The Mystery School Traditions

What Hermeticism actually teaches — the Corpus Hermeticum, the Emerald Tablet, and 'as above, so below' — sourced to primary texts, with the Kybalion myth corrected.

c. 100–300 CE (Greco-Egyptian Alexandria)

What the Gnostics actually believed — the Demiurge, the Archons, Sophia's fall, and the trapped spark — from the Nag Hammadi texts rather than their opponents.

1st–4th century CE

The 42 Negative Confessions, the weighing of the heart, and the Egyptian soul's nine parts — sourced to the Papyrus of Ani, with the Ten Commandments claim corrected.

c. 3100–30 BCE

Christianity's own contemplative tradition — theosis as Orthodox dogma, the Philokalia, Meister Eckhart, and John of the Cross's dark night, with sources.

250 CE–present

Zen without the Western filter — zazen, the koan curriculum, shikantaza, and the Ten Ox-Herding Pictures, including what D.T. Suzuki left out.

c. 520 CE–present

The Tree of Life, the ten Sefirot, and Ein Sof — what Kabbalah actually teaches, sourced to the Zohar and Sefer Yetzirah rather than to modern popularisations.

c. 1200 BCE–present; the Zohar c. 1280 CE

What the Upanishads actually say about Atman, Brahman, and the five koshas — the most complete map of consciousness any tradition produced.

c. 2500 BCE–present

The Tao Te Ching, wu wei, yin and yang, and the internal alchemy of jing, qi and shen — what Taoism teaches, sourced to the primary texts.

c. 600 BCE–present

Islam's mystical interior — the seven levels of the nafs, fana and baqa, dhikr, and Ibn Arabi's unity of being, beyond the inspirational Rumi quotes.

c. 700 CE–present

Odin's nine nights on the World Tree, the Elder Futhark, and the Norse nine-part soul — the tradition as the Eddas actually record it.

c. 500–1100 CE; living revival

What we genuinely know about the Druids — Awen, the bardic tradition, the Mabinogion — and an honest account of what Iolo Morganwg invented.

c. 500 BCE–400 CE; living revival

The African diaspora traditions without the Hollywood distortion — the lwa and orisha, Ifá divination, and why the 'voodoo doll' is European folk magic.

1500s–present; Yoruba and Fon roots far older

The 256 odù of Ifá, Orí as the destiny chosen before birth, and Àṣẹ — West Africa's complete system, and the Leibniz binary claim corrected.

c. 800 CE–present; older oral roots

The Bardo Thödol's between-states, Dzogchen's trekchö and tögal, tummo, and the rainbow body — including what laboratory measurement has confirmed.

7th century CE–present

The oldest written descent-and-return narrative, the me, and the Gilgamesh flood that predates Genesis — with the British Museum tablet numbers.

c. 4000–500 BCE