Esoteric Christianity is the major work on Christian doctrine by the English Theosophist Annie Besant, published by the Theosophical Publishing House in 1901. Besant argues that the canonical Christian sacraments, creeds, and figures — baptism, Eucharist, the Christ, the Trinity — were originally taught at two levels: an exoteric one for the wider community and an esoteric one transmitted within a closed school of initiates.
Besant contends that the esoteric level can be reconstructed by reading the Pauline and Patristic record alongside the surviving Greek mystery-religion sources. The fourteen chapters move from the hidden side of religions in general through the historical, mythic, and mystic Christ, to the sacraments, prayer, and the Book of Revelation. The book is one of the principal documents of the Theosophical reading of Christianity that later shaped Rudolf Steiner's Anthroposophical Christology and the modern esoteric-Christian milieu.
The object of this book is to suggest certain lines of thought as to the deep truths underlying Christianity, truths generally overlooked, and only too often denied.
p. vii · Foreword
First lines
Many, perhaps most, who see the title of this book will at once traverse it, and will deny that there is anything valuable which can be rightly described as "Esoteric Christianity." There is a wide-spread, and withal a popular, idea that there is no such thing as an occult teaching in connection with Christianity, and that "The Mysteries," whether Lesser or Greater, were a purely Pagan institution.
Contents
Foreword
Chapter I — The Hidden Side of Religions
Chapter II — The Hidden Side of Christianity
Chapter III — The Hidden Side of Christianity (concluded)
Chapter IV — The Historical Jesus
Chapter V — The Mythic Christ
Chapter VI — The Mystic Christ
Chapter VII — The Atonement
Chapter VIII — Resurrection and Ascension
Chapter IX — The Trinity
Chapter X — Prayer
Chapter XI — The Forgiveness of Sins
Chapter XII — Sacraments
Chapter XIII — Sacraments (concluded)
Chapter XIV — Revelation
Afterword
Reception
Esoteric Christianity has remained continuously in print through the Theosophical Publishing House for over a century and is one of the standard 20th-century sources for the claim that early Christianity carried a hidden initiatic core; Rudolf Steiner cited it approvingly in the years before his 1912 break with the Theosophical Society, and it remains a regular reference in contemporary Anthroposophical and Liberal Catholic literature. Academic historians of religion (Jonathan Z. Smith, Olav Hammer) have argued that Besant's reconstruction systematically reads the categories of late Theosophy back into a heterogeneous source base — the parallels she draws between the Eleusinian mysteries and the Pauline epistles are far less stable in the primary record than the book presents — and that the volume is most useful today as a primary source for the Theosophical reception of Christianity rather than as a critical history. The book sits alongside Besant's earlier Ancient Wisdom (1897) and her work with Charles Leadbeater as the most cited Theosophical writings on the Christian tradition.
Frequently asked
What does Esoteric Christianity argue?
Besant argues that canonical Christian figures and rites — baptism, the Eucharist, the Trinity, the Christ — were originally taught at two levels: an exoteric one for the general community and an esoteric one passed on within a school of initiates. The second level, she contends, can be reconstructed by reading Paul and the Church Fathers alongside Greek mystery-religion sources.
What is Annie Besant's background for writing this book?
Annie Besant (1847–1933) was the second president of the Theosophical Society and a prolific writer on comparative religion. She wrote Esoteric Christianity in 1901 as part of the Theosophical project of recovering a hidden wisdom said to underlie all major world religions.
How do academics regard Esoteric Christianity today?
Academic historians of religion treat it primarily as a source for the Theosophical reception of Christianity rather than as a critical history. Scholars such as Jonathan Z. Smith and Olav Hammer have argued that Besant's parallels between the Eleusinian mysteries and the Pauline epistles are not supported by the primary sources, and that she reads late Theosophical categories back into a heterogeneous record.