Theos-Talk Archives (August 2002 Message tt00191)

brianmuehlbach wrote:
> Oke, but then what is left over you can read in any of hundreds of other
> new age metaphysical book 

Virtually all of which are based, one way or other, off the Secret
Doctrine and other writings by Blavatsky. Should we also read from
Blavatsky's sources? Sounds like a good idea, to me.

> that doesn't have the errors like talk about
> root races Lemuria or Atlantis as in the SD.

Are these errors of writing or errors of interpretation? Were the terms
"Atlantis" and "Lemuria" based on previous (certainly not later)
writings on the subject, or were they mainly convenient labels? The
Mahatma Letters certainly point out that "root races" was a convenient
label.

> Also these other New metaphysical books are admit tingly written by
> regular people and since they contain few if none of the errors that you
> all seem to admit now, the SD is full of. 

I find that far too many New Age books also use arbitrary labels, often
taken from Theosophical concepts but without understanding of what these
terms mean (such as "vibrations", "will", "auras", just to name a few). 

> So why even assume the SD came from Mahatmas if there is noting in 
> the SD to show that this is so ? 

Why does it matter? Certainly, the Mahatmas, in the Mahatma Letters,
show themselves to be somewhat more advanced than Blavatsky (which is
pretty good evidence that Blavatsky was not the author of those
letters), but even they say they aren't infallible. 

> So why not stop lying about this, or quote the evidence from the SD
> that would proof or at least indicate otherwise ?

We're not lying about it. The Secret Doctrine is a massive work. You
found a few paragraphs which seem to contradict current knowledge. What
about the huge body which has been confirmed by later knowledge? What
about the way current knowledge enables us to better understand what
Blavatsky was talking about?

Bart Lidofsky