Theosophy:

The English word theosophy is derived from the Greek-Coptic word theosophia being a composition of the word theos and sophia. Theos means God(s) and sophia means either knowledge, doctrine or wisdom (it is this last meaning which is mostly used).

The word theosophy has, however, been used very differently through western history.
In the sixth century Dionysius the Areopagite uses the word theosophy as a gnosis or knowledge which is experienced rather than theology which is knowledge (logy) of God (theo), which is learned.
In the thirteenth century in a work attributed to Robert Grosseteste known as the Summa philosophiae a fourfold distinction of terms is made where theosophy is one of them. There are the:

Philosophers: Plato, Aristotle, Ibn Rushd, etc.
Moderns: Alexander of Hales, Albert of Cologne.
Theosophists: All authors inspirering the holy books.
Theologians: Those whose task it is to teach theosophy or the holy books, such as the theoso¬phy of Areopagite, Ambrose, Jerome, Augustine, Orign, etc.

During the Renaissance the use of the word became more frequent. Johannes Reuchlin the alchemist and expounder of the Christian Kabbalah used the word theosophistae to designate decadent scholastics which also seems to be the way Henry Cornelius Agrippa used the term. The Rosicrucians called themselves Theosophistae and Jackob Boehme used it to designate the interior word (Mercury) and was later called the theo¬sophical philosopher. After the renaissance into the enlightenment the word theosophy came to be a part of regular language especially due to Jakob Brucker who dedicated a whole chapter “De theosophiis” in his great work “Historica critica philosophiae” (1741) and later due to Denis Diderot who wrote and article on theosophy in his great encyclopedia.[1]

Antoine Faivre writes that the word theosophy was often found in relation to pansophy.
“As defined by Will-Erich Peuckert, Pansophy refers to a knowledge of divine things that is acquired by deciphering the “signatures,” or hieroglyphs, of the concrete uni¬verse, conceived of as the “book” of nature. This “book” aids one’s understanding of scripture and of God himself. The word theosophy is properly reserved from the reverse process, that of acquiring knowledge of the universe through one’s knowledge of God. In practice, however, and especially from the beginning of the eighteenth century on, the word theosophy was applied to the pansophic approach as well.” [2]

In the eighteenth century Kant uses the word theosophism in order to describe those philosophers who believe that they can see everything in God. Others like Antonio Rosmini designates theosophy as the metaphysics of being. Friedrich Schiller also titles one of his texts “Theosophie des Jilius”. This leads up to H. P. Blavatsky’s Theosophical Society founded in 1875.

H. P. Blavatsky argues that theosophia signifies “divine wisdom” and not as sometimes translated “the wisdom of God”. H.P. Blavatsky defines the word as follows:

““Divine Wisdom,” (Theosophia) or Wisdom of the gods, as (Theogonia), genealogy of the gods. The word theos means a god in Greek, one of the divine beings, certainly not “God” in the sense attached in our day to the term. Therefore, it is not “Wisdom of God,” as translated by some, but Divine Wisdom such as that possessed by the gods. The term is many thousand years old.”[3]

To H. P. Blavatsky the word theosophy itself dates back to the beginning of the Neoplatonic school of Alexandria:

“It comes to us from the Alexandrian philosophers, called lovers of truth, Philaletheians, from phil “loving,” and aletheia “truth.” The name Theosophy dates from the third cen¬tury of our era, and began with Ammonius Saccas and his disciples, who started the Eclectic Theosophical system.”[4]

The way she has used the term is primarily in connection with her idea of a primal or original wisdom religion, a first religion which later became fragmented and spread all over the world in its exoteric expression:

“The “Wisdom-religion” was one in antiquity; and the sameness of primitive religious philosophy is proven to us by the identical doctrines taught to the Initiates during the MYSTERIES, an institution once universally diffused. “All the old worships indicate the existence of a single Theosophy anterior to them. The key that is to open one must open all; otherwise it cannot be the right key.” (Eclect. Philo.)” [5]

Tim Rudbøg, 2002

[1] For a more detailed account of the word theosophy see Antoine Faivre’s Access to Western Esotericism and The Encyclopedia of Religion edited by Mircea Eliade.

[2] The Encyclopedia of Religion, edited by Mircea Eliade, London, Macmillan And Free Press, 1987, Theosophy by Antoine Faivre.