Theos-Talk Archives (August 1998 Message tt00039)

Dear friends,

On 7/22 Jake Jaqua posted a review of "Kuthumi on Selfhood"
(Malibu: Summit University Press, 1969). I like to respond in two
ways. First by giving a reaction to the review itself, and
secondly by posting one of the messages from the book.

Although Jake has stated that he is not interested in discussing
these issues--which is fine with me--I will post this anyway,
because I feel I have to respond to his review.

Following is the review with comments:


>Clare Prophet's "Kuthumi on Selfhood"
>
>      "Kuthumi on Selfhood" is a recent re-release under new
title of
>Elizabeth Clare Prophet's 1969 volume 12 of her "Pearls of
Wisdom"
>series. It is a series of short essays supposedly channeled from
the
>adepts behind the founding of the Theosophical Society, Mory and
Koot
>Hoomi (and a host of others from "Archangel Michael" to Gautama
Buddha)
>which are bound together in one volume.

Anybody can have a subscription to these Pearls of Wisdom. They
are published somewhat irregular, but every volume, which covers
a whole calendar year, has between 45 and 60 issues. For many
years now the rate has been $ 40 per year. Most issues are
dicatations by different Masters, Archangels and Cosmic Beings,
and are mostly given during one of the four quarterly conferences
of C.U.T., which are open to the public.

>    First of all, any serious student of Theosophy realizes that
Clare
>Prophet's "Morya and Kuthumi" are not the REAL Morya and Koot
Hoomi
>since these two adepts did not believe in the practice of
mediumship.

Dictations are quite different from mediumship, which opens the
possibility that they are the REAL ones.

>The impersonation of adepts by astral entities is no uncommon
thing as
>can be seen by Koot Hoomi's own words on page 419 and other
places in
>"The Mahatma Letters."

Agree. At a Whole Life Expo in Los Angeles a few years ago not
less than eight persons were channeling Saint Germain.

>      While "The Mahatma Letters" (the production of the REAL
Koot Hoomi
>and Morya) is solid philosophy throughout and obviously the
production
>of great minds, whether the critic be theosophist or not, the
Contents
>of Prophet's "Kuthumi on Selfhood" is nearly entirely pollyannic
>gibberish, with undefined terms piled helter-skelter upon each
other
>from every area of religion and occultism in such an irrational
fashion
>as to make anyone attempting to find even a focal point as a
basis for
>critique to throw his hands up in anguished despair.

Great polemical sentence and probably true for the reviewer's
point of view. I had similar experiences reading my first book
'Dossier on the Ascension' by Serapis Bey. I could read Kant,
Krishnamurti, HPB, Steiner and still decipher what they were
saying. Even Heidegger I could crack open. But the Pearls of
Wisdom were quite different. Very frustrating experience. I don't
know what made me understand them at a certain moment.
Discussions with other students, prolonged exposure to the
writings, deciphering its particular vocabulary, illumination
from within, Gnostic breakthrough? Anyway I will post an
accessible part or a whole Pearl of that volume on this site and
let you decide.

Once again, as the
>case in most all channeling, the discourses are an appeal to the
>emotions with only the barest necessary trace of rhyme, reason
and
>system.

After a while I found the rhyme and reason and discovered that
indeed they appeal to the emotions, though I rather describe it
as 'evocation of higher spiritual feelings, with subtle
intellectual
Content.'

>One wonders how with any sense of conscience Clare Prophet can
for
>the last 30 years present her channelings as from the same Morya
and
>Koot Hoomi behind the original Theosophical Society and
responsible for
>most of Founder Blavatsky's erudite writings.  How could one
suppose
>such a drastic degeneration in style and complete about-face on
>philosophic matters could come from the same men?

>From a philosophical point these teachings can be a bit
disappointing. Nevertheless I believe with Anrias that the
intellectual content of the SD was too high for the average
western student to be beneficial. One of the reasons being that
the life-style most conducive to obtain a beneficial
understanding of the SD could hardly be maintained in the frantic
west. For this reason the Masters turned more to other practices,
like group rituals, to effect the changes in Their students They
first tried to accomplish by releasing the SD. In this view it is
not so much the content of the SD which counts but more its
transformative effects. I just read that Steiner had a similar
view of the philosophy of Hegel and Fichte. They were kind of
Gnostic philosophers, not because they philosophied about Gnostic
doctrines--though in another sense that might be true--but more
because by reading them a Gnostic experience could be effected.

The word "God" is
>used approximately half a dozen times on each page of Prophet's
work,
>while in "The Mahatma Letters" K.H. and M. would not use this
term at
>all without qualification because of the terms connotation of
the
>Christian *Personal* Diety.

If you would study these teachings more in depth you will find
many qualifications of the term God. As I understand it God is
not to be equated with the Absolute, which is his 'background,'
and God is both personal and impersonal, and many variations in
between.


>While it is stated repeatedly in the
>adept-produced writings that it is hoped the Theosophical
Movement will
>avoid any sort of "churchism," Clare Prophet's "masters" have
instructed
>her to do this very thing with her "Church Universal and
Triumphant"
>complete with bishops, et. al.

Well, They made an exception for their Tibetan temples, and later
on also for the LCC and now for C.U.T.

>"Morya" is even made to give a wonderful
>Christmas sermon at one point and vicarious atonement is
promulgated at
>others - something that is the complete antithesis of
Theosophical
>Teachings.

Morya's letter is indeed wonderful.

The Masters do not teach the doctrine of vicarious atonement. The
exoteric doctrine that Jesus died for our sins and thus liberated
us from our negative karma is incorrect. Our esoteric
understanding is that Jesus, because of his spiritual attainment
and his office as Lord of the Piscean Age, temporarily carried
the bulk of humanity's karma so we could more easily grow
spiritually and be better prepared when this karma would come due
during the transition to a new age, which is happening now.


>"Jesus Christ" delivers a message also, and in the adept's
>earlier Theosophical teachings Christ was held to be an Avatar -
a
>being created by white magic which ceases to exist forever after
>physical death - one wonders what he is still doing around.

We teach, as did CWL, that Jesus and Christ were two different
beings. Jesus, under tutelage of the Masters, prepared his body
and mind to be overshadowed by the World Teacher and
representative of the Cosmic Christ Lord Maitreya. The same was
intended with Krishnamurti about 2000 years later.

>Did Clare
>Prophet's "adepts" change their philosophy from early
Theosophical days,
>or does she merely ignore the above discrepancies and the
thousand other
>paradoxes between her "new" adepts and the old, genuine adepts -
who
>were not "ascended masters" at all (whatever this may be) but
real
>living men.


Discrepancies can indeed be problematic. So far I found some
discrepancies solved by deeper study, or I chose one side or the
other--both not being infallible--or I just have to suspend
judgment. As far as the grander ideas and principles concerned I
do not see discrepancies, but mutual reinforcement and, as an
effect on me, a deepening of understanding. More problematic for
me are the discrepancies between theosophy and Krishnamurti's
teachings.

Meanwhile, that is since They were instrumental in founding the
TS, the two Masters involved made Their ascension at the turn of
the century and were later joined by Djwal Kul. They are still
living men, but without a physical body, though They could
materialize one if so desired.

Concerning this issue I wrote in my pamphlet "The Masters and
Their Emissaries:From H.P.B. to Guru Ma" (at
http://pages.prodigy.net/schuller/story.htm ):

"Both Masters [M. and K.H.] took their fifth initiation, the
Ascension, at
the close of the last century, thereby becoming incorporeal
Ascended
Masters.  And as Blavatsky has written--referring to other
saints, that,
when “unburthened of their terrestrial tabernacles, their freed
souls,
henceforth united forever with their spirits, rejoin the whole
shining host,
which is bound together in one spiritual solidarity of thought
and deed, and
called the ‘anointed,’ ”--the same glad tidings could be told,
not only
about these two illustrious Masters, but also about many other
brave souls
who followed them. [H.P. Blavatsky, Isis Unveiled (Pasadena CA:
Theosophical
University Press, 1976), II, p. 159].  For practical purposes the
difference
between an Unascended Master and an Ascended one is not very
great. Both can
work in the physical as well as in the spiritual realm and both
have a wide
array of occult powers at their command to guide Their pupils and
help
mankind.  The difference is that an Unascended Master has its
base of
operations in a physical body and an Ascended Master in a
spiritual.  To
dismiss the latter as spooks, because the they do not conform to
one’s idea
of flesh-and-blood Masters, is to deny oneself the great wisdom
coming from
the 'anointed.' ”

In defense of Ballard &co.

Govert