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National mysticism

{{Short description|Form of nationalism which raises the nation to the status of numen or divinity}}National mysticism (German: Nationalmystik) or mystical nationalism is a form of nationalism that elevates the nation to the status of numen or divinity. Its best-known instance is Germanic mysticism, which gave rise to occultism under the Third Reich. The idea of the nation as a divine entity was presented by Johann Gottlieb Fichte.{{Cite journal |last=Asmuth |first=Christoph |date=April 2024 |title=Revolution and Nation: Johann Gottlieb Fichte's Late Philosophy of Religion |journal=Religions |language=en |volume=15 |issue=4 |pages=426 |doi=10.3390/rel15040426 |doi-access=free |issn=2077-1444}} National mysticism is closely related to Romantic nationalism,{{Citation needed|date=November 2021}} but goes beyond the expounding of romantic sentiment, to a mystical veneration of the nation as a transcendent truth. It often intersects with ethnic nationalism by pseudohistorical assertions about the origins of a given ethnicity.{{Citation |last=Stone |first=Dan |title=Race Science, Race Mysticism, and the Racial State |date=2017 |work=Beyond the Racial State: Rethinking Nazi Germany |pages=176–196 |editor-last=Pendas |editor-first=Devin O. |url=https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/abs/beyond-the-racial-state/race-science-race-mysticism-and-the-racial-state/C663BAC1511CD359F92B304FCD3C0BEA |access-date=2024-10-20 |series=Publications of the German Historical Institute |place=Cambridge |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=978-1-107-16545-8 |editor2-last=Roseman |editor2-first=Mark |editor3-last=Wetzell |editor3-first=Richard F.}}

National mysticism is encountered in many forms of nationalism other than Germanic or Nazi mysticism and expresses itself in the use of occult, pseudoscientific, or pseudohistorical beliefs to support nationalistic claims, often involving unrealistic notions of the antiquity of a nation or any national myth defended as "true" by pseudo-scholarly means.{{Citation |last=Stone |first=Dan |title=Race Science, Race Mysticism, and the Racial State |date=2017 |work=Beyond the Racial State: Rethinking Nazi Germany |pages=176–196 |editor-last=Pendas |editor-first=Devin O. |url=https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/abs/beyond-the-racial-state/race-science-race-mysticism-and-the-racial-state/C663BAC1511CD359F92B304FCD3C0BEA |access-date=2024-10-20 |series=Publications of the German Historical Institute |place=Cambridge |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=978-1-107-16545-8 |editor2-last=Roseman |editor2-first=Mark |editor3-last=Wetzell |editor3-first=Richard F.}}{{Cite journal |last=Mosse |first=G. L. |date=1961 |title=The Mystical Origins of National Socialism |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/2707875 |journal=Journal of the History of Ideas |volume=22 |issue=1 |pages=81–96 |doi=10.2307/2707875 |jstor=2707875 |issn=0022-5037}}

Notable examples

{{More citations needed|section|date=November 2021}}

  • Narratives on the origin of the Albanians in Albanian nationalism{{cite journal |last1=Todorović |first1=Miloš |title=Nationalistc Pseudohistory in the Balkans |url=https://www.academia.edu/41295763 |journal=Skeptic Magazine |date=January 2019 |access-date=18 December 2019}}
  • American Manifest Destiny{{Cite web |title=The Religious Origins of Manifest Destiny, Divining America, TeacherServe©, National Humanities Center |url=https://nationalhumanitiescenter.org/tserve/nineteen/nkeyinfo/mandestiny.htm |access-date=2024-10-20 |website=nationalhumanitiescenter.org}}
  • Some currents of Armenian nationalism (see Armenia, Subartu and Sumer)
  • Belgians (and even Benelux) descended from the Kingdom of the Franks
  • British Israelism
  • Some branches of revisionist history theories of Bulgarians and Bulgaria (i.e. "Thracomania") and Macedonian nationalist history theories
  • Croatian Illyrian movement
  • Greek Epsilonism
  • The Indigenous Aryans hypothesis in Hindu nationalism{{Cite journal |last=Birkvad |first=Ida Roland |date=September 2020 |title=The Ambivalence of Aryanism: A Genealogical Reading of India-Europe Connection |url=https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0305829820971686 |journal=Millennium: Journal of International Studies |language=en |volume=49 |issue=1 |pages=58–79 |doi=10.1177/0305829820971686 |issn=0305-8298|doi-access=free }}
  • Hoteps among African-Americans
  • Claims of interplanetary travel, possible existence of in-vitro fertilization and genetic engineering by ancient Indians (102nd Indian Science Congress) {{cite news|url=http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/mere-study-of-ancient-texts-not-science/article6757599.ece|title='Mere study of ancient texts not science'|first=Pheroze L.|last=Vincent|newspaper=The Hindu |date=5 January 2015|via=www.thehindu.com}}
  • Hungarian Holy Crown Doctrine{{Cite journal |last=Kürti |first=László |date=2015-10-13 |title=Neoshamanism, National Identity and the Holy Crown of Hungary |url=https://brill.com/view/journals/jre/8/2/article-p235_4.xml?language=en |journal=Journal of Religion in Europe |language=en |volume=8 |issue=2 |pages=235–260 |doi=10.1163/18748929-00802001 |issn=1874-8929}}
  • Indonesian nationalism{{Cite journal |last=Sahri |date=2024-12-31 |title=The role of Tharîqat in strengthening nationalism in Indonesia |url=https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/23311886.2024.2347010 |journal=Cogent Social Sciences |language=en |volume=10 |issue=1 |doi=10.1080/23311886.2024.2347010 |issn=2331-1886|doi-access=free }}
  • Irish author George William Russell has been described as a "prophet of mystic nationalism"{{Cite journal|last=Tierney|first=Michael|date=1937|title=A Prophet of Mystic Nationalism: A.E.|url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/30097473|journal=Studies: An Irish Quarterly Review|volume=26|issue=104|pages=568–580|jstor=30097473|issn=0039-3495}}
  • State Shinto in Japan prior to the forced secularization following World War II{{Cite journal |last1=Susumu |first1=Shimazono |last2=島茴進 |last3=Murphy |first3=Regan E. |date=2009 |title=State Shinto in the Lives of the People: The Establishment of Emperor Worship, Modern Nationalism, and Shrine Shinto in Late Meiji |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/30233855 |journal=Japanese Journal of Religious Studies |volume=36 |issue=1 |pages=93–124 |jstor=30233855 |issn=0304-1042}}
  • Jews as the chosen people in Judaism
  • Juche in North Korea and Ilminism in South Korea
  • Kurdish nationalists often make the claim that they are the descendants of Hurrians and the Medes{{cite web|title=The Ethnic Identity of the Kurds in Turkey |author=Martin van Bruinessen |url=http://www.let.uu.nl/~martin.vanbruinessen/personal/publications/Bruinessen_Ethnic_identity_Kurds.pdf}}{{Cite web |last=Lewis |first=Martin W. |date=2022-12-21 |title=Are the Kurds Linked to the Bronze-Age Hurrians? Is Tattooing Evidence of This Connection? |url=https://www.geocurrents.info/blog/2022/12/21/are-the-kurds-linked-to-the-bronze-age-hurrians-is-tattooing-evidence-of-this-connection/ |access-date=2025-04-18 |website=GeoCurrents |language=en-US}}
  • Lithuanian fictional Rome-descended dynasty of Palemonids
  • Mormon belief of Israelite descent for Native Americans
  • Philippine Destiny
  • Polish Sarmatism and later Christ of Europe concept
  • Romanian protochronism and Dacianism{{Cite web |last=Coțofană |first=Alexandra |date=July 2021 |title=Contorted Naturalisms: The Concept of Romanian Nationalist Mountains |url=https://www.researchgate.net/publication/352885324 }}
  • In a 2004 article, David Gelernter described Ronald Reagan as a "mystic nationalist"{{Cite magazine|last=Gelernter|first=David|author-link=David Gelernter|date=2004-06-21|title=What Ronald Reagan Understood|url=https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/weekly-standard/what-ronald-reagan-understood|access-date=2021-04-01|website=The Weekly Standard|language=en}}
  • Currents of Russian nationalisme.g. Alexander Sokurow, [https://www.faz.net/s/Rub79A33397BE834406A5D2BFA87FD13913/Doc~EF1A3ACB2BE54453B997F3647635127E9~ATpl~Ecommon~Scontent.html www.faz.net]; see also Arkaim.
  • The Kosovo Myth in Serbian nationalismDescribed as national mysticism in Christian Kind, Der Wille zur Macht -Wie sich Milosevic zum Herrscher über Serbien erhob NZZ Folio 06/99
  • The Spain destiny in Falangism{{Citation needed|date=October 2024}}
  • Swedish Gothicism
  • Currents of Tamil nationalism (as in Devaneya Pavanar)
  • The Sun Language Theory and Turkish History Thesis in Pan-Turkism and Turkish nationalism{{Cite journal |last=Aytürk |first=İlker |date=2004 |title=Turkish Linguists against the West: The Origins of Linguistic Nationalism in Atatürk's Turkey |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/4289950 |journal=Middle Eastern Studies |volume=40 |issue=6 |pages=1–25 |doi=10.1080/0026320042000282856 |jstor=4289950 |issn=0026-3206|hdl=11693/49528 |hdl-access=free }}
  • Kabbalistic currents in religious ZionismMoshe Sharon, Studies in Modern Religions and Religious Movements and the Babi-Baha'i (2004), p. 77.

See also

References

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{{Nationalism}}