Theosophy, the Successor of Neoplatonism?

BLAVATSKY ADDRESSES CHRISTIAN READERS ABOUT THEOSOPHY

H.P. Blavatsky, Lucifer, Vol. I, No. 4, December, 1887, pp. 242-251: “The Christian reader is no doubt aware that Theosophy is not a religion, but a philosophy, which is both religious and scientific; and that the chief work, so far, of the Theosophical Society has been to revive in each religion its own animating spirit, by encouraging and helping enquiry into the true significance of its doctrines and observances. Theosophists know that the deeper one penetrates into the meaning of the dogmas and ceremonies of all religions, the greater becomes their apparent underlying similarity, until finally a perception of their fundamental unity is reached. This common ground is no other than Theosophy—the Secret Doctrine of the ages; which, diluted and disguised to suit the capacity of the multitude, and the requirements of the time, has formed the living kernel of all religions.

The Theosophical Society has branches respectively composed of Buddhists, Hindus, Muslims, Zoroastrians, Christians and Freethinkers, who work together as brethren on the common ground of Theosophy; and it is precisely because Theosophy is not a religion, nor can for the multitude supply the place of a religion, that the success of its teachings has been so great, not merely as regards its growing membership and extending influence, but also in respect to the cultivation of the sentiment of compassion and wisdom among human beings on this globe.

We Theosophists believe that a religion is a natural incident in the life of man in his present stage of development; and that although, in rare cases, individuals may be born without the religious sentiment, a community must have a religion, that is to say, a uniting bond—under penalty of social decay and material annihilation. We believe that no religious doctrine can be more than an attempt to picture to our present limited understandings, in the terms of our terrestrial experiences, great cosmical and spiritual truths, which in our normal state of consciousness we vaguely sense, rather than actually perceive and comprehend; and a revelation, if it is to reveal anything, must necessarily conform to the same earthbound requirements of the human intellect.

In our estimation, therefore, no religion can be absolutely true, and none can be absolutely false. A religion is true in proportion as it supplies the spiritual, moral and intellectual needs of the time, and helps the development of mankind in these respects. It is false in proportion as it hinders that development, and offends the spiritual, moral and intellectual portion of man’s nature. And the transcendentally spiritual ideas of the ruling powers of the Universe entertained by an Oriental sage would be as false a religion for the African savage as the grovelling fetishism of the latter would be for the sage, although both views must necessarily be true in degree, for both represent the highest ideas attainable by the respective individuals of the same cosmico-spiritual facts, which can never be known in their reality by man while he remains but man. Theosophists, therefore, are respecters of all the religions, and for the religious ethics of Jesus they have profound admiration. It could not be otherwise, for these teachings which have come down to us are the same as those of Theosophy. So far, therefore, as modern Christianity makes good its claim to be the practical religion taught by Jesus, Theosophists are with it heart and hand. But the historical truth about the gospels is another issue. . .

So far as the Christian doctrine goes contrary to those ethics, pure and simple, Theosophists are its opponents. Any Christian can, if he will, compare the Sermon on the Mount in the Gospels with the dogmas of his church, and the spirit that breathes in it, with the principles that animate this Christian civilisation and govern his own life; and then he will be able to judge for himself how far the religion of Jesus enters into his Christianity, and how far, therefore, he and Theosophists are agreed. But professing Christians, especially the clergy, shrink from making this comparison. Like merchants who fear to find themselves bankrupt, they seem to dread the discovery of a discrepancy in their accounts which could not be made good by placing material assets as a set-off to spiritual liabilities. The comparison between the teachings of Jesus and the doctrines of the churches has, however frequently been made—and often with great learning and critical acumen—both by those who would abolish Christianity and those who would reform it; and the aggregate result of these comparisons . . . goes to prove that in almost every point the doctrines of the churches and the practices of Christians are in direct opposition to the teachings of Jesus.

We are accustomed to say to the Buddhist, the Mohammedan, the Hindoo, or the Parsee: “The road to Theosophy lies, for you, through your own religion.” We say this because those creeds possess a deeply philosophical and esoteric meaning, explanatory of the allegories under which they are presented to the people; but we cannot say the same thing to Christians. The successors of the Apostles never recorded the secret doctrine of Jesus—the “mysteries of the kingdom of heaven”—which it was given to them (his apostles) alone to know. These have been suppressed, made away with, destroyed. What have come down upon the stream of time are the maxims, the parables, the allegories and the fables which Jesus expressly intended for the spiritually deaf and blind to be revealed later to the world, and which modern Christianity either takes all literally, or interprets according to the fancies of the Fathers of the secular church. In both cases they are like cut flowers: they are severed from the plant on which they grew, and from the root whence that plant drew its life. Were we, therefore, to encourage Christians, as we do the votaries of other creeds, to study their own religion for themselves, the consequence would be, not a knowledge of the meaning of its mysteries, but either the revival of mediaeval superstition and intolerance, accompanied by a formidable outbreak of mere lip-prayer and preaching or else a great increase of scepticism, for Christianity has no esoteric foundation known to those who profess it.

For even you, and all priests, bishops, cardinals, and Pope must be painfully aware that you know absolutely no more of those “mysteries of the kingdom of heaven” which Jesus taught his disciples, than does the humblest and most illiterate member of your church. And if you do, why do you not act in accordance with true teachings of the “mysteries of the kingdom of heaven”?”

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