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| This National Women's Suffrage Association photo possibly contains more theosophists than you can shake a stick at. |
There has been more notice of the influence of theosophy in American feminism in the last ten years, (see American Feminism and Joscely Godwin's, Upstate Cauldron). The holy trinity of 19th century American feminism, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Matilda Joslyn Gage, and Susan B. Anthony, all had varying degrees of theosophical interests. Elia B. Peattie, Josephine Cables, and Emily Coues, are three more feminist theosophists who deserve further study. I think that there is more to be told about this story. Further research into the American theosophy-feminist connection would make for an interesting article, or a full book even. The recent article by Shawn F. Higgins offers excellent ground-breaking research that supports this point.
The Shade of Sattay
Shawn F. Higgins February 25, 2023
This is the story of Govindarao Sattay, the first male Brahmin to visit
America in 1884. He would experience both generosity and malice in that
country, including imprisonment for declaring his beliefs. Sattay would
ultimately die in New York, and be the first South Asian of any caste to
be cremated in America.
Good article on Gage's theosophical and spiritual interests
Reclaiming the Spooky: Matilda Joslyn Gage and Mary Daly as Radical Pioneers of the EsotericMarguerite Rigoglioso, Issue 63 (Fall 2015): Spirituality Issue
Derr, Mary Krane, Feminism & Nonviolence Studies Sep 22, 1998
How to Ruin Your Reputation: Elizabeth Cady Stanton and The Woman's Bible, Sophia Ecumenical Feminist Spirituality Centre, 12 Aug 2017 Dee Michell
Susan B. Anthony had spiritual interests, but was more down-to-earth, concrete, and practical, therefore, rightly or wrongly, she thought theosophy was too mystical
Susan B. Anthony’s Bargain with the Devil
Carol P. Christ, November 25, 2019
The copy of Science and Health owned by Susan B. Anthony
In 1897 she wrote to Elizabeth Cady Stanton, “The truth is, I can no
more see through Theosophy than I can through Christian Science,
Spiritualism, Calvinism or any other of the theories, so I shall have to
go on knocking away to remove the obstructions in the road of us
mortals while in these bodies and on this planet; and leave Madam Besant
[Annie Besant, a prominent theosophist] and you and all who have
entered into the higher spheres, to revel in things unknown to me….”1
15 Surprising Facts About Susan B. Anthony
Jone Johnson Lewis, Updated on February 18, 2020
Originally a Quaker, with a maternal grandfather who had been a Universalist, Susan B. Anthony became more active with the Unitarians
later. She, like many of her time, flirted with Spiritualism, a belief
that spirits were part of the natural world and thus could be
communicated with. She kept her religious ideas mostly private, though
she defended the publication of "The Woman’s Bible" and criticized religious institutions and teachings that portrayed women as inferior or subordinate.
https://www.thoughtco.com/surprising-facts-about-susan-b-anthony-3528409Theosophy Reaches Omaha Read Peattie's Writings,
A Talk with Annie Besant Omaha World-Herald, 25 December 1892
Margaret Fuller – Working Towards Women’s Equality
https://www.few.org/2016/08/01/margaret-fuller-working-toward-womens-equality/ How Native American Women Inspired the Women’s Rights Movement
Sally Roesch Wagner, 2020
Having worked for women’s rights for forty years, Gage and Stanton
became increasingly frustrated with their inability to make major gains
in their social, economic, or political positions as women by the
1880’s. In their disappointment, they looked beyond the Euro-American
culture that was already known intimately to them and gained a vision of
a world of equality from their nearby neighbors. Stanton and Gage grew
up in the land of the Haudenosaunee, the six nations of the Iroquois
Confederacy: the Onondaga, Mohawk, Seneca, Cayuga, Oneida and Tuscarora
who had social, religious, economic, and political positions far
superior to their own, they wrote.
Video
& trancscript:
The Divine Feminine: A Modern Genealogy
Joy Dixon, October 26, 2021
modern esotericism, & its intersection with questions of politics,
religion, sex, gender, & sexuality. 1st in CSWR’sseries on “The
Divine Feminine & Its Discontents.”
Gloria Steinem (1934-)
Journalist and social-political activist who emerged as a nationally recognized leader of second-wave feminism in the United States in the late 1960s and early 1970s.Her mother was a Theosophist.
'In
retrospect, I realize that I was so lucky that it was my mother’s
child-rearing philosophy, because if you believe in reincarnation, you
don’t think children are your possessions.'
The holy trinity of 19th century American feminism, Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Matilda Joslyn Gage, and Susan B. Anthony, all had varying degrees of theosophical interests.
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