Theos-Talk Archives (November 2000 Message tt00099)

Interested to see Bart's reply to Art as I didn't see Art's reply to me.
For some reason I don't seem to get all of the mails sent to this group.
Would you mind posting it again, Art, or sending it to me directly. Thanks


..Peter

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Bart Lidofsky [mailto:bartl@sprynet.com]
> Sent: 14 November 2000 02:49
> To: theos-talk@egroups.com
> Subject: Re: Theos-World Concept of Mahatma:
>
>
> "Arthur E. Gregory" wrote:
> > > Yes, I agree with you, Art. The whole of the Secret Doctrine
> > from which
> > > this passage comes is an example of the "genius" of HPB and
> > the Mahatmas who
> > > together produced that work.
> > >
> >
> > Thanks for your insights Peter.... I think I would differ with you on
> > the concept of "Mahatmas" as it is usually understood in
> > theosophic circles. To me the Mahatmas of the early
> > theosophic movement are very close to spirit guides in the
> > Spiritualist movement and that's just the way I see it.
>
> That actually came later. The Mahatmas represented
> themselves as being
> quite human, and were rather upset when treated as something greater
> than human.
>
> > many of the
> > early theosophists were spiritualists and frequented seances
> > and this tinged the Mahatma concept with a kind of flavor that to
> > me has thrown many of our most valuable contributions into
> > disrepute.
>
> Actually, Blavatsky went into the Spiritualist movement because the
> type of people who joined it were the type of people likely to be
> interested in Theosophy. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle (among other things, a
> leader of the British Spiritualist movement) wrote that when she first
> came, the spirits were quite friendly towards her, but turned against
> her when she started declaring that they were just empty shells.
>
> Bart Lidofsky
>
>
>
>
>