Theos-Talk Archives (March 2002 Message tt00006)

Thursday, February 28, 2002

Re: Relation of H P B to the MASTERS OF WISDOM


Dear Doss:

Any one who has read the early Theosophical literature is well
aware that it was the Masters of Wisdom who had sought for an
"agent" to work on their behalf in this world of ours. From what
is written H P B offered to act as their "agent' in the world.
One of them she called her "Master." It plainly clear that H P B
operated in close contact with Them and carried out Their
instructions.

I append hereto some references that ought to make this evident.

----------------------------------


The Master wrote Mr. A. P. Sinnett - Editor of the PIONEER
Journal of Allahabad.:


"...imperfect as may be our visible agent...yet, she [HPB] is the
best available at present, and her phenomena have for about half
a century astounded and baffled some of the cleverest minds of
the age."
M L 9-10


In 1888, Master wrote to Col. H S Olcott on board the steamer S S
Shannon in th Mediterranean sea as he approached Brindisi, Italy

"But we employ agents--the best available. Of these, for the
past thirty years, the chief has been the personality known as
H.P.B. to the world (but otherwise to us). Imperfect and very
troublesome, no doubt, she proves to some; nevertheless, there
is no likelihood of our finding a better one for years to come,
and your theosophists should be made to understand it.

Since 1885 I have not written, nor caused to be written save
through her agency, direct or remote, a letter or line to anybody
in Europe or America, nor communicated orally with, or thro' any
third party. [ see M L, pp. 404-8 ] Theosophists should learn
it. You will understand later the significance of this
declaration, so keep it in mind.

Her fidelity to our work being constant, and her sufferings
having come upon her thro' it, nether I nor either of my Brother
Associates will desert or supplant her...ingratitude is not among
our vices. With yourself (Olcott) our relations are direct, and
have been, with the rare exceptions you know of, like the
present, on the psychical plane, and so will continue thro' force
of circumstances. That they are so rare--is your own fault as I
told you in my last.

To help you in your present perplexity: H.. P. B. has next to no
concern with administrative details, and should be kept clear of
them, so far as her strong nature can be controlled. But this
you must tell to all:--with occult matters she has everything to
do. We have not abandoned her. She is not given over to chelas.
She is our direct agent..." Letters From the Masters of
Wisdom, Ist. Series, pp. 52-3


To Mr. Sinnett:

"After nearly a century of fruitless search, our chiefs had to
avail themselves of the only opportunity to send out a European
body upon European soil to serve as a connecting link between
that country and our own...my brother M. made to you through her
a certain offer...you had but to accept it, and at any time you
liked, you would have had for an hour or more, the real
baitchooly to converse with, instead of the psychological cripple
you generally have to deal with now." M L 203-4


"On the 17th of November next [1882] the septenary term of trial
given the Society at its foundation in which to discreetly
"preach us" will expire. One or two of us hoped that the world
had so far advanced intellectually, if not intuitionally, that
the Occult doctrine might gain an intellectual acceptance, and
the impulse given for a new cycle of occult research...consent
was given for the trial. It was stipulated, however, that the
experiment should be made independently of our personal
management; that there should be no abnormal interference by
ourselves.

So casting about we found in America the man to stand as
leader--a man of great moral courage, unselfish, and having other
good qualities. He was far from being the best, but...he was the
best available. With him we associated a woman of most
exceptional and wonderful endowments. Combined with them she had
strong personal defects, but just as she was, there was no second
to her living fit for this work.

We sent her to America, brought them together--and the trial
began. From the first both he and she were given to clearly
understand that the issue lay entirely with themselves. And both
offered themselves for the trial...For 6 1/2 years they have been
struggling against such odds as would have driven off any one who
was not working with the desperation of one who stakes life and
all he prizes on some desperate supreme effort. Their success
has not equaled the hopes of their original backers, phenomenal
as it has been in certain directions.

In a few more months the term of probation will end. If by that
time the status of the Society as regards ourselves --the
question of the "Brothers" be not definitely settled (either
dropped out of the Society's programme or accepted on our own
terms) that will be the last of the "Brothers" of all shapes and
colors, sizes or degrees. We will subside out of public view
like a vapour into the ocean. Only those who have proved
faithful to themselves and to Truth through everything, will be
allowed further intercourse with us..." M L 263-4


"You can never know her [HPB] as we do, therefore--none of you
will ever be able to judge her impartially or correctly. You see
the surface of things; and what you would term "virtue," holding
but to appearances, we--judge but after having fathomed the
object to its profoundest depth, and generally leave the
appearances to take care of themselves. In your opinion H.P.B.
is...a quaint, strange woman, a psychological riddle...We on the
other hand, under the garb of eccentricity and folly--we find a
profounder wisdom in her inner Self than you will ever find
yourselves able to perceive...we...light daily upon traits of her
inner nature the most delicate and refined, and which would cost
an uninitiated psychologist years of constant and keen
observation, and many an hour of close analysis and efforts to
draw out of the depth of that most subtle of mysteries--human
mind--and one of the most complicated machines,--H.P.B.'s
mind--and thus learn to know her true inner Self."
M L 314


Master wrote Mr. A O Hume:

"I have been more than once suspected by you of taking my
knowledge and impressions about you and other persons and things
in the outside world from Olcott's and the O.L.'s heads. Kindly
give thought to the following law...do you know that between
adept and chela--Master and Pupil--there gradually forms a closer
tie; for the psychic interchange is regulated
scientifically...as the water in a full tank runs into an empty
one...so does the knowledge of the adept flow to the chela; and
the chela attains the adept-level according to his receptive
capacities. At the same time the chela, being an individual, a
separate evolution, unconsciously imparts to the Master the
quality of his accumulated mentality. The Master absorbs his
knowledge...So you see it is quite possible for me to catch
H.P.B.'s or any other chela's ideas about you without meaning to
do you any injustice; for whenever we find such ideas--unless
trifling--we never proceed to judge and render our sentences
merely on the testimony of such borrowed light; but always
ascertain independently and for ourselves whether the ideas so
reflected in us are right or wrong.' [ Letter to Hume ]
Letters from the Masters of Wisdom, 1st Series., pp. 82-3


-----------------------------------------


[Note by DTB: Why should the master refer to HPB as a "chela" ?

Like all human beings, "Mme. Blavatsky" was both a "personality,"
and an "INDIVIDUALITY" -- in other words, Mme. Blavatsky
represented on this plane of daily affairs and materials the best
"agent" possible for the Masters to employ because of her
heredity, physical and psychic, in our "world."

As in every incarnation by an "Adept," the physical personal
psychological self has to undergo a period of training for the
learning and practice of Occultism in that new form--so, to the
Masters, the personality of Mme. Blavatsky was to them as a chela
might be, but they also knew her to be, as an EGO, an Adept of
the same Brotherhood as they were. [see explanations given on
this in SD II 167, 246, 243.]

The ENTITY named sometimes: "H.P.B." is quite evidently
something different -- see the 1893 Lahiri letter for an
explanation circulated 2 years after her "death" as a physical
personality.
[ see also HPB to APS, p. 174 bottom. ]

Unless this duality is understood (see for explanation what HPB
writes in Transactions of the Blavatsky Lodge, ULT Edn. pp.
66-76, on the relations of the real EGO, to the embodied
"personal ego."

Most people are not able to conceive of, or understand this
psychological dichotomy, although it is also within them. How
is it possible for the human mind to hold a dialog with itself,
on morals, metaphysics, or any other subject, unless there is an
"inner Resident" to whom the universality of Law, and of
experience and knowledge, is accessible?

Add to this the curious statements also made in the S D regarding
the "undying race" -- SD II 275fn, 281, 652; I 619 and the puzzle
begins to get resolved, or deepens for some. -- DTB )

------------------------------------

On the subject of a Mahatma becoming active in our world:

"since the MAHATMA is but an advanced occultist, who has so far
controlled his lower "self" as to hold it more or less in
complete subjection to the Cosmic impulse, it is in the nature of
things impossible for him to act in any other but an unselfish
manner. No sooner does he allow his "personal self" to assert
itself, than he ceases to be a MAHATMA...The law of Cosmic
evolution is ever operating to achieve its purpose of ultimate
unity and to carry the phenomenal into the noumenal plane, and
the MAHATMAS, being en rapport with it, are assisting that
purpose...they alone have got to the basic knowledge which can
determine the right course and exercise proper discrimination.
And for us...it will be evident that, as soon as the least
feeling of selfishness tries to assert itself, the vision of the
spiritual sense, which is the only perception of the MAHATMA,
becomes clouded and he looses the "power" which abstract
"knowledge" alone can confer. Hence the vigilant watch of the
"will" we have constantly to exercise to prevent our lower nature
from coming up to the surface..." Theos. Movement, Bombay,
Vol, X pp. 138-9


"A perfect man is not made to order but is a product of
evolution. Wisdom is not a matter of book-learning but of
growth. General rules for conduct can be given, but to apply
them properly, the power of discrimination is necessary...A
virtue, practiced without moderation, becomes a crime. To know
how to find the point of equilibrium is the great secret of the
Adept, that cannot be told but must be learned by experience,
when sagacity and goodness will be united in wisdom."
HPB -- THEOSOPHIST , 1885
Reprinted in: THEOSOPHY, Los Angeles, Vol.. 47, pp,
441-2


-------------------------------------


HPB ON HER RELATIONS WITH THE MASTERS


[In the monthly magazine The PATH, Volumes 9 and 10, published
by Mr. W.Q.Judge in New York, we find a series are reprinted
there. In 1894 some of those letters from HPB to her family and
friends were published in excerpt form, beginning Vol.
9 --1894-5-- pp. 265,297, 379, 411; and, Vol 10 (1895-6), pp. 6,
33, 73, 105, 139, 169, 203, 235, 267, 297, 332, 366.


Some extracts are given below:

"...when I again laid down...I soon fell asleep and then got
surrounded with a heavy, impenetrable darkness. Then I saw a
star appearing; it lit up high, high above me, and then fell,
dropping straight upon me. It fell straight on my forehead and
got transformed into a hand. Whilst this hand was resting on my
forehead I was all ablaze to know whose hand it was...I was
concentrated into a single prayer, into an impulse of the will,
to learn who it was, to whom did this luminous hand belong...

And I have learned it: there stood over it Myself. Suddenly
this second me spoke to my body, "Look at me!" My body looked at
it and saw that half of this second me was as black as jet, the
other half whitish-grey, and only the top of the head perfectly
white, brilliant, and luminous. And again I Myself spoke to my
body: "When you become as bright as this small part of your
head, you will be able to see what is seen by others, by the
purified who have washed themselves clean...And meanwhile make
yourself clean, make yourself clean, make yourself clean. And
here I awoke." Path Vol. 9, p. 269


"He [the "Sahib" -- Mahatma] has cured me entirely [of a
gangrenous leg]. And just about this time I have begun to feel a
very strange duality. Several times a day I feel that besides me
there is someone else, quite separable from me, present in my
body. I never lose the consciousness of my own personality;
what I feel is as if I were keeping silent and the other one--the
lodger who is in me--were speaking with my tongue...let my fate
conduct me at its own sweet will...it would be perfectly
ridiculous if I were to deny the possession of knowledge avowed
by my No. 2, giving occasion to people around me to imagine that
I keep them in the dark for modesty's sake.

In the night, when I am alone in my bed, the whole life of my No.
2 passes before my eyes, and I do not see myself at all, but
quite a different person--different in race and different in
feelings...I try to throw myself into the part and to forget the
strangeness of my situation.

This is no mediumship, and by no means an impure power; for
that, it has too strong an ascendancy over us all, leading us
into better ways. No devil would act like that. 'Spirits,'
maybe ? ... It is enough for me to enter the room where a seance
is being held to stop all kinds of phenomena at once, especially
materializations. But phenomena of another sort take place more
and more frequently under the direction of my No. 2. (*)
Footnote: These phenomena were those amazing feats of magic,
hundreds of which I witnessed in broad daylight or blazing
gas-light, from 1872 to 1878--WQJ. ]" Path, Vol. 9, pp. 269-70
[ see also WQJ --"Conversations on Occultism with HPB" ]


"I see this Hindu [Mahatma] every day, just as I might see any
other living person, with the only difference that he looks to me
more ethereal and more transparent. Formerly I kept silent about
these appearances, thinking that they were hallucinations. But
now they have become visible to other people as well. He (the
Hindu) appears and advises me as to our conduct and our writing.
he evidently knows everything that is going on, even to the
thoughts of other people, and makes me express his knowledge.
Sometimes it seems to me that he overshadows the whole of me,
simply entering me like a kind of volatile essence penetrating
all my pores and dissolving in me. Then we two are able to speak
to other people, and then I begin to understand and remember
sciences and languages--everything he instructs me in, even when
he is not with me any more." Path Vol. 9, p. 297


"It seems strange to you that some Hindu Sahib is so free and
easy in his dealings with me...here is something about which I am
perfectly certain: Admit that man's soul--his real living
soul--is a thing perfectly separate from the rest of his
organism; that this perisprit is not stuck with paste to the
physical "innerds;" and that this soul which exists in
everything living, beginning with an infusoria and ending with an
elephant, is different from its physical double, only as being
more or less overshadowed by the immortal spirit, it is capable
of acting freely and independently. In the case of the
uninitiated profane, it acts during their sleep; in the case of
an initiated adept, it acts at any moment he chooses according to
his will. Just try and assimilate this, and then many things
will become clear to you...

What mediums accomplish unconsciously, under the influence of
outside powers which take possession of them, can be accomplished
by Adepts consciously at their own volition. That's all...

As to the Sahib, I have known him a long time. Twenty-five years
ago he came to London with the prince of Nepaul; three years ago
he sent me a letter...In this letter he reminded me of many
things, foretold by him at the time, and asked me whether I
believed him now and whether I would consent to obey him...After
this he appeared repeatedly, not only to me but also to other
people, and to Olcott whom he ordered to be President of the
Society, teaching him how to start it. I always recognize and
know the Master, and often talk to him without seeing him. How
is it that he hears me from everywhere, and that I also hear his
voice across seas and oceans twenty times a day? I do not know,
but it is so. Whether it is he personally that enters me I
really cannot say with confidence; if it is not he, it is his
power, his influence. Through him I am strong; without him, I
am a mere nothing." Path, Vol. 9, pp. 298-9


H P B wrote to Dr. Franz Hartmann, who had spent time in Adyar:

"I never gave myself out for a full-blown occultist, but only for
a student of Occultism for the last thirty or forty years. Yet I
am enough of an occultist to know that before we find the Master
within our own hearts and seventh principle--we need an outside
Master...I got my drop from my Master (the living one)...He is a
Saviour, he who leads you to finding the Master within yourself.
It is ten years already that I preach the inner Master and God
and never represented our Masters as Saviours in the Christian
sense."
[ HPB to Dr. Hartmann ] Path, X, p. 367



"...as I venerate the Master, and worship MY MASTER--the sole
creator of my inner Self which but for His calling it out,
awakening it from its slumber, would never have come to conscious
being--not in this life, at all events..." HPB to APS p. 104


"Well, Vera, [H P B's sister] whether you believe me or not,
something miraculous is happening to me. You cannot imagine in
what a charmed world of pictures and visions I live. I am writing
Isis; not writing, rather copying out and drawing that which She
personally shows to me...sometimes it seems to me that the
ancient Goddess of beauty in person leads me through all the
countries of the past centuries which I have to describe.

I sit with my eyes open and to all appearances see and hear
everything real and actual around me, and yet at the same time I
see and hear that which I write...Slowly century after century,
image after image, float out of the distance and pass before me
as if in a magic panorama; and meanwhile I put them together in
my mind, fitting the epochs and dates, and know for sure that
there can be no mistake. Races and nations, countries and
cities, which have for long disappeared in the darkness of the
prehistoric past, emerge and then vanish, giving place to others;
and then I am told the consecutive dates.

Hoary antiquity makes way for historical periods; myths are
explained to me with events and people who have really existed,
and every event which is at all remarkable, every newly-turned
page of this many-colored book of life, impresses itself on my
brain with photographic exactitude. My own reckonings and
calculations appear to me later on as separate colored pieces of
different shapes in the game which is called casse-tete
(puzzles).

I gather them together and try to match them one after the other,
and at the end there always comes out a geometrical whole...Most
assuredly it is not I who do it all, but my Ego, the highest
principle which lives in me. And even this with the help of my
Guru and teacher who helps me in everything.

If I happen to forget something I have just to address him, or
another of the same kind, in my thought, and what I have
forgotten rises once more before my eyes--sometimes whole tables
of numbers passing before me, long inventories of events. They
remember everything. They know everything. Without them, from
whence could I gather my knowledge ?" Path Vol. 9, pp 300-1



H P B ON HERSELF


"...either I have invented the Masters, their philosophy, written
their letters, etc. or, I have not. If I have and the Masters do
not exist, then their handwritings, could not have existed,
either: I have invented them also; and if I have--how can I be
called a "forger ?" They are my handwritings and I have a right
to use them if I am so clever. As for philosophy and doctrine
invented, the S.D. shall show. Now I am here alone with the
Countess for witness. I have no books no one to help me. And I
tell you that the Secret Doctrine will be 20 times as learned,
philosophical and better than Isis which will be killed by it.
Now there are hundreds of things I am permitted to say and
explain...The whole Doctrine is shown the mother stone the
foundation of all the religions including Xty, and on the
strength of exoteric published Hindu books, with their symbols
explained esoterically." M L, pp. 480-1


[ H.P.Blavatsky wrote to Mr. A P Sinnett :

"There is a limit to endurance, there is one to the greatest
self-sacrifice. I have worked for them faithfully and
unselfishly for years, and the result was, that I ruined my
health, dishonored my ancestral name, got reviled [by
everyone]...My time is also fast approaching when, my hour of
triumph will strike. Then is it, that I also, may prove to those
who speculated about me, those who believed as those who
disbelieved that none of them approached within 100 miles of the
area of truth. I have suffered hell on earth, but before I leave
it, I promise myself such a triumph...

Now, do you really think that you know ME my dear Mr. Sinnett?
Do you believe that, because you have fathomed--as you think--my
physical crust and brain; that shrewd analyst of human nature
though you be--you have ever penetrated even beneath the fist
cuticles of my Real Self ? You would gravely err, if you did.

I am held by all of you as untruthful because hitherto I have
shown the world only the true exterior Mme. Blavatsky...It is not
boasting for I do not say whether inside that unprepossessing
rock there is a palatial residence or an humble hut. What I say
is this: you do not know me; for whatever there is inside it,
is not what you think it is; and--to judge of me therefore, as
of one untruthful is the greatest mistake in the world besides
being a flagrant injustice. I, (the inner real "I") am in prison
and cannot show myself as I am with all the desire I may have to.
Why then, should I, because speaking for myself as I am and feel
myself to be, why should I be held responsible for the outward
jail-door and its appearance, when I have neither built nor yet
decorated it ? [ see TRANSACTIONS OF THE BLAVATSKY LODGE, p.
66-77 ]

But all this will be for you no better than vexation of spirit.
"The poor old lady is crazy again--" will you remark. And let me
prophecy that the day will come when you will accuse K H too of
having deceived you; for only failing to tell you what he has no
right to tell anyone." M L, pp. 465-6


[From the Preface to the SECRET DOCTRINE, 1888 ]

"The Author--the writer, rather...These truths are in no sense
put forward as a revelation...what is contained in this work is
to be found scattered through thousands of volumes embodying the
scriptures of the great Asiatic and early European religions...to
gather the oldest tenets together and to make of them one
harmonious and unbroken whole.

The sole advantage which the writer has over her predecessors is
that she need not resort to personal speculations and theories.
for this work is a partial statement of what she herself has been
taught by more advanced students, supplemented, in a few details
by the results of her own study and observation...
this book is not the Secret Doctrine in its entirety...The
writer, therefore, is fully prepared to take all the
responsibility for what is contained in this work...its logical
coherency and consistency entitle this new Genesis to rank...on a
level with the "working hypotheses" so freely accepted by modern
science...It is written in the service of humanity, and by
humanity and the future generations it must be judged. Its
author recognizes no inferior court of appeal..." - HPB -
Preface to the SECRET DOCTRINE I , pp vii-viii



Masters on The SECRET DOCTRINE


"I have also noted your thoughts about the "Secret Doctrine." Be
assured that what she has not annotated from scientific and other
works, we have given or suggested to her. Every mistake or
erroneous notion, corrected and explained by her from works of
other theosophists was corrected by me, or under my instruction.
It is a more valuable work than its predecessor [ISIS UNVEILED],
an epitome of occult truths that will make it a source of
information and instruction for the earnest student for long
years to come."
Letters from the Masters of Wisdom, 1st Series, p. 54.



THE "MASTER" WITHIN


"Every human being contains within himself vast potentialities,
and it is the duty of adepts to surround the would-be chela with
circumstances which shall enable him to take the "right-hand
path," if he have the ability in him...until he has passed that
period [of probation] we leave him to fight out his battles as
best he may; and have to do so occasionally with higher and
initiated chelas such as H.P.B., once that they are allowed to
work in the world, that all of us more or less avoid...We were
all so tested; and while Moorad Ali--failed--I, succeeded. The
victor's crown is only for him who proves himself worthy to wear
it; for him who attacks Mara single handed and conquers the
demon of lust and earthly passions; and not we but he himself
puts it on his brow...there is no such other difficult struggle.
If it were not so, adeptship would be but a cheap acquirement."
M L 318


"The whole individuality is centred in the three middle
Principles or third (MANAS), and fifth (ASTRAL BODY) principles.
During earthly life it is all in the fourth (KAMA-MANAS), the
center of energy, volition--will...the individuality survives...
to run its seven-fold and upward course [ it ] has to assimilate
to itself the eternal-life power residing but in the seventh
(ATMA), and then blend the three (4th, 5th & 7th) into one--the
6th (BUDDHI). Those who succeed in doing so become Buddhas,
Dhyan Chohans, etc... The chief object of our struggle and
initiations is to achieve this union while yet on this earth."
M L, 77-8

[ Note: To explain this, HPB devotes over 100 pages in The Key.
See 3 tables pp. 91-2, 135-6, 175-6. -- DTB ]


"Happy the man physically pure, for his external soul (astral
body, the image of the body) is pure, it will strengthen the
second (the lower Manas), or the soul which is termed by him the
higher mortal soul, which, though liable to err from its own
motives, will always side with the reason against the animal
proclivities of the body. In other words, the ray of our Higher
Ego, the lower Manas, has its higher light, the reason or
rational powers of the Nous, to help it in the struggle with
Kamic desires." HPB Articles I, pp. 27-8

--------------------------------

I hope this clarifies some of the facts history records. There
are those who discard from their consideration anything that does
not suit their pre-judgment. But that prejudice ought not
masquerade under the guise of an assumed scholarly of critical
inquiry, plainly supported by prejudiced skepticism. These, do
not abolish the fact of that which was said and written, and,
both of those, are supported by many who testified to their
accuracy.

I find it strange, inexplicable in fact, that those who presume
to call into question the history have not familiarized
themselves with Theosophy as doctrine philosophy.

They lame, and blind themselves in doing that, because no one can
consider the superficies of history unless they have a perception
of its causes.

>From a reading of their offerings, they appear arrogant and
ignorant of the purpose of Theosophy. They have greatly
handicapped themselves by ignoring its basic ethico-moral
aspects.

Many have not read or studied the material offered in the book:
ISIS UNVEILED, and the magazine articles by H P B published in
THEOSOPHIST, LUCIFER, the PATH, and, finally, the book: The
SECRET DOCTRINE.

Consequently, their statements lack perception of dimension --
breadth and depth. I would say: they do not satisfy the primary
requirements of true and unbiased scholarly review and critical
inquiry.

In preparing for a study one ought to have at least a newcomer's
knowledge of the subject being questioned. I find this lacking
in many cases. It degrades the plausibility of the critic and
augments the arrogance of the questioner. A little intensive
study would make a difference.

I hope the extracts will fill in some gaps, and give pointers as
to where to find facts.

Best wishes,

Dallas

===================================

-----Original Message-----

From: MKR
Sent: February 27, 2002
To: theos-talk@yahoogroups.com
Subject: Re: Theos-World No evidence for Daniel Caldwell's claim.



>"H.P.Blavatsky in reality was the "teacher " of "K.H." and of
"Morya." B_M
>
===================================

MKR:

Is it not the other way around?

CUT