‘A new Fama translation 400 years on’

     

Enigmatic literature of the esoteric world is at its most powerful when it intrigues and inspires occultist practitioner, academic scholar, and candid seeker alike, and the mysterious Fama Fraternitatis has stood the test of time for these reasons, despite there never being a high quality adaptation into English of the original German text. Leave it to Dr. Christopher McIntosh and  wife Donate Pahnke McIntosh to bring the classic text into the 21st century with this brand new English translation in the quadricentenary year of the Fama’s first publication. Donate McIntosh also has produced a translation into modern German.

The Fama—its full title reads: Fama Fraternitatis: Manifesto of the Most Praiseworthy Order of the Rosy Cross, addressed to all the rulers, estates and learned of Europe—is perhaps to Rosicrucianism what the Declaration of Independence is to the United States. Its message is an announcement to the world of the existence of the mysterious order, and it arrived at a time when Protestantism was setting free Christianity from the confines of Rome. Its authorship is legendary, meaning no one is sure of the exact who, what, and why. It’s even said that the author meant it as a prank, or a gambit of disinformation to protect something and someone else.

Regardless, values like truth have layered significance in the esoteric world. Factual accuracy sometimes ranks behind intuitive import when romantic types are attempting to define their spiritual lives. Sometimes believing is seeing.

And sometimes that’s okay.

I do not have a copy of this new paperback yet, so for description I will just share what Amazon offers:

Christopher McIntosh
at the 2011 Rose Circle
conference in NYC.

The seminal document known as the Fama Fraternitatis (the Proclamation of the Fraternity) burst like a firework over Europe in the early 17th century, igniting the imagination of many with its story of the German seeker Christian Rosenkreuz, his journey through the Middle East in search of wisdom, and his creation of the esoteric Rosicrucian Fraternity.

The first of three so-called Rosicrucian Manifestos, it has hitherto received no adequate English translation. Now, to mark the 400th anniversary of the original German publication in 1614, Christopher McIntosh and Donate Pahnke McIntosh have produced an English rendering, based on careful study of printed and manuscript versions. This edition is an essential resource for all who are drawn to Rosicrucianism, whether as a field of study or a spiritual path.

Paperback: 62 pages
Publisher: CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform (June 25, 2014)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1499555482
ISBN-13: 978-1499555486


About the Author: Dr. Christopher McIntosh is a writer and historian specializing in the esoteric traditions of the West. Earlier in his life he worked in publishing in London and subsequently for the United Nations in New York and UNESCO in Hamburg and has travelled throughout the world. He was for several years on the faculty of the Centre for the Study of Esotericism at Exeter University. He lives in Bremen, Germany. Dr. Donate Pahnke McIntosh is a scholar of religion and was for many years standing a lecturer at the University of Bremen, specializing in Gender Studies, Esotericism, and Ritual. She runs the Selene Institute for Ritual in Bremen. Her work as a translater includes books, articles, lectures, poetry and regular translating for the UNESCO Institute for Lifelong Learning, Hamburg.