#theosophists

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What a delight to open a box and discover such a beautiful binding. The leather is buttery and the gold design almost glows.

The book is on the education of girls by François Fénelon and was previously owned by American theosophist Genevieve Ludlow Griscom (b. 1868).

Theosophy had emerged from spiritualism during the 1870s but was quite different in many ways. Even so, the two movements did maintain some relationship with each other, and in the United States, Britain, and Canada a number of people, especially social activists, feminists, intellectuals, and artists, appear to have moved from spiritualism to Theosophy during the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Theosophy espoused the Western occult tradition but was also influenced by many ideas from Eastern religions – Buddhism and most particularly Hinduism. As a result, karma and reincarnation were integral to its beliefs, and cremation, a Hindu practice, was common among Theosophists at a time when it was beyond the pale for most Euro-Canadians. As Gillian McCann reveals in her study of the Toronto Theosophical Society, the adoption of many major tenets of Hinduism led Theosophists to respect and appreciate Eastern religions. They were very critical of the Christian missionaries who attempted to convert the followers of these religions. They were not immune to the “Orientalism” that pervaded Euro-Canadian society, however, and they sometimes viewed Eastern religions and cultures as exotic “others,” but they were much more positive than other Canadians about these religions and were generally respectful of the South Asians who occasionally provided lectures on links between Hindu teachings and Theosophical beliefs.

The intent of Theosophy was to reach a deeper understanding of the divine. As Michele Lacombe points out, Theosophists believed in “a divinity indistinguishable from a Universe which is living, conscious, and endlessly evolving.” This evolution moved toward a positive endpoint, which included the brotherhood of mankind. Not all Theosophists subscribed to the same views, but a belief in the interconnectedness of the world and in universal brotherhood was central for all. During the early twentieth century, Canada had few Theosophists (at least as listed on the census), but between 1901 and 1921 more than 30 percent lived in British Columbia, and the province claimed over 35 percent in 1911 and 1921, although even by 1921 British Columbians composed only 6 percent of the Canadian population.

Theosophy made its first official appearance in British Columbia in 1892, with the establishment of a “headquarters” in downtown Victoria. By 1894, this headquarters was also equipped with a free library of Theosophical books. The Victoria chapter seems to have been one of Canada’s first three Theosophical Societies. The Theosophists offered regular public lectures, provided by their own members or visiting speakers, and though their numbers were small, the new religion appears to have aroused considerable public interest. Sometimes the local paper noted that their talks attracted large audiences, as in the case of visiting speakers Dr. Griffith and Sidney Coryn, whose 1896 and 1898 lectures were titled “Theosophy in Ancient Egypt” and “Adepts and the Mysteries of Antiquity. In the spring of 1911, Mr. C. Jinarajadasa, a protégé of international Theosophical leader Annie Besant and a member of the executive of the International Theosophical Society, gave a series of three lectures in Victoria titled “The Growth and Evolution of the Soul,” “Theosophy in the Christian Church,” and “The Laws of Reincarnation.” After his lectures, a letter appeared in the Victoria Colonist from a local Sikh leader, protesting the fact that even Hindus “of good social standing” like Jinarajadasa had difficulty entering the country because of its racist immigration laws. Jinarajadasa was not the only Theosophist lecturer to discuss the relationship between Christianity and Theosophy, as this was an occasional topic at the Victoria Theosophical Society’s public lectures in the decades preceding the First World War. Titles such as “What Is True Christianity?” and “Some Forgotten Teachings of Jesus” imply that Theosophists hoped to interest Christians in shared Theosophical and Christian beliefs such as universal brotherhood – beliefs that they felt many Christians failed to practise.

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Theosophy’s focus on the brotherhood of man and the amalgamation of Eastern and Western religious beliefs led at least some Canadian Theosophists to follow the example of their international leaders, such as Annie Besant, in attacking racism and British imperialism. Not surprisingly, this critique tended to concentrate on the behaviour of the British government and Christian missionaries in India, although in the Canadian context considerable focus was also placed on Canada’s racist immigration and citizenship laws. Hugh Johnston points out that both this critique and the adoption of Hindu beliefs forged links between BC Theosophists and at least a few South Asian immigrants, who were themselves highly critical of both Canada’s immigration laws and British rule in India. Johnston discusses Teja Singh, a well-educated and pious Sikh immigrant who was planning to undertake graduate work at Harvard and who spent some time in Vancouver during the pre-war years. Local Theosophists lionized him, “treating him as a guru and inviting him to their homes for intimate philosophical talks.” Canadian security officials considered Singh a subversive at least in part for his efforts to assist his compatriots in dealing with Canada’s racist immigration laws. Gillian McCann identifies another South Asian man, Kartar Singh, who immigrated to Vancouver during the pre-war years, moved to Toronto during the war, and became involved with the Toronto Theosophists. He returned to Vancouver in the late 1920s to assist the BC Sikhs in their struggle to become Canadian citizens.

Johnston also mentions another Sikh immigrant, Kapoor Singh, who was associated with the Theosophists. Singh came to British Columbia in 1912 as a labourer and became a businessman and community leader, developing increasingly close links with Theosophists in both Toronto and Vancouver. He was initially attracted to them because of their respect for Indian religious traditions and beliefs. Some Euro-Canadian Theosophists assisted South Asians in dealing with a racist society wherever they could, and by the interwar period were actively involved with them in challenging Canada’s immigration laws. Some Theosophists studied and practised their religion with the despised “Hindus” while also working to address their oppression in Canada, but the new religion was not socially transformative for everyone. Some Toronto Theosophists, who could not escape the values of Euro-Canadian society, treated visiting South Asian speakers in a highly racist manner.

Whereas some Theosophists challenged racial oppression or fought for women’s rights, others were strong socialists. Robert Gosden, although a complex figure by the time he embraced spiritualism and then Theosophy in the mid- to late 1910s, retained at least some of his socialist ideals. Perhaps the most famous BC activist to incorporate both socialist and Theosophist ideals in the years before the First World War was Matti Kurikka, the leader of Sointula, a Finnish socialist utopian community on Malcolm Island, just off the northeast coast of Vancouver Island. The extent to which the Sointula community accepted Kurikka’s Theosophical beliefs is not clear. Certainly, his embrace of the free-love currents of Theosophical thought helped to break up the community fairly soon after its founding. Those who remained, however, stayed true to socialist, cooperative beliefs but seemed more irreligious than Theosophist. As a longtime resident told Imbert Orchard in the 1960s, long-time inhabitants of Sointula “were all pretty against” the church and Christianity.

Most scholars have focused on the relationship between socialism and Theosophy in Ontario, whereas Samuel Wagar provides an in-depth exploration of the subject in the BC context. He concentrates largely on the 1920s, when active socialist and Theosophist Jack Logie ran a number of summer camps in the Okanagan that promoted both Theosophist and socialist beliefs. However, Wagar also identifies earlier links between socialism and Theosophy, arguing that materialism was not the only model available to BC socialists, since a number of prominent socialists espoused Theosophy. Wagar discusses a major front-page article titled “Socialism and Theosophy,” which appeared in the April 1903 issue of the Western Socialist, an organ of the Socialist Party of British Columbia. It was written by Phillips Thompson, an Ontario Theosophist and well-known leftist, whose career reflects an ongoing spiritual journey. In the 1880s, Thompson had promoted a radical Christian social gospel critique of capitalism, and later in the century he became involved in spiritualism. He was also an active member of Toronto’s freethought community for a time but had embraced Theosophy by the early 1890s, which he saw as the best way of integrating spirituality with socialism. As he told Western Socialist readers,

I am a class-conscious Socialist from the ground up, and I claim that my Socialism is reinforced by [Theosophy]; in fact, I might go further and say based upon the truths of Theosophy.

Thompson was clear that he did not accept Christianity, but at the same time, his article was rather different from the general hostility to religion that characterized Marxist journals in British Columbia. Wagar notes that in 1907, Jack Logie ran as a candidate for office in the Socialist Party of Canada, although he does not provide evidence that Logie was a Theosophist at the time. He has clear evidence that by 1920 some individuals combined Theosophy and socialism: for example, socialist James Taylor was also president of the Vancouver Theosophical Society in 1920, and A.M. Stephen, president of the Julian Theosophical Society in Vancouver during the early 1920s, was also a committed Marxist and a well-known author and poet. Those who integrated Theosophy and socialism were able to abandon a capitalist-tainted Christianity but retain a spiritual belief system that focused on human betterment and the brotherhood of man."

4. Osburn mentions the fact that bouquets of the lotus Buddhists , and modern Theosophists . were presented to the guests at Egyptian funerals ; Monu- 6. In RAWLINSON'S Herodotus , vol . ii . , p . 149 , where the mental History of Egypt , vol . i . , p . 63 .

authority of PROCLUS is quoted . COLONNA - CECCALDI , 5. WESTROPP , Ancient Symbol Worship , p . 77. INMAN , Monuments antiques de Chypre , p . 141 , mentions this solar Ancient Pagan and Modern Christian Symbolism ; many significance . So does EBERS , . Egipt Descriptive , I. p . 66 .

Theosophical Society Beliefs | What are the core beliefs of theosophy

Theosophical Society Beliefs Theosophy is a religion established in the United States during the late 19th century. theosophical society beliefs were founded primarily by the Russian immigrant Helena Blavatsky and draws its teachings predominantly from Blavatsky’s writings. Categorized by scholars of religion as both a new religious movement and as part of the occultist stream of Western…