Theosophia, Inner Wisdom: Origin, Practical Application, and Ultimate Destiny

Compiled and edited by Dr C.A. Bartzokas, MD · Integrative Theosophical Studies, Series 1 — Eclectic Theosophy · 49 pages

First published in Great Britain in 1996 and revised through several editions since, this is the opening volume of the Integrative Theosophical Studies series and the natural place to begin. Its method is definition by elimination. Four chapters put the question directly — is Theosophy a science? is it a religion? is it spiritualism? is it a philosophy? — and take each possibility seriously enough to say precisely where it holds and where it fails. Only then does the book offer its own answer, in two parts: metaphysically, Theosophy is the accumulated testimony and wisdom of the ages; ethically, it is unconditioned love for humanity and for all that lives.

Around that core sit an account of what the compiler calls the renaissance of ancient spiritualism, a description of Theosophists in the same two registers, metaphysical and ethical, and a closing set of warnings to aspirants. At forty-nine pages it is the shortest of the Major Works and the most introductory, and it establishes the vocabulary that the other five volumes assume their readers already have. Anyone opening the Philaletheians library for the first time should start here rather than with the longer studies.

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