It is important for an understanding of Zen to realize that the esoteric preoccupations of the select few cannot be the doctrine of the common man.

He then went to Mount Hiei, the cradle of Japanese Tendai Buddhism, where he found the original purity of the Tendai doctrine corrupted by the introduction and acceptance of other doctrines, especially Amidism and esoteric Buddhism.

Mao's godlike status during the period yielded him ultimate definitional power over Communist doctrine, yet the esoteric nature of his writings led to endless wars over its interpretation, with both conservatives and liberals drawing on Mao's teachings to achieve their divergent goals.

Drawing on its established esoteric doctrine, Willey asserts that the Ismaili understanding of Paradise is a deeply symbolic one.

It holds a doctrine or theology " built on esoteric truths of the ancient past ", which, " concealed from the average man, provide insight into nature, the physical universe and the spiritual realm.

Hasan was well trained in Ismaili doctrine and ta ’ wil ( esoteric interpretation ).

Drawing on its established esoteric doctrine, Willey asserts that the Ismaili understanding of Paradise is a deeply symbolic one.

The main theme of the NGE doctrine spoken on hip hop records were the teachings that black people were the original or first human life to walk the planet, that the Blackman is God, the Black Woman is Earth, and through the inner esoteric powers of the Gods and Earths, the youth can transform and possess its true potential, which seems to overthrow the overbearing oligarchy by becoming just rulers of themselves.

After returning to Japan, Kūkai collated and systematized all that he had learned from Huiguo into a cohesive doctrine of pure esoteric Buddhism that would become the basis for the Shingon school.

The Shingon lineage is an ancient transmission of esoteric Buddhist doctrine that began in India and then spread to China and Japan.

Eventually, according to Tendai Taimitsu doctrine, the esoteric rituals came to be considered of equal importance with the exoteric teachings of the Lotus Sutra.

On causes of development occultation doctrine among Shi ' as, Yaan Richard suggests, " the last Imams were confronted with a difficult situation: theoretical claimants to power, politically important, backed by discontented supporters of Omayyad and Abbasid caliphs, taking refuge in an esoteric justification of their quietism, the Immam were embarrassment to everyone.

Martinism also arose as an esoteric doctrine, as did various Rosicrucian orders.

According to the esoteric doctrine of the Three Wheels, whereas Buddhas represent pure concepts and bodhisattvas teach through compassion, Wisdom Kings are the embodiment of the wheel of injunction and teach through fear, shocking nonbelievers into faith.

While Upaya or the Noble Lie can be ( as in Wittgenstein ) teaching devices or stratagems to be superseded at a later stage, in many cases the laity only ever learns the exoteric doctrine, with only the elite ever learning the true esoteric version.

The Jewish mysticism category contains articles concerning the doctrine of esoteric knowledge and the interpretation ( exegesis, hermeneutic ) key, " soul " of the Torah ( Hebrew Bible ), and the religious mystical system of Judaism.

During this time, he was preparing the highest vehicle of his doctrine, The Pistis Sophia Unveiled, in which he meditated, verse-by-verse, upon the extremely esoteric Gnostic text Pistis Sophia.

They follow the Shugendō ( 修験道 ) doctrine, an integration of mainly esoteric Buddhism of the Shingon ( 真言 ) sect, with Tendai ( 天台宗, Tendai-shū ) Buddhism, Taoism, and Shinto ( 神道 ) elements.

Pierre A. Riffard: " The doctrine of analogy and correspondence, present in all esoteric schools of thinking, upholds that the Whole is One and that its different levels ( realms, worlds ) are equivalent systems, whose parts are in strict correspondence.

as an esoteric wisdom doctrine, and said that the " Wisdom " referred to was " an emanation of the Divine principle " typified by "... some goddesses -- Metis, Neitha, Athena, the Gnostic Sophia ..."

No other writer but Brunton has declared Mentalism to be the esoteric doctrine of the Orient.

The esoteric doctrine ( Armanism ) was concerned with the secret mysteries of the gnosis, reserved for the initiated elite, while the exoteric doctrine ( Wotanism ) took the form of popular myths intended for the lower social classes.

This was the first time that Jewish mysticism, embodied in the elite esoteric deveikut of the Tzadik, was combined with practical, popular social doctrine and movement.

At this time, knowledge of the numerals was still widely seen as esoteric, and Talhoffer presents them with the Hebrew alphabet and astrology.

In the same year, the Anthroposophical Society was called the " most important esoteric society in European history.

In Hinduism, particularly in an esoteric context, the four states-of-matter describe matter, and a fifth element describes that which was beyond the material world.

The Stromata is less systematic and ordered than Clement's other works, and it has been theorized by André Méhat that it was intended for a limited, esoteric readership.

The Zohar, which was written in the 13th century, is generally held as the most important esoteric treatise of the Jews.

The former was founded by Raimundo Irineu Serra in the early 1930s, as an esoteric Christian religion with shamanic tendencies.

While the comrades from both the and sympathised, a promotional brochure was produced for the project, which reads as a pamphlet for a new esoteric sect.

Beside such revived currents from late Antiquity, a second major source of esoteric speculation is the Kabbalah, which was lifted out of its Jewish context and adapted to a Christian framework by people such as Johannes Reuchlin.

Anthroposophy, which was founded by Rudolf Steiner in the early part of the 20th century, includes esoteric versions of education, agriculture, and medicine.

In Switzerland, the city of Geneva was commonly associated with the occult at the time, particularly by Catholics, because it had been a stronghold of Protestantism, and many of those interested in the esoteric travelled from their own Roman Catholic nations to Switzerland to purchase grimoires or to study with occultists.

A common characteristic of some of these groups was the teaching that the realisation of Gnosis ( esoteric or intuitive knowledge ) is the way to salvation of the soul from the material world.

INTERCAL is an esoteric programming language that was created as a parody by Don Woods and James M. Lyon, two Princeton University students, in 1972.

Bowersock in particular ), Julian's paganism was highly eccentric and atypical because it was heavily influenced by an esoteric approach to Platonic philosophy sometimes identified as theurgy and also Neoplatonism.

Gnosticism was an important development of ( and departure from ) early Christianity, blending Jewish scriptures and Christian teachings with traditional pagan religion and esoteric Greek philosophical concepts.

Some researchers add that Nichiren strongly criticized the esoteric rituals of other schools: “ As Sasaki notes, Nichiren ’ s view of the shift of authority from GoToba to Yoshitoki was inseparable from his criticism of the esoteric teachings.

Thus, property was no longer an esoteric philosophical question, but a political issue of substantial concern.

René Guénon in Insights into Islamic Esoterism and Taoism ( Sophia Perennis 2003 ) contended that Sufism was the esoteric aspect of Islam supported and complemented by exoteric practices and Islamic law.

The practice of Emperor worship was further spread by distributing imperial portraits for esoteric veneration.

He began to seriously explore myth and esoteric practices within as shamanism, Buddhism and alchemy, perceiving that imagination could heal dualistic splits in the human psyche and poetry was the language of the work.

They comment that Blavatsky's work " helped to foster antisemitism, which is perhaps one of the reasons her esoteric work was so rapidly accepted in German circles.

Kuji-kiri is an esoteric practice which, when performed with an array of hand " seals " ( kuji-in ), was meant to allow the ninja to enact superhuman feats.

The mudrā, a series of hand symbols representing different Buddhas, was applied to the kuji by Buddhists, possibly through the esoteric Mikkyō teachings.