Theos-Talk Archives (December 2001 Message tt00399)

<<<<Hi Jerry. I have always enjoyed your posts. Another phenomenon I have noticed is that when one discovers that "neither is true" one thinks and writes as though "nothing is true." While "nothing is true" may be true, it does not follow logically from what has been proven thus far. i.e. that neither extreme is true. If truth does fall somewhere between extremes, then where?
Bill>>>>>>>

Yeah, the Buddhist view does sound nihilistic on first glance. However, it is not. Even Blavatsky agrees that matter and spirit are two aspects of the same thing and that this "thing" is manifestation, an emanation or "radiance" or "ray" of divinity itself that Hinduism refers to as The Great Breath. Thus matter-and spirit are two sides of mayavic manifestation. But this only means that matter and spirit are illusions and that something else is behind these illusions. That "something else" is the indivisible Monad and divinity itself. 

The Monad and Parabrahman, as Blavatsky defines and describes them, are equivalent to the buddha nature and dharmadhatu of Buddhism. OK, but the problem comes in when we try to define these two non-dualities, because definitions are inherently limiting (if something is "this" then it cannot be "that" and so on). So, when we try to define ineffable "things" we get into reifications. Buddhism has this same problem, for example, when they define the three bodies of a buddha, the tendency is to reify them. But the indivisible Monad is not a subject nor is it an object nor is it a thing that one can point to. But it is real and permanent and can be experienced - it is usually experienced as a pure awareness with clarity and luminousity but without "elaborations" (which is a modern translation meaning without definable characteristics such as ideation or mentation of any kind). It is poetically called a naked awareness, to distinguish it from our normal subjective awareness.

That which is real and permanent is hard to define in words, but it can be experienced in meditation.

My point on propoganda is that Theosophists can see it in others but often miss seeing it in themelves. Blavatsky was a human being, and her writings do contain a few errors and mis-statements as any reasonable person would expect.

Jerry S.
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