The Ritman Library Newsletter

Posted on December 4, 2016 by The Ritman Library

THE RITMAN LIBRARY IS TRAVELLING

The next location of our travelling exhibition ‘Divine Wisdom – Divine Nature’ or ‘Isteni bölcsesség – Isteni természet’ will be the National Library in Budapest from 18 February to 27 April in 2017! We are working on the preparations and the translation of the Hungarian version of the publication!

HOUSE WITH THE HEADS

Artist’s impression – Grote Sael

On Monday 5 December the renovation of the House with the Heads kicks off with demolition and repair activities. In 8 weeks’ time, we will know whether we have been able to dig up historical surprises hidden underneath the floors of the 17th century building. Renovation proper starts in the summer. We hope to be open to the public again in the summer of 2018. Find out more about the House with the Heads on the website.

Artist’s impression – Treasure room

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â€˜PARADISE IS GREENâ€™ – ETS HAIM

On Thursday 24 November, the Menasseh ben Israel Institute and the Jewish Historical Museum organized a symposium to celebrate the fact that Portuguese Jews who had settled in Amsterdam to escape oppression in their native country founded a Talmud Torah school and the Ets Haim Library in their new homeland, in 1616. The director of the Jewish Historical Museum, Emile Schrijver, and the curator of the Ets Haim library, Heide Warncke, welcomed the participants in the historical ‘wintersnoge’ (winter synagogue).

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INFERNO – THE MOVIE

One Wednesday evening, The Ritman Library staff and a few members of the Ritman family went to the Pathé film theatre to watch the latest film based on one of Dan Brown’s novels: ‘Inferno’. We enjoyed it a lot, a thrilling and impressive storyline!Learn more about Dan Brown’s donation to our library on our website.

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WEBSHOP

VIDEO – DIVINE WISDOM – DIVINE NATURE

DIVINE WISDOM – DIVINE NATURE (€ 30)
The Message of the Rosicrucian Manifestoes in the Visual Language of the Seventeenth Century.This lavishly illustrated work, published on the occasion of the fourth centenary of the Rosicrucian Manifestoes in 2014-2016, focusses on an extraordinary range of images which appeared in Germany in the early 17th century. The illustrations partly originated in a circle of artists and thinkers who were directly inspired by the Rosicrucian Manifestoes and also by similar sources expressing the relationship between God and Nature, the macrocosm and the microcosm.Available in English/German/Dutch/PolishGo to our website and read the preface for free!

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DIGITIZATION PROJECT

The books just came back from the “Divine Wisdom – Divine Nature” exhibition in Poland, and off they went again… This time to be digitized! Our curator José Bouman and volunteer Reinout Spaink went to the Archive in Alkmaar where our pre-1900 books are currently stored. They prepared the second batch of books to be digitized by Picturae. We have some more exciting news to share: the first digitized books are expected to be online in the spring of 2017!
Once this second batch has been digitized, some of them will travel to the Hungarian “Divine Wisdom – Divine Nature” exhibition in Budapest in February/April 2017!

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SPINOZA DAY 2016

Spinoza, being a prime exponent of the Embassy of the Free Mind with his thoughts on freedom of conscience and freedom to philosophise, will be a key figure in the House with the Heads when it opens.
Chaired by Karianne Marx and introduced by Peter Paul van Loon, the Amsterdamse Spinoza Kring held its ninth annual meeting, on the theme of the relevance of Spinoza’s political philosophy for us today, in a sold-out Paradiso in Amsterdam on Sunday 28 November.

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UPCOMING EXHIBITIONS

‘Isteni bölcsesség – Isteni természet’
A Rózsakeresztes Kiáltványok üzenete a tizenhetedik század képi nyelvén

FEBRUARY-APRIL 2017
Exhibition in The National Library in Budapest, Hungary

SOCIAL MEDIA

“All things existing have their opposite, except God: it is for this reason that God cannot be made intelligible.”

Art & Imagination

Fludd on Friday

WEBSHOP

Hermetic Notebook – Jacob Boehme

Beauty as the Imprint of the Cosmos – ebook

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ALSO ON OUR WEBSITE

PER UNUM – AD UNUM
Preface from Poimandres to Jacob Böhme: Gnosis, Hermetism and the Christian Tradition

The eightieth birthday, on 30 May 1996, of Gilles Quispel, the nestor of Hermetic gnosis, was the occasion of a symposium held in his honour at the University of Amsterdam. The lectures presented at the symposium by Gilles Quispel, Roelof van den Broek, Peter Kingsley, Jean-Pierre Mahé and Carlos Gilly are included in this volume, From Poimandres to Jacob Böhme. Gnosis, Hermetism and the Christian Tradition.

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MODERN APPROACHES TO THE HERMETICA
by R.A. Plimer

The message of the Hermetica can be studied from a historical perspective but can also be implemented in modern life. Robert Anderson Plimer is a modern-day Hermeticist and Alchemist who offers courses in alchemy and the Hermetica. Students have the opportunity to discuss and debate the significance and usefulness of the Hermetica in line with the occult traditions of the day.

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THROWBACK TIME

The Ritman Library live in ‘Streets of Amsterdam’
When our library was still on Bloemstraat and open to the public, a team from the Amsterdam broadcasting station AT5, visited Bloemstraat and The Ritman Library. Anchor woman Gülden Ilmaz talked to Joost and Esther Ritman in a fascinating journey of discovery through the former location of the library.Read the English transcript and watch the (Dutch) video.

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CONTACT US

The Ritman Library
P.O. Box 11126
1001 GC Amsterdam
The Netherlands+31 20 625 8079
bph@ritmanlibrary.nl

SUPPORT THE EMBASSY OF THE FREE MIND
IN THE HOUSE WITH THE HEADS

The Embassy of the Free Mind in the House with the Heads is a platform for free and contrarian thought. The Embassy offers room for exhibitions, tours, presentations, debates and conferences. The Ritman Library, with its wealth of knowledge and its unique collection, will be the vibrant heart of the Embassy of the Free Mind. The collection of some 25,000 books tells the story of the Western spiritual and philosophical tradition and is, like the House of the Heads itself, inseparably connected to Amsterdam and its history of free and open thinking. freedom of speech and freedom of the press. As in the Golden Age, the House with the Heads will welcome the free spirits and independent thinkers of yesterday, today and tomorrow, from the Netherlands and abroad and be a home to artists and scientists, entrepreneurs and anyone seeking and offering inspiration and power of thought.
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DISCOVER – ENCOUNTER – ENTERPRISE

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4 Responses to The Ritman Library Newsletter

Chantal Connochie says:

March 8, 2017 at 2:25 pm

I would like to see the Image du monde’s manuscript (signature 108). Is it available?
Unfortunately, I do not found it in your collection.
thank you for your answer.

Reply
- BPH says:
  
  March 15, 2017 at 3:02 pm
  
  Dear Chantal,
  Unfortunately this manuscript is no longer in our collection indeed, so we do not have it available. Good luck with your quest!
  Kind regards,
  Beatrice
  
  Reply
Joseph says:

June 5, 2018 at 12:10 pm

https://www.ritmanlibrary.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/09/.jpg

Hi there,

Does anybody know what book this image is from please

Reply
- BPH says:
  
  June 12, 2018 at 11:37 am
  
  Hi Joseph! Which image are you referring to exactly? It doesn’t show unfortunately. ^Beatrice
  
  Reply