The title page of Mabel Potter Daggett’s 1911 essay, “The Heathen Invasion of America”

#HindooHistory
“Eve is eating the apple again. It is offered as a knowledge of the occult that shall solve the riddles of existence. Yoga, that eastern philosophy the emblem of which is the coiled serpent, is being widely disseminated here”
“Literally yoga means the ‘path’ that leads to wisdom. Actually it is proving the way that leads to domestic infelicity and insanity and death”
“They are priests from ‘East of Suez’ who with soft spoken proselytizing have whispered this mysticism into the ears of the American woman”
“While the churches of America are spending twenty million dollars annually in the cause of foreign missions the pagans have executed an amazing flank movement; they have sent their emissaries to us.”
Today the tinkling of temple bells ring out with a derisive, jarring note in a Christian land”
“It was the Congress of Religions at the Chicago World’s Fair in 1893 that with a spirit of fine religious toleration beckoned the first holy men from their fastnesses in the Himalayas”
“That benign condescension has proved fraught with far reaching consequences. The Swamis and Babas who came to America discarded in India the simplicity of their Sanyasin garb for gorgeous robes more tempered to western taste”
“They arrived silken clad and sandal shod, to prove an attraction that outshone the plain American variety of divine, the minister in a frock coat and white tie”
“These dusky-hued Orientals sat on drawing-room sofas, the center of admiring attention, while fair hands passed them cakes and served them tea in Sevres china. It was far better than squatting, clad in yellow loin cloth, at some heathen temple’s gate”
“When there was started at Green Acre, Maine in 1896, a summer school of philosophy which was the outgrowth of the World’s Fair Congress of Religions, its platform was an open forum where the Swamis found a welcome”’
“It is via this New England route from Calcutta that nearly every Eastern kharid has arrived and established his vogue in this country”
“With this introduction from Green Acre, Maine, the land of the Puritan forefathers, the turbaned teachers from the East set out across the continent...”
“The yoga class is becoming as popular as the Browning Class or the Shakespeare class. It is the direct means by which a Swami reaches the public. Through its aid, the Eastern teaching is gathering a wider clientele than it formerly numbered...”
“Placing the Hindu scriptures, the Bhagavadgita, or the Persian scriptures, the Zend Avesta, above their bibles many women who were formerly predestined Baptists and Presbyterians, Methodists saved by grace, established Episcopalians, Catholics who said their rosaries...”
“Is it not enough to tempt the feminine mind from Paradise itself? Small wonder that a Swami’s following, while it includes notably here and there college professors and men of learning... recruits its largest numbers among women”
“But yoga is a dangerous knowledge to lure any but the best balances brain. In the pursuit of it, too often the listening devotee is offering her sacrifices even at the altar of her soul”
Caption: “THE HINDOO HOLY MAN ON HIS NATIVE HEATH IN INDIA”
Caption: “Mrs. Ole Bull, widow of renowned violinist. This picture, taken some years ago when Mrs. Bull was fifty, shows her as the beautiful woman she was before the study of yoga shattered her reason”
“The imported religions of the Orient that sow the subtle seeds of destruction, are offered to the uninitiate as beautiful philosophies. On the surface they are that. But they are inevitably sprung from the soil of paganism and are tinctured with its practices”
“A greater menace than that of image worship lurks in the teachings of the Hindoo mystics. The casual observer will not discover it...And the descent from Christianity to heathenism is by such easy stages that the novice scarcely realizes she is led”
“How many are followers of the new gods it is difficult to estimate with exactness. It is known, however, that their number is in the thousands. The Vedanta society, established in America by the Swami Vivekananda...lectures to audiences of from three to five hundred people”
Caption: “Baba Bharati, the priest of the Los Angeles Radha-Krishna temple, who has many American converts, especially women”
“And your religion that is three thousand years old, what, let me ask, has it done for the women of India?”

“The Swami hesitated. He laughed disagreeably. ‘What has yours done for the old maids of New England?’”
“The missionary’s question is argument for which Orientalism in its most plausible phase has no answer. That one shrewd sentence punctures the sophistry of the East”

• • •

Missing some Tweet in this thread? You can try to force a refresh
 

Keep Current with HindooHistory

HindooHistory Profile picture

Stay in touch and get notified when new unrolls are available from this author!

Read all threads

This Thread may be Removed Anytime!

PDF

Twitter may remove this content at anytime! Save it as PDF for later use!

Try unrolling a thread yourself!

how to unroll video
  1. Follow @ThreadReaderApp to mention us!

  2. From a Twitter thread mention us with a keyword "unroll"
@threadreaderapp unroll

Practice here first or read more on our help page!

More from @HindooHistory

4 Apr
The Birmingham age-herald, 1912

“MOST CRUEL-MOST KIND IDOLS IN THE WORLD”

“Terrible tortures of human beings figure in bloody rites of ‘Kali’, Goddess of thugs and robbers, in interior state of India, says British archaeologist...”

#HindooHistory Image
“The ritual performed in the worship of Kali involves the most revolting rites, which the British government has long tried to suppress, but not with complete success” Image
“To the ‘true worshipers of Kali’ human sacrifice is essential...cutting their flesh and burning portions of their bodies is part of the devotion required of Kali’s worshipers.” Image
Read 7 tweets
17 Mar
The Washington Times, 1908

“MYSTERIOUS YOGA FAITH OF EAST INDIES WHICH HAS ROBBED AN AMERICAN CITIZEN OF A DEVOTED WIFE”

#HindooHistory #Yoga
“‘You are my affinity no longer.’ It was with these words that Mrs. W. E. Stone abandoned husband, children, home, country, and friends—gave up her position as a leader of the exclusive society of LaFayette, Ind....”
“And she accepted, in the place of all this, a life of semi-barbarity, among the mystics, the fakers, and the dervishes of East India, where as a devotee of the weird, intangible faith which is called Yoga, she must satisfy her heart’s desire in the contemplation of the occult..”
Read 8 tweets
15 Mar
The Hawaiian Star, 1908

“TRAGEDY MARKS THE YOGA CULT”

“Reported Separation at Purdue Recalls Sensational Incidents in Chicago”

“ADEPT IS HEARD IN SOCIETY”

“Swami Vivekananda Listened to by Many, But Mrs. Craddock Driven Away to Final Suicide”

#HindooHistory #Yoga
“The cult, which is now reported to have claimed Mrs. Stone, is an offshoot of an ancient Hindoo system of thought”
“A number of years ago one phase of the cult was forcibly called to the attention of Chicagoans through the lectures of Mrs. Ida Craddock, who applied its theory to details of life in such a way her books and publications were barred from the malls and she was indicted”
Read 10 tweets
14 Mar
Tacoma Times, 1915

“SEATTLE YOGA SCANDAL GROWS”

“CULT LEADERS BATHED LIKE SEPT. MORN”

#HindooHistory #Yoga Image
“Lack of drapery appeared today as one of the chief beliefs of the leader of the Christian Yoga cult, Yogi Ralph DeBit, in his trial with Mrs. Dorothy Gerber before Justice Brinker for alleged misconduct” Image
“Like the character in ‘The Naked Truth,’ it appeared that the mystery of human life was unveiled, and the inner truth revealed to the elect only when earthly and statutory vestments were tossed away”
Read 8 tweets
14 Mar
Kinsley Graphic, 1899

“SAVED FROM SUTTEE”

“How a Hindoo Woman, Now an American, Escaped from a Horrible Heathen Sacrifice”

“Mrs. Ramee Lalros... arrived in Chicago recently from India via Yokohama and San Francisco, with her husband.”

#HindooHistory Image
Mrs. Lalros...was about to become the victim to the terrible suttee of her caste when reduced by the man who afterward would become her husband” in Image
“At the age of 11, just on the eve of the children’s marriage, the youth of 13 who was to be the bridegroom died and... according to the irrevocable laws of her caste, she was doomed to be burned on the funeral pyre” Image
Read 5 tweets
24 Feb
THREAD

Excerpts from an abridged version of Mabel Potter Daggett’s essay titled “The Heathen Invasion of America” published in 1911 in the Hampton-Colombian Magazine: 1/

#HindooHistory
“Yoga, that Eastern philosophy, the emblem of which is the coiled serpent, is being disseminated in America. Literally yoga means ‘path’ that leads to wisdom. Actually, it is pricing the way that leads to domestic infelicity and insanity and death” 2/
“It was the Congress of Religions, at the Chicago World’s fair, in 1893... they arrived silken clad and sandal shod, to prove an attraction that outshone the plain American variety of minister in a frock coat and white tie.” 3/
Read 14 tweets

Did Thread Reader help you today?

Support us! We are indie developers!


This site is made by just two indie developers on a laptop doing marketing, support and development! Read more about the story.

Become a Premium Member ($3/month or $30/year) and get exclusive features!

Become Premium

Too expensive? Make a small donation by buying us coffee ($5) or help with server cost ($10)

Donate via Paypal Become our Patreon

Thank you for your support!

Follow Us on Twitter!