Theos-Talk Archives (November 1998 Message tt00512)

Dallas wrote quoting HPB in THE THEOSOPHICAL GLOSSSARY:

> >Lets take the case of a JIVANMUKTA.  "An adept or yogi who has
> >reached the ultimate state of holiness and separated himself from
> >matter;  a Mahatma, or Nirvanee, a "dweller in bliss" and
> >emancipation.  Virtually one who has reached Nirvana during
> >life.:  [Theos. Glos. pp 165-6]
> >


Jerry Schueler replied:

> This may be where we are having problems, Dallas. You are
> quoting HPB who does NOT use the term in the way Hinduism
> uses it. I prefer the Hindu definition: a person who is living (a jiva
> is a living being) who is free of karma (mukti means liberated).
> HPB has it completely backwards. She thinks it refers to a
> discarnate being, but actually it has always referred to a
> living embodied human being who acts without producing
> future karma (ie., a living Buddha).

Daniel comments:

Jerry, you seem quite opinionated with some of your "Phooey"
and "Baloney" comments.  Many of your statements are vague,
general, undocumented and many times
simplistic if not downright erroneous.

To illustrate my contention, let us take for example your comment
above.  You wrote:

"HPB has it completely backwards.  She thinks it refers to a
discarnate being."

Yet the very last sentence that Dallas quoted above from HPB's
Thesophical Glossary reads:

"Virtually one who has reached Nirvana during life."

DURING LIFE. !!! That would appear to me to indicate that
the state of a "jivanmukta" can be achieved in the body. . .
during life.  Yet you maintain that HPB says the opposite.
Funny interpretation on your part, I would say.  Plus please
check (for instance) the cumulative index (Vol. 15) to Blavatsky's
COLLECTED WRITINGS for "jivanmukta".  In  many of these references
HPB indicates that a jivanmukta can still be in the body.

Again, Jerry, you write:

"You are quoting HPB who does NOT use the term in the way Hinduism
uses it."

Among other things, you imply that Hinduism is some monolithic system in
which
there is only one concept with no differing views.  Or the implication
of your
statement is that all Hindu texts and yogis view "jivanmukta" only in
the way
you define it above.

I quote but two sources that will show others (*if not you*) that
you are overgeneralizing and oversimplifying.

George Feuerstein in YOGA:  THE TECHNOLOGY OF ECSTASY (p. 198) writes:

"At the peak of this ecstatic unification, the yogin reaches the point
of no return.  He becomes liberated.  According to the dualistic model
of Classical Yoga, this implies the dropping of the finite body-mind.
...Some schools of Vedanta, which hold that the ultimate Reality is
nondual, argue that liberation does not have to coincide with the
death of the physical body.  This is the ideal of liberation in life
(jivan-mukti).  Patanjali, however, does not appear to to have
subscribed
to it. . . . This is also the ideal of Classical Samkhya. . . ."

Bruce M. Sullivan in his HISTORICAL DICTIONARY OF HINDUISM writes (p.
106):

"JIVAN-MUKTI. . . . Most Hindu religious and philosophical traditions
accept the possibility of one attaining liberation while living, so
that one continues to live thereafter without generating any
Karma. . . . [but] the Nyaya philosophical tradition. . . does not admit
the possibility of liberation until death."

These are two quotes of several that I could give that show that to
state that "Hinduism" teaches this that or the other is overgeneralizing
and oversimplifying the issue under discussion.

Unfortunately, in the last week or two, you have made at least
a dozen other similar statements without any documentation or any
references, etc.  Without this documentation, it is difficult for
most of your readers to follow up and check on the accuracy of
your statements.  I wish I had more time to point out your errors
by quoting chapter and verse.  Hopefully interested readers will
consult other sources (Buddhist and Hindu, for example) before
they naively accept many of your characterizations.