Theosophy

Theosophy denotes a set of mystical belief systems which seek to understand or experience the nature of divinity. Deriving from ancient Greek words meaning "knowledge of the divine," its earliest forms originated in the Kabbalistic traditions of Jewish mysticism, later spreading into branches of Western European esoteric study. The Theosophical Society was established in 1875 as a popular movement to promote its claims as a coherent philosophy. Although amalgamating the findings of many schools of esoteric thought, it drew mainly on Indian and East Asian lore, particularly Brahmanism and Tibetan Buddhism. Belief in a unitary, personal God is not among the claims of the Society, which instead explores multiple and simultaneous paths toward the intuitive experience of the divine. Theosophy has acquired many adherents worldwide in this highly influential form, and it maintains a significant profile in the twenty-first century, represented by affiliated organizations in more than fifty countries.

Background

Theosophy has always been occupied with bringing to light arcane, occult, or hidden knowledge. This knowledge was syncretic: it drew, in other words, on numerous doctrines from multiple places and time periods. As such, theosophy is a major part of the broad tradition of Western esotericism, an aggregation of belief systems pursuing spiritual enlightenment via the study of noncanonical scriptures and writings. During the Middle Ages and through the European Renaissance of the fourteenth-seventeenth centuries, interpretations of the ancient Kabbala—a body of mystical Judaic teachings—were woven into the hybrid systems of Christian Cabala and Hermetic (hidden or occult) Qabalah. A gnostic school of thought, in which individuals sought communion with semi-divine intermediaries, gradually moved theosophy away from Judeo-Christian practices and toward pantheism—the belief in a host of divinities inherent in nature. An interest in early pantheistic religions, particularly those of Ancient Egypt, was, in turn, fostered.

These were the core principles that led Ukrainian émigré Helena Blavatsky, William Q. Judge, Henry Steel Olcott, and thirteen others to found the Theosophical Society in New York City in 1875. It was an inclusive, nonsectarian organization, as opposed to religious dogma as it was to materialism, committed to raising awareness of what Blavatsky habitually called "ancient wisdom." Blavatsky was the most energetic of the founding members, and her claims of psychic communication with "enlightened masters," deceased and living, as recounted in her many lectures and publications, were the main driving force of the Society in its early years. Her principal work was the foundational tract, The Secret Doctrine (1888). Blavatsky's fundamental interest was in linking early philosophical traditions that had sought contact with the divine mind, such as Neo-Platonism (third-sixth centuries), with Asian and Indian religious creeds promising visions of higher realities. In Theosophy (which, in reference to the Theosophical Society, is always spelled with an uppercase "T"), the natural world was wholly interdependent with human nature and divine nature; by deciphering mythic codes and messages, it was possible to access many other realms. This public commitment to Theosophy settled it on a firmer footing than at any previous time.

Impact

The prolific treatises and manifestoes of Theosophy written by its nineteenth- and twentieth-century adherents, while always alluding to its heterogeneous sources, generally emphasized its roots in Eastern religions and mystic traditions. Blavatsky and Olcott traveled to India in 1879, and the establishment of the Bombay Charter of the Theosophical Society, rapidly followed by other charters in India and then worldwide, marked the beginning of its growth as an international body. By 1900 the Society was being represented by over 600 charters in Europe, the Americas, Asia, Africa, and Australia. The momentum of the Society stalled after Blavatsky's death in 1891, and it descended into temporary factionalism, although under successive leaders, the organization managed to evolve according to the principles established by its founders until a high point in the 1930s. Its principal figurehead post-Blavatsky was Annie Besant (1847–1933), a British political activist and feminist, under whose governance the Society assumed a less mystical and more socially committed shape. Following Besant, despite its tendency to subdivide into offshoots and splinter groups, Theosophy has continued to grow as a global movement, impacting the development of new religions. These range from the coalescence of esoteric beliefs represented by New Age thinking and the rise of occult faiths such as Wicca, to more programmatic or traditionally inclined systems of thought. Some of them include forms of Christian faith, particularly those (such as the Coptic Church of Egypt) which acknowledge a mystic interpretation of sanctity. Although the Blavatsyan articulation of Theosophy remained preeminent, a more generic theosophy, which usually denotes more openly Christian interpretations, or places Christianity at the heart of a constellation of beliefs, has also been influential. Many prominent twentieth-century figures have been drawn to theosophy in this sense, among them American inventor Thomas Edison; Irish poet William Butler Yeats; artists Vasily Vasilyevich Kandinsky, Piet Mondrian, and Paul Klee; and educational theory pioneer Maria Montessori.

The three main Theosophical organizations operating in the twenty-first centuries were the Theosophical Society of Adyar (in Tamil Nadu, India), the Theosophical Society of Pasadena, California, and the United Lodge of Theosophists, with bases worldwide. Additionally, eight National Sections are active in the United States, Europe, Africa, and Australia. These groups and their subsidiaries share the same constitutional goals: to maintain a universal community of humankind in perfect equality; to explore the interrelations of religion, philosophy, and science; and to investigate the hidden laws of nature. They offer online and written correspondence courses, and the Theosophical University Press, located in Pasadena, publishes books and journals. Theosophy has always drawn serious criticism, both from practitioners of mainstream religions who condemn it as a pseudoreligion and from hostile commentators denouncing it as meaningless or—more damagingly—a form of charlatanism. For better or worse, however, theosophy made a distinctive mark in the climate of popular religion. Its manifold origins have lent it flexibility and resilience in weathering the storms of its long history: in its most enduring expression, represented by the Theosophical Society, it has proved a valuable resource for many inquirers into the nature of reality.

Bibliography

Faivre, Antoine. Theosophy, Imagination, Tradition: Studies in Western Esotericism. Translated by Christine Rhone, SUNY Press, 2000.

Gomes, Michael. “H. P. Blavatsky and Theosophy.” The Cambridge Handbook of Western Mysticism and Esotericism, edited by Glenn A. Magee, Cambridge University Press, 2016, pp. 248–59.

Hammer, Olav, and Mikael Rothstein, editors. Handbook of the Theosophical Current. Brill, 2013.

Lavoie, Jeffrey D. The Theosophical Society: The History of a Spiritualist Movement. BrownWalker Press, 2012.

Lewis, James R., and Inga B. Tøllefsen, editors. The Oxford Handbook of New Religious Movements: Volume II. 2nd ed., Oxford Univeristy Press, 2016.

Partridge, Christopher. The Occult World. Routledge, 2016.

Santucci, James A. “Theosophy.” The Cambridge Companion to New Religious Movements, edited by Olav Hammer and Mikael Rothstein, Cambridge University Press, 2012, pp. 231–46.

“Welcome to the Theosophical Society.” The Theosophical Society in America, www.theosophical.org/about/about-the-society. Accessed 5 Feb. 2025.

Wilson, Leigh. Modernism and Magic: Experiments with Spiritualism, Theosophy, and the Occult. New ed., Edinburgh Univeristy Press, 2015.