Holy Men of the Electromagnetic Age

A Forgotten History of the Occult

Raphael Cormack

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Hardback

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English

New South Books
01 July 2025

General & world history; Religion & beliefs; Other non-Christian religions; Occult studies

Exploring death, religion, science and social crisis, a startling history of the occult between the world wars, when Spiritualism was truly an international obsession.

The interwar period was a golden age of the uncanny. Clairvoyants, fakirs, Theosophists, mind-readers, miracle-workers and jinn-summoners--all assured the masses that, just like the newly discovered invisible forces of electricity, radiation and magnetism, unseen spiritual powers commanded a realm of hidden human potential. This was a transnational movement of eccentrics, gurus and prophets, with East and West interacting in unexpected ways.

Drawing on untapped sources in Arabic as well as European records, Raphael Cormack follows two of the most unusual and charismatic figures of this age: Tahra Bey, who took 1920s Paris by storm as an 'Oriental' missionary; and Dr Dahesh, who harnessed Western science to create a pan-religious faith in Lebanon. Travelling between Cairo, New York and Jerusalem, Paris, Istanbul and Rio de Janeiro, the two mystics reflected the desires and anxieties of a troubled age. These forgotten holy men, who embodied the allure of the unexplained at a time of dramatic change, speak to our own unstable world today.

'Raphael Cormack is a brilliant archival sleuth and a riveting storyteller.'

Anna Della Subin, author of Accidental Gods: On Men Unwittingly Turned Divine

'Rarely is cultural history presented with such mesmerizing legerdemain.'

Nile Green, author of Empire's Son, Empire's Orphan: The Fantastical Lives of Ikbal and Idries Shah

By: Raphael Cormack
Imprint: New South Books
Country of Publication: United Kingdom
Dimensions: Height: 216mm, Width: 138mm,
ISBN: 9781805262749
ISBN 10: 1805262742
Pages: 304
Publication Date: 01 July 2025
Audience: General/trade , ELT Advanced
Format: Hardback
Publisher's Status: Active

Raphael Cormack is an award-winning editor, translator and writer. The author of the widely acclaimed Midnight in Cairo, he is Assistant Professor of Modern Languages at Durham University.

Reviews for Holy Men of the Electromagnetic Age: A Forgotten History of the Occult

'Raphael Cormack’s enthralling Holy Men of the Electromagnetic Age makes clear the connections not merely between science and magic but also, more ambitiously, between science, magic and celebrity.' -- The Wall Street Journal 'Fascinating ... Today, ""holy men"" have mostly been forgotten ... Cormack excavates them from obscurity, stitching together from their misadventures a kind of counterhistory of the era.' * TLS * 'Cormack presents a fascinating study of the way mythical status can conjured out of the human desire for meaning in times of darkness.' * BBC History Magazine * '[An] impressively researched book. … Cormack’s overall take on the seductive power of unreason in troubled times … is … sound.' -- Literary Review 'Raphael Cormack revisits the early-20th-century golden age of spiritualism to uncover the stories of ... Arab mystics who combined science and esoteric faith to explain a world in flux.' * Publishers Weekly * 'A fascinating, detail-laden history of a time when occultism ran rampant.' * Kirkus * 'Extraordinary. A delightfully engaging and highly original chronicle of our willingness to believe six impossible things before breakfast.' -- Alberto Manguel, author of A History of Reading 'Raphael Cormack is a brilliant archival sleuth and a riveting storyteller. In lives full of violent glamour, mystical illusions, and often hilarious twists, set against the inhumanity of the two world wars, Cormack's madcap prophets reveal how modern politics and the occult are in fact propelled by the same question: do we dare to imagine another world?' -- Anna Della Subin, author of Accidental Gods: On Men Unwittingly Turned Divine 'From Athens and Cairo to Montmartre and Manhattan, Raphael Cormack reconstructs the careers of four occult impresarios through interlinked circles of artists, immigrants, politicians, and theatergoers. Rarely is cultural history presented with such mesmerizing legerdemain.' -- Nile Green, author of Empire's Son, Empire's Orphan: The Fantastical Lives of Ikbal and Idries Shah