Further reading for Madame Helena Blavatsky
Isis Unveiled: Secrets of the Ancient Wisdom Tradition by Madame Helena Blavatsky
The Secret Doctrine by Madame Helena Blavatsky
Madame Blavatsky: The Mother of Modern Spirituality by Gary Lachman
Madame Blavatsky: The Woman Behind the Myth by Marion Meade
The Astral Plane: Its Scenery; Inhabitants and Phenomena by CW Leadbetter
No historical personality has had as great an impact on Last Podcast on the Left more than Madame Helena Blavatsky. The entire Western Esoteric Tradition owes her a great deal of gratitude as she has her fingerprints all over everything from the philosophy of Aleister Crowley to the legends of Lemuria to the unfortunate adoption of esoteric Hitlerism and the occult practice of the Nazi secret societies. And that’s just to name a few.
Helena Petrovna Blavatsky is among the world’s most renowned philosophers. Much of her life is a huge question mark but what is known about her is that she spent much of her childhood and teenage years being a gigantic pain in the ass for her family, Russian aristocracy, before passing into adulthood, giving her husband the slip and globetrotting while picking up bits and pieces of esoteric knowledge from cultures both enlightened and otherwise. Upon landing in New York City in 1875, Blavatsky officially founded her philosophy/religion, Theosophy, a dense combination of Neoplatonism, Hermeticism, and esoteric Buddhism said to have been passed down to her by hidden, ascended masters. It details the nature of human consciousness and the true origin of the human race.
Though, Blavatsky is seen by many as a fraud, Theosophy made a massive impact on the world of the occult, which was much more common in the lat 1800’s than one might think. In many ways, Blavatsky was every bit as important as Freemasonry in kicking off the spiritual and occult renaissance of the late 1800’s, a movement which is making a comeback today.
Episodes: 410-412
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