Editing Mircea Eliade (section)

===Polemics and exile===
Dumitru G. Danielopol, a fellow diplomat present in London during Eliade's stay in the city, later stated that the latter had identified himself as "a guiding light of [the Iron Guard] movement" and victim of [[Carol II of Romania|Carol II]]'s repression.<ref name="oscaderea"/> In October 1940, as the [[National Legionary State]] came into existence, the [[Foreign and Commonwealth Office|British Foreign Office]] [[blacklist]]ed Mircea Eliade, alongside five other Romanians, due to his Iron Guard connections and suspicions that he was prepared to spy in favor of [[Nazi Germany]].<ref name="zfscriit"/> According to various sources, while in [[Portugal]], the diplomat was also preparing to disseminate propaganda in favor of the Iron Guard.<ref name="oscaderea"/> In ''Jurnal portughez'', Eliade defines himself as "a Legionary",<ref name="vilasanjpaseo"/><ref name="pcommare"/> and speaks of his own "Legionary climax" as a stage he had gone through during the early 1940s.<ref name="pcommare"/><ref name="aoamniotica"/>

The depolitisation of Eliade after the start of his diplomatic career was also mistrusted by his former close friend [[Eugène Ionesco]], who indicated that, upon the close of [[World War II]], Eliade's personal beliefs as communicated to his friends amounted to "all is over now that Communism has won".<ref>Ionesco, 1945, in Ornea, p. 184</ref> This forms part of Ionesco's severe and succinct review of the careers of Legionary-inspired intellectuals, many of them his friends and former friends, in a letter he sent to [[Tudor Vianu]].<ref name="oscaderea"/><ref>Ornea, pp. 184–185</ref> In 1946, Ionesco indicated to [[Petru Comarnescu]] that he did not want to see either Eliade or Cioran, and that he considered the two of them "Legionaries for ever"—adding "we are [[hyena]]s to one another".<ref>Ionesco, 1946, in Ornea, p. 211</ref>

Eliade's former friend, the communist [[Belu Zilber]], who was attending the [[Paris Peace Treaties, 1947|Paris Conference]] in 1946, refused to see Eliade, arguing that, as an Iron Guard affiliate, the latter had "denounced left-wingers", and contrasting him with Cioran ("They are both Legionaries, but [Cioran] is honest").<ref>[[Stelian Tănase]], [http://www.revista22.ro/html/index.php?art=575&nr=2003-08-25 "Belu Zilber" (III)] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070927011339/http://www.revista22.ro/html/index.php?nr=2003-08-25&art=575 |date=2007-09-27 }}, in ''[[22 (magazine)|22]]'', Nr.702, August 2003; retrieved October 4, 2007 {{in lang|ro}}</ref> Three years later, Eliade's political activities were brought into discussion as he was getting ready to publish a translation of his ''Techniques du Yoga'' with the left-leaning Italian company ''[[Giulio Einaudi Editore]]''—the denunciation was probably orchestrated by Romanian officials.<ref name="Ornea, p.210">Ornea, p. 210</ref>

In August 1954, when [[Horia Sima]], who led the Iron Guard during its exile, was rejected by a faction inside the movement, Mircea Eliade's name was included on a list of persons who supported the latter—although this may have happened without his consent.<ref name="Ornea, p.210"/> According to exiled dissident and novelist [[Dumitru Ţepeneag]], around that date, Eliade expressed his sympathy for Iron Guard members in general, whom he viewed as "courageous".<ref>Constantin Coroiu, [https://web.archive.org/web/20090115020500/http://www.evenimentul.ro/articol/un-roman-la-paris-0.html "Un român la Paris"], in ''[[Evenimentul]]'', August 31, 2006; retrieved October 4, 2007 {{in lang|ro}}</ref> However, according to Robert Ellwood, the Eliade he met in the 1960s was entirely apolitical, remained aloof from "the passionate politics of that era in the United States", and "[r]eportedly [...] never read newspapers"<ref name="Ellwood, p.83">Ellwood, p. 83</ref> (an assessment shared by [[Sorin Alexandrescu]]).<ref name="scnostal"/> Eliade's student [[Ioan Petru Culianu]] noted that journalists had come to refer to the Romanian scholar as "the great recluse".<ref name="ipcmahapar"/> Despite Eliade's withdrawal from radical politics, Ellwood indicates, he still remained concerned with Romania's welfare. He saw himself and other exiled Romanian intellectuals as members of a circle who worked to "maintain the culture of a free Romania and, above all, to publish texts that had become unpublishable in Romania itself".<ref>Eliade, ''Ordeal by Labyrinth'', in Ellwood, p. 115</ref>

Beginning in 1969, Eliade's past became the subject of public debate in Israel. At the time, historian [[Gershom Scholem]] asked Eliade to explain his attitudes, which the latter did using vague terms.<ref name="aoamniotica"/><ref name="oscaderea"/><ref name="Oişteanu, Angajamentul...">Oişteanu, "Angajamentul..."</ref> As a result of this exchange, Scholem declared his dissatisfaction, and argued that Israel could not extend a welcome to the Romanian academic.<ref name="oscaderea"/> During the final years of Eliade's life, his disciple Culianu exposed and publicly criticized his 1930s pro-Iron Guard activities; relations between the two soured as a result.<ref>[[Sorin Antohi]], [http://www.iwm.at/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=306&Itemid=478 "Exploring the Legacy of Ioan Petru Culianu"], in the [http://www.iwm.at/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=109&Itemid=231 ''Institut für die Wissenschaften vom Menschen Post''], Newsletter 72, Spring 2001; retrieved July 16, 2007; Ted Anton, [http://linguafranca.mirror.theinfo.org/9209/culianu.html "The Killing of Professor Culianu"], in ''[[Lingua Franca (magazine)|Lingua Franca]]'', Volume 2, No. 6, September/October 1992; retrieved July 29, 2007; Oişteanu, "Angajamentul..."</ref> Eliade's other Romanian disciple, [[Andrei Oişteanu]], noted that, in the years following Eliade's death, conversations with various people who had known the scholar had made Culianu less certain of his earlier stances, and had led him to declare: "Mr. Eliade was never antisemitic, a member of the Iron Guard, or pro-Nazi. But, in any case, I am led to believe that he was closer to the Iron Guard than I would have liked to believe."<ref>Culianu, in Oişteanu, "Angajamentul..."</ref>

At an early stage of his polemic with Culianu, Eliade complained in writing that "it is not possible to write an objective history" of the Iron Guard and its leader [[Corneliu Zelea Codreanu]].<ref name="Eliade, in Ellwood, p.91"/> Arguing that people "would only accept apologetics [...] or executions", he contended: "After [[Buchenwald concentration camp|Buchenwald]] and [[Auschwitz concentration camp|Auschwitz]], even honest people cannot afford being objective".<ref name="Eliade, in Ellwood, p.91">Eliade, in Ellwood, p. 91; in Oişteanu, "Angajamentul..."</ref>