A conversation with critic Eitaro Ogawa reveals how political pressure, media hysteria, and flawed evidence converged to produce a judicial failure.
How Japan’s Unification Church Case Went Off the Rails: Attorney Nakayama’s Inside Account
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From the World
Shincheonji: A Session in Rome Held Under the Shadow of an Arrest
At the European Academy of Religion, scholars gathered to discuss the religious movement while its elderly leader remained behind bars.
The New Testament Church and the Tai Ji Men Case: The Mount Zion Saga in Comparative Perspective
The repression of the Christian millenarian movement during the Martial Law period in Taiwan has similarities with the post-authoritarian assault on Tai Ji Men.
Theosophy, “Thought-Forms,” and the Arts. 4. From Ringbom’s Legacy to Today’s Scholarship
How a once-marginal thesis reshaped the understanding of modernism’s spiritual roots.
Global Anti-Cultism and the Return of “Brainwashing” Theories
Accusing “cults” of “coercive persuasion” looked démodé, at least in academia and courts of law outside of France. But the discredited theory is coming back.
Theosophy, “Thought-Forms,” and the Arts. 3. Kandinsky and Theosophy in Munich.
How occult ideas and deep esoteric structures shaped the painter who transformed modern art.
Theosophy, “Thought-Forms,” and the Arts. 2. Artists Who Saw the Invisible
From Symbolism to abstraction: how a clairvoyant atlas shaped painters across continents.
Shincheonji and the Unification Church: South Korea’s Minister of Justice Promises “Strict Punishment” of “False Prophets”
Elderly religious leaders are kept in detention, while the politician quotes the Gospel against the “heretics” and hails what happened in Japan.
Theosophy, “Thought-Forms,” and the Arts. 1. Discovering the Esoteric Roots of Abstraction
Sixten Ringbom’s “dynamite”: how a young scholar’s archival shock reshaped the history of modern art.
How Media Generate Violence, From Rwanda to Anti-Cult Campaigns. 2. Hate Speech Against “Cults”
Nothing in today’s anti-cult agitation can be compared to the scale of the Rwandan genocide. Yet, the logic is the same: dehumanization, fear, and hate speech.