Fulcanelli: Master Alchemist (Le Mystere Des Cathedrales Esoteric Interpretation of the Hermetic Symbols Of Great Work)

Rating:
Summary: Liquid Sermons in stone
Review: Many years ago, an artist friend of mine said "I'm not interested in Gothic stuff. Its been 'done.' I want to explore new things. " True - not everyone thinks like that, but it does underscore a serious illusion - that we know what 'Gothic' is - that we have somehow quantified it. In truth, we haven't. Gothic cathedrals are as mysterious as the pyramids. We all know that a cathedral is a religious centre or 'seat.' But the@emergence of gothic cathedrals - all over Europe, with their soaring architectural forms and rhythmns, quite unlike anything around them - enshrines a great and rich mystery. This book explores something of that mystery.

Until of late, an appreciation of Fulcanelli's 'The Mystery of the Cathredals' has been restricted to a few estoric circles. Fulcanellihimself - remains something of an enigma. Born Paris, 1877, Fulcanelli's manum opus was first published in 1926 in a limited edition of 300 copies. It has attracted interest ever since - even though viewed askance by the more orthodox interpreters of Church history/architecture. Basically, Fulcanelli's book celebrates the 'hermetic' or 'masonic' mysteries enshrined in the great European cathedrals, the presence of a truly 'catholic' i.e. universal)and dynamic mystery tradition - at once concealed and revealed -within the very facade of 'stone' orthodoxy.

Fulcanelli devotes much attention to the facade of the Notre Dame de Paris, but what he had to say is true of all great European cathedrals, designed and built by master-masons who had access to the hermetic tradition. This makes 'Dan Brown' stuff look tame and provincial. Look at any genuine Gothic church architecture - carefully, and you will dis-cover what Fulcanelli was hinting at. The dynamic symbolism involved flows
like liquid - through every authentic Gothic edifice.

Taking its 'verticality' into account - more than a few art historians have condemned Gothic as 'artificial' and unnatural- compared to the earthy distribution of weight and horizontality of Graeco-Roman forms. But this is shallow. The secret of Gothic architecture lies in its emergence and unfoldment from a single pointless-point, and its regathering therein. It celebrates a two-way flow, from formlessness into form, and form into formlessness. The 'Gothic' primarily celebrates the mystery of spaceless-space, the space where mind, form and the divine energeia interact. Read this book, digest what it has to say - and you will rediscover the mystery enshrined in every form and the cathedral of life.