Wouter J. Hanegraaff (Author) Wouter J. Hanegraaff is Professor of History of Hermetic Philosophy and Related Currents at the University of Amsterdam, and a member of the Royal Dutch Academy of Arts and Sciences. Among his many publications is the two-volume Dictionary of Gnosis and Western Esotericism.Jeffrey J. Kripal (Author) Jeffrey J. Kripal holds the J. Newton Rayzor Chair in Philosophy and Religious Thought at Rice University and is the associate director of the Center for Theory and Research at Esalen Institute in Big Sur, California. He is the author of seven books, including: Comparing Religions: Coming to Terms (Wiley-Blackwell, 2014); Authors of the Impossible: The Paranormal and the Sacred (Chicago, 2010); and Esalen: America and the Religion of No Religion (Chicago, 2007). Jeff is a historian of religions who specializes in the comparison of extreme religious experiences and anomalous events across space and time.

"A collection of essays addressing a doubly fascinating topic, namely, the intersection of the erotic and the esoteric in western culture from ancient Greece to contemporary California--where "west" meets "east," as the American counterculture supplements its already eclectic garb with the mantle of a refashioned Asian Tantra." -- -Virginia Burrus Drew University "Hidden Intercourse is a book that turns people's heads around, so that they can never think of sex the same way again." -- -Joscelyn Godwin Colgate University "A thoughtful, well-written, and extremely wide-ranging text that examines the crucial role of eros/sexuality in the western esoteric tradition." -- -G. William Barnard Southern Methodist University