The great religions of antiquity, including Christianity,-the doctrine commonly Perfect Way in 1886, acknowledging authorship, they stressed its OccidentalĬharacter, scientific and historical, claiming that it represented both anĪttempt ‘to ascertain at first hand the nature and method of existence’ andĪlso a recovery of ‘that which constituted the basic and secret doctrine of all Order to avoid schism, with Kingsford in charge of an offshoot Hermetic Opposition to her, and within a year the two tendencies had split peacefully in Sinnett had returned to Britain shortly before Kingsford became President, effectively leading an As President she issued a pamphlet criticising Esoteric Buddhism, which initiated a pamphlet war involving, among others, Subba Row. Her bias was towards a Western, ChristianĪnd Hermetic esotericism, rather than the Oriental one that was favoured byīlavatsky and A. Was no secret in Theosophical circles, and did not pose any difficulty to herīeing made President of the Theosophical Society in 1883, even though she was The Perfect Way or, the Finding of ChristĪs a series of lectures, first published anonymously in 1882. Together with Maitland, Anna Kingsford wrote Sacrifice to atone for the sins of humanity. Principle of perfection within every person, rather than the necessary Includes hymns to planetary deities, and where Christ is regarded as a The abodes of the soul which are in this triangle are seven in number.Īnna Kingsford, the Hermetic Society and Esoteric ChristianityĪlthough Yeats was generally uninterested in Christian orthodoxy, he probably found the tradition more sympathetic in the form expressed by Anna Kingsford and her collaborator Edward Maitland, which does not claim that Christianity is the only true religion,

These were set forth in the Eleusinian Mysteries, under the parable of the Rape of Proserpine, who represents the world-soul lapsing from the celestial abodes into materiality, and becoming subject to Karma or Fate, personified by Hecate.

To the lower triangle belong the lesser mysteries, those of natural evolution. The central part is a hexagon, which is bisected vertically and horizontally, by a cross, the beams of which are called respectively the Tree of Life and the Tree of Knowledge. Of the two triangles which compose the 'Seal of Solomon' the upper represents the unmanifest world of pure spirit, and the knowledge of it was reserved for initiates of a high grade, the elect, or illuminated, and is the subject of Mysticism the lower, which represents the manifest universe, is the province of Occultism. This page is related to these other pages:Įsoteric and Occult Background Theosophy Vedanta and Theosophy

Yeats and 'A Vision': The Hermetic Society

Hermetic cross meaning