This essay outlines the analysis of the central categories of Mircea Eliade’s philosophy,
i.e., those of space and time, concentrating on the latter. Eliade makes out two fundamental
ways of understanding time and history: one linear (characteristic of the Judeo-Christian tradition,
of western science and culture) and one circular (characteristic of primitive religions).
In the light of the Eliade’s own analyses, such a distinction turns out to be unsustainable.
Mainly through Nietzsche’s philosophy, the illegitimacy of the proposal of Eliade, who – on
the grounds of that distinction – hopes for the retrieval of the possibility (essential to a circular
understanding of time) of freeing oneself from the pain and the anxiety inherent to a linear
understanding of time is thus brought to light.
