Theos-Talk Archives (April 1998 Message tt00140)

FOOD FOR THOUGHT, Part II
Bogus Adepts: shams, swindles, and frauds

H.P. Blavatsky writes in 1889:

" . . . Behold, only fourteen years ago, before the Theosophical
Society was founded, all the talk was of "Spirits." They
were everywhere, in everyone's mouth; and no one by any
chance even dreamt of talking about living "Adepts," "Mahatmas,"
or "Masters." One hardly heard even the name of the Rosicrucians,
while the existence of such a thing as "Occultism" was
suspected even but by very few. Now all that is changed.
We Theosophists were, unfortunately, the first to talk of
these things, to make the fact of the existence in the East of "Adepts"
and "Masters" and Occult knowledge known; and now the name
has become common property. It is on us, now, that the Karma,
the consequences of the resulting desecration of holy names
and things, has fallen. All that you now find about such matters
in current literature -- and there is not a little of it --
all is to be traced back to the impulse given in this direction
by the Theosophical Society and its Founders. Our enemies
profit to this day by our mistake. The most recent book
directed against our teachings is alleged to have been written
by an Adept of twenty years' standing. Now, it is a palpable
lie. We know the amanuensis and his inspirers (as he is
himself too ignorant to have written anything of the sort). These
"inspirers" are living persons, revengeful and unscrupulous in
proportion to their intellectual powers; and these bogus
Adepts are not one, but several. . . ."

". . . Great are the desecrations to which the
names of two of the Masters have been subjected. There
is hardly a medium who has not claimed to have seen them.
Every bogus swindling Society, for commercial purposes,
now claims to be guided and directed by "Masters," often
supposed to be far higher than ours! Many and heavy are
the sins of those who advanced these claims, prompted
either by desire for lucre, vanity, or irresponsible
mediumship. Many persons have been plundered of their
money by such societies, which offer to sell
the secrets of power, knowledge, and spiritual truth
for worthless gold. Worst of all, the sacred names of
Occultism and the holy keepers thereof have been dragged
in this filthy mire, polluted by being associated
with sordid motives and immoral practices, while
thousands of men have been held back from the path
of truth and light through the discredit and evil report
which such shams, swindles, and frauds have brought
upon the whole subject. . . ."

Extracts from Madame Blavatsky's THE KEY TO THEOSOPHY.