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Abstract
This article addresses the paradox of contemporary New Age spirituality, which combines the individualist ideology of the capitalist market with traditional truth claims. The underlying assumption of the New Age—that there is one universal Truth in many guises—supports this type of legitimation. I argue that this paradox can be illuminated from a transcultural ethnographic perspective with the help of the concept of vernacular belief. The emphasis on lived experience reveals the New Age as a mutable and diverse set of practices from which we cannot expect ideological coherence. Analysing the plural ideological landscape of the Child of Nature festival in St Petersburg, this article investigates how its participants deal with competing narratives of universal truth, all of which pivot on one term: ‘Vedic wisdom’.
Acknowledgements
This article was supported by the Doctoral Studies and Internationalisation Programme DoRa of the European Social Fund, by the European Union through the European Regional Development Fund (Centre of Excellence in Cultural Theory), and by the Estonian Ministry of Education and Research (Institutional Research Project IUT2-43). I would like to thank Child of Nature participants for thoughtful conversations and the two anonymous referees of the Journal of Contemporary Religion for informative feedback.
Notes
1. For an overview of post-Soviet pagan movements, see Shnirelman Citation2002, Citation2007.
2. See section on “Sects and False Teachings” on Pravoslavie.ru (www.pravoslavie.ru/answers/page_1093.htm, accessed 13 November 2016).
3. The term was first applied to social protest movements (see Gerlach and Hine Citation1970).
4. Many scholars and practising Pagans object to the conflation of Paganism and New Age. Melissa Harrington argues that the dedication required by some Pagan movements clashes with the New Age practice of “spiritual seeking” (2007, 441), while Hanegraaff (Citation2007, 36) considers some forms of Paganism, such as Wicca and the Goddess movement, to be compatible with New Age.
5. For a review of scholarship on religion in consumer societies, see Gauthier, Martikainen, and Woodhead Citation2011.
6. The prestige of traditional roots is, of course, not exclusive to religion: history serves as a legitimating basis for nations and other groups (see Hobsbawm and Ranger Citation1992).
7. For an overview of lived experiences of Slavic spirituality, see Aitamurto and Gaidukov Citation2013.
8. At the festival, the term ‘Slavic’ refers to Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus—three countries seen as having common spiritual roots. South and Central Slavic nations are absent from the picture, although they may be included in more universal visions of Vedic history.
9. Claiming ninth-century origins, the Book of Vles was discovered by Yurii Mirolyubov in the twentieth century (it was probably created in the nineteenth century). It became popular in the 1970s. For a history of the manuscript and the controversy surrounding it, see Tvorogov Citation1988.
10. The idea that each letter of the ancient Russian alphabet had spiritual meaning was first articulated in the VseYaSvetnaya Gramota theory. Although criticised by many Pagan groups, the idea is popular in wider Russian spiritual circles (see http://gramota.org/, accessed 13 November 2016).
11. See the description of Zdrava on Samopoznanie.ru: “Recently, numerous foreign healing systems, from Tai Chi to Hatha Yoga, have gained enormous popularity. However, by getting interested in them, we miss the fact that they were not meant for our anatomy, since all nations have different anthropometric characteristics. By contrast, Slavic gymnastics is specifically relevant to and effective for the representatives of the Caucasoid race… [D]uring its creation, our nation’s constitution was taken into account.” (http://samopoznanie.ru/schools/slavyanskaya_gimnastika_zdrava/, accessed 13 November 2016).
12. “Beloyar” [Белояр]. Individual Health Modelling [Персональное моделирование здоровья]. Accessed 9 June 2014. http://pmhealth.ru/2011-01-27-11-43-27.html
13. The Bhagavat Gita, the Upanishads, and Bhagavada Purana.
14. See, for example, the discussion of ISKCON’s challenges in Russia by one devotee on http://vedic-culture.in.ua/old/vaisnav/_3/1.htm, accessed 13 November 2016
15. In May 2013, ISKCON established a special commission to examine Torsunov’s activity from doctrinal, medical, and legal perspectives. In response, Torsunov issued an official apology for misleadingly identifying his personal healing methods with Vedic teachings (http://www.forum.krishna.ru/showthread.php?t=7525, accessed 13 November 2016).