Pythagoras. The Delphic Mysteries

MediaКнига Studio presents the sixth book “Pythagoras,” a world-famous work by the French philosopher Édouard Schuré—“The Great Initiates,” translated into many languages, including Russian.

“Know thyself, and you will know the Universe and the Gods…”

Inscription over the Delphic temple

Pythagoras is a legendary figure: an ancient Greek philosopher, mathematician, and mystic; founder of the religious-philosophical school of the Pythagoreans. He was subjected to persecution and ruthless pursuit many times.

Pythagoras visited the whole ancient world before he spoke his word to Greece. He saw Africa and Asia, Memphis and Babylon—their politics and their initiations. His turbulent life resembles a ship fighting among the ominously agitated sea: with sails unfurled, he steadily advances toward the goal of his appointed destiny—a beautiful image of calm and strength amid the enraged elements.

From many of his contemporaries, a mass of testimonies about his mind, his beauty, and his magical influence over people has come down to us. Neoplatonists of Alexandria, Gnostics, and even the first Church Fathers cite him as an authority.

His teachings form a magnificent whole—orderly, solid, and stable—its separate parts internally joined together by a single basic idea. Reproducing esoteric doctrines of India and Egypt, Pythagoras gave them clarity and simplicity of Hellenic thought, attaching to them a more energetic and clearly expressed idea of human freedom.