CONTENTS

Introduction: Western Esotericism and Polemics --- Olav Hammer and Kocku von Stuckrad

PART ONE KABBALAH IN POLEMICAL PERSPECTIVE

Christian Kabbalah and Anti-Jewish Polemics: Pico in Context --- Kocku von Stuckrad

Christian Orthodoxy and Jewish Kabbalah: Russian Mystics in the Search for Perennial Wisdom --- Konstantin Burmistrov

Adorno's Kabbalah: Some Preliminary Observations --- Steven M. Wasserstrom

"Authorized Guardians": The Polemics of Academic Scholars of Jewish Mysticism against Kabbalah Practitioners --- Boaz Huss

PART TWO HERESIES, IDENTITIES, AND INTERCONFESSIONAL POLEMICS

The Trouble With Images: Anti-Image Polemics and Western Esotericism --- Wouter J. Hanegraaff

Between Heresy and Orthodoxy: Alchemy and Piety in Late Sixteenth-Century Germany --- Hanns-Peter Neumann

Between Theosophy and Orthodox Christianity: Johann Salomo Semler's Hermetic Religion --- Peter Hanns Reill

The Masonic Necromancer: Shifting Identities in the Lives of Johann Georg Schrepfer --- Renko Geffarth

PART THREE LEGITIMATING IDENTITIES IN MODERN CULTURE

René Guénon and the Traditionalist Polemic --- Brannon Ingram

Contested Diviners: Verbal Battles between Dowsers and Skeptics --- Olav Hammer

Seeking Ancient Wisdom in the New Age: New Age and Neognostic Commentaries on the Gospel of Thomas --- Dylan Burns

United in Diversity, Divided from Within: The Dynamics of Legitimation in Contemporary Witchcraft --- Titus Hjelm

Notes on Contributors

Index