Mircea Eliade, a Romanian-French-American philosopher, historian of religions, and writer. Mircea Eliade was born on March 9, 1907, in Bucharest, Romania, into a military family. He was the second of three children. Although born into Orthodox Christianity, he did not receive a thorough religious education at home, school, or the "Spiru Haret" Lyceum, where he studied. Later, Eliade remarked about this: “I did not know my own tradition, Orthodoxy, very well. My family was what one might call 'believing,' but in Orthodoxy, as you know, religion is studied through tradition; school curricula do not include catechism lessons. The focus is on liturgy, liturgical life, rituals. Mysteries. I participated in all of this but did not attribute much significance to it.” This ultimately influenced his fascination with the non-Christian East and the pantheistic aspects of his worldview, which persisted throughout his life. In 1930–1931, he practiced yoga at an ashram in the Himalayas and, through contact with traditional Indian culture, became an adherent of traditionalism. Starting in 1931, he returned to Romania and taught at the University of Bucharest (1933–1939). In 1940, he served as Romania’s cultural attaché in London, and between 1941 and 1945, in Lisbon. In the 1930s–early 1940s, Eliade published works in Romanian, including: “Asian Alchemy” (Alchimia Asiatică, 1935, Russian translation 1998), “Babylonian Cosmology and Alchemy” (Cosmologie şi alchimie Babiloneană, 1937, Russian translation 1998), “The Myth of Reintegration” (Mitul Reintegrării, 1942, Russian translation 1998). After World War II (1939–1945), Eliade moved to Paris, where he worked as a professor at the École Pratique des Hautes Études. During his Parisian period, he published works in French, including: “Treatise on the History of Religions” (Traité d’histoire des religions, 1949, Russian translation 1999), “The Myth of the Eternal Return” (Le mythe de l’éternel retour, 1949, Russian translation 2000), “Shamanism and Archaic Techniques of Ecstasy” (Le Chamanisme et les techniques archaїques de l’extase, 1951, Russian translation 1998), “Images and Symbols” (Images et symboles, 1952, Russian translation 2000), “Yoga: Immortality and Freedom” (Le Yoga. Immortalité et liberté, 1954, Russian translation 2000), “The Sacred and the Profane” (Le Sacré et le Profane, 1956, Russian translation 1994), “Myths, Dreams, and Mysteries” (Mythes, rêves et mystères, 1957, Russian translation 1996). Eliade identifies homo religiosus as the archetypal figure of traditional society, living in an “eternal present” through repetition and the “eternal return,” perpetually imitating archetypes. Detachment from this world is described by Eliade as a “fall,” which becomes the source of “nostalgia for paradise” and the yearning for reunion with the cosmic universal wholeness. Eliade also applies the concept of homo religiosus to modern individuals, whose irreducible religiosity often manifests only subconsciously in transformed forms (crypto-religiosity), such as in the case of an agnostic or atheist. In this context, Eliade notes “the mythological structure of communism and its eschatological meaning.” By understanding the religious experiences of Asia and ancient peoples, Eliade envisioned a new self-awareness for Western individuals, referring to it as “a new humanism” or “the planetaryization” of culture. In his phenomenological analysis of mystical experiences across various religions, Eliade highlighted phenomena such as ecstasy, mystical flight, visions of light, ascension to Heaven, and more. He called the ability to experience the “sacred”—a meeting that resolves human existential crises—a “superconsciousness,” rooted in the “collective unconscious” (a concept introduced by C. G. Jung), which preserves the religious experiences of ancestors. Eliade also authored literary works in the style of fantastic realism in Romanian, including: “Maitreyi” (Russian translation 2000), “Miss Christina” (Domnișoara Christina, Russian translation 1992), “The Secret of Dr. Honigberger” (Secretul doctorului Honigberger, Russian translation 1994), “The Snake” (Șarpele, Russian translation 2003), “With the Gypsy Girls” (La țigănci, Russian translation 1989). In 1980, Mircea Eliade was nominated for the Nobel Prize by Lyon's Jean Moulin University. In 1983, the third volume of his “History of Religious Ideas” was published. In 1986, Eliade passed away in Chicago. Posthumously, in 1990, he was elected a member of the Romanian Academy of Sciences.