Customer Reviews

The Theosophical Enlightenment (S U N Y Series in Western Esoteric Traditions) (Suny Series, Western Esoteric Traditions)

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This book was published over ten years ago and yet, as I write this, it has gotten only two reviews here on Amazon. It deserves far better than that, although I respect and agree with the reviews that precede this. But let me say a bit more.

The 19th century was a pivotal time, especially in the field of religion, spirituality, and inner experience. The beginnings of anthropology and the theories of Darwin threw conventional religion for a loop and induced many seekers to pursue the twilight zones of Spiritualism, the Occult, Theosophy, and Magic. Godwin takes the reader on a tour of the highways and byways of this milieu and does so in a delightfully droll manner. We are introduced to a marvelous cast of eccentric thinkers -- including those who were inclined to think that all religion could be traced back to "worship of the generative organs" as the Victorians put it.

Despite all my reading about the 19th century occult revival, I don't think I ever really got a handle on it in its totality until I read Godwin's book. I've found it invaluable ever since. In fact, I pull this book off the shelf every year or two and read it through again -- finding new things every time.

Were I forced to choose ten "desert island books" to take with me, this would head my list. No doubt this is not true for everyone, but if the names of Godfrey Higgins, Bulwer Lytton, Anna Kingsford, Emma Hardinge Britten, Madame Blavatsky, or Cagliostro ring a bell, then this is the book for you.

This is an as yet unequalled study on an aspect of the cultural history of the West (and in particular of the English-speaking world) which has up to now been under-rated. The so-called occult, despite its important place in the dynamics of cultural interaction, has not been granted its proper place in history, not so much because of any particular "conspiracy" but rather due - paradoxically - to a "Victorian" view by which "history" is mainly or exclusively limited to political, military and economic problems. The early aspects of the impact of the Theosophical movement on Anglo-American culture have been documented here, and it is to be hoped that it will stimulate other researchers to explore this many-faceted topic.

Godwin's work is vital for those who truly wish to understand Anglo-speaking occultism. While the book claims that the Theosophical Movement is more influenced by the skeptical Enlightenment, I do not find the evidence for that point compelling, since for Godwin what he means by "the Enlightenment" is really anti-Christian resentment. The book should be read as a history of occult ideas in the 18th and 19th centuries of Britain and America, not as a judge on the Theosophical Movement as a whole. As a history of that subject, it is wonderful, and no other books like it exist.

While the scholarship of polyglots such as Godfrey Higgins, author of Anacalypsis, Bryant of Mythology fame, Blavatsky and many other industrious authors is as highly suspect as the conclusions drawn, it would be a mistake to dismiss them as outdated amateurs or outright charlatans. In such works as Anacalypsis, Furlong's Rivers of Life, and Isis Unveiled the reader finds epic achievements of the imagination. Aside from being invaluable collections of fragments from earlier authors, these books present a world view that attempts to include all knowledge in one logical system. Such works are the origin of classic Borges tale "Tlon, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius." Professor Godwin is a detective and an entertaining guide as he recovers threads of truth behind the rumors and exaggerations, the sworn secrecies of generations of seekers after light including not only rogue scholars but also practitioners of arcane arts such as the founders of the Order of the Golden Dawn.