Theos-Talk Archives (December 2002 Message tt00555)

Dear Paul,

One of the beautiful things about Theosophy is that unlike all these
religions, there are no masses, no sacraments, no rituals of any kind
really that would obligate a person to an organization. There are
certainly benefits fron lodge attendance, but nothing that prevents a
person from studying at home and reaping that degree of knowledge they
can. There must be thousands of "closet theosophists" and untold others
who while they may not accept theosophy 100%, are influenced to some
extent by it's teachings. I've mentioned many times that I constantly
encounter people who have in their possession one or more of HPB's works
and can carry on an intelligent theosophical conversation while never
having been affiliated with a lodge. Another factor is that theosophical
titles are carried by most new age bookstores while those books by
Mormons, Christian scientist or Adventists are pretty much distributed
solely by the organizations that publish them, being taboo in "Christian"
bookstores. 

Larry


On Tue, 17 Dec 2002 00:51:32 -0000 "kpauljohnson
<kpauljohnson@yahoo.com>" <kpauljohnson@yahoo.com> writes:
> Dear Dallas and all,
> 
> There were about 2 billion people on earth in 1930, and about 6 
> billion in 2000. Over that 70 years, Theosophical membership shrank 
> 
> from about 50,000 to about 35,000 (roughly.) That means that 
> Theosophists were .0025% of world population in 1930 and .00005% 
> today. Sounds pretty bad, but some consolation can be found in the 
> fact that HPB's popularity as an author has not declined at all, 
> judging from recent sales figures. Kind of a reversal of people 
> like 
> Joseph Smith, Mary Baker Eddy, or Ellen G. White: no one except 
> members of the churches they founded has any interest in their 
> writings. In the cases of Smith and White, the denominations are 
> booming but the literary respect is nil. HPB's "denomination" is 
> barely surviving but her books are as alive as ever.
> 
> Cheers,
> 
> Paul
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to 
> http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/ 
> 
> 
> 


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