"The logic of nihilism leads inexorably to the Abyss. He who will not return to truth must follow error 'til it's end." ~ Nihilism - The Root of the Revolution in the Modern Age, Eugene(Seraphim) Rose.
I'm just on the final pages of this book now: 'Nihilism - The Root of the Revolution in the Modern Age' by Eugen Rose and overall a very enjoyable read. It's very much a traditionalist critique of the modern world, from the enlightenment up to the modern age and how everything fits together.
This book is only just over a 100 pages long, it's two This was actually to be the beginning of the magnus opus by Rose but he passed away before getting much more finished. I found this a very insightful book on the dialectic of nihilism.
So who was this Eugene Seraphim Rose? He was an American Orthodox monk, writer, philosopher. Raised a protestant, in his adulthood he became very atheistic and a follower of Nietzsche but later developed a keen interest in eastern mysticism, daoism, buddhism and completed a masters degree in oriental languages. He was was resolute in his belief that certain texts should be read as they were originally written so if that meant mastering Mandarin, so be it. He became very convinced of the idea of a primordial truth, that all religious traditions are individual instantiations of this one truth and perennial philosophy. It was during some time spent in a Russian Orthodox church that he claims to have had a deeply spiritual experience. He felt he had always been very much outside of most traditions, more as a philosopher studying them, but his experience in that church made him feel like he was coming home, and that this was the truth. And so he went on to become a great populalizer of orthodox Christianity.
In this book, Rose says fundamentally, nihilism is the rejection of fundamental truth. What I find interesting is how he talks about it as the dialectic of nihilism. He pinpoints 4 stages of this dialectic but at the same time, these stages are not all all separate stages from one another, but they follow each other logically and they build on one another. For Rose, they all come from the same source of nihilistic relativism. All in all, a good read.