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On the attitude of the Greeks with regard to foreign religions The Greeks place the beliefs, rites and behaviour patterns which we regard as religious in the category of νόμοι., which also includes many other traditional usages. They note that these νόμοι vary according to the peoples, but are not disturbed by this observation. They are not unaware that though the names and images vary and different rites are practiced the same gods are addressed. The author endeavours to understand this attitude. He refers to what is known about the religious psychology of the Greeks and asks what can be learnt from this attitude.

The World Upside Down in Taoist Internal Alchemy. The process of inversion is one of the fundamental principles of internal alchemy. The course of the seasons flows in a direction opposite to the natural one : Water-winter gives birth to Metal-autumn. Metal floats and Wood sinks, Fire goes down and Water up. Fire is above Water, Earth above Heaven, woman above man. In the same way one takes the interior concealed in its envelope : Yin in Yang and Yang in Yin. So, for instance, the moon is masculine and yang and the sun is feminine and yin. This illustrates the hierogamic exchange of attributes. This process of inversion co-exists with the natural process so that the two opposite movements can be seen at the same time (« en transparence ») and it realizes the figure of the "coincidentia oppositorum".

Invulnerable to iron and fire. Soufism and fakirism in Southern India (Karnataka). In the Indian melting pot, soufism and devotion have constantly woven networks of reciprocal influence. Notwithstanding the orientalist prejudice, academic islamology can shed light on the « popular » muslim religion mainly based on fakirical or magical practices. For instance, in Southern India (Karnataka), the violent ritual mortifications the members of a fakir brotherhood (Jalālî) inflict on themselves originates in a really fulfilled mystical act ; the aura of a saint worshipped on the occasion of his « wedding » with Allah makes them invulnerable to iron and fire. Though effectively heterodox, their behaviour can nevertheless be interpreted as the expression of the fundamentalism of a fanatic commitment by the « true friends of God », a tradition which is still very much alive in Indian islam.