A Scholar on Trial

SECRETS, LIES, AND CONSEQUENCES: A GREAT SCHOLAR'S HIDDEN PAST AND HIS PROTÉGÉ'S UNSOLVED MURDER. By Bruce Lincoln. New York: Oxford University Press, 2024. Pp. x + 190. Hardcover, $29.95. Mircea Eliade is, without any doubt, a name known to researchers in the field of religion. Works such as Patterns in Comparative Religion, The Sacred and the Profane, The Myth of the Eternal Return, Yoga: Immortality and Freedom, or Shamanism: Archaic Techniques of Ecstasy are well known not only to students in the departments of religious studies but to a wider public as well. Even if his theories have been under scrutiny, Eliade continues to arouse interest through his scholarly works, novelistic production, and the role played in the organization of the academic study of religion in the United States. However, what makes Eliade a truly controversial figure are his political past and his own view of it. It is now an indisputable fact that Eliade was involved in far-right politics in interwar Romania. Questions regarding Eliade's political engagement in the 1930s arose immediately after the end of the Second World War while he was living as an émigré in France. More detailed public revelations regarding this past began to appear at the beginning of the 1970s when Eliade had already become a professor at the University of Chicago and an important figure in the academic world. The literature written on this topic is considerable and includes publications that first appeared in Romania, Israel, Italy, and, since the 1980s, the United States. According to his most radical critics, the Romanian scholar was a fascist, anti-Semite, and member of the far-right Romanian party called the Legion of the Archangel Michael (or the Iron Guard). Being a diplomat in the pro-German government during the war, Eliade allegedly knew about the plan to deport Romanian Jews to Poland. The fact that after the war he continued his collaboration with former legionaries legitimizes the description of his earlier political options as “moral infamy” rather than a temporary, opportunistic adhesion (Theodor Lavi). It was also said about Eliade that he was a philo-Nazi, counter-revolutionary, and enemy of democracy (Ambrogio Donini) and that he was morally responsible for the German extermination camps (Enrico Filippini). Eliade's work was read from the perspective of a “secret message,” that is, the premeditated concealment of his Romanian past, a past that would represent the true cause of his exile (Alfonso di Nola, Furio Jesi, Daniel Dubuisson). Compared to other Philo-Nazis who became professors in the United States (Norman Manea), Eliade, too, drew on fascist views even in his academic writings, especially with respect to sacrifice, myth, and history (di Nola, Jesi, Ivan Strenski). His interpretation of Judeo-Christianity and ethics, the emphasis on the bloody and orgiastic elements of religion, or the interest in heresies, point to his fascist-Nazi militancy as well as to serious intellectual deficiencies, his work being pure “imposture” (Dubuisson). Last but not least, Eliade's rejection of history indicates his desire to erase his own fascist past, which proves that he projected biographical elements onto his scholarship (Carlo Ginzburg). The scholars who outlined this portrait of Eliade have followed, in general, three directions of research. Above all, the discovery and publication of the so-called “legionary articles” stimulated investigations into Eliade's biography that sought to draw up the indictment against him. The authors engaged in this type of research are particularly interested in establishing the facts that associate Eliade with the Legionary Movement and the support he gave to anti-Semitism, fascism, and Nazism in the 1930s and, according to some, even after the war. Furthermore, the exposure of these things has raised questions about the relationship between Eliade's political choices and his academic writings. Many authors have tried to illustrate how right-wing political ideas conditioned Eliade's concepts and theory regarding religion as well as the extent of this influence. Lastly, there is also literature oriented especially towards the broader reconstruction of Eliade's biography, which describes in detail the way in which the political and the scholarly (to which the literary can also be added) intertwine in such a way that discredits both the person and the work of the Romanian scholar. Bruce Lincoln's Secrets, Lies, and Consequences: A Great Scholar's Hidden Past and His Protégé's Unsolved Murder is a book that reflects these trends in the literature regarding Eliade's personality and work. While it discusses less the fascist genealogy of Eliade's theory of religion, the book draws on the legionary articles in order to question Eliade's early life and postwar career as much as it tries to reconstruct his biography from the point of view of his political beliefs and academic goals. In essence, it subscribes to the portrait of Eliade sketched by the radical critics mentioned above. The element of novelty with which Lincoln hopes to contribute to this literature can be located in the emphasis he places on the relationship between Eliade and the death of Ioan Petru Culianu, his disciple. As the subtitle of the book suggests, the author underlines the connection between Eliade's political past and Culianu's assassination. While Eliade's critics have focused on his past, academic career, and work, Lincoln warns us of the posthumous consequences of Eliade's political allegiances and their role in Culianu's unsolved murder. To be sure, both the fact that Culianu was Eliade's disciple and his violent and surprising death at an early age have aroused the interest of many researchers. The apparent synchronicity between Culianu's increasing dissociation from Eliade's legacy, his murder, and the resurgence of Romanian right-wing extremism in the context of the collapse of the communist regime has raised questions about the possible involvement of the former legionaries—to whom Eliade arguably belonged—in this crime. Among the theories advanced to solve this enigma, it was claimed that Culianu was killed by the Romanian secret police (known under the communist regime as Securitatea) (Ted Anton) or by the former legionaries from Chicago, who probably collaborated with Securitatea (Moshe Idel). Even though it has sometimes been suggested that Culianu was killed because he knew too much about Eliade, no one has gone so far as to establish a causal relationship between Eliade's political allegiances and the death of his disciple. Lincoln revisits the complicated story of Mircea Eliade's “hidden past” precisely for the purpose of shedding light on the “unsolved murder” of Ioan Petru Culianu. By doing this, Lincoln also hopes to find answers to the more personal questions of who actually was Eliade—who was his professor, research guide, and benefactor—and what actually happened to Culianu, his colleague at Chicago. The author fashions thus a narrative whose texture combines personal and scholarly elements. The book begins on a personal note with an account of Culianu's last week of life when he gave “a sheaf of papers” to one of his colleagues at the University of Chicago Divinity School. In May 1991, Culianu handed Mark Krupnick some papers he was working on to safeguard. They comprised an English translation of Eliade's articles written in the 1930s in support of the Legionary Movement. Several days later, Culianu was shot dead. In 2003, Krupnick gave the papers to Lincoln, who let them go to the dumpster in 2017 while cleaning his office at the retirement. Having given them at first only “a cursory reading” and persuaded himself that “on the crucial question they were neither damning, nor exculpatory, but sufficiently and to Lincoln had about the of the the and study them and the is what the first of The book is, as Lincoln suggests, this story be into by an in which Lincoln a of and in Culianu's of The first through with Eliade's life and career, with a on the relationship between his legionary and the of his academic It the that Eliade had his early legionary Lincoln that Eliade's support for the Legion Hidden continued even after his from the in Hidden and was by Culianu's early in of Eliade Hidden The author the and by Eliade's narrative regarding his past to the radical on the research of the on Eliade's such as and the of Romanian secret Lincoln that Eliade regarding his past in order to his the war, Eliade in himself as the of that he to the radical after he to the and a Lincoln to an Eliade who had tried to his of the he was no involved in politics while his legionary he was not a but to their cause According to Lincoln, much to only an but the of a by by an in Lincoln's a his scholarly Culianu Eliade's by the of the and the and most of the book and on the posthumous Eliade and Culianu's Lincoln that Culianu's own was by his to Eliade's secret Unsolved to Culianu's the author with scholars such as Ivan and who Eliade's involvement with the Legion from a scholarly from Culianu, Eliade had a most in his Being to and his against Eliade the publication of many things written by Eliade in support of the Legion to Culianu and Eliade's the to some in order to him. However, Eliade's to Culianu's to a study about Eliade's legionary and his views on Eliade with The last Unsolved to a perspective on Culianu's an of the facts that to Culianu's murder, Lincoln the theories of this that a possible to this is The sheaf of papers given by Culianu to his colleague his death indicates that Culianu to establish from Eliade, to be no of his but a and scholar of and Being of Eliade to the Romanian of Chicago, a that legionaries who the as Lincoln that one of them to solve the by Culianu to Eliade's it is to Eliade would have gone so far as to a in order to them from is to is a that in which no one of this some his it to solve the of for Secrets, Lies, and is a book that draws on the of establishing the of and, their The author himself to his Eliade, who was also his The with his places Lincoln in of a it was by Culianu, Eliade's to only with the of Eliade and not to become a or to with the past of his former at and the The of Eliade's and the history of up that a that and even the of many has to Lincoln that it is a and to Eliade's past and relationship with Culianu's The way Lincoln to this is, and far from being the of the and the narrative of the book that Lincoln the of the and the and himself into that have the Lincoln the way he to the of the the and study them and the to read these articles to the and to Culianu's perspective on them and his involvement with the Eliade As one can it is by of on the and that Lincoln hopes to through the of by Eliade and his Culianu and the However, the way Lincoln the of the the context in which they and the of is the is by Lincoln's of the of the legionary articles written by the one the author that there is of Eliade's involvement with the legionaries any at the beginning of the he that the thus can no more than from and the have from with the and most own views are less than the According to Lincoln, the are so that they would only a guide, if not the of any tries to his that his interpretation of these is as as it is with their even a translation and publication of these to them more to the wider public would have been if Eliade's had not this how these with the account of Lincoln's first with the Mark Krupnick handed the articles by Culianu, Lincoln us that he them a cursory and persuaded that on the crucial question they were neither damning, nor exculpatory, but sufficiently and to It that it days for Lincoln to have about the The but what the cause of Lincoln's was in the of such of Eliade's legionary a of with Romanian history and Eliade's on who was these how much they already and what of the these be read as damning, or even the that Eliade so Lincoln in the he with Culianu and so many Lincoln to what was this can only be that have who how to with a and it to what his beliefs and what Lincoln by the of Eliade's legionary articles is also Even if he tries to read these against the of interwar Romania, Lincoln a and of both Romanian and Eliade's intellectual While a detailed and of interwar history is of the it is for an not to be by the in which Lincoln's narrative Romanian and the life of from some of the by Lincoln to after the World War to Lincoln the Romanian context in which Eliade as an intellectual as being by the of and the of right-wing The of in a in a that was by the of the of the or the rejection of that interwar at the a much more and political which not be in of of of or of the were not the of the as they also be in other intellectual In for and of views at that were and it is to them and to them from a broader and to them to a between the and the Lincoln's perspective is to Eliade, the can only be a Eliade who had in the of and the Legionary Movement. The to Eliade's with the Lincoln to the in the concepts with which he Even if he sometimes between an Eliade and one involved with the Lincoln to towards the precisely by what he to be the of Eliade's for Lincoln, the and the of the because they that the of in and to war a of Eliade's in which he these that Eliade had in the of the of which he to not with the rejection of but with the between and the only to the of and of being or Eliade's of religion, which is a for this an to life that the of the is Lincoln's interpretation of it as “a to politics as a that was by the of the with Lincoln that in Eliade's indicates his was a with in interwar Romania, political such as and the that Even if that this type of Eliade's to the Legionary the way Lincoln this to Eliade, with the a that had been and be the Legionary Movement as fascist, Lincoln with when the Lincoln neither that the was by the Legion with some of the in interwar as the nor that it was as a of the of by and the of It is that Lincoln the between the and the fascist Legion to Eliade's that he was not into account the of the in and the of of the secret police (known during the interwar as Lincoln Eliade the legionaries and, in to a and In as the Romanian as it with the since and Eliade in his on a of dissociation from the Legionary Movement of the perspective on the Romanian context is the of Eliade's of the of of as In this Lincoln into account neither the of this which be in the of and without of the nor the fact that Eliade the theories of that While in Eliade for in and from a in the written on the death of legionaries and in Eliade their to such as or It can be said that Lincoln's to the of Eliade's and of the ideas that in the in which he was is not only by the perspective on interwar the broader but also by a interpretation of the articles written by he to from the legionary Lincoln so if as he himself the of the to with them he only one from one of the most legionary and, even in this the not Eliade's most radical to the Lincoln on The author not read of Eliade's articles as a in order to the of the concepts but and concepts that he from the perspective of a by the of the far though is the narrative by Lincoln. he to the of the and the of their Lincoln by he according to a that he the he the for a type of interpretation of the he and that the is more in the only to to his can be when Lincoln the of the legionary Eliade in and in which Eliade's is read against a by right-wing ideas and his in the Legionary Movement. would not be possible without the of controversial Eliade's in Lincoln against a from by without the by which it was even in the he indicates that to death the is that Eliade can be any in a right-wing the of the early is Lincoln can his to Eliade's from the postwar The of the in the of the for the of Eliade's that of the death of Culianu and the involvement of his in the murder, without on the In this too, the that Lincoln on are Lincoln to Mircea in by and the against Culianu's of on the of the in this only to actually the of and of regarding Eliade is It is to this only after about in which Lincoln the in the of It is that are not in what way his nor what of as important is the fact that the note regarding these also one of Eliade's radical critics whom Lincoln as a research when Culianu's interpretation of As for Mircea it is that Lincoln the possible regarding raised by the between and from to he to be from the book this and Lincoln the things that not his and that on the in answers regarding the of Eliade's that would have to about the and that Eliade not himself too much in the legionary publications nor on and while the is in that he is for regarding Eliade's postwar collaboration with legionary publications and he claimed in that Eliade was already with the that the about Eliade from that appear in represent only in which Mircea Eliade is there and while the to or after in that Eliade was a member of the to that he is and let the on that and the of Lincoln's his to the of his he a that to the scholarly that Lincoln. Lincoln the research by Culianu, with of his past, intellectual and that Culianu's to the and his continued to with Lincoln's of Culianu's perspective on Eliade indicates how the author to the Eliade with a one in order to the on Eliade The perspective by Culianu at the end of the 1970s for Lincoln, because the Romanian scholar to have his research with more than goals. much a for the he sought of of and of with which he himself and the against his by such as of and the and and that are to the of a later, the author in that Culianu to at Eliade's and and for Lincoln, to study Eliade's past for and on that is, Eliade with of anti-Semitism, fascism, and point the most with the for Culianu's while any is The by Lincoln and the way he to the for and their no regarding his of doing research. that support for he was no or that for he was is not to the the fact that Eliade articles about the scholar in the of his to the Legionary Movement is not even to up at the of and the fact that any connection with the legionaries not or the question that to be from Eliade's no in Lincoln's book for a between being and In his for the true Eliade, Lincoln is to himself from the and from the at any and being thus too much involved with the of his he from a into a Lincoln's to the and the topic to the that especially when personal and are as respect for the other even when it be said that Lincoln to his research according to this Being and of the of his Lincoln engaged himself in a personal the the to is not too especially since Lincoln is it in view of a as it the would be and anti-Semitism, the of the would the of to to when a would be to on Eliade's However, the both a of a and the of the last element in it is so important for Lincoln to Culianu's The between a and the of the indicates that Lincoln study with and in the he not in a or the point of view of the the book biographical elements according to a narrative that without a point of this into an that to the of without the that the would to Eliade, in this a of the a more serious with Eliade's as well as from his It is possible that Lincoln these in order to be to without to the Lincoln's to Eliade the by di against Eliade in combines a view of the with the of the the to the of that us and that without being of to a of the of is, study into The with Lincoln's is not that it a connection between Eliade and the Legionary Movement. is a fact that is in the literature written on this The in to this connection since the in Lincoln's book to be than the us to represent especially Eliade's in the his fascism, and his who a more to the that it is possible to about Eliade's political allegiances without into the of being too or type of also the of Eliade according to the between biography, academic work, and literary writings. Lincoln's portrait of Eliade not account for what the wider public about the Romanian Eliade's interest in what the view of the world. Lincoln's to Eliade's by of what is in his biography not how a person who a and for his life was also to his own study and such of as Patterns in Comparative Religion, The Sacred and the Profane, or In their of Eliade's legacy, and have while Eliade precisely for his to us of the of religion in a context and with the of the things that Lincoln's a things be said about how Lincoln Culianu and have already that Lincoln to Culianu in order to Eliade's It is that the author discusses the relationship between Culianu and Eliade in of and Lincoln's is not without a interest in Culianu's in Eliade's Even the fact that this is from the of a former legionary from Chicago, who of the of a legionary of which Culianu was as Eliade's to Culianu in that legionary However, this view to the of and a of As have already Lincoln's of is While Culianu for on written by legionaries to their Lincoln himself draws on the of a legionary who about the of a legionary in Chicago. the other is Lincoln not by to Culianu's regarding his account of Eliade the between the to political not he to Eliade's onto Culianu, a political that the Romanian of Culianu's work have to Culianu's from Eliade since the publication of the on Eliade in as well as to the of in a of one of the revelations of Lincoln's that Eliade was the possible of Culianu's assassination. Lincoln this by the between Culianu and Eliade, a after into an However, there are many that to the of the between the the last days of Culianu's the of some of and about Culianu's for the about his without from Eliade, as well as about his continued for Lincoln not the facts when he Eliade in the of Culianu by the Chicago not how this was possible since Eliade secret from his legionary past and from the legionary in Chicago. Lincoln also that a towards the according to the of a former legionary whose for Lincoln, are to a for Culianu's assassination. To it can be said that Secrets, Lies, and to the interest that Eliade The publication of this book less in English such as the relationship between the Eliade and Culianu's but The theory by Lincoln regarding Culianu's death is However, it would from a and more of the relationship between biography, academic and writings, and their context for both Culianu and The of between these elements to a of by the to regarding the of the The of Eliade, the of Culianu's and the involvement of Eliade in the us that Lincoln, as a to a to the question of Eliade's past that would us that important of the book are not the of his can only that the publication of this book the interest of researchers and in Eliade not to an or at any but for a more of a whose to the field of religious the research of Eliade's life and work the of of the author of this book and into both the political past of the Romanian scholar and the publications that as his critics Eliade's work be from questions regarding his political the of his past the of some of his academic writings, as well as Eliade's interest in and religious and Lincoln's controversial view of Culianu the for a more serious of Culianu's research on and or of the of his for a to religion. this more light be on Culianu's scholarship and his relationship with by name of a a as of the

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