“It is to the priceless and accurate translations of the Vedic Books, and to the personal researches of Dr. Haug, that we are indebted for the corroboration of the claims of the hermetic philosophers. That the period of Zarathustra Spitama (Zoraster) was of untold antiquity, can be easily proved.
The Brahmanas, to which Haug ascribes four thousand years, describe the religious contest between the ancient Hindus, who lived in the pre-Vedic period, and the Iranians. The battle between the Devas and the Asuras – the former representing the Hindus and the latter the Iranians – are described at length in the sacred books.
As the Iranian prophet was the first to raise himself against what he called the “idolatry” of the Brahmans, and to designate them as the Devas (devils), how far back must then have been this religious crisis?
“This contest”, answers Dr. Haug, “must have appeared to the authors of the Brahmanas as old as feats of King Arthur appear to English writers of the nineteenth century.”
There was not a philosopher of any notoriety who did not hold to this doctrine of metempsychosis (the passing of the soul at death into another body either human or animal), as taught by the Brahmans, Buddhists, and later by the Pythagoreans, in its esoteric sense, whether he expressed it more or less intelligibly.
Origen and Clemens Alexandrinus, Synesius and Chalcidius, all believed in it; and the Gnostics, who are unhesitatingly proclaimed by history as a body of the most refined, learned, and enlightened men, were all believers in metempsychosis.
Socrates entertained opinions identical with those of Pythagoras; and both, as the penalty of their divine philosophy, were put to a violent death. The rabble has been the same in all ages.
Materialism has been, and will ever be blind to spiritual truths.”
H. P. Blavatsky
The Mark Of God: Understanding Your "I AM Presence" 