Esoteric Christianity, or The Lesser MysteriesBesant, Annie
Religion
Esoteric Christianity, or The Lesser Mysteries
Besant, Annie
Christianity -- Miscellanea; Mysticism; Theosophy
We are thus brought face to face with the position that we cannot have
one and the same religious teaching even for a single nation, still less
for a single civilisation, or for the whole world. If there be but one
teaching, a large number of those to whom it is addressed will entirely
escape its influence. If it be made suitable for those whose
intelligence is limited, whose morality is elementary, whose perceptions
are obtuse, so that it may help and train them, and thus enable them to
evolve, it will be a religion utterly unsuitable for those men, living
in the same nation, forming part of the same civilisation, who have keen
and delicate moral perceptions, bright and subtle intelligence, and
evolving spirituality. But if, on the other hand, this latter class is
to be helped, if intelligence is to be given a philosophy that it can
regard as admirable, if delicate moral perceptions are to be still
further refined, if the dawning spiritual nature is to be enabled to
develope into the perfect day, then the religion will be so spiritual,
so intellectual, and so moral, that when it is preached to the former
class it will not touch their minds or their hearts, it will be to them
a string of meaningless phrases, incapable of arousing their latent
intelligence, or of giving them any motive for conduct which will help
them to grow into a purer morality.
Looking, then, at these facts concerning religion, considering its
object, its means, its origin, the nature and varying needs of the
people to whom it is addressed, recognising the evolution of spiritual,
intellectual, and moral faculties in man, and the need of each man for
such training as is suitable for the stage of evolution at which he has
arrived, we are led to the absolute necessity of a varied and graduated
religious teaching, such as will meet these different needs and help
each man in his own place.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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