Customer Reviews

Spiritualism, Madame Blavatsky, and Theosophy C: An Eyewitness View of Occult History

5 star:		(0)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

"Spiritualism, Madame Blavatsky and Theosophy" is a collection of lectures and articles by Rudolf Steiner, the founder of Anthroposophy. The volume is subtitled "An Eyewitness View of Occult History" but is nothing of the sort. It's rather a general criticism of Blavatsky and Theosophy, the religious movement founded by her. Steiner himself belonged to the Theosophical Society before breaking away to create his own pet religion.

Frankly, the anthology is extremely bland, boring and uninteresting. Steiner's speculations about this or that are as bizarre as usual, but his way of putting them forward is just enough to put the reader to sleep. The only interesting piece of information is the claim that top Theosophist Annie Besant offered Steiner to play the role of the re-incarnated John the Evangelist (!) to prop up the Krishnamurti project. Steiner wasn't interested. (Krishnamurti was an Indian boy the Theosophists promoted as a kind of new Messiah.)

Steiner also criticizes the Theosophical Society for its political entanglements. Annie Besant supported India's independence from Britain, something Steiner sarcastically writes off as "On the one side you have the Berlin-Baghdad Railway and on the other side Anthroposophy". He also claims that the Theosophists changed their position during World War I, supporting Britain.

Otherwise, I fear that this tome is only of interest to Rudolf Steiner aficionados or very specialized students of occult history...