In the second half of the nineteenth century a Russian woman of magnetic and unpredictable character founded a movement that would change the face of Western spirituality. Helena Petrovna Blavatsky and the Theosophical Society brought concepts such as karma and reincarnation to Europe and America, opened a dialogue between East and West and influenced artists, writers and reformers. Their story is also one of controversy, and it is worth knowing it in a balanced way.
An adventurous youth
Helena Petrovna von Hahn was born in 1831 in Yekaterinoslav, in the Russian Empire, today Dnipro in Ukraine, into an aristocratic family. At seventeen she married the official Nikifor Blavatsky, much older than her, but left him after a few months.
There followed years of travel about which little is known for certain. Blavatsky said she had travelled the world, stayed in Tibet and received teachings from Eastern masters. Historians regard many of these accounts as unverifiable. What is certain is that in 1873 she arrived in New York, where she moved in the circles of Spiritualism, then very widespread.
The 1875 founding
In New York Blavatsky met Henry Steel Olcott, a lawyer and former officer in the American Civil War who was interested in Spiritualist phenomena. Together with him, the lawyer William Quan Judge and others, in 1875 she founded the Theosophical Society.
The term "theosophy", "divine wisdom", had been used in Europe for centuries for Christian mystical currents such as that of Jakob Böhme. Blavatsky gave it a new meaning. The Society soon adopted three objects:
- to form a nucleus of the universal brotherhood of humanity, without distinction of race, creed, sex, caste or colour;
- to encourage the comparative study of religions, philosophies and sciences;
- to investigate the unexplained laws of nature and the powers latent in human beings.
Isis Unveiled
In 1877 Blavatsky published Isis Unveiled, a two-volume work criticising both scientific materialism and religious dogmatism. It argued for the existence of an ancient universal wisdom of which all religions would be fragments. The book was quite successful, although critics noted many unacknowledged borrowings from other authors.
India and Adyar
In 1879 Blavatsky and Olcott moved to India. Their arrival coincided with a period of Indian cultural revival, and the Society found many members among Hindus and Buddhists. In 1880, in Ceylon, today Sri Lanka, the two founders formally took the Buddhist precepts. Olcott went on to work for the revival of Sinhalese Buddhism and the founding of schools.
In 1882 the headquarters was established at Adyar, near Madras, today Chennai, where it still stands.
The Mahatmas and the Hodgson report
At the heart of Theosophical teaching were the Mahatmas or Masters, adepts who, according to Blavatsky, lived in Tibet and guided humanity's spiritual evolution. Two in particular, called Koot Hoomi and Morya, were said to correspond by letter with certain members.
In 1884 two former associates accused Blavatsky of fraudulently producing these letters and some phenomena. The London Society for Psychical Research sent the investigator Richard Hodgson to India, and in 1885 he published a very severe report concluding that they were deceptions. The report badly damaged Blavatsky's reputation. A century later, in 1986, a member of the same Society published a critique of Hodgson's method, reopening the debate.
The Secret Doctrine
Blavatsky left India and finally settled in London, where in 1888 she published her main work, The Secret Doctrine. Presented as a commentary on the ancient "Stanzas of Dzyan", it describes an immense cosmology: the evolution of the universe through cycles, the history of humanity through a succession of "root races", the law of karma and reincarnation.
That same year she founded an Esoteric Section reserved for the most committed students. She died in London in 1891.
After Blavatsky
After her death the Society saw both success and schism:
- William Quan Judge led the American section to autonomy in 1895;
- Annie Besant, a British social reformer, became president of the Adyar Society in 1907 and promoted the young Indian Jiddu Krishnamurti as a future world teacher;
- Rudolf Steiner, general secretary of the German section, broke away in 1912-1913 and founded the Anthroposophical Society;
- in 1929 Krishnamurti dissolved the Order of the Star in the East created for him, declaring that truth is "a pathless land".
Theosophy influenced painters such as Kandinsky and Mondrian, poets such as Yeats, and the spread of Eastern spiritualities in the West.
For Studio Esoterico Cornelio, the Theosophical story shows the importance of combining openness with critical sense: dialogue between traditions is fruitful, but it requires transparency and respect for historical evidence.
In short
- Helena Blavatsky (1831-1891) founded the Theosophical Society in New York in 1875 with Olcott and Judge.
- Isis Unveiled (1877) and The Secret Doctrine (1888) are her main works.
- From 1882 the headquarters was at Adyar, India; the 1885 Hodgson report accused Blavatsky of fraud.
- After her death came schisms, including Steiner's Anthroposophy, and Krishnamurti broke away in 1929.