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THEOSOPHY IN SOUTH AFRICA: THE FIRST FIFTY YEARS
In 1895 students of occultism, comparative religion and allied topics were drawn together by an advertisement in “The Star ” newspaper, then the mouthpiece for liberalism in a town which was little more than a glorified mining camp. Johannesburg was populated by prospectors and adventurers drawn from all over the world by the discovery of gold bearing reef of the Witwatersrand. As described in: “An Indian Patriot in South Africa” by M.K. Gandhi
“This is a strange City. In many respects a wonderful City. So young and yet so old. The problem of vice and poverty which perplex those aggregates of humanity , whose experiences cover ten centuries ,are all here . A young form and a jaded heart. Then the population is so diverse. The other day an accident happened just in front of me and a small crowd gathered. It was an ordinary crowd in a very ordinary street. As I reached it, a young Italian priest mounted a bicycle and rode away. A Chinese followed. The few who remained were nearly all of different nationalities. They were a tall Indian, probably a Pathan, some Kaffirs and a few white people, one Dutch and the other a Jew. This cosmopolitan character of the population forms at once the attractiveness and the perplexity of the place. There is no cohesion but there is no monotony. Few live here long without loving it.”
As always Theosophy was at the frontier of human thought (in this case literary)
The advertisement was placed by Lewis Ritch whose interest in theosophy had been stimulated by discovering Sinnet`s “Occult World”, as he wrote “I felt impelled to try and establish a centre “Some twenty” men responded to the advertisement and met in Joel`s Café, Commissioner Street.
Several of them joined the Society. The group’s activities included studying, manuals by Dr. Annie Besant
(To quote from a letter sent to A.B. “to acknowledge our supreme indebtedness to your teachings would prove us ingrate”) and the “Voice of the Silence”, hosting lectures, holding discussion evenings.
 Four years later on April 14th, 1899 the first lodge (Johannesburg) came into being. A faded charter hanging on the wall of the “Derick Shoobridge” library bears the signature of the first International President of the Theosophical Society Colonel H.C. Olcott as well as those of lodge’s sponsors Louis L. Playford (Chief Resident Magistrate of Johannesburg), Herbert Kitchen (an electrical engineer) and Lewis Ritch (an attorney).The newly formed lodge was placed in the jurisdiction of the Indian Section but keep a close tie with London. Countess of Wachtenmuster, a great friend of Madam Blavatsky, was appointed Correspondent and she guided the early steps in South Africa. Colonel Olcott also became interested in the lodge’s activities, so much so that he wanted to personally visit. However the Anglo-Boer war was imminent. So Lewis Ritch, as we read an entry in the 2nd volume of his diary dated Sunday 11June, wired Col Olcott, Madras, not to come. To quote from it,
“Felt much comfortable afterwards, don’t want him to land in the thick of the impending troubles”.
A few months after the establishment of the lodge, the second Anglo-Boer War broke out. This was disruptive as most of the members joined up and were soon scattered amongst both sides of the conflict.
On a cold winter’s night in the middle of 1902, a reunion was held in Mr. Playford`s Johannesburg home. An executive committee was formed that evening to revive the society. Mrs Playford, Kitchen and Bell being elected president, secretary and treasurer respectively. The re-opening of the lodge was advertised and one those who saw the advertisement was Elizabeth Knudsen the pioneer of Swedish massage in South Africa, who became and remained a member for the next 50years. By the end of 1903 membership had increased to one hundred and thirty three, largely due to Miss Pope of the London lodge, whom the TS executive, responding to a request of Mr. Playford on a visit to England, had the foresight to have seconded from the English Section. She was to do much to establish Theosophy on a sound basis in South Africa.
 Early on the T.S. scene in South Africa, the first magazine titled The South Africa Theosophist appeared in April 1903.The editor was Major C.L. Peacock a deep student of theosophy who as a lecturer attracted large crowds. The society even charged those who attend his lectures an admission fee of one shilling. The quarterly magazine printed on good paper sold for one shilling and six pence per copy. It also carried advertising- Mrs. Knudsen`s Swedish massage and L.M.Legate & Co., booksellers of Pritchard Street, who stocked the imported Theosophical books - Leadbeater`s “The Christian Creed” priced at two shillings and A.Besant`s “the Path of Discipleship” at three shillings. Another advertiser was the Vegetarian Hotel of 54 Fox Street –monthly and weekly borders were offered special diets for indigestion and rheumatism. The content of the magazine was a mixture of local writing, reprints of writings of leading Theosophists and occasionally articles on indigenous lore and customs. This made it comparable to the publications of the “learned” societies of the day. The September 1903 edition covered an address on 18th August 1903 presented to a T.S. audience in the Freemason’s premises given by M.K. Gandhi. He said:
“he owed a debt to the society as a member in London asked him to come and expand on the Bhagavad-Gita to a group of students and this had made him realise for the first time that he had neglected to the study of his own religion… and thus his attention had been directed to the mighty spiritual philosophy of his native land”.
Mahatma Gandhi’s religious views and his place in the theological world has been a subject of much discussion. When asked “Are you a Theosophist? “ He said “No, I am not a theosophist although there is much in Theosophy that attracts me…” On the August 22, 1905 he delivered a lecture in the Johannesburg lodge entitled “The Real Life”. In it he said:
“He felt that though one may read with great profit many works of Theosophical literature, the society during that period placed too much stress on intellectual and mental studies, argument and development of occult powers. The central idea of Theosophy i. e. the brotherhood of mankind and the mental growth of man was lost in the process. Hindu sages had told him that to live the life, no matter how hampered it might be, no matter with what limitations, was infinitely superior to having a mental grasp of things Divine. They had taught him, until one by one and step by step, he had woven these things into his life, he would not be able to have a grasp of the whole of the Divine teaching and so was urged to live the Real life .It was not to be lived in the lecture hall, not to be lived in Theosophical libraries, but it was to be lived in the world around him. In the real practice of the little teaching that he might be able to grasp.”
In spite of him declaring himself not to be a Theosophist, Gandhi introduced a number of people to the society, Lewis Ritch one such person, he worked in the legal practice of which M.K. Gandhi was the senior partner. Another was H.S.L. Polak who too worked in the practice. He went on to become a prominent Theosophist representing the society at International gatherings like the conference of non-government organisations which met in Geneva in 1948 and the United Nations. His eulogy to Gandhi carried this statement, “The ideal was always real to him –but there were other realities besides”.
 Johannesburg lodge members 1903
Over the next five years the emphasis was on the expansion of Theosophical teaching from Johannesburg to many other urban centers in South Africa. Besides a second lodge in Johannesburg (Harmony), five other lodges were formed in Pretoria, Durban, Cape Town, Germiston and Krugersdorp. This was the position when W.B.Fricke, by birth a Netherlander, who had worked in what then was the Netherlands East Indies (Indonesia and Timor) and had been Recording Secretary of the Theosophical Society at Adyar, came to South Africa to organize the National Section.
At Annie Besant’s request he was to assist with the establishment of The South African Theosophical Society. This was finalized on April 27th 1909. The first Convention of the National society, held in the Masonic Hall, Pretoria on September 30th, 1909. The first General Secretary, Henry Dyckman, shortly after election, resigned, because as a Christian fundamentalist his religious convictions brought him into conflict with the second theosophical principle.
 His successor was C.E. Nelson; he held office for seven years (1910-1916) He has been described as one of the finest executive officers the society. He, a descendant of the settlers of 1820, was born in Grahamstown, Eastern Cape, on October 1st 1853, and died after being knocked down by a train at Umzumbi on the Natal South Coast on 1st May 1934. A respected Chartered Accountant in Johannesburg of many years standing had joined the Society in 1903.A further two lodges were formed in 1910 Arcadia- Pretoria and Pietermaritzburg. In the same year the title of the magazine was 
changed, to “The Seeker”, and publishing moved to Pietermaritzburg. The editor was W.E. Marsh. He introduced a system of exchanging the publication for a large number of contemporary magazines including the Theosophical journals of other countries. May, 1910 had seen the Union of South Africa come into being and this prompted an article entitled “Unity”. The author’s hidden identity hidden under the initials K.E.T. begs us to find where we agree and so rise above the heresy of separateness.
“More than anything in South Africa now we need the spirit of Union, we want to absorb the perfect ideal of Unity and Brotherhood, for on no other foundation can this infant nation reach a development it deserves”.
The editor it seems was also prepared to be controversial as seen in his interest in spiritual healing. In his column “From a Minaret” raises a question.
“Has the question of healing by religion means been taken up by the Church of South Africa .So far nothing has been done, if the subject has received any attention at all? Yet in England there exist three different organisations within the pale of the Church of England”.
At the 1911 National Convention, for conformity sake with other national sections, a name change was agreed. From that date it was known as The Theosophical Society in South Africa. Three more lodges were formed in 1914, another in Cape Town and others in Harare and Bulawayo. During the First World War the onus for organizing the Convention was rested on the shoulders of the Johannesburg lodge as Elizabeth Knudsen (of Swedish massage fame) had a fine piece of land in the Observatory suburb of Johannesburg and Convention was held there in a large marquee with her as the hostess.
Margret Murchie became General Secretary in 1916. By the end of her tenure of office in 1920, three more lodges had been added in De Aar, Port Elizabeth and Kimberley. One Convention under her leadership stands out in the memory of members of that time, a convention and summer school held in Cape Town with lectures in pleasant gardens in a boarding school hired for the occasion, with excursions to the mountains and vineyards of the district. Her successor was John Walker.
 He stayed in that office until 1923 a period of rapid growth for the society. His emphasis was on “quality speakers”. For instance in 1921 the Rt.Rev J.J. Wedgewood came to South Africa and his lecture on “Reincarnation” in the Selborne hall the main assembly room of the Johannesburg city hall, attracted over one thousand people. He brought from England, Miss S.Oppenheimer a brilliant lecturer, in 1922 and she travelled the Section giving talks. Also at this time, there were some very able leaders at lodge level.
Like Howard A. Arnold who was president of the Johannesburg lodge in 1921/22. An Estate Agent by profession, he was most energetic during the nineteen-twenties, at different times he was not only president of Johannesburg but also the Germiston and Orange Grove lodges. The next General Secretary was Bruno Bischoff, a member of the Pretoria lodge.
He had fought on the Boer side in the Anglo-Boer war and he said that it was in those days he learnt to respect even his enemy. He served until 1926, during which time, in 1924 the “Seeker” magazine was superseded by “Theosophy in South Africa”.
C.E. Gyde (1927/28) who followed was another man of energy and devotion; under his guidance the Section not only consolidated it’s footprint but continued to grow.
He inspired the Pretoria lodge to build its own lodge premises -a lecture hall with a kitchen and study adjoining it and in the other wing of the building a library. (To this day the Lodge is surrounded by a delightful garden, though now somewhat smaller with a good deal of the original land having been acquired by the State for offices. The Apies River still forms one boundary. A river whose name will be well known to those who have studied Winston Churchill’s exploits, during the Anglo-Boer war as a correspondent. Then too the Olcott lodge in Durban was also formed as was the Bloemfontein lodge and another one in Cape Town the Brotherhood lodge. He too, brought to South Africa lecturers of note, one of them being Mrs. A Gowland from South America who having travelled widely in Tibet keep audiences enthralled with talks on this then “mysterious land”. He also encouraged theosophists to seek more specialized knowledge as did G.R. Heywood, a well known mine manager and president of the Johannesburg lodge for three years running. He visited the Netherlands and attended the Ommen Camps in 1927 where avidly studied the teachings of Krishnamurti and came back to lecture regularly to audiences of four hundred people in the City Hall.
By 1929 owing to the now large number of lodges and the vast distances involved (Cape Town and Johannesburg are 1500 kms apart) it was decided to form two Sections. The Northern section covering the Transvaal (Now the provinces of Gauteng, Limpopo, North West Province and Mpumalanga) and the Rhodesias (Now the countries of Zimbabwe and Zambia) called the Central South African Section with Sidney Ransom as General Secretary. He had emigrated from the United Kingdom to South Africa in 1926 and as an international speaker of considerable standing was from the beginning in constant demand. So too was his wife Josephine who was also a speaker of note. The lodges in the other three provinces Natal (now Kwa-Zulu Natal), Orange Free State (now the Free State) and the Cape (now the Western Cape, Eastern Cape and the North West Cape) retained the title South African Section with Margret Murchie recalled as Secretary General. New lodges continued to be formed – seven in the Central Section mainly in the environs of Johannesburg but one founded in Nairobi, Kenya and one ( the Blavatsky lodge ) in Lourenco Marques ( now Maputo), Mozambique was brought under it’s jurisdiction as well as four in the South African section – George ,Good Hope (Cape Town) and two in Natal. At the end of the year 1929 there were thirty clubs in existence in the two Sections.
 The name of the “mouthpiece” changed again to “The Link” during the time, Ethel Turner, who was Secretary General of the Central Section. She became editor. Also in this period Geoffrey Hudson paid his first visit to South Africa ( he was to visit again in 1937), and his intimate description of the Kingdom of Faerie, a world he knew so well and described with the scientific accuracy, left a permanent mark on the lodges of the Section.
In 1937 it was decided to form one section again under Dr. Humphrey as General Secretary. Clara Codd arrived in South Africa in 1938 and became Secretary General; an office she held until the Easter Convention of 1944.Her story properly goes beyond her days with the South African Section and is indeed now part of the history of Theosophy throughout the world. However it was at her instigation, that almost fifty years later, synchronicity came into play, once again a Netherlander, who had worked in Netherlands East Indies like W.B. Ficke, was came to South Africa. Jan Kruisheer was sent, to assist, by the International President of the time Dr. Arundale ( as Annie Besant had done previously).The task was to revise the constitution of the South African Section, centralizing the work and eliminating the unwieldiness brought about by the days of the Federation. The principle officer of the Section hitherto known as the Secretary General was designated National President in the new constitution.
 He succeeded Clara, becoming the first president. The period, during which Clara and Jan lead the Section, coincided with the Second World War. In South Africa, this was less disruptive to life than experienced in the countries of Europe. Theosophy proved a solace and enlightenment to many especially to prisoners of war held in this country. Lodge members were active in contacting many such. They also helped many of the displaced persons of Europe who sought refuge in South Africa.
At the 1946 Convention Eleanor Stakesby-Lewis was elected to succeed Jan Kruisheer. 
In the same year, with Clara Codd leaving for America and her date with destiny, Eleanor also took over as editor of “The Link”. So she not only undertook the heavy administrative duties in running the Section, the editorship of the society’s magazine but as an architect spent many hours working hard, on the drawing board. She was by all accounts a gifted person; another Netherlander, married to an Englishman (who was at the time president of the Johannesburg lodge), fluent in English, a gifted artist, a singer and a orator of note who gave thought provoking lectures. It was under the stewardship of someone as dynamic, dedicated and able, as her, that fittingly, the curtain came down on the first fifty years of Theosophy in South Africa. A verse by one of the Johannesburg lodge members, C. Mc Mahon, on the occasion of the Golden Jubilee is a fitting Epilogue.
Let’s start spring cleaning,
And let us throw out
All thoughts of worry
Depression and doubt
Let’s put in their place
Such thoughts as will bring
Peace, Power and Plenty
Of every good thing
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