ABSTRACT
How can the great number of spiritual/occult texts in the twentieth century be accounted for? And why are the continuing fascination with and the popularity of the occult in society and in literature met with a persistent academic “occultophobia”? Frymer-Kensky, among others, underscores this renewed cultural interest in religious issues: “Much of our society has been secular for a long time, no longer finding its answers in the traditional religions. But contemporary society is witnessing a renewed interest in religious matters, with increasingly widespread interest in nonmonotheist religions, in Eastern mysticisms, in occult beliefs, in mediums and channels, in neopaganism and goddess worship” (1992, 219). This contemporary interest in the form of a movement away from traditional monotheistic religions, however, is not a new phenomenon but has been characteristic for much of the modern and postmodern period, becoming particularly visible since the “mystic revival” in the 1880s, which brought a resurgence1 of the interest in the occult.
