Blavatsky on the Knighted Oxford Sanskritist Who Could Speak No Sanskrit

Helena Petrovna Blavatsky · Blavatsky Speaks Series · 10 pages

From Lucifer of May 1889, and reprinted in the Collected Writings as Buddhism through Christian Spectacles. The target is Sir Monier Monier-Williams, Boden Professor of Sanskrit at Oxford, and the occasion a new piece by him that she calls a pseudo-Oriental dirge. The specific charge is that he deploys the well-worn missionary device of presenting Buddhism as the Devil's imitation of Christianity — an argument that concedes the resemblance and then explains it away.

The detail that gives the piece its edge is a small one: the Oxford Sanskritist had attributed the Buddha's death to eating too much dried boar's flesh. Around it she builds a general contrast between two ways of approaching eastern philosophy, and it is stated fairly rather than as abuse — the theosophist seeks guidance and enlightenment; the professional orientalist seeks to satisfy intellectual curiosity and advance a career. She also notes, with some enjoyment, that Asiatic mystery in any form has a great charm for a certain class of mind, which cuts against her own side as much as against his.

Read the full text (PDF, 0.7 MB, 10 pages)