Post #550

From a methodological point of view, it is not sufficient—or to put it more strongly, not possible—to describe traditions neutrally. Homi K. Bhabha notes: “The recognition that tradition bestows is a partial form of identification. In restaging the past it introduces other, incommensurable cultural temporalities into the invention of tradition. This process estranges any immediate access to an originary identity or a ‘received’ tradition.” The formulation of conflicting traditions within and beyond the scriptural religions’ framework in medieval and early modern esoteric discourse reveals that ‘tradition’ is a polemical term in the historical sources, which should be applied scholarly in a discursive way only, describing its varying uses, functions, and contexts. It is not a candidate for an analytical term in the study of religion. Although there are identifiable continuities in the history of religions, these continuities do not necessarily constitute tradition. Instead, tradition is the evocation and application, if not the invention, of a set of continuities for certain identifiable purposes. Kocku von Stuckrad - Locations of Knowledge in Medieval and Early Modern Europe: Esoteric Discourse and Western Identities (2010), p. 42