There are exceptional works on a literary level (Victor Hugo, for example), on a philosophical level (Aristotle, for example), on a theological level (Thomas Aquinas, for example), on a metaphysical level (Plato, for example), on a mystical level (Dionysius the Areopagite, for example) … If Jean Borella seems to bring all these exceptionalities together, it is because he is the ‘integral thinker’ of our time.
An integral thought, sadly rare in times of the dispersion of knowledge over an indefinite number of subjects, is thus exceptional, numerically already; but that is not enough! “Integral thought” takes us beyond academic specializations, marked by dispersed points of view that lead us astray, beyond eras, often frozen in provisional conceptualities, beyond regions of the world, anchored in their mythology and revelations that seem tailored to their culture…
Jean Borella has placed himself at the service of the highest human thought, which, when touched by grace, opens minds to something greater than oneself. If “man infinitely surpasses man” (Pascal), it is an understatement to say that Jean Borella’s thought infinitely surpasses Jean Borella. All the contributions in this tribute book bear witness to this, introducing us to a wisdom that is the true alternative to the materialism, nihilism and false spiritualities in which Western thought tends to be lost.
If one were to imagine the creation of a dictionary of love for this work, one would find, collected in this book, thirty-three entries, synthesizing together this integral thought, made as accessible as possible to all.
Twenty-seven contributors have come together to produce this presentation of a prodigious work in homage to Jean Borella on the occasion of his 95th birthday.
Contents
Excerpt
Introduction
Testimonials
Part One. Historical Situation and Issues
Historical Situation of Jean Borella’s Thought
1. Intellectual Situation of Jean Borella’s Work
2. Professor of Philosophy and Philosopher
3. Jean Borella’s Adoring Intellect
4. Civilization and Counter-Civilization
5. On the Notion of Cycle
The Issue of Critics of Modernism
6. The spiritual function of the critique of modernism
7. The confusion of the psychic and the spiritual
8. The intellect as agent of culture
Tradition or perennialism?
9. A critical appreciation of René Guénon
10. Jean Borella and Frithjof Schuon. Sanctity of intelligence and intelligence of faith
11. On esotericism, according to Jean Borella
12. On the immanent unity of religions
Part Two. The Borellian metaphysical revolution
13. Reason and intelligence
14. A history of reason
15. Plato or Aristotle
16. The natural and the supernatural
17. The intellective faculties of the soul as spiritual powers
18. Philosophy and science: epistemic opening and closing of the concept
19. Thinking philosophy
20. The refutation of philosophical atheism
Part three. Symbolic realism and the metaphysics of the symbol
On the ontological relationship of the symbol
21. Symbol theory
22. The paradox of Epimenides
23. On analogy
24. On the Beyond of Being
From application to hermeneutics and exegesis
25. Jean Borella: theoretician of exegesis and exegete himself
26. Reading St. Thomas Aquinas with Jean Borella
27. An application to Gregorian chant
Part Four. The end of metaphysics
28. The meaning of the supernatural
29. Gnosis or Gnosticism
30. The four modes of theology
31. The pneumatization of the intellect
32. Christian mysteries
33. The universal Christ
Significant biography
Essential bibliography
Excerpt
We can heap praise on the academic world of our time – it certainly deserves it – but we will struggle to find any connection with the perspective, methods and style that characterized the relationship to knowledge of the Ancients. The quest for scientific “objectivity”, the neutral and dispassionate tone, hyperspecialization – and thus the renunciation of any integral knowledge –, a conception of knowledge that is neither operative nor soteriological, reducing the study of sacred writings to a study of dead historical documents, all coupled with a mode of transmission of knowledge unsuitable for any spiritual use, this is a framework that could not and will never be able to adequately receive the work of Jean Borella. (Fr. Maxime)
[…]
Thus, very personal testimonies are gathered at the beginning of the book. They mark a reception of the work combining, as it should always be, a mathein (knowledge) and a pathein (experience) or a “science” and a “suffering” (Aeschylus, Agamemnon, 177), that is to say, a knowledge associated with his intimate experience. As Aristotle reminded us, “it is not intelligence that knows, it is man”. They are certainly from France, but also from many other countries: Brazil, Italy, the United States, Switzerland, England, even Japan (by citation). And they are the work of women and men from various professions. There are certainly philosophy professors, but also theology, history and Tibetan yoga professors, and while there are certainly essayists and publishers, there are also musicians, students, a critical psychoanalyst, a computer scientist, a translator, a diplomat, as well as former seminarians, monks and priests.
These testimonies from all walks of life thus highlight the gap between discourse based solely on discursive reason and the opening of the intellect to a possible theophany of the Spirit, even if it is offered by the doctrines expounded by Jean Borella. These testimonies thus show how much Borellian philosophy is operative and embodied, instead of being reduced to the simple status of abstract and theoretical speculation. (Bruno Bérard)
[…]
In contrast to modern reductionism, the human being is presented as having an essentially triadic constitution, rather than a monadic or dualistic one: at once body, soul and spirit, or to be more precise, material body, physical soul and spiritual soul. Through the latter, Man proves capable of participating in the divine Spirit to which he is supernaturally ordained.
Finally, the possibility and the modalities of this knowledge of God through participation, transforming the being of Man, has occupied the series of works of Jean Borella on gnosis (cf. Problèmes de gnose), true and false, orthodox and heterodox, as well as on esotericism, especially based on the Guénonian synthesis (cf. Guénonian Esotericism and the Christian Mystery) which, it must be said, has brought a great deal of order to this word that lazy bookshops continue to confuse with fin-de-siècle or New Age occultism, which seriously impairs the understanding of true traditional spirituality.
(…) Any philosopher of the second millennium, as well as any artist and any seminarian of our modern times, should read it once in their life, in order to give their thoughts eyes to see and a heart to understand. (Paul Ducay).
Notice of publication
Jean Borella is the integral thinker of our time. Attuned to the major cultural, intellectual and religious upheavals of modernity, he has built his work around diverse and original research into the theory and use of the symbolic sign, the philosophy of religion and metaphysics. In the light of Christian and Platonic traditions, Jean Borella’s philosophy offers a renewed conception of Man, whose current crisis of meaning and truth can only be overcome through participation in transcendence.
Being “the greatest Christian philosopher of our time” (Jean Hani), Jean Borella has placed himself at the service of the highest human thought, which, when touched by grace, opens minds to something greater than oneself. If “man infinitely surpasses man” (Pascal), it is an understatement to say that Jean Borella’s thought infinitely surpasses Jean Borella. All the contributions in this tribute book bear witness to this, introducing us to a wisdom that is the true alternative to the materialism, nihilism and false spiritualities in which Western thought tends to be lost.
With contributions, in various capacities, from Franck Agier, Alexandra Arcé, P. Luke Bell, Bruno Bérard, David Bisson, Greg Calto, John Champoux, Paul Ducay, P. Richard Escudier, Aldo La Fata, Christian Faure, Philippe Faure, Bruno Guillemin, Sandy Hinzelin, Marie-José Jolivet, Thomas Julien, Fr. Maxime Laborde, James Mullen, Leo Nunes, Damien Poisblaud, Arthur Schwarz, Jacob Sherman, Pierre-Marie Sigaud, Wolfgang Smith, Denis Sureau, Adrian Walker, Thomas Zimmermann.
