The Mystical Roots of Italian Fascism and Its Ramifications

Part IV: Evola and Conclusion

[This is the final segment of my series on Italian Fascism and its mystical roots.]

     Recently (at the end of 2023) the Internet rather “blew up” with feigned outrage of the release by one of America’s most respected publishers of esoterica, Inner Traditions International, of a boxed set of basic writings by the Italian “superfascist” thinker and writer, Julius Evola (1898-1974). The motive for this company to print these books was the motive shared by most businesses: simply to publish what people want to read.

     Now, as I discuss in my book THE OCCULT ROOTS OF BOLSHEVISM, the proponents of the modern Left practice all of these same things while hypocritically maintaining that they represent the opposite. This “playbook” was inherited from, and imitative of, the early medieval Christians who destroyed the Roman Empire and took it over in the form of the Church. 

     Headlines in America are rife with examples of the basic practice of the Left, which might be summarized in the phrase: “Rules for Thee but not for Me.” This is reflective of the culture found on full display in the Soviet Union. Officials of the Communist Party lived like princes while the proletariat, which they claimed to “represent,” toiled away in dark obscurity worse that that suffered by any serf in Tsarist times. Simply put, Party apparatchiks operate above the Law, because their cause is “just.” The same rationale was used by the early Church which ran roughshod over the indigenous cultures of Europe.

     What is shocking about Fascism and thinkers such as Evola is that they are not hypocritical and come right out and say what they stand for instead of the usual tactic of stating the opposite and relying on trickery and propaganda.

     However, it must be said that the condemnation of Evola based on the idea that he was a “fascist” appear misguided on many levels. Modern individuals, armed as they usually are with pre-set political and personal-power agendas, are little interested in any truth or insight into reality. They are only interested in making “points” for their “side” or their imaginary “team.”

     Any honest and objective reading of the written output of Evola shows a very complex individual. His writings are voluminous and by selectively quoting him, or by selectively citing this or that action in his life almost any case can be made. But it appears absolutely true that he was a thinker who could not be contained in any given political framework. He would be a heretic in any system but that one which he himself authored. He adhered to concepts of idealism (symbolism) and transcendent reality which were concepts rejected by the materialistic philosophies of both National Socialism (which Evola rightly saw as biological materialism) and Marxism (which is overtly materialistic in all aspects but mainly rooted in the concept of “economy” or as Marx called his “god”— Kapital. Both Nazism and Marxism are dedicated to the future transformation of society into a perfected model. Evola, like the traditionalists of the past, focused on a mythic paradigm which envisioned an idealized past and exhorted the individual and the state to fix themselves upon the heroic struggle to live up to those well-known and well-established ideals. Evola was one of the most dedicated opponents to the Myth of the Modern that we have ever known.

     The writings and personality of one Julius Evola (Giulio Cesare Andrea Evola) [1898-1974) have been associated with some good reason with the ideology of Italian Fascism. Although the connections are real and strong, they are more complicated and nuanced than one might at first suspect. Evola’s links existed not only with Mussolini, but with Himmler and Hitler, whom Evola admired (with many reservations). Evola’s philosophy has been characterized with a string of concepts woven throughout his works. These include that it was aristocratic, monarchist, reactionary, heroic, traditionalist and masculine. Several of these principles set Evola at odds with the political regimes of his day. No one was in favor or a return to aristocracy and monarchy, this aspect of Evola’s thinking but him in harmony with the true conservatives of modern history, i.e., those who which to return to a powerful monarchy. This is what defines the word “reactionary” as those who wish to restore the status quo ante— the old order. Although we usually associate the term “reactionary” with Leftist jargon, it was indeed a common part of national Socialist terminology as well. The anthem of the NSDAP, “The Horst Wessel Lied” explicitly name the “reactionaries’ as the enemies of the Nazi Party. (This is just one more of the thousand indications that, despite all post-war efforts to the contrary, the NSDAP was essentially a Leftist movement.

     Evola did not mainly write about “politics,” but rather cultural criticism and the systems of Eastern and Western religion, mysticism and magic. He was a Dadaist and Futurist in his youth but when he suffered a spiritual crisis he had an awakening conditioned by Buddhistic thought. His philosophy was transformed in connection with occult beliefs.

     In the beginning of his activity, Evola was actually critical of the Fascist movement in Italy— he saw clearly the obvious connection between Socialism, Democracy, Populism, etc., and the Fascist ideology. This overriding point about Fascism and National Socialism are usually overlooked by critics. There is very little differences among all of these movements. Both the Nazis and the Fascists recognized that Evola’s ideas might be intriguing and perhaps inspiring, but they were ultimately impractical in the modern world. These political organizations had only one goal in mind: the obtaining and wielding of secular political and economic power in the modern world. Evola dreamed of an ideal world based on the heroic world of pre-Christian Europe.

     After the collapse of Fascist Italy Evola went to Vienna and worked with and was under the protection of Himmler’s SS. Himmler seems to have had a soft spot for eccentrics. The SS file on Evola assesses him as a fantasist, utopian, reactionary Roman who had the dubious goal of promoting an “insurrection of the old aristocracy against the modern world.” The Germans also did not trust Evola’s belief in an international order. It would appear that Evola was actually a representative of the philosophical traditions of ancient Greco-Roman world. His form of paganismwas that of many of the philosophers who, like him, did not believe in a personal “god” but rather a perennial body of authentic knowledge with its own authority, hierarchy and order.

     Evola, like Mussolini himself, apparently felt pressure from the Germans, the senior partner in the Axis Alliance, to represent a racial ideology, which had to mimic the Nazi kind of facial doctrine (materialistic) and also be expressly Anti-Semitic. The Italians, despite having pioneered Anti-Semitism both in Pagan Rome and in the Roman Catholic Church for centuries, were rather uncomfortable with this medieval mind-set. But they were more or less “forced” into it by the Germans in 1938. Both Mussolini and Evola had expressed their doubts about the German form of materialistic racism and Anti-Semitism, but their reservations were not sufficient in the face of the German offer that they simply could not refuse. Interestingly both the Germans and the Italians under Mussolini flirted with Islam and expressed their admiration for its absolutism and strict control (especially of women)— although they were not required not think it all through to its logicaldisastrous conclusion.

     Evola’s wide ranging views put him at odds with all collectivist thinking and all forms of crass materialism— those things which most characterized both Marxism and Fascism. Free of the pressures of the political worlds of the early 20^th century it appears to me that Evola’s most pure and authentic philosophy is that expressed by him in some of his earliest writings. In the 1920s he wrote works that have not drawn as much attention as those dedicated to various religions and political systems, but which seem to be his true heart and soul. These are writings known as Essays on Magical Idealism (1925), “The Individual and the Becoming of the World” (1926), “The Theory of the Absolute Individual” (1927) and “The Phenomenology of the Absolute Individual” (1930). These works outlined what became known as “magical idealism” in which the ego of the individual creates its own god by making itself divine. It need not be emphasized, for it is all too obvious, that this idea of the “absolute individual” is the most profound anathema to the collectivist systems such as Marxism, Fascism and National Socialism. The great tragedy of Evola is that he was drawn into these political systems contrary to his own best thoughts.

     Most of the people who admire the works of Evola today do so on the basis not of his “racism,” or “authoritarian” views, but rather due to his insightful criticism of the pernicious effects of the “modern.” Additionally, as he wrote from so many different perspectives, Eastern thought, Western occultism and magic, etc., he offers a wide range of readers a point of entry into his ways of thinking.

     A penultimate word should be said about the legacy il Duce. Other so-called “rightist” leaders of the early 20^th century such as Adolf Hitler or Francisco Franco have various legacies which they left behind in their own countries and in the world. The Federal Republic of Germany has endeavored to de-Nazify the landscape and has progressively eliminated National Socialist icons and institutions form the public life of the country. The final resting place of Hitler’s ashes remains secret.  Franco, who many think does not even rank as an actual Fascist leader, but more of just a glorified strong-man with little philosophy behind his government, nevertheless continues to draw the ire of the Socialist interests in Spain which he defeated in the Spanish Civil War. But in contrast to all of this, Mussolini’s tomb remains a shrine of sorts, his political views continue, all be it in a minority position, politicians still run on his platform and win elections in Italy. It is hard to say just why all of this is so.

     Mussolini’s granddaughter, Alessandra, entertainer and politician, has served in various political offices, There are various neo-fascist parties in Italy today, e.g., Social Alternative, Movimento Sociale Italiano and the Forza Italia. Statistically, as late as 2018 a survey in Italy showed that 19% of those interviewed has a “positive or very positive” opinion of Benito Mussolini.

Tomb of Mussolini in the family crypt, in the cemetery of Predappio

     The Italian Fascism of Mussolini and his intellectual advisors as well as the hyper-idealistic philosophy of Julius Evola have continued to exert an influence on the hearts and minds of individuals long after the demise of the Fascist regime. Evola, despite the efforts of ardent apparatchiks on the Internet, and despite all of Evola’s own futile attempts to link himself with, and influence, the Fascist and National Socialist systems, must be understood as something outside the limitations and definitions of these modernistic political structures. Much to the disappointment of Evola’s spirit, what he has left behind is unlikely to be instituted in a political system in any foreseeable future. It does, however, stand on its own as the philosophy of a heroic individual standing among the ruins. 

     The Fascism of Mussolini can be seen to have had definite mystical roots. The philosophies of men such as Gentile and Giani provided for Fascism an ideological framework that set it outside the more conventional Marxist model adopted by both the Socialists (Bolsheviks of Russia) and the National Socialists of Germany which is one way or another make use of the historical dialectic, in the former case being formulated in an international class/economic model and in the latter case similarly formulated in a nationalist racial one. Although the words “fascism” and “Nazism” have been thoroughly demonized in modern jargon, the beliefs and practices of these political systems enjoy ever-increasing success in the world: in Russia, in China, in Iran and in many other smaller countries. Until a comprehensive understanding of the systems of group-think, Newspeak and the manipulation of the masses though media outlets is understood and mastered the future will most likely belong to these systems. Awareness of them and the unmasking of them (their masks consist of their false identities by which they masquerade as the opposite of what they actually are) is the first step in a long journey for the authentic thinking individual.