Robert D.

Hughes,

III

Zen, Zurvan, and Zaehner: A memorial tribute to the

Spalding Professor of Eastern Religions and
Ethics, Oxford
late

Professor R. C. Zaehner, Spalding Professor of Eastern Religions and

Ethics in the University of Oxford, and a Fellow of All Souls, died on
November 24. He was 61. So did the unsigned, extensive obituary in
the Times (London) for November 29, 1974 inform the community of those
interested in religious studies of a great loss. While it is still premature to
attempt a definitive appraisal of Zaehners life and work, it is not too early
to consider some of the major themes in the extensive literature he left
behind and to relate them, where possible, to what we know of his life.
Indeed, we know very little beyond what appears in Whos Who or his
obituary, partly because Zaehner himself was very shy and somewhat
nervous and led a deliberately obscure life. He was born April 8, 1913 to
Swiss emigre parents in England, and was thus raised bilingually in English
and French. His early religious upbringing remains something of a mystery, but nominal Anglicanism predominated during his days at Tonbridge
School. In his most recent work, Our Savage God, 2 Zaehner leaves no
doubt that this experience of public school Anglicanism had a not uncommon effect on him-he became an atheist.
Following Tonbridge, Zaehner went to Christ Church, Oxford, on a
classical scholarship, where he took a second-class degree in Moderations.
He then wisely moved to Oriental Languages and took a First Class in
1936, specializing in Persian, to which he soon added Armenian and
Zend.3 Sometime during the Oxford years he had his first mystical experience of the cosmic consciousness type of monism, which apparently
converted him to a religious outlook on life, but to no particular faith.4 We
know little else of this period of his life, except that he later confessed a
personal acquaintance with the amorality of that kind of mysticism, manifested chiefly in an insensitivity to the needs of a friend.5 During this and
subsequent years he also laid the textual foundation for his later work on
Zoroastrianism with his publication of the Pahlavi texts and related Christian documents in Bulletin of the Schools of Oriental and African Studies. 6
1

I did not have the

2
3
4
5
6

London: William Collins, 1974.

privilege of knowing Professor Zaehner personally. I am therefore

greatly indebted to the Reverend William Newell, SJ, a one-time student of Zaehners,
and to the Reverend Canon David L. Edwards of Westminster Abbey, also a Fellow of
All Souls, for the biographical material not in the public sources, though I alone am
responsible for any distortions I may have introduced.
Times obituary.
Our Savage God, 210ff.
Ibid., 213.
Vols. 9 (1936-37), 303-20,
as BSOAS.

575-85, 871-907; 10 (1938-39), 377-98, 605-31. Cited hereinafter

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140

Presumably it was also during these years at Oxford that Zaehner, like so
others, adopted that peculiarly British form of Marxism as his lifeidealistic Marxism, suspicious of party line and
long political creed-an
7
anti-Soviet.
ultimately
Despite the handicap of extreme near-sightedness and thick glasses,
Zaehner joined the army and served in Teheran as press attach6 from
1943 to 1947; he returned, after a brief stint as university lecturer in Persian,
as acting counsellor in 1951-52, the period of the dispute over the
nationalization of the Anglo-Iranian Oil Company, during which the CIA
and other Western intelligence services were engineering the downfall of
Dr. Musaddiqs liberal socialist regime and the entrenchment of the Shah.8
Zaehners activities in Teheran are shrouded in secrecy, but apparently his
duties as a loyal British subject believing deeply in Britains cause9 came
into deep conflict with his own political views and the morality (or lack of it)
of actual policy, as he himself gives the very briefest notice in Zen, Drugs,
and Mysticism. 10 It is reported that Zaehner found the whole thing a
disillusioning and embittering experience.
While the time spent in Teheran gave much opportunity for Zaehner to
broaden his knowledge of both Islam and Zoroastrianism, it was also in
1946 that he was converted to the Roman Catholic church by one of his
secretaries. His loyalty would always be primarily to the golden thread of
mysticism and the contemplative tradition of Catholicism 11 and to Jesus as
God because he so obviously stands for everything and everyone who will
not bend the knee to the ancient god of Mammon, the god of money and
the spirit of avarice, and the modern god of efficiency, or
&dquo;performance&dquo;.... 12 He could be quite critical of ecclesiastical
humbug and hierarchy; his devotion throughout his life was very real,
many

...

9
10

11
12

Zaehners works are filled with anti-Soviet remarks; see especially Our Savage God,
159, in the context of the entire chapter, and cf. below on the impact of the Brezhnev
Doctrine and its consequences.
Zaehners activities during the war years are not known, but it may be noted that this was
the period of the attempted Russian takeover of Azerbaijan through the Tudeh party. The
period 1951-52 was the height of the dispute over the nationalization of the Anglo-Iranian
Oil Co. by Dr. Mussadiqs government. Zaehner presumably went home when diplomatic relations between Teheran and the Court of St. James were temporarily suspended on
October 22, 1952. Mussadiqs government fell in August 1953; negotiations were
reopened and the problem solved in August 1954; diplomatic relations were restored on
December 22, 1954. Mussadiqs fall also prevented the national referendum concerning
the further limitation of the Shahs power. For details, see the entries under Persia
in The StatesmansYearbook (London: Macmillan) for the appropriate years. In the 1952
edition, p. 1279, Zaehner is listed among the first secretaries, but without portfolio.
Zaehner himself tells us in Concordant Discord (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1953), 6, that
in 1952 he had just returned from a career of professional lying.
Our Savage God, 251f.
New York: Vintage Books, 1974, 144; reprint of New York: Pantheon Books, 1973;
originally published as Drugs, Mysticism and Makebelieve (London: William Collins,
1973), expanded from three talks given on BBC/3 (published in The Listener November 5,
12, and 19 [1970], 623-24, 654-56, 695-96). See also his Theology, Drugs, and
Zen, Theology 74 (1971), 290-96, 350-55, 391-99.
Our Savage God, 210.
Ibid., 253.

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141
however-he worked at the practice of his religion, and his devotion to
Pope John XXIII was almost child-like, as may be seen in many of his
works. He became, indeed, like so many converts, a bit of a hyperCatholic, but this increased rather than diminished his care for other
religions, and at no time did he attempt to proselytise.133
In 1952 he accepted the appointment to the Spalding Chair and Fellowship of All Souls, which became his home, succeeding the eminent Sir
Sarvepalli Radhakrishnan. A mistaken belief that the chair was meant for
Asians, and Zaehners ardent Catholicism made the appointment somewhat controversial, as his obituary notes, and as he himself acknowledged
in his inaugural address of November 2, 1953, Foolishness to the
Greeks. 14 Fortunately, however, he received the support of the founder of
the chair, and his subsequent career more than justified the appointment.
From this point onwards Zaehners contribution is best seen in the light of
the themes of his published works.
A first category of works was based upon Zaehners earlier work on
the Zoroastrian texts; in fact, his monumental Zurvan: A Zoroastrian
Dilemma 5 had already been accepted for publication and was presumably
one of the reasons for his election to the Spalding chair. As an attempt to
establish the existence of a major heterodox sect in the Sassanian period, it
remains the controversial landmark. In a very favourable review,16 the
distinguished Iraniologist Duchesne-Guillemin confessed himself converted to Zaehners middle way between discounting the existence of the
sect from lack of direct evidence and making too much of it. Even in this
early work, however, Zaehner showed his tendency to impose order on
material even when that order was problematic or the evidential justification weak.&dquo; In his otherwise favourable review of The Dawn and Twilight
of Zoroastrianism , 18 S. Shaked took Zaehner to task for this tendency, as
well as for another tendency apparent in other works-the neglect of
details of the daily practice of a religion and its lived ritual in favour of
textual matters.9 Nevertheless, Dawn and Twilight shows a greater sensitivity to historical, political, and economic realities than other of
Zaehners works, and remains a useful and scholarly introduction to the
subject. An earlier work, The Teachings of the Magi: A Compendium of
Zoroastrian Beliefs, 20 is a useful, more popular introduction.
Although the years in Persia had given Zaehner an increasing fluency
in Arabic and a first-hand introduction to Islam, he did not turn immediately in this direction, except for a brief article, Islam and
13
14

15
16
17

18
19
20

Times obituary.
Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1953; also published as an appendix in Concordant Discord:
The Interdependence of Faiths, being the Gifford Lectures on natural religion delivered
at St. Andrews 1967-69 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1970), 428-43; see also pp. 7-8.
Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1955.
Journal of Near Eastern Studies 15 (1956), 108-12.
It should be noted that in Postscript to Zurvan, BSOAS 17 (1955), 231-49, Zaehner
makes a number of corrigenda, especially on the subject of Mithraism.
London: Weidenfeld and Nicolson, 1961.
BSOAS 27 (1964), 447-49.
London: Allen and Unwin, and New York: Macmillan, 1956.

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142

Christ, Dublin Review 231/474 (1957), 271-88, in which he showed his

appreciation for the high christology of the Koran, as opposed to some
more popular Muslim views, and announced that deep appreciation of
Muhammed as a true prophet of the one God-along with Zoroaster and the
prophets of Israel-that was to remain his stance in his subsequent more
general works. He turned to a more general study of the world religions,
which bore fruit in his editorship of The Concise Encyclopaedia of Living
Faiths, 21 which despite certain weaknesses of balance presents the general
reader with strong articles by distinguished scholars in each field.
Zaehners opening and closing remarks, as well as his chapter on the new
Buddha (Jung) and the new Tao (Marxism), shed interesting light on his
early attempts to formulate an overview of the field.
His attention to a particular religion turned to Hinduism, partly because he saw it as the archetype and source of mystical religion, the
opposite pole (by his own categorization) to the prophetic type flowing
from Judaism, and partly perhaps because of the need to be conversant
with the field of his distinguished predecessor at Oxford. The first fruits
were his Hinduisrrc, 22 a useful overview, and Hindu Scriptures, 23 a good
selection for the general reader, culminating in his edition of The Bhagavad
Gita24 with a useful introduction, commentary, and extensive notes. All
these works are shaped by Zaehners view, shared by Basham in his article
on Hinduism in the Encyclopaedia, that the characteristic trend in the
development of Indian religion was towards the higher bhakti of devotional
theism, thus following the theistic mediaeval commentator Ramanuja as
opposed to the earlier monist Vedantan, Sankara, the latter revitalized in
the neo-Vedantan movements of modern times, which are often reactions
against Islam and Christianity. This position is certainly highly controversial, but of great importance is the fact that Zaehners integrity always led
him to admit his own biases25 so that the reader might correct for them.
This is a healthy contrast to self-styled objective scholars who often
simply assume the neo-Vedantan approach to be correct; Zaehners works
provide the balance of a new point of view to such works.
Despite his careful attention and devoted if controversial scholarship
in these particular areas, Zaehner himself tells us that his major thrust was
elsewhere: Since my election to the Spalding Professorship of Eastern
Religions and Ethics at the University of Oxford in 1952, my principal
interest (apart from the study of the great religions as such), has been in the
phenomenon of mysticism.26 In the first of a long series of works which
would spend at least some time on the phenomenon of mysticism, namely,
the often reissued Mysticism, Sacred and Profane, 2 Zaehner makes it
21
22
23
24
25
26
27

New York: Hawthorn Books, 1959.

London and New York: Oxford University Press, 1962.
London: Dent, and New York: Dutton, 1966 (Everyman, No. 944).
Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1969.
See, for example, his introduction to his edition of the Gita, 2.
Ibid., 2.
Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1957; first Oxford paperback, Oxford University Press, 1961;
page references are to the 1971 reprint.

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143

quite clear in the introduction why he turned to this field; he was reacting
violently against Aldous Huxleys claim, in The Doors of Perception, 2a
that all religious mystical experience was basically alike, and that furthermore the basic experience could be produced by drugs such as mescalin.
Zaehner felt himself particularly qualified to answer that claim, partly
because he felt the challenge so keenly, partly because he had had in his
youth an experience similar to that described by Mr. Huxley, and partly
because he had some of the scholarly skills necessary to evaluate the
literature of the Eastern religions so often appealed to by the advocates of
the philosophia perennis. In addition, to further validate his views Zaehner
undertook a controlled mescalin experience (reported in Appendix B),
which he found highly amusing but hardly mystical. Zaehner never tells us
whether or not he had ever experienced the contemplation of loving union
with God which is at the core of Christian and other theistic mysticisms, but
from much of his writings we must assume he had at least tasted it (people
who have are often quite reluctant to talk about it because to do so violates
the humility that is part of the experience). Theists are often at a loss to
defend the distinction between what they experience and believe, on the
one hand, and nature mysticism and its parallel drug experiences, on the
other, if they have not experienced the latter, partly because those who
have experienced only the latter are so convinced of the identity; to those
who have experienced more than one kind, it is simply obvious that there is
a

difference.

Beginning with Mysticism, Sacred and Profane, Zaehner distinguished four essentially different kinds of mystical experience:29
(1) The transcending of spatial limitations and the consequent feeling
is the All. Zaehner sees this as the essential feature of nature
or cosmic consciousness.
(2) The transcending of temporal limitations and the consequent
realization that one cannot die-a feature of somewhat more advanced
instances of (1). Both of these Zaehner sees as either genuine or as illusions
of mere ego expansion, and drugs may produce parallel experiences thus
far.
(3) The intuition of oneness outside both space and time in which
there is no becoming, only Being. If one is a monist, this is interpreted as
experiencing oneself as the only reality, leading to statements such as I am
Brahman. If one is not, this is usually experienced as personal integration
or centring, and Zaehner often identifies it with the Jungian concept of
that

one

mysticism,

integration.
This state is achieved by a process of Yoga~f introspection and integration of all the
faculties into a timeless inner core. This is a contraction into the One rather than an
Expansion into the All. All three experiences invariably bring peace and joy: sometimes they
are considered to transcend good and evil. Of love there has hitherto been no hint.

(4) The love of God in the context of pure spirituality beyond space
and time and beyond the &dquo;One.&dquo; In the Hindu tradition this first appears in
28
29

London: Chatto and Windus, 1954.

Zen, Drugs, and Mysticism (see n. 10 above), 93; see also Concordant Discord (see n. 14
above), 204. In Mysticism, Sacred and Profane categories one and two were still combined in one—nature mysticism.

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144

the Bhagavad-Gita.3 Although Zaehner himself would be haunted by the

question often asked by his critics, whether precision can be brought into
the heart of mysticism without discrediting the mystical vision of unity as
such,31 those who agree with him concerning the varieties of praeternatural experience see the development and championing of these
categories, especially against the fads of drugs and pop Eastern mysticism, as perhaps his major contribution. In the scholarly field they received
their first test in Zaehners Hindu and Muslim Mysticism.32 Although
Zaehners view that later Sufism shows clear non-dualist Vedantan influence from India is highly controversial,33 the categories proved their usefulness as analytic tools.
In what appears in retrospect to be the mainstream of Zaehners work,
this interest in and categorization of mystical experience is joined by a
second thrust-the effort honestly to study and appreciate other religions
from the standpoint of Catholicism, as Zaehner himself tells us
in Concordant Discord (20). Many of these works are either of a popular
kind, or publications of lecture series (during his career, Zaehner was
invited to deliver many of Britains most distinguished memorial lectures in
the field of religion). In noting tendencies toward rhetorical discourse and a
tendency to repeat himself from book to book, it is important to keep the
sociology of these books in mind. What is fascinating about them, in
addition to new bits of knowledge about religion which Zaehner added (he
became much more sophisticated in his treatment of Chinese religion as
time went on), is the degree to which they manifest four changing characteristics of Zaehners thought: (1) a continuing search for an adequate
model for relating the religions to one another and to Catholicism in
particular; (2) a continuing struggle to find adequate philosophical and
theological tools and concepts for the understanding of his own faith; (3) a
constant and keen awareness of current events and trends as these placed
demands on the first two; and (4) a personal struggle, or wrestling like a
modern Jacob, with Yahweh, the God of the Old Testament who often
appears to be mad, bad, or both, and with the problem of evil in general.
Tracing the subtleties of this development would require a major study
beyond the scope of this one, but some highlights may be observed here.
In At Sundry Times, 34 written shortly after Mysticism, Sacred and
Profane, Zaehners purpose is to discuss How a Christian should regard
the non-Christian religions and how, if at all, he could correlate them into
his own ...; the last chapter shows, or tries to show, how the main trend
in Hinduism and Buddhism on the one hand, and of Zoroastrianism on the
other meet and complete each other in Christian revelation (9). The basic
In his introduction to his edition of the Gita, 2-3, Zaehner confessed this was why he
loved the Gita.
311 Our Savage God (see n. 2 above), 73.
32 London: University of London, Athlone Press, 1960.
33 See the review by T. Gelblum in BSOAS 25 (1962), 173-76.
34 At Sundry Times: An Essay in the Comparison of Religions (London: Faber and Faber,
1958); republished as The Comparison of Religions (Boston: Beacon Press, 1962), with a
new preface; page references are to the latter.
30

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145

categorization

is still between

prophetic and mystical religion as the ideal

types, the effort being to show that Christianity combines the best of both.

However, Zaehner clearly rejects any rigorist view that would deny all
revelation in other religions. In particular, since the mystical religions of
further Asia do not refer to the historical activity of God at all, they may be
seen as not even in conflict with the Old Testament, but as teaching
empirical truths about the human soul. Zoroaster and Muhammed are
recognized as true prophets, and the ideological dangers of the prophetic
type are contrasted with the more peaceful tolerance of the mystical
varieties. Like his inaugural address, Foolishness to the Greeks,35 this
work still tends to emphasize the differences among the religions.
As the very title of The Convergent Spirit: Towards a Dialectic of
Religions36 indicates, Zaehner had turned in the early sixties to a new set of
categories. The ideal types now become religions of the solitary as contrasted to religions of solidarity, allowing for a more accurate placement of
Confucianism. Although all are to meet in Catholic Christianity, this is no
longer by amalgamation of bits and pieces, but via an historical dialectic.
The thought of Teilhard de Chardin becomes of great importance for
Zaehner for the first time in this work. Zoroastrianism remains very much a
paradigm (194), and the this-worldly optimism of that faith is identified by
Zaehner with that of Teilhard de Chardin (141).
Christianity and Other Religions,37 designed for a wider audience,
repeats many of the same themes. Zaehners devotion to Pope John,
evident from this work on, makes itself felt (7). Some sociological awareness is shown in the recognition of the problem of imperialism in Christian
missions (10), and the categories move somewhat in the direction of the
subtler dialectic of Concordant Discord. The idea of the fall as a fall
upwards into self-consciousness, typical of Teilhardian thought, is
strongly stated (136ff.); unfortunately, Zaehner was apparently never
aware of the link this could have provided to Anglican thought, notably that
of William Temple, and thus missed an opportunity to make some peace
with the church of his boyhood. The following passage, indicative of
Zaehners attitude towards Judaism, also shows that the ideal types of
prophetic/mystical are still operating underneath the new categories:
Judaism is the prophetic religion par excellence, and Christianity sees itself as the fulfilment
of Jewish prophecy. In this sense it too is a prophetic religion, but it fulfils the Old Covenant by
introducing into it a mystical element which it has in common with the religions of further
Asia, but which is absent from the Old Testament, for the Old Testament too is a Defective
Vehicle (100).

Unfortunately Zaehner never takes account of the indigenous mystical

element in later rabbinic Judaism.
In the Gifford lectures of 1967-69, published as Concordant Discord, 38
35
36

37
38

See n. 14 above.
In the series Religious Perspectives, 3 (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1963);
republished as Matter and Spirit: Their Convergence in Eastern Religions, Marx and
Teilhard de Chardin (New York: Harper & Row, 1963).
The Twentieth Century Encyclopedia of Catholicism, Sec. 15, Non-Christian Beliefs,
Vol. 146 (New York: Hawthorn Books, 1964).
See n. 14 above.

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146
Zaehner reached the peak of his dialectical Teilhardian subtlety. If one is to
read only one of his works, this should be the one, for much of his prior
positive contributions are in it. The lectures open with a quotation from
the Trait de lamour de Dieu of St. Francis De Sales, which indicates the
new subtlety in the framework: There is beauty in music, when voices,
which are true, clear, distinct, blend to produce perfect consonance, perfect harmony, to achieve unity in diversity and diversity in unity-a good
description might be discordant concord; better still, concordant discord
(1). That is, Zaehner sought ever more to avoid the Scylla of emphasizing
only the differences among the religions, and the Charybdis of a cheap
harmonizing typical of a facile comparison of religions still too often
evident in political and educational circles. The model of Concordant
Discord represents Zaehners greatest attempt to find a way to let each
religion speak and be valued for itself, and yet still be valued from the
standpoint of his own faith: Like Teilhard de Chardin I see my own
religion, Catholic Christianity, in terms of creative evolution, but as an
evolution in which each of the world religions has or will have its distinctive
and individual part to play (20). Because it is so different, it provides a
good balance to that other great attempt to appreciate other religions in
their own right and yet from the standpoint of personal Christian commitment, the work of Wilfred Cantwell Smith.39 In fact, Zaehner has some
telling remarks to make about the excessive personalism of the modern
West, which is one of the bases of Smiths work. 40
Some of Zaehners own typical weaknesses are still here. Though
there is a greater emphasis on the actual religious experience of persons,
and a bit more attention to historical and social realities than in other
works, this remains a work based largely on scholarly examination of texts.
Here as elsewhere Zaehner shows an amazing inability to appreciate the
metaphysical mysticism of the Christian Platonist tradition (276), while his
dislike of theologians (11) bears undesirable fruit whenever he theologizes
himself, as in his unsubtle attack on Protestantism (348), or his simple
identification of Yahweh of the Old Testament with the first person of the
Christian Trinity (365). 41 Many of his particular strengths are also evident,
however, including his ability to draw meaningfully on classics of French
literature. His use of Bernanos already hints at the gathering shadows.
In the Riddell lectures of 1969, published as Dialectical Christianity
and Christian Materialism, 42 and in lectures given in India later that year,
published as Evolution in Religion: A Study in Sri Aurobindo and Pierre
Teilhard de Chardin,43 the analysis of Concordant Discord is pushed
farther in particular areas towards parallels with Marxist and Eastern
thought. The first two categories of mysticism (cosmic consciousness)
39
40
41
42

43

E.g., in The Meaning and End of Religion (New York: Macmillan, 1962).
Concordant Discord, 205, 226.
The patristic tendency is to see in Yahweh the pre-existent second person of the Trinity
as the active agent in creation, or, better yet, the whole Trinity.
Fortieth Series, delivered at the University of Newcastle upon Tyne, February 25, 26, 27,
1969 (London: Oxford University Press, 1971).
Westcott Lectures, St. Stephens College, Delhi, 1969 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1971).

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147
are now seen as Teilhard de Chardins mysticism of matter, the Nirvana
mysticism of category three as the mysticism of spirit (Dialectical Christianity, 3-4). Though the note of optimism is still dominant, there are darker
hints in some early criticism of Teilhard de Chardin-mostly for obscurantism (Dialectical Christianity, 76~and in recognition that the defect of all
mysticism is the tendency to bypass the problem of evil (Evolution, 8). The
first twilight of Zaehners dark night of the soul-his wrestling with the

Yahweh of the Old Testament-also appears, as he seems to see Yahweh

much like Zurvan in heterodox Zoroastrianism, having the serpent
within himself as well as the divine goodness (Evolution, 62), and in his
sympathy for Aurobindos view of God as a tyrant and a bully (Evolution,
as

68).
For the dark night was coming for Zaehner, when he would be forced
by a new appreciation of (in Bonhoeffers phrase) the wickedness of evil
to give up all his dialectical optimism and reject Teilhard de Chardin. Little
is known of the reasons, though the time can be placed between the lectures
in Delhi, Christmas 1969, and the Abc talks of November 1970, later
published as Zen, Drugs, and Mysticism.44 The state of the Roman church
after Humanae Vitae may have had some effect. Perhaps most significant
was the rape of Czechoslovakia, for the idealist Marxist in Zaehner was
much taken with Dubcezks Communism with a human face, and he is
reported even to have gone to Prague during this period to learn the
language. His last two works show his bitterness not only towards the
Soviets, but also towards Western indifference. 45
Whatever the reason, the rejection of Teilhard de Chardin was nearly
total, first because Zaehner came to see him as unscientific, and secondly
because he saw him as amoral. 46 In Our Savage God the attack becomes
almost vicious; having used the murders of Sharon Tate and companions
by Manson and family as a point of departure, Zaehner declares Teilhard
de Chardins vision to be as mad as Mansons (71), accusing him of
transforming Christianity from its roots in atoning (&dquo;at-one-ing&dquo;) self

sacrifice in the most literal sense of that word into a Platonic mishmash in
which a holy matter is alternately worshipped and spurned (161). Revolted, as before, by Teilhard de Chardins apparent reaction to the atomic
bomb (248), Zaehner presents his own pessimistic view that mankind is
converging on nothing, and condemns Teilhard de Chardins vision as
that of an anthill. In a final, bitter attack he condemns him as the prophet of
efficiency (260), to which, it will be remembered, he saw Christ forever
opposed, and he declares that the church had been right to suppress
Teilhard de Chardins works (262). Needless to say, all this is hardly fair to
Teilhard de Chardin, and much of this new bitterness spreads to other areas
of Zaehners early beliefs.
And yet these later works are not without interest as they show
Zaehners final search for adequate philosophical categories in which to
understand his own faith and that of others; that he had turned to Aristotle
44
45
46

See

n.

10 above.

Zen, Drugs, and Mysticism, 14, 144, 171; Our Savage God, 250.
Zen

Drugs, and Mysticism, 179.

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148
God suggests that had he lived, he might soon
have discovered St. Thomas Aquinas, and through him a bit more sympathy for the much maligned theologian. Perhaps most important for our
time is that the great lover of the golden thread of mysticism found it
necessary to add to his caution against facile monisms a profound warning
that without a deep sense of evil all religion is dangerous, and that the
passion of Arjuna must be tempered by the conscience of Yudhishthira.
Many of the lacunae in Zaehners work have already been noted: the
lack of attention to the personal dimension of the beliefs of others except in
the mystical realm, to ritual and practice, to larger social, historical, and
economic trends-especially surprising in a Marxist. His dislike of Protestantism and all mysticism of the Word led him to ignore Bunyan, Wesley,
and Jonathan Edwards, and he never understood the Hebrew dimensions
of the logos doctrine of his own faith, only the Greek. Judaism for him was
never a still living tradition, and, perhaps strangest of all, he never examined the mystical element in either the conversion or prophetic
experiences-surely an important link between his ideal types.
But these cannot overshadow his great contributions in the textual
scholarship of Zoroastrianism and Hinduism, his pioneering work in the
analysis of mysticism and the provision of preliminary categories for
nuanced interreligious dialogue at the deepest levels of religious experience. His warnings to contemporary culture concerning cheap mysticism,
drugs, and a monism removed from its social context and its tendency to
amorality still appear appropriate to many. For those who believe with
W. C. Smith and the Chicago school that personal religious commitment
can be an asset rather than a hindrance in the study of religion, an honest
and openly stated bias better than a pretended pseudo-objectivity,
Zaehners deep faith and equally deep sympathy are a valued example.
Those who share his faith can take comfort in the evidence at the end
of Our Savage God that the wrestling with Yahweh was nearly over, that in
the midst of his own despair a great Christian had found the final Islam. He
died, it is reported, on the way back to his rooms from mass. 47

by the time of Our Savage

47

My thanks

to Professor

Joseph

T. OConnell of St. Michaels

College for his help and

encouragement in this project. The interesting and informative article by Geoffrey

Parrinder, Robert Charles Zaehner, History of Religions 16/1 (1976), 66-74, appeared
after the present article was too far along in the publication process to consider it. I am
pleased to note, however, the many points of agreement.

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