Stanislas de Guaita

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Stanislas de Guaita

Marquis Stanislas de Guaita (often also: Guaïta ) (born April 6, 1861 in the Château d'Alteville near Tarquimpol ( Lorraine ); † there, December 19, 1897 ) was a French poet , occultist , Kabbalist and Satanist .

Life

Stanislas de Guaita came from a Lombard noble family who had settled in Alleville in Lorraine around 1800 , where he was born on April 6, 1861. His parents were François Paul Guaita (1825-1880) and his wife Amelia Marie Grandjean d'Alteville (1832-1901), a granddaughter of the Napoleonic general Grandjean . He was educated at the Jesuit schools in Dijon and Nancy . Accompanied by his old school friend, the later writer and politician of the national right, Maurice Barrès , he went to Paris. His friend, the writer Catulle Mendès , led him through his occupation with the works of Eliphas Lévis to occultism , to which he devoted himself from then on. A letter to the editor relating to his first volume, Le Vice Suprême (1884, German: Das Höchst Laster , 1923) led to an exchange of letters with its author, Joséphin Péladan , from which a student body and later a friendship developed. In 1888 the two founded the Ordre Kabbalistique de la Rose-Croix .

Act

Pentagrams from de Guaitas The key to black magic .

De Guaita first appeared as a poet of the Poète maudit type ("ostracized poet"), for example with his volume of poetry La Muse noire ( The Black Muse ) , published in 1882 . De Guaita's interest in the occult was rooted (as with Péladan) in a resolute rejection of contemporary rationalism , and he was particularly inclined to Satanism and black magic. In La Clef de la Magie Noire (The Key to Black Magic) he wrote: "One withdraws from humanity only to live with God - or with Satan ...". There is no middle ground.

De Guaita's apartment on Rue Trudaine in Paris with its extensive library has become a meeting place for the esoteric scene. In 1887 he founded the first lodge of the Ordre Martiniste with Papus and Péladan . He was also a member of the High Council of the Order of Martinists, established by Papus in 1891. De Guaita headed the Ordre Kabbalistique de la Rose-Croix, founded with Péladan in 1888 . Due to the satanic orientation of de Guaitas, but also because of the newly added Indian influences in the order, which were registered by the French Theosophical Society , a separation from Péladan took place after a short time: In June 1890 there was a major split under Péladan who founded the Ordre de la Rose-Croix Catholique with several supporters .

Through his intensive preoccupation with the occult tradition and the works of Eliphas Lévi , whose pupil he became, de Guaita also came into contact with black magic. In his Essais de sciences maudites published between 1890 and 1896 , he dealt with subjects such as The Temple of Satan; The key to black magic and the problem of evil . In these works he justified black magic and explained the purpose of evil by referring to the law of opposites. In 1896 he published La clef de la magie noire . In 1881 his first volume of poetry, Oiseaux de Passage, was published . In 1883 he published his work La Muse Noire: heures de Soleil . Rosa Mystica followed in 1885, making him known in the initiated. He announced his main work in 1886 with his 32-page essay Essais de Sciences Maudites . The first part of his major work appeared in 1890 under the title Essais de Sciences Maudites. Au seuil du Mystère. The second appeared in 1891 under the title Essais de Sciences Maudites II. Le Serpent de la Genèse . In 1891 he made known the occult activities of Joseph-Antoine Boullan , who was then convicted of illicit medical activity.

Together with his secretary Oswald Wirth created de Guaita later than the Oswald Wirth Tarot known Tarot . De Guaita claimed to be able to communicate with the dead through music and ecstasy . Wirth took on the spiritual inheritance of de Guaita.

De Guaita used morphine and cocaine and also experimented with hashish . His death, aged only 36, is attributed to drug poisoning.

Works

  • Oiseaux de passage: rimes fantastiques, rimes d'ébène , 1881
  • La Muse noire , 1882
  • Rosa Mystica , 1885
  • Au seuil du Mystère , 1886
  • Essais de Sciences Maudites , 1886
  • Essais de Sciences Maudites. Au seuil du Mystère. 1890
  • Essais de Sciences Maudites II. Le Serpent de la Genèse. 1891
  • Le Temple de Satan , 1891
  • La Clef de la Magie Noire , 1897

literature

  • Maurice Barrès : Stanislas de Guaita (1861-1898): un renovateur de l'occultisme: souvenirs , Chamuel, Paris 1898
  • André Billy: Stanislas de Guaita , Mercure de France, 1971
  • Arnaud de l'Estoile: Guaita , collection “Qui suis-je?”, Éditions Pardès, 2005
  • René Philipon: Stanislas de Guaita et sa bibliothèque occulte , Dorbon, Paris 1899
  • Oswald Wirth: Stanislas de Guaita, souvenirs de son secrétaire , Éd. du symbolisme, Paris 1935

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Christopher Mcintosh: The Rosicrucians. The History, mythology and Rituals of an Esoteric Order. York Beach (Maine), 1997 (first edition 1980). P. 93.
  2. ↑ a b c The Ordre Kabbalistique de la Rose-Croix in: Material for the book: "Neue Rosenkreuzer" by Harald Lamprecht
  3. ↑ James Webb : The Flight from Reason , Marixverlag, Wiesbaden 2009, p. 267
  4. ↑ Webb, pp 261-280
  5. ↑ La Clef de la Magie Noire , p. 180, quoted from Webb, p. 280
  6. ↑ Jean-Pierre Laurant: Guaita, Stanislas, Marquis de , in: Wouter J. Hanegraaff (Ed.): Dictionary of Gnosis and Western Esotericism , Brill, Leiden 2006, pp. 441f
  7. ↑ L'Initiation - Historique
  8. ↑ a b Horst E. Miers : Lexicon of secret knowledge. (= Esoteric. Vol. 12179). Goldmann, Munich 1993, p. 269.
  9. ^ Karl RH Frick : Satan and the Satanists I-III. Satanism and Freemasonry - Their History to the Present . Marixverlag Wiesbaden 2006. Part II, pp. 175–176. ISBN 978-3865390691
  10. ↑ Webb, pp. 277f
personal data
SURNAME Guaita, Stanislas de
BRIEF DESCRIPTION French poet, occultist, Kabbalist and magician
DATE OF BIRTH April 6, 1861
DATE OF DEATH December 19, 1897