Pythagoras

Pythagoras of Samos (c. 570 BC – c. 495 BC) was an Ionian Greek pre-Socratic philosopher, mathematician, and founder of the spiritual movement called Pythagoreanism. As a mystic he made influential contributions to philosophy and religion, while he is also regarded as a great mathematician and scientist.

Theosophical view

Mme. Blavatsky wrote:

The most famous of mystic philosophers, born at Samos, about 586 B.C. He seems to have travelled all over the world, and to have culled his philosophy from the various systems to which he had access. Thus, he studied the esoteric sciences with the Brachmanes of India, and astronomy and astrology in Chaldea and Egypt. He is known to this day in the former country under the name of Yavanâchârya (“Ionian teacher”). After returning he settled in Crotona, in Magna Grecia, where he established a college to which very soon resorted all the best intellects of the civilised centres. His father was one Mnesarchus of Samos, and was a man of noble birth and learning. It was Pythagoras. who was the first to teach the heliocentric system, and who was the greatest proficient in geometry of his century. It was he also who created the word “philosopher”, composed of two words meaning a “lover of wisdom”—philo-sophos. As the greatest mathematician, geometer and astronomer of historical antiquity, and also the highest of the metaphysicians and scholars, Pythagoras has won imperishable fame. He taught reincarnation as it is professed in India and much else of the Secret Wisdom.

Master K.H., in one of his letters stated that some of Galileo's discoveries had been prompted by a Pythagorean MSS. in his possession.

Online Resources

Articles

• Pythagoras and his School by Raghavan Iyer
• Pythagoras at WisdomWorld.org
• The Pythagorean Science of Numbers at WisdomWorld.org

Video

• Turning-Points for the West: From Pythagoras and Plato through Gnosticism and Neoplatonism (3 Parts) by Stephan Hoeller and Tony Lysy