Theos-Talk Archives (April 2000 Message tt00150)

In a message dated 4/15/00 3:30:43 PM Eastern Daylight Time, 
monad@earthling.net writes:

<< Friends,
 
 For the theosophical library in the Netherlands (TS), we're 
 planning to create a thesaurus of theosophical terms.
 Once that is available, it can be linked to the resources
 like books and magazines which we have available for 
 the public. We hope it will help people interested in specific 
 subjects find the relevant materials quickly, and also provide 
 them with a kind of roadmap of terms that are linked together.
 
 My question to all of you is: does anyone know of
 some thesaurus in the field of theosophy that has already
 been created or is in use by some library for instance?
 It's not purely details of the ancient wisdom itself but also
 more broadly the important people involved in the movement,
 and related subjects on esoteric philosophy in general.
 I noticed there is some good material online like occult 
 glossaries or the Index to the Secret Doctrine; even though 
 in English (and we are starting out in the Dutch language) 
 that kind of material is suitable as a starting point to establish 
 a list of important theosophical terms. But more interesting 
 will be a clearly defined list of keywords and their cross- 
 references, hierarchies etc.
 
 Any tips are welcome!
 
 Best wishes,
 Peter Walstra >>

Dear Peter,
It's truly wonderful to hear of your project.  I'll be glad to help in any 
way I can.  So please, let me know if I could be of any service to you.
The classic in this field is, of course, HPB's THEOSOPHICAL GLOSSARY, which 
you are probably thinking of using as a foundation.  Many years ago, I had a 
Spanish version, the GLOSARIO TEOSOFICO, published by Editorial Kier, which 
has been a major publisher of theosophy-related works for many decades, out 
of Buenos Aires, Argentina.  I do not know if they still publish it.
I mention this, because the Spanish edition had many additional terms, & was 
a much larger edition than HPB's.  From the perspective of HPB purism that 
was not good.  But from the perspective of what you're trying to do, this 
might be helpful, in that it would provide you with additional entries to 
consider.  If you think this might be a lead, I can try to find out for you 
if this work is still in print.  Unfortunately, I gave my copy to a 
theosophical branch, long, long ago.
Another source you might want to look into is G.A. Gaskell, DICTIONARY OF ALL 
SCRIPTURES AND MYTHS, New York:  Julian Press, 1960.  Although this is not 
strictly theosophical, some of the entries would be most relevant to your 
project.
Godspeed in your work,
Aryel Sanat

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