Theos-Talk Archives (January 2003 Message tt00637)

--- In theos-talk@yahoogroups.com, "D. H. Caldwell <info@b...>" 
<info@b...> wrote:
> Bhakti Ananda Goswami wrote:
> 
> "Reality anyone ?
> 
> 'Master M. wrote about HPB:'
> 
> "Or, was it HPB writing as M. writing about HPB ?"
> 
> Bhakti Ananda Goswami, does this mean you doubt the existence of 
the 
> Master Morya or the Master Koot Hoomi?

///// The evidence is that over time there were a variety of 
real 'adepts' in HPB's life. That these were other than normal 
gifted men has not been shown by any credible evidence, nor has it 
been shown that they actually authored any of the letters ascribed to 
HPB's "Mahatmas". In fact 'their' "Mahatma Letters" have in numerous 
ways been actually identified as the physical writing of other 
persons ESPECIALLY HPB. Your question ignores what I have previously 
written on the subject, and creates an artificial dichotomy, that the 
real men mentioned as below either existed and therefore wrote the 
letters, or that they didn't exist. You have also phrased your 
question so that it cannot be answered "no" or "yes". Let me ask two 
proper questions. Do I think that some real persons existed that HPB 
modeled her "masters" on? YES. I do NOT doubt the existence of 
persons that HPB modeled her "masters" on. Do I think that they were 
the powerful Guides and Guardians of all humanity whose "letters" HPB 
delivered to the world ? NO. I am SURE that there were no 
such 'masters' as her "Mahatmas" who materialized letters that landed 
on peoples' heads. Furthermore I doubt that she had a 
tradition 'disciple' relationship of obedience to any real living 
master, because her ego was so huge. The only masters she could 
surrender to were her own inventions. 

BA G


> 
> I refer you to the following resource:
> 
> http://mahatmas.net
> 
> Concerning some of these encounters with HPB's Masters, Steve 
Stubbs, 
> who does not consider himself a Theosophical fundamentalist, has 
> written:
> 
> ". . . the only proof we can have of the masters' historical 
> existence is testimony from a qualified witness, and we have that 
> from Olcott. . . . Olcott's testimony is sufficient in my judgment 
to 
> establish their corporeal existence as legal persons. . . . I 
cannot 
> agree with anyone that they were fictions, fantasies, imagined 
> beings, trance personalities, or any such thing as that unless the 
> Olcott evidence can be satisfactorily disposed of. I raised that 
> question some time ago, and no one has ever addressed it, so for 
that 
> reason I remain stubbornly convinced that the mahatmas were real 
men 
> as they were claimed to be."
> 
> Do you take issue with Steve's assessment? If so, please give us 
the 
> particulars of your argument rather than making vague assertions.
> 
> Bhakti Ananda Goswami, also consider the following:
> 
> In Colonel Henry S. Olcott's diary for Tuesday, November 20,
> 1883, the entry reads: 
> 
> "1:55 a.m. Koot Hoomi came in body to my tent. Woke me suddenly out 
> of sleep, pressed a note (wrapped in silk) into my left hand, and 
> laid his hand upon my head. He then passed into Brown's
> compartment and integrated another note in his hand (Brown's). He 
> spoke to me." 
> 
> William T. Brown gives the following narrative of some of these 
> meetings with the Master K.H.:
> 
> "...Lahore has a special interest, because there we saw, in his own 
> physical body, Mahatma Koot Hoomi himself. On the afternoon of the 
> 19th November [1883], I saw the Master in broad daylight, and 
> recognized him, and on the morning of the 20th he came to my 
> tent....On the evening of the 21st, after the lecture was over, 
> Colonel Olcott, Damodar and I were sitting outside the shamiana, 
> (pavilion or pandal), when we were visited by Djual Khool (the 
> Master's head Chela, and now an Initiate), who informed us that the 
> Master was about to come. The Master [KH] then came near to us, 
gave 
> instructions to Damodar, and walked away. On leaving Lahore the 
next 
> place visited was Jammu, the winter residence of His Highness the 
> Maharajah of Cashmere....At Jammu I had another opportunity of 
seeing 
> Mahatma Koot Hoomi in propria persona. One evening I went to the 
end 
> of the `compound,' (private enclosure) and there I found the
> Master awaiting my approach. I saluted in European fashion, and 
came, 
> hat in hand, to within a few yards of the place on which he was 
> standing....After a minute or so he marched away, the noise of his 
> foot-steps on the gravel being markedly audible…." Quoted from
> W.T. Brown's pamphlet Some Experiences In India, 1884, pp. 15-17.
> 
> Bhakti Ananda Goswami, you may counter that only naive and foolish 
> Theosophists would believe such accounts but consider the following.
> 
> In the book IN SEARCH OF THE MASTERS (p. 242) the scholar K. Paul 
> Johnson assures his readers that: 
> 
> "K.H. did INDEED visit Olcott, Damodar and Brown on the edge of 
> Lahore." caps added.
> 
> And several years later Johnson in his SUNY book titled INITIATES 
OF 
> THEOSOPHICAL MASTERS, p. 40, again wrote:
> 
> "Damodar had GENUINELY met Koot Hoomi outside Lahore and at the 
> palace of Ranbir Singh [at Jammu]....This is one of the great TRUE 
> Mahatma stories of Theosophical history...." caps added.
> 
> Bhakti Ananda Goswami, if you think you have a better explanation 
> then please give it to us.
> 
> Daniel H. Caldwell
> 
> Visit Blavatsky Archives at:
> 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.