Podcast episodes – The Secret History of Western Esotericism Podcast (SHWEP)

Apr 18 2025 205 ep. 44 mins 2.2k

Podcast episodes – The Secret History of Western Esotericism Podcast (SHWEP) artwork

Exploring the forgotten and rejected story of Western thought

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Introducing the Qur’ān, Part II: Ambiguity and Esoteric Themes

Apr 18 2025 70 mins

We begin to explore the esoteric side of the Qur'ān, examining several case-studies in terms of ambiguity and esoteric themes. It turns out that every letter of the Qur'ān is an esoteric text.

Introducing the Qur’ān, Part I: Revelation, Text, and History

Mar 14 2025 57 mins

We cover some basic territory in introducing the Qur'ān, the holiest text of Islām. We introduce the text, discuss the traditional story of the Qur'ān's revelation, the modern text-critical enterprise of Qur'anic studies, and try to pin down the elusive character of this book-that-is-not-a-book.

Fred Donner on the History of Early Islām

Feb 07 2025 53 mins

We discuss what little we know and how much we don't know about the nature of the early ‘Believers' movement’, the nature and origins of the Qur'ān, the curious case of the so-called Constitution of Medinah, and what went on during the earliest decades of the Arab conquests. Fred Donner is our guide into unknown territory.

Matthew Melvin-Koushki on Islam, ‘the West’, and Western Esotericism

Jan 20 2025 64 mins

We welcome Matthew Melvin-Koushki back to the show to discuss how we might improve our historical picture of western esotericism by including the vast majority of the surviving historical dossier of western esotericism. There's only one problem: in order to do this, we need to embrace the Islamicate world as a major part of the west.

Introducing Islām

Jan 03 2025 73 mins

With Episode 200 the SHWEP has reached a milestone of sorts. We are in the seventh century, and the world-order suddenly changes irrevocably as a new political force arises from Arabia: the Believers. We discuss three main respects in which the history of Islam is the history of western esotericism.

Paul Pasquesi on the Book of the Holy Hierotheos

Dec 24 2024 57 mins

We discuss one of the lesser-known, but most esoterically-important, classics of Syriac spiritual literature, the Book of the Holy Hierotheos. Hierotheos was said to have been the teacher of Dionysius the Areopagite, but he wrote in Syriac, and taught a suspiciously-Evagrian practice of ascent to god.

The Pseudo-Dionysios, the Esoteric, and (Christian) Mysticism

Dec 22 2024 66 mins

We turn to the questions: What is ‘mystical’ in the Corpus Dionysiacum? What is esoteric? The answers we come up with involve pretty much every aspect of the western esoteric traditions, and, after all the initiatory liturgy, esoteric scriptural hermeneutics, and theandric activity are cleared away, there remains the ascent to ‘the ray of the divine shadow’.

Naming Divine Nothingness: Introducing the Pseudo-Dionysios

Dec 17 2024 69 mins

Into the divine darkness of a hyper-non-existent god walks the Pseudo-Dionysios. In this episode we join many esoteric currents from the antique and late-antique past into a new synthesis which will forever shape western esotericism going forward.

One Empire, Many Names: Reading “Byzantium” with Anthony Kaldellis

Oct 22 2024 82 mins

We are delighted to speak with Anthony Kaldellis about ‘Byzantium’, fabled empire full of Greek-speaking Romans which never fell until the fifteenth century, and which plays an outsize role in the history of western esotericism. Come for the historiographical debates about the term ‘Byzantine’, stay for the ‘Byzantine’ court astrology.

Contested Esotericisms at the End of Antiquity: Simplicius, Philoponus, and Olympiodorus

Oct 16 2024 60 mins

We discuss three of the most important thinkers from the final generations of philosophical teaching at Alexandria. One is an upstart Christian. Two are esoteric Platonists of the Golden Chain. One may or may not have been an alchemist.