Blavatsky Stripped Bare by a Buddhologist, Even.
I just finished reading this splendid new book by the Swiss scholar Urs App (I already knew him from a previous book about The Birth of Orientalism ). Finally, somebody has done all the hard historical-philological work that is required to uncover the true foundations of Helena P. Blavatsky’s Theosophy, one of the most influential esoteric movements of the late nineteenth and the twentieth century. App’s method rests on some simple and quite traditional but essential foundations. (1) Take the time to carefully study all the relevant primary sources, i.e. not just some part of what HPB wrote, but really everything she wrote; (2) consistently place those sources in a strict chronological order , if possible even on a day-to-day basis, so that you can see exactly how her thinking develops over time; (3) don’t be satisfied by just scanning “the discourse” in general terms, as is common in academia today, but analyze her ideas ; and finally (4) do whatever you can to identify the exact wri...
