Theos-Talk Archives (November 1998 Message tt00055)

>We've mentioned the Adyar, Pasadena and ULT theosophical
>groups. Yet, there is an independent TS in Germany, still
>functioning, which was started by Franz Hartmann and which
>is based on his presentation of theosophy. He was a colleague
>of HPB. Does anyone know anything about this Society and how it
>faring?  It's had to compete with Steiner's Anthroposophical
>Society.
>
>Augoeides


The Hartmann TS in Germany was founded on Sept 3rd, 1897 in Munich. The HQ
were transferred to Leipzig in 1898. In 1933 when the Nazis got the power
all TS'ies were persecuted and watched by government agents. In 1937 they
were officially destroyed. After WWII there was another great harm for the
Hartmann TS as Leipzig was now in the "Russian Zone" and the Communists
never allowed the reestablishment of the TS in their zone and they had to
survive only in Western Germany, although small nucleuses hold their
meetings in the underground in the former GDR until the break of the Berlin
wall in 1989 and working only with that stuff some Theosophists smuggled
into the GDR. The Hartmann TS is still working and has many of Hartmann's
books still in print. I was just two weeks ago at the HQ of the
Anthroposophical Society at Dornach near Basel in Switzerland and researched
for the disliked theos. materials. Hartmann and Steiner knew each other from
their Vienna time in the late 1880'ies but they were antagonistic.

BTW, there is another line not mentioned in the last messages: The various
Point Loma Lodges and Centers in many countries. Since James Long took
office in 1951 and brought to birth his Pasadena TS from the former Point
Loma-Covina TS the scattered PL-groups are working loosely and independent
without no HQ until today like the Freemason Lodges. Since 1971 Point Loma
Publications, founded by the secretary and the intimatest pupils of
Gottfried de Purucker offers the unaltered books of the Point Loma era
together with important new titles like "The New Testament Commentaries of
H. P. Blavatsky", "The Inner Group teachings of H. P. Blavatsky" (with new
discovered materials - and for the first time HPB's diagram on meditation)
or "Fundamentals to the Esoteric Philosophy" a classic scholarly commentary
of Dr. de Purucker, a life time student of HPB, on the Secret Doctrine.

Frank