Self-Negation -- Vita III. "Delay Not Longer the Blessed Day": Kelpius in Germantown, 1694-1703-4-5-6-7 -- 5. The Long Shadow of the Enlightenment: Memories of Kelpius in Charles Brockden Brown's Wieland (1798) -- The Long Shadow Falls -- An American Tale -- Effects without Cause -- "Hermes Never Taught Thee" -- The Great Derangement -- Long Shadow Fallen |
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6. "Weird as a Wizard": History and Literature in the Emergence of the American Kelpius Legend -- Mühlenberg's Report -- The Philosopher of the Forest -- Chronicon Ephratense -- The Spiritual Travel of Conrad Matthai -- The Method of Prayer -- The History of Human Folly -- "Weird as a Wizard" -- "Rosicrucian Vestiges" -- All Folk Songs Are True -- Conclusion: An Unmute Gospel -- American Aurora -- Notes -- References -- Index |
| Summary |
"American Aurora explores the impact of climate change on early modern radical religious groups during the height of the Little Ice Age in the seventeenth century. Hermetic, alchemical, and esoteric texts became crucial sources of religious meaning and perspective among radical Protestants during this period as they struggled to understand their changing climate and a cosmos that seemed to be declaring its own decline. In particular, American Aurora focuses on the life and legacy of Johannes Kelpius (1667-1707), an enormously influential but comprehensively misunderstood theologian who settled outside of Philadelphia from 1694 to 1707. American Aurora explores the Hermetic and alchemical dimensions of Kelpius's Christianity before turning to his legacy in American religion and literature. This includes original translations of Kelpius's university writings-which have never before been translated into English-along with other important sources from the period in German and Latin. By the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, Kelpius's legacy began to warp under the scrutiny of both Enlightenment historians and antiquarian authors, entangling him in the legacies of nineteenth century Rosicrucianism and the occult revival. American Aurora points toward a time and place when climate change caused an eruption of esoteric thought and practice-and how this moment has been largely forgotten"-- Provided by publisher |
| Bibliography |
Includes bibliographical references and index |
| Notes |
Text in English with some parts translated from the German or Latin |
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Description based on online resource; title from digital title page (viewed on May 29, 2024) |
| Subject |
Kelpius, John, 1667?-1708.
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| SUBJECT |
Bible. Revelation. http://id.loc.gov/authorities/names/n78095796
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| Subject |
Religion and science -- United States -- History
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Pietism -- United States -- History
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Climatic changes -- Religious aspects -- Christianity
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Biography & non-fiction prose.
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Biography.
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Pennsylvania -- Church history -- 17th century
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| Form |
Electronic book
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| LC no. |
2024000743 |
| ISBN |
9780197765593 |
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0197765599 |
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9780197765609 |
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0197765602 |
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9780197765586 |
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0197765580 |
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