Our modern day clown world, our "sinister perpetual carnival", where chaos, disorder, and inversion reign supreme. Why were carnivals once a crucial element of civic life and why have they largely disappeared as we have moved deeper into the Kali Yuga? Do we even still need carnivals when we live in a clown world?
René Guénon, a French metaphysician, explored the significance of carnivals in the context of traditional symbolism and their decline in modern society. According to Guénon, carnivals were once a reflection of the sacred and the metaphysical, representing a form of ritualistic expression that connected the human with the divine. He argued that the essence of carnivals lay in their ability to reveal the hidden truths of the cosmos through symbolic actions and representations.
Guénon's essay "On the Significance of Carnivals," published in 1945, discusses how these festivals were not merely occasions for merriment but were deeply rooted in the esoteric traditions of various cultures. He noted that the absurd and chaotic elements of carnivals were symbolic of the deeper metaphysical principles, such as the inversion of the normal order, which was a way to access higher knowledge and spiritual insight.
However, Guénon also observed that the modern era had led to a degradation of these sacred traditions. He suggested that the contemporary celebrations of carnivals, such as New Year's Eve and Halloween, had lost their original spiritual significance and had become mere secular festivities. This transformation, according to Guénon, was part of a broader trend of metaphysical decline, where the sacred was replaced by the profane, and the symbolic was overshadowed by the literal.
The Significance of Carnivals
René Guénon
With regard to a particular theory of festivals formulated by a sociologist, we have pointed out that, among other shortcomings, this theory wishes to reduce all festivals to a single type, constituting what may be called "carnival festivals," an expression which seems to us clear enough to be understood easily by everyone, since, in fact, the carnival represents what still remains of it in the West today. At the time, we said that, on the subject of this kind of festival, there arise questions deserving of a deeper examination. Indeed, the impression that emerges from them is always and above all else one of disorder in the most complete sense of this word. How then does it happen that they are to be found not only in an age such as ours, in which case they could be considered simply as one of the numerous manifestations of the general disorder, but also, and even with a more ample development, in traditional civilizations with which they seem at first glance to be incompatible?
It would not be unprofitable to cite some specific examples, and we will mention first of all, in this connection, certain festivals of a truly strange character which were celebrated in the Middle Ages: the Festival of the Ass, wherein this animal, of which the properly satanic symbolism is well known in all traditions, was introduced into the very chancel of the church, where it occupied the place of honor and received the most extraordinary tokens of veneration; and also the Festival of Fools, wherein the lesser clergy indulged in the worst improprieties, parodying both the ecclesiastical hierarchy and the liturgy itself. How is it possible to explain that, in such a period, things of which the most evident characteristic is incontestably parody and even sacrilege were not only tolerated but, in a way, even given official sanction?
We will also mention the Saturnalia of the ancient Romans, from which the modern carnival seems to have been directly derived, although it is, in truth, no longer anything but a very diminished vestige of it. During these festivals, slaves ordered the masters about, and the masters served the slaves. One then had the image of a truly upside-down world, wherein everything was done contrary to the normal order. Although it is commonly claimed that these festivals were a reminder of the Golden Age, this interpretation is manifestly false, for there is no question here of any sort of equality that could, if necessary, be regarded as representing the primordial indifference of social functions, insofar as is possible in present conditions. It is a question of the reversal of hierarchical relationships, which is altogether different, and such a reversal constitutes, in a general way, one of the plainest characteristics of Satanism. We should thus rather see in these something that relates to the sinister aspect of Saturn, an aspect which certainly does not pertain to him as god of the Golden Age but, on the contrary, insofar as he is now no longer anything but the fallen god of a completed period.[^8]
[^8]: The ancient gods became demons in a certain manner, as a fact quite generally noted, and the attitude of the Christians towards the gods of paganism is merely a particular case, but one that seems never to have been explained as it should be. But we cannot dwell further on this point, which would lead us too far from our subject. It is understood, of course, that this refers solely to certain cyclic conditions and does not affect or in any way modify the essential character of these same gods, insofar as they symbolize, non-temporally, a principle of superhuman order, so that, in spite of everything, their benefic aspect still subsists side by side with their accidentally malefic aspect, even when it goes completely unrecognized by those without. The astrological interpretation of Saturn could furnish a very clear example in this respect.
It can be seen by these examples that in such festivals there is invariably a sinister and even satanic element, and what is particularly noteworthy is that it is precisely this element that pleases the mob and excites its mirth. This is something very well suited, indeed even more so than anything else, to giving satisfaction to the tendencies of fallen man, insofar as these tendencies urge him on to develop especially the lowest possibilities of his nature. Now, it is just this that constitutes the real raison d’être of such festivals. It is, in short, a matter of somehow channeling these tendencies and rendering them as inoffensive as possible by giving them an opportunity to manifest themselves, but only during very brief periods and in very set circumstances, and by assigning this manifestation narrow limits which it is not allowed to overstep. If this were not so, the same tendencies, for lack of the minimum satisfaction required by the present state of humanity, would be at risk of exploding, so to speak, and spreading their effects to the whole of existence, collectively as well as individually, causing a disorder far more serious than that which is produced only during some few days especially reserved for that purpose, and which, moreover, is all the less to be feared for being thus regularized by that very festival. For, on the one hand, these days are, as it were, placed outside the normal course of things in such a way as not to exert any appreciable influence on the latter, while, on the other hand, the fact that there is nothing unforeseen in these festivals in a way normalizes the disorder itself and integrates it into the total order.
Apart from this general explanation, which is perfectly evident to anyone prepared to reflect, there are some useful remarks to be made concerning particularly the masquerades that play an important part in carnivals properly speaking and in other more or less similar festivals, and these remarks will confirm still further what we have just said. Indeed, carnival masks are generally hideous and most often evoke animal or demonic forms, so that they are like a figurative materialization of those lower, we might say infernal, tendencies which are allowed to be expressed. Furthermore, each person, without even being fully aware of it, will quite naturally choose from among these masks the one that best suits him, that is, the one which represents what most conforms with his own lower tendencies, so that one could say that the mask, which is supposed to hide the true face of the individual, quite to the contrary reveals to all what the latter really carries within himself but which he is habitually obligated to dissimulate. It is worth noting, for this throws further light on the precise character of masks, that here we have a kind of parody of the reversal which, as we’ve explained elsewhere, takes place at a certain degree of initiatic development; a parody, we say, and a truly satanic counterfeit, for here the reversal is an exteriorization no longer of spirituality but, on the contrary, of the lowest possibilities of being.
To conclude this survey, let us add that if festivals of this kind became more and more rare and no longer even seem able to arouse the slightest interest of the crowd, it is because, in an age such as our own, they have become truly pointless. For how could there still be any question of circumscribing disorder and containing it within strictly defined limits when it is spread everywhere and is manifested constantly in all domains of human activity? Thus, considering only externals and from a purely aesthetic point of view, although one might be tempted to be satisfied with the almost complete disappearance of these festivals on account of the ugliness in which they are inevitably garbed, if one goes to the heart of the matter, this disappearance can, on the contrary, be seen as not at all reassuring, since it testifies to the fact that disorder has erupted into the entire course of existence and to its having become generalized to such a point that, in reality, we could be said to live in a sinister perpetual carnival.