The Other Side of Salvation: Spiritualism and the Nineteenth-Century Religious Experience

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Summary: East and West Met in 1850
Review: First, let me say that this is a pre-review given the fact that I am quite familiar with the material on Mr. Buescher's excellent website devoted to the primary writings of Spiritualism. As this book is based on the website, I feel safe in predicting that this publication will be a fascinating read. America, at the time of the birth of Spiritualism in 1849, was already experiencing the rise of Transcendentalism in the writings of Emerson, Channing, Fuller and the other members of the the Brook Farm Community and the Dial. One of the great sources of this interest in things Transcendental was Coleridge's misreading of Kant, and Emerson's misreading of Coleridge, but the other was the translation of Hindu writings into English. (Swedenborgianism also had a hand in making America a fertile place for Spiritualism, but that's another story.) Buescher's contention is that Spiritualism was Asian-inspired Transcendentalism in a popular form, and he takes great delight in cataloguing the many creative expressions it found among its male and female practioners. There was Spiritual (Utopian) architecture, spiritual machines (the Rev. Spear's "New Motor") which offered unlimited sources of power, and plans for the creation of an "Ulimate Weapon" which would be so devastating in its destructive ability, that the world powers would see that war was, in a real sense, pre-empted, and would come together in eternal peace. (That's a high order for what appeared to be a kind of tank, from the description of the plans given by spirits to its inventor.) There was also a new kind of theater of improvisation inspired by Spiritualism, as well as group performances of spontaneously generated texts that seem to herald our post-modern experiments in oral literature. In short, Buescher introduces us to a veritable explosion of creative thinkers who attempted to transform religion, the arts, politics, race relations, and gender issues using the new mandate given them from table-tipping and seances. He intoduces us to obscure and eccentric figures, to be sure, but he also shows us that the writings of many of these long-forgotten mediums, visionaries and preachers, contained sometimes viable plans for the creation of a better society, all under the guise of a Transcendental connection with the Other World. It is no secret that Madame Blavatsky and Col. Olcott began as practicing Spiritualists and ended by creating their own transcendental philosophy--Theosophy--and taking it back to India, where it became a real movement for social reform. Strange to say, I'm a bit like a medium myself, right now, making pronouncements on an unseen text, but allow me to deepen this Transcendental Paradox by giving you my unqualified recommendation of The Other Side of Salvation. My order goes out today!