Theos-Talk Archives (August 2002 Message tt00169)

Dallas,

Thanks for your latest posting at:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/theos-talk/message/7701

Dallas, I wrote to you the following:
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"Madame Blavatsky may have added and modified the material
found in the 1886-1887 manuscripts of the SD."

"But before going into that issue, do you agree that in the
summer of 1887 Volume I became
Volume III as reported by Bertram Keightley and also
verified by comparing the SD manuscript at Adyar with what
was published in 1888?"
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Dallas, you then replied to my comments as follows:

"For the reason that I am unsure of the contents of the
MSS as defined, I would hesitate to agree sight unseen.
That is to me, assuming too much."

"Within the context you define, it seems to me that this
sounds correct. But, was it CORRECT ? I do not know and am
therefore uncertain in terms of exactitude. I have to agree
that the contents listed as "Vol. I" seem to have been
displaced by the Keightleys to a third volume, never
published under H P B."

"The THIRD VOLUME was the result of Mrs. a. Besant's editing
and apparently includes those articles listed and said to
have formed originally part of Vol. I , as copied by
Countess Wachmeister and sent to Adyar for Subba Row in
1886, to review. . . . "
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Dallas, let me first focus on two of your sentences which read:

(1) "I have to agree that the contents listed as 'Vol. I' seem to 
have been displaced by the Keightleys to a third volume. . . ."

(2) "The THIRD VOLUME [as published in 1897] . . .
apparently includes those articles listed and said to
have formed originally part of Vol. I , as copied by
Countess Wachmeister and sent to Adyar for Subba Row in
1886, to review. . . . "

Let's think all of this through again.

First of all, there should be no reasonable doubt that the following 
articles were in Vol. I of the SD manuscript as of 1886. The 
manscript at Adyar is good, physical evidence of this. This was the 
volume received by Olcott in early Dec. 1886. Here is the list of the 
relevant articles from that volume I manuscript:

* White and Black Magic in Theory and Practice
* Hermes and the 32 Ways of Wisdom
* Mathematics and Geometry--- The Keys to the Universal
Problems
* The Key of the Absolute in Magic-- the Hexagon with the
Central Point -- or the Seventh Key
* Who Was the Adept of Tyana?
* The Roman Church Dreads the Publication of the Real Life
of Apollonius
* Confession and Property in Common
* What the Occultists and Kabalists Have to Say
* The Souls of the Star -- Universal Heliolatry
* The Mystery "Sun of Initiation" The Trial of the
Sun-lnitiate

Several months later in 1887, when HPB went to London,
based on Bertram's direct eyewitness testimony, this Volume I
containing the above articles became Volume III.

There is no reason and no evidence to suggest otherwise.
>From HPB's own letters of the last 6 months of 1886 and
the first six months of 1887, she was occupied in writing
Volume II of the SD manuscript which was the volume
containing the Cosmogonic Stanzas of Dzyan (i.e. on
Cosmogenesis) and Volume III of the SD manuscript
which was the volume containing the Anthropogonic
Stanzas of Dzyan (i.e. Anthopogenesis.)

To cite only one of many primary source documents that illustrate 
this point:

Sometime around Feb. 23, 1887, HPB writes to Sinnett about how
her SD is progressing:

"I am on the 4th Race. I have done with the Hermaphrodite Third 
Race." (Letters of H.P. Blavatsky to A.P. Sinnett, p. 230.)

Here we see HPB writing on the Third Volume SD Manuscript
dealing with Anthropogenesis.

Archibald Keightley gives us a fascinating glimpse into this time 
period in his article "From Ostende to London" (The Path, New York, 
November 1892, pp. 245-248)which can now be read at:
http://www.blavatskyarchives.com/keightleyafromostende.htm

To summarize my point, during this time period under discussion,
HPB was not rearranging or revising Volume I of the SD manuscript.
She was trying to simply finish Volume II and Volume III.

So when Bertram testifies that Volume I became Volume III,
we can be fairly certain that the following articles were transferred
to Volume III. Therefore as of the summer of 1887, the manuscript of
Volume III of the SD would have included the following articles:

* White and Black Magic in Theory and Practice
* Hermes and the 32 Ways of Wisdom
* Mathematics and Geometry--- The Keys to the Universal
Problems
* The Key of the Absolute in Magic-- the Hexagon with the
Central Point -- or the Seventh Key
* Who Was the Adept of Tyana?
* The Roman Church Dreads the Publication of the Real Life
of Apollonius
* Confession and Property in Common
* What the Occultists and Kabalists Have to Say
* The Souls of the Star -- Universal Heliolatry
* The Mystery "Sun of Initiation" The Trial of the
Sun-lnitiate

Pausing and absorbing all of the above, I ask:

Is it therefore not highly significant that all of the above material
is ALSO to be found in the 1897 Volume III of the SD?

HPB wrote the above articles for Volume I of the SD manuscript.
The Adyar manuscript is good evidence of this. 

These articles were transferred to Volume III in mid-1887.

And these articles were finally published in the 1897 Volume III.

In light of that, I find it hard to understand why certain Blavatsky
students look on this material as "spurious"? 

Dallas, later in your same posting, you also write:

"I also observe H P B did not leave us, either in 1886 or
1888 a list of the chapters she would include in Vol. 3,
(and/or 4) in spite of the list and the MSS sent by her to
Adyar in 1886, modifications were still in her hands up to
the time when she died. . . ."

Dallas, I fail to understand the import and significance of this 
statement in light of all the documentary evidence I have given 
previously and also in the above material. The Volume I manuscript 
at Adyar serves as a very good list as to the contents of the SD 
manuscript.

Dallas, I welcome your further comments. And I hope others like Ian
and Wes may share their thoughts on these particular issues under
discussion.

In the near future, I will advance my thesis to another step.

Daniel

Daniel H. Caldwell
BLAVATSKY ARCHIVES
http://blavatskyarchives.com/introduction.htm
"...Contrast alone can enable us to appreciate things at
their right value; and unless a judge compares notes and
hears both sides he can hardly come to a correct decision."
H.P. Blavatsky. The Theosophist, July, 1881, p. 218.