Theos-Talk Archives (January 1999 Message tt00202)

> ><<Would you not agree that that which is public knowledge is, by default,
> >exoteric?>>
> >
> >Yes, Paul, all printed knowledge commonly available cannot be
> truly said to
> be
> >"esoteric."  Therefore, all HPB wrote is now "exoteric," even if we
> may.assume
> >her source, with the complete teachings of the Wisdom Tradition, remains
> >"esoteric."
>
> Not necessarily. . . The difference between exoteric teaching and esoteric
> teaching does not depend on whether the ideas presented are
> published or not.
> It's the *ideas* themselves that are either esoteric or exoteric.

That's a pertinent way of putting it.

Re: esoteric/exoteric: one could even say that the term "esoteric" has
itself become exoteric.  All manner of self-styled 'gurus', 'experts', and
'teachers' like to label the word "esoteric" to almost anything,
particularly if it attracts sheep to be fleeced.

<snip>

> The Tibetan iconography and personifications, therefore, are
> certainly no more
> esoteric than all the other religious disciplines, no matter
> whether given out
> to the common monks or reserved for the initiated lamas,    who,
> as HPB said,
> were "mostly ignorant fools".  (And, if so, then, many of their
> students would
> be equally so, or even more so.  Especially, if they had to depend on
> seconhand and even third hand *interpreted* versions of the
> original "canons"
> made by linguists, philologists, or "orientalists".;~).

Well said.  A corruption/degradation thus results . . . and wide and open is
the way to delusion (or worse).

The correct understanding of Archaic symbolism - providing the
symbols/emblems themselves have not been altered/corrupted beyond
recognition - is the work of the student.  Archaic symbolism is a
multi-faceted (seven-fold) diamond.  What facet - if any - the
student/enquirer 'sees' depends entirely upon themself. As referred to
above, it is exoteric or esoteric as the case may be. NB: it is only the
(true) Mahat-ma who can understand the diamond from all its
aspects/angles/viewpoints *as a Whole*.

There is an old saying that the most esoteric secret in the whole world
could be shouted from every roof-top in the land and no one would be any the
wiser. While we may not choose to accept this literaly, the underlying
meaning is clear.  It is possible that the most esoteric 'thing'/'no-thing'
within the entire Kosmos is SAT ("Be-ness"), yet who could claim to
understand/'see' THAT?

<snip>

> We might add that HPB (along with her co-writers, M and KH) also
> stands head
> and shoulders above every writer of "Religious Canons" used in
> any exoteric
> "religion" for at least the past 24 centuries.

Masters attribute 2/3rd's of the world's woes to . . . religion.  Period.

Best wishes,
Paul.