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Re:Why world is not perfect?

Oct 16, 1997 10:16 PM
by Dallas TenBroeck


Oct 17th 1997

Dear Phillips Spencer and Rudy Don:

Many thanks for the inspiring quote from KATHA Upanishad.

I think it parallels a similar statement that Krishna offers in
BHAGAVAD GITA:

"A man is said to be confirmed in spiritual knowledge when he
forsakes every desire which enters his heart; and, of himself is
happy and content in the Self through the Self.  His mind is
undisturbed in adversity and he is happy and contented in
prosperity, and he is a stranger to anxiety, fear and anger...The
tumultuous senses and organs hurry away by force the heart even
of the wise man who strives after perfection.  Let a man
restraining these, remain at rest in me, his true self; for he
who has his senses and organs in control possesses spiritual
knowledge." B.  GITA Chap 2 pp 18-19

And also in THE VOICE OF THE SILENCE, which HPB translated from
the "Stanzas of Dzyan," we find in the very beginning the
statement :

> Having become indifferent to objects of perception, the pupil
> must seek out the Rajah of the Senses, the Thought-Producer, he
> who awakes illusion.
>
> The Mind is the great Slayer of the Real.
>
> Let the Disciple slay the Slayer.
>
> For--
>
> When to himself his form appears unreal, as do on sleeping all
> the forms he sees in dreams;
>
> When he has ceased to hear the many, he may discern the ONE--the
> inner sound which kills the outer.
>
> Then only, not till then, shall he forsake the region of Asat,
> the false, to come unto the realm of SAT, the true.
>
> Before the Soul can see the harmony within must be attained, and
> fleshly eyes be rendered blind to all illusion."
>
> -- VOICE pp.  1-2


What strikes me as valuable is the unanimity of the ancients on
the subject of knowing what the nature of human psychology is.
Seems to me what we lack to day is the ability to probe those
statements for their accuracy.

HPB claims that Theosophy is the root record of all ancient
systems and therefore they will reflect, each in its own way, the
mind-set of the place and time when issued and recorded.  (SD
Vol.  1, pp 272-3, Original 1888 Edition )

The quote from the Katha Upanishad is familiar to me and shows
the similarity in thought in Hindu scripture and philosophical
psychology, translated into other words and phrases.  Are you
also familiar with the YOGA SUTRAS of PATANJALI ? They also tend
to provide the same information, but they also show how the
powers of the "mind" and the "Soul" can be studied and developed
by a student intent on learning about his own nature.

I am constantly struck by the dualism resident in me and in
others -- of the nature of the moral use to which we put
knowledge.

I see the two extremes of potential results of action, and yet I
(the "real me") seem to be undisturbed, as an observer might be,
looking at the idea-pictures which my mind can generate--as those
two extremes.  Should not the moral and ethical usage be also
sutdied, and how applied ?

Now, is the Inner "I" which serves as "observer, or Witness to
the thoughts and desires of the embodied "I" ever "biased ?"

I constantly go back to the idea that if "bias" is sensed, then
something in us is UNBIASED.  Would it not be of value to find
out what that is ?

The quote from the DHAMMAPADA from the "Twin-Verses" is also
valuable.  It goes on to add: " (verse 1) "If a man speaks or
acts with an evil thought, pain pursues him, as the wheel of the
wagon follows the hoof of the ox that draws it." (verse 2) ...
"If a man speaks or acts with a pure thought, happiness pursues
him like his own shadow which never leaves him."

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