Open Theology 2017; 3: 408–416 Stanislav Panin* Astral Karate as a Phenomenon of Late-Soviet Esoteric Underground https://doi.org/10.1515/opth-2017-0032 Received May 31, 2017; accepted July 11, 2017 Abstract: The article concentrates on the history of Astral Karate, its doctrine and sources. Astral Karate was a late-Soviet eclectic spiritual movement based on esoteric interpretations of martial arts and yoga. The term “Astral Karate” had spread in the 1980s thanks to spiritual leader and underground esoteric author Valery Averianov who called himself Guru Var Avera. On one hand, the movement reflected global tendencies, such as growing interest in Eastern cultures and spirituality, that characterized esoteric groups in the USSR as well as in the USA and Europe during this period. On the other hand, esoteric groups in the Soviet Union developed in isolation from European and American esoteric currents and under unique ideological and legal pressures. The combination of these factors contributed to the originality of late-Soviet esoteric currents and therefore makes Astral Karate an important object of academic inquiry, which helps us to understand the specifics of Soviet spirituality and its further developments in post- Soviet states Keywords: Western esotericism; Soviet esotericism; martial arts; karate; yoga Soviet society, although atheistic on the surface, in fact had a rich and vibrant esoteric underground that scholars has been extensively researching since the 1990s. Interest in research in the field rose thanks to publication in 1997 of an anthology The Occult in Russian and Soviet Culture, edited by Bernice Glatzer Rosenthal and based on the conference on that topic that took place in 1991. This conference was probably one of the first attempts to create a holistic picture of Soviet and Russian esotericism as a subject of academic inquiry. In the Introduction to the anthology, Rosenthal stated that “the occult was a remarkably integral part of pre-revolutionary Russian and Soviet culture.”1 Instead of the traditional description of the Soviet culture as thoroughly materialistic and atheistic, Rosenthal highlighted that the turn from religion to science proclaimed by the Soviet ideology coexisted with an adaptation of esoteric symbols and ideas, widespread in pre-revolutionary culture, to the new social reality. The Occult in Russian and Soviet Culture emerged twenty years ago, however, despite all developments in the field in the last decades, we are still far from creation of the holistic image of Soviet esotericism. Even the basic terminology is sometimes confusing when it comes to the study of Soviet esoteric groups, mixing terms, i.e. occultism, esotericism, and mysticism, especially when it comes to translation of Russian scholarly research or primary sources into English.2 Keeping in mind this terminological uncertainty, it is worth noting that the term “esotericism” in this article is used in accordance with definition elaborated by an American scholar Arthur Versluis. Versluis defined esotericism as a set of traditions based on claims of knowledge of hidden aspects of reality achieved through direct spiritual insights, and accompanied by 1 Rosenthal, “Introduction,” 1. 2 Menzel, “Introduction,” 18-19. *Corresponding author: Stanislav Panin, D. Mendeleev University of Chemical Technology of Russia, Russian Federation; E-mail: stanislav_panin@gmx.com Alternative Religiosities in the Soviet Union and the Communist East-Central Europe: Formations, Resistances and Manifestations Open Access. © 2017Stanislav Panin, published by De Gruyter Open. This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 License. Unauthenticated Download Date | 9/4/17 8:47 PM