Theos-Talk Archives (January 2002 Message tt00175)

Paul: "he sold his birthright for a mess of pottage. 
That is, he could have become a serious historian of
the movement, participating in a collegial manner in
the process of working on Blavatsky studies, gaining
respect from outside scholars for original research,
etc. But ... he has become a sectarian apologist and
hereticslayer, and thrown away all opportunity
to be taken seriously in the world of scholarship.

Not irrevocably. He has the ability, the interest and
the knowledge. All that is lacking is the
inclination. The potential is certainly there, and he
has collected more source material than anyone else in
the world.

Paul: "This is a damn shame for Daniel, but also for
the Theosophical movement. The quality of discourse
about HPB has been dragged down into such deep mud
that it can never recover in our lifetimes.

That may be true, and again it may be unduly
pessimistic. If it does not recover, it will be
because there is no incentive for you, Godwin, Deveney
and others to soldier on, as we discussed earlier, and
not because some partisans have used disingenuous
arguments to stifle comment. One thing that is
necessary, though, is for the skill of thinking
clearly to become more widespread than it is at
present. Once that happens, no one will dare to use
silly arguments in public, any more than they would
dare to use them in a conference of trained scholars.

If rationality becomes dangerously prevalent, that
will have side effects, though. Certain politicians
will have to sell used cars instead of selling sound
bites. Churches will either go empty or be
drastically reformed. We won't have fifteen year old
kids in Florida proclaiming themselves new converts to
"islam" and crashing small aircraft into buildings. 
No more converts to "islam" trying to ignite exploding
shoes. No more Talibans or Wahhabes. Comedians will
stop telling jokes and imitate twentieth century man
for a laugh. What a shcking thing that would be!

I suspect irrationality will continue its sovereign
reign over humanity until we succeed in turning the
earth into an uninhabitable desert. For that reason I
shall celebrate my own mortality.

Steve

--- kpauljohnson <kpauljohnson@yahoo.com> wrote:
> --- In theos-talk@y..., "Bill Meredith"
> <bilmer@s...> wrote:
> > Dear Daniel,
> > Look at your comments below. You offer that your
> statement [about 
> Paul's work] may be "nasty" but it is factual. 
> 
> Whereas it is of course an evaluation. As I pointed
> out in my reply 
> at the time of publication, in 3 years of digging
> for stuff to 
> discredit me with, Daniel came up with 5 minor
> errors out of three 
> books totalling 800 pages plus. All this material
> occupied less than 
> half a page in total, and could be removed without
> the slightest 
> impact on my overall argument. What's really creepy
> and unfair are 
> his sweeping boasts to the effect that it would take
> hundreds of 
> pages for him to actually catalog all my errors,
> when he only managed 
> to document an insignificant handful. Equally
> creepy and unfair is 
> that the very same process could be applied to any
> work of comparable 
> length and complexity and produce comparable
> results, as Daniel has 
> admitted in the case of Cranston. Far more so in
> many cases.
> 
> As for your contention that D. is his own worst
> enemy, I don't know 
> about that. He obviously has *some* capacity for
> fairness and 
> objectivity that peeks out now and again. For
> example in the work on 
> Vol. III of the SD, in arguments with Dallas about
> claims made on 
> behalf of ULT, in a *single* post in 1994 where he
> described TMR as a 
> treasure trove of research findings that all
> students of HPB ought to 
> read. So I'd say rather that Daniel's worst enemies
> are those 
> Theosophists that have encouraged him to be a
> hatchet man, to attempt 
> to destroy another Theosophical author's reputation;
> who have told 
> him that he has done something wonderful with his
> attacks on me, and 
> succeeded in showing what horrible work I've done,
> etc. And this 
> includes high ranking figures in all the
> Theosophical organizations.
> (At the time, Daniel privately taunted me with the
> unnamed 
> Theosophists who told him he was wonderful for
> refuting my horrible 
> books; later he publicly admitted that such praise
> was worthless and 
> meaningless since such people turned on him the
> moment he said 
> something that conflicted with their dogmas.)
> 
> Years ago, Daniel told me privately that I'd be
> surprised if I knew 
> how much he really agreed with me on some things,
> shared my 
> perspectives, etc. In my reply, I said something to
> the effect 
> of "in that case, look out for the danger of selling
> your soul to the 
> devil." Meaning, he was abandoning all fairness and
> objectivity, as 
> well as all commitment to civility in discussion of
> Theosophical 
> history, in order to curry favor with the
> organizations who wanted 
> someone to refute the Johnsonian heresy. Instead of
> taking this to 
> heart, he replied that I was being "ugly" in so
> warning him. (My 
> gazillion warnings that ALL THOSE CAPS AND
> EXCLAMATION POINTS!!! made 
> him look like an enraged partisan were equally
> ignored.)
> 
> In all sincerity I believe that what has happened
> here is that by 
> becoming an attack dog serving Theosophical
> orthodoxy, despite 
> knowing full well that he could have attacked
> Cranston just as 
> viciously as he did me using the same criteria, that
> he sold his 
> birthright for a mess of pottage. That is, he could
> have become a 
> serious historian of the movement, participating in
> a collegial 
> manner in the process of working on Blavatsky
> studies, gaining 
> respect from outside scholars for original research,
> etc. But by 
> acting on his *interests* (to be somebody respected
> in the movement, 
> to be published by TPH, and whatnot) and violating
> his stated 
> *principles* he has become a sectarian apologist and
> heretic-slayer, 
> and thrown away all opportunity to be taken
> seriously in the world of 
> scholarship.
> 
> This is a damn shame for Daniel, but also for the
> Theosophical 
> movement. The quality of discourse about HPB has
> been dragged down 
> into such deep mud that it can never recover in our
> lifetimes. 
> (Thanks to Pratt for showing that Pasadena can
> produce something even 
> more ghastly than Adyar or ULT in this regard, a
> truly shocking 
> development for me.) Considering the possibilities
> that seemed to be 
> on the horizon in 1994, that's sickening.
> 
> But it must have been kismet. Remember what HPB
> wrote at the end of 
> her last book:
> 
> "Every such attempt as the Theosophical Society has
> hitherto ended in 
> failure, because, sooner or later, it has
> degenerated into a sect, 
> set up hard-and-fast dogmas of its own, and so lost
> by imperceptible 
> degrees that vitality which living truth alone can
> impart... If, 
> then, they [Theosophists] cannot be freed from such
> inherent bias, or 
> at least taught to recognize it instantly and so
> avoid being led away 
> by it, the result can only be that the Society will
> drift off on to 
> some sandbank of thought or another, and there
> remain a stranded 
> carcass to moulder and die."
> 
> Paul
> 
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> 
> 


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