Wouter Jacobus Hanegraaff (born 10 April 1961) is professor of the History of Hermetic Philosophy and related currents at the

University of Amsterdam The University of Amsterdam (abbreviated as UvA, ) is a public university, public research university located in Amsterdam, Netherlands. Established in 1632 by municipal authorities, it is the fourth-oldest academic institution in the Netherlan ...

, Netherlands. He served as the first president of the European Society for the Study of Western Esotericism (ESSWE) from 2005 to 2013.

Early life

Hanegraaff was raised as the son of a theologian. He originally studied

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at the Municipal Conservatory at

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from 1982 to 1987, and cultural history at the University of Utrecht from 1986 to 1990. From 1992 to 1996 he was a Research Fellow at the department for the Study of Religions at the University of Utrecht. From 1996 to 1999 Hanegraaff held a postdoctoral fellowship from th
Dutch Association for Scientific Research
(NWO), during which time he spent a period working in

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Career

In 1999 he became professor of History of Hermetic Philosophy and Related Currents at the

. From 2002 to 2006 he has been president of th
Dutch Society for the Study of Religion
and, from 2005 to 2013, president of the European Society for the Study of Western Esotericism. In 2006 he was elected member of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences, and he is now an honorary member of the ESSWE.

Partial bibliography

Monographs

* -----''New Age Religion and Western Culture: Esotericism in the Mirror of Secular Thought'', Brill, Leiden 1996,

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, Albany 1998. ; . * ----- and R.M. Bouthoorn ''Lodovico Lazzarelli (1447–1500): The Hermetic Writings and Related Documents'', Arizona Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies, Tempe, 2005. * -----''Swedenborg, Oetinger, Kant: Three Perspectives on the Secrets of Heaven'', The Swedenborg Foundation, West Chester, Pennsylvania 2007 (Swedenborg Studies Series, no. 18) . * -----''Esotericism and the Academy: Rejected Knowledge in Western Culture'',

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, Cambridge 2012, . * -----''Western Esotericism: A Guide for the Perplexed'',

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, London 2013. * -----''Hermetic Spirituality and the Historical Imagination: Altered states of knowledge in late antiquity'',

, 2022. . * -----''Esotericism in Western Culture: Counter-Normativity and Rejected Knowledge'',

, London 2025. .

Edited volumes

* (ed., with Peter J. Forshaw & Marco Pasi), ''Hermes Explains: Thirty Questions about Western Esotericism''. Amsterdam University Press 2019, . * (ed., with Ria Kloppenborg), ''Female Stereotypes in Religious Traditions''. Brill, Leiden 1995, . * (ed., with Roelof van den Broek), ''Gnosis and Hermeticism from Antiquity to Modern Times''. State University of New York Press, Albany 1998. * (ed., with Antoine Faivre), ''Western Esotericism and the Science of Religion'', Peeters, Louvain 1998. * (ed., with Richard Caron, Joscelyn Godwin & Jean-Louis Vieillard-Baron), ''Ésotérisme, gnoses & imaginaire symbolique: Mélanges offerts à Antoine Faivre'', Peeters, Louvain 2001. * (ed. in collaboration with Antoine Faivre, Roelof van den Broek, Jean-Pierre Brach, ''Dictionary of Gnosis and Western Esotericism'', Brill, Leiden 2005. . * (ed. with Jeffrey J. Kripal), ''Hidden Intercourse: Eros and Sexuality in the History of Western Esotericism''. Brill, Leiden 2008. * (ed. with Joyce Pijnenburg), ''Hermes in the Academy: Ten Years' Study of Western Esotericism at the University of Amsterdam''. Amsterdam University Press, 2009.

References

Footnotes

Sources

: : :

External links

Wouter J. Hanegraaff Personal Website

European Society for the Study of Western Esotericism
{{DEFAULTSORT:Hanegraaff, Wouter 1961 births Living people 20th-century Dutch philosophers 21st-century Dutch philosophers Religion academics New Age writers Utrecht University alumni Academic staff of the University of Amsterdam Writers from Amsterdam Western esotericism scholars Members of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences Scholars of modern philosophy