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H.P Blavatsky, Theosophy, and Nineteenth-Century Comparative Religion

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H.P Blavatsky, Theosophy, and Nineteenth-Century Comparative Religion H. P. BLAVATSKY, THEOSOPHY, AND NINETEENTH-CENTURY COMPARATIVE RELIGION BY DEWALD BESTER A thesis submitted to the Doctoral Degrees Board at the University of Cape Town in full fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctorate of Philosophy in the Department of Religious Studies in the Faculty of Humanities. University of Cape Town UNIVERSITY OF CAPE TOWN 2017 1 The copyright of this thesis vests in the author. No quotation from it or information derived from it is to be published without full acknowledgement of the source. The thesis is to be used for private study or non- commercial research purposes only. Published by the University of Cape Town (UCT) in terms of the non-exclusive license granted to UCT by the author. University of Cape Town Abstract Although H. P. Blavatsky (1831-1891), co-founder of the Theosophical Society, has featured prominently in histories of Western esotericism, her engagement with late nineteenth-century comparative religion has not been appreciated. This thesis offers the first sustained analysis of H. P. Blavatsky’s theosophical comparative religion. Despite the fact that one of the original goals of the Theosophical Society was advancing comparative religion, H. P. Blavatsky has been excluded from standard accounts of the field. This thesis draws on a range of theoretical resources—Richard Rorty’s pragmatic theory of knowledge, Alun Munslow’s analysis of narrative in history, Thomas Gieryn’s critique of boundary-making in science, and Lorraine Daston and Peter Galison’s history of objectivity—to argue for the inclusion of H. P. Blavatsky in the history of comparative religion. Substantial chapters analyse H. P. Blavatsky’s major works, from Isis Unveiled (1877) to The Secret Doctrine (1888), to uncover the theoretical template that she developed for analysing religion and comparing religions. The thesis highlights H. P. Blavatsky’s interpretative strategies in fashioning a theosophical comparative religion. In developing a comparative religion, H. P. Blavatsky referred to leading figures in the emerging field of the academic study of religion, such as F. Max Müller, E. B. Tylor, and Herbert Spencer, in positioning her theosophical comparative religion in the context of late nineteenth-century production of knowledge about religion and religions. This thesis demonstrates that H. P. Blavatsky’s comparative religion was reasoned, literary, rhetorical, coherent, and strategic. By analysing H. P. Blavatsky’s theoretical work on religion and religions in its late nineteenth-century context, this thesis contributes to the ongoing project of broadening our understanding of the complex and contested history of the study of religion. 2 Acknowledgements I’d like to thank my supervisor Professor David Chidester for his supervision, guidance, support, and encouragement throughout this process. I feel fortunate that he agreed to take me on as a graduate student. I’d like to acknowledge Professor Chidester’s influence on my intellectual life. Though unbeknownst to him, a series of postgraduate lectures 23 years ago left a mark on me which I have never shaken. I cannot say whether it has been for the better or the worse. I can say that the seminars shaped my thought life and that, in my life, the study of religion has not been separate from my personal commitments. I thank my wife, Assumpta, and my mother, Jean, who have supported and encouraged me in ways they both know. 3 CONTENTS pg. CHAPTER ONE – INTRODUCTION 7 1) Preface 7 2) Literature Review 9 2.1) History of Comparative Religion 9 2.2) Academic Studies of Theosophy 12 2.3) Theosophical Scholarship 20 3) Research Problem 22 4) Unit of Analysis 23 5) Research Question 24 6) Research Objectives 24 7) Research Methodology 25 7.1) Delimiting the Field 25 7.2) Opening the Field 26 7.3) Challenging Binaries 39 7.4) Examining the Hermeneutic Method of H. P. Blavatsky 43 8) Chapter Outline 48 8.1) Chapter One – Introduction 48 8.2) Chapter Two –Isis Unveiled and Comparative Religion 49 8.3) Chapter Three – The Secret Doctrine and Comparative Religion 49 8.4) Chapter Four–H. P. Blavatsky and Comparative Religion 50 8.5) Conclusion 50 CHAPTER TWO – ISIS UNVEILED AND COMPARATIVE RELIGION 52 1) Introduction and Entry 52 1.1) An Entry 53 1.2) E. B. Tylor 55 1.3) A. R. Wallace 57 1.4) H. P. Blavatsky 60 2) Introduction to Isis Unveiled 67 2.1) Production of Authority 67 2.2) Academic Assessments of Isis Unveiled 70 2.3) Motivation and Aims 74 4 3) H. P. Blavatsky and Interpreting Religion 76 3.1) Interpretive Background and Enabling Assumptions 76 3.1.1) Binary Homologies 79 3.1.2) Theosophical Ancient Wisdom Tradition 82 3.1.3) Origins and Beginnings – Diffusion and Psychology 83 3.1.4) De-contextualising and Re-contextualising 89 3.1.5) Religion as Science and a Body of Propositional Statements 92 3.2) Supporting Interpretive Strategies 96 4) Origins of the Theosophical Template 98 5) Conclusion 101 CHAPTER THREE – THE SECRET DOCTRINE AND COMPARATIVE RELIGION 103 1) Introduction 103 2) The Interim Years 104 2.1) Interim Years – 1877 – 1880 105 2.2) Interim Years – 1881 106 2.3) Interim Years – 1882 110 2.4) Interim Years – 1883 113 2.5) Anomalous References 114 3) Summary 115 4) The Secret Doctrine (1888) 115 4.1) Background 116 4.2) A Recapitulation 118 5) Origins 124 6) Comparing Religions 129 6.1) Structural patterning 129 6.2) Texts are Interpretable 139 6.3) Seven Keys 140 6.4) Additional Interpretive Strategies 144 7) Conclusion 146 CHAPTER FOUR – H. P. BLAVATSKY AND COMPARING RELIGIONS 150 1) Introduction 150 2) Broad Background to Comparative Religion in the Late Nineteenth Century 150 5 3) Professionalising the Field 159 4) H. P. Blavatsky on Comparing 161 5) The Intersection 165 5.1) George Oliver on the Seven-fold Constitution 167 5.2) E. B. Tylor as Referenced 169 5.3) Herbert Spencer and the “Unknowable” 173 5.4) F. Max Müller 181 6) Conclusion 192 CONCLUSION 194 REFERENCES 205 6 CHAPTER ONE – INTRODUCTION 1) PREFACE This study examines the writings of Helena Petrovna Blavatsky as an exercise in comparative religion in the late nineteenth century. Its primary component will be an exploration of the nature and content of her comparative enterprise. This exploration identifies textual links to a selection of actors in the broader field of comparative religion and provides insight into the nature of the field in the nineteenth century and the boundary-marking mechanisms and assumptions which excluded Blavatsky from it. My focus is on the scientific debates of the nineteenth century, though other issues are implied, for example, class and gender distinctions as they relate to knowledge production and cultural acceptance. Through a process of re-description I will remove Blavatsky’s work from the margins of current and past research in the field, both of which reflect essentialist assumptions, and situate her as a legitimate student of religion having justifiable insights worthy of recognition in mainstream thought. In conversation with criticisms aimed at the early founders of the field, her research and work in comparative religion will prove to be as insightful as those lauded contributors to the field. This journey will include a broad review of the origins of the field of comparative religion in the late nineteenth century in the light of recent theories in various academic fields which aim to root out essentialist thought patterns inherited from the past. Potential entry points are many, but a statement from Blavatsky’s first major work, Isis Unveiled (1877), brings to the fore many of the issues examined in this study. She writes, “Such are the glimpses which anthropology affords us of men, either arrived at the bottom of a cycle or starting in a new one. Let us see how far they are corroborated by clairvoyant psychometry” (1988a, vol. I, 295). For the sake of this thesis I collapse into one category séance phenomena, spiritualistic phenomena, and the occult sciences. While these do have different histories and trajectories, they offered a similar broad challenge to materialistic positions of the nineteenth century. In the extract above, Blavatsky addressed the nineteenth century, and a number of questions present themselves. What voice is speaking? Who is the intended audience? What conditions of knowledge allow for the seamless shift from anthropology to psychometry? Is it irrational, ignorant, a stubborn survival, or are other factors at play? What are the implied sources of authority (cultural, scientific, political, and intellectual)? What power struggles of the past, the results of which underpin our most 7 pervasive and hidden assumptions, are here alluded to? And lastly, what conditions our personal response to the statement? The passage hints at the boundary labour of the past and present, and evokes any number of binaries which require attention, including: science/pseudo-science, scholar/amateur, rational/irrational, science/religion, knowledge/faith, and objectivity/subjectivity. The essentialist and dualistic nature of binary constructions have been directly challenged since the 1970s, and the complicated repercussions of this activity have wide-ranging implications. The rationale behind this work is to offer a new perspective on the origins of comparative religion emerging in the late nineteenth century. This formative period in the field of comparative religion will be reassessed through the work of a forgotten actor, Helena Petrovna Blavatsky (1831-1891), co-founder of the Theosophical Society. The historical influence of the Theosophical Society in the areas of Western esotericism and the New Age has been noted by many scholars (Godwin 1994; Hanegraaff 1998; Hammer 2004; Goodrick- Clarke 2008). I will, however, argue that Blavatsky participated in the more mainstream concerns related to comparative religion in her time and that she should not be excluded from the histories of this field.1 Nor should her contribution be confined or solely linked to any imagined esoteric current of thought.
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