Theos-Talk Archives (June 2003 Message tt00092)

--- In theos-talk@yahoogroups.com, Mauri <mhart@i...> wrote:
> Quoting from THE DIALOGUES OF G DE P, VOL. 2,
> PAGE 208:
> 
> <<Those of you who are students of Theosophy will 
> see the logical, absolutely logical, necessity of an 
> esoteric teaching, of an esoteric School wherein the 
> deeper teachings are given: the profounder, broader, 
> larger secrets of the Universe and of man's constitution, 
> which cannot be given out publicly because they 
> cannot be understood without at least some real 
> esoteric training. When H. P. B. spoke in later years in 
> her Secret Doctrine about the mistake that was made in 
> the name of Sinnert's Esoteric Buddhism, it was a very 
> wise and clever thing that she did. Every word that she 
> wrote was true, yet it was a deliberate 'pulling of the 
> wool' over the eyes of those who thought they knew so 
> much, that it blinded them and thus they could not see 
> the truth. I have used the same policy myself. When I 
> find that an esoteric teaching is being argued about, or 
> mocked at, or misconstrued, then instead of trying to 
> remedy the situation by denying it, or explaining it, I 
> say something like this: "Why yes, of course, this is the 
> way to look at it," apparently but not really agreeing 
> with the proud brain-minds who cannot because they 
> will not see. It is an ancient rule in our School that 
> when a teaching is misunderstood or is in danger of 
> being abused, then it must be veiled. This is a wise 
> thing to do. When H. P. B. said that if Mr. Sinnett had 
> only called his book Esoteric Bodhism, or Esoteric 
> Budhism, meaning 'Esoteric Wisdom,' it would have 
> rightly expressed the teachings of the Masters, as far as 
> it went, she made a true statement. Nevertheless, the 
> title first given to the book was right, for it was indeed 
> the esoteric teaching of the Lord Buddha which was in 
> the background of the Masters' minds when they gave 
> to Mr. Sinnett the knowledge that he received. It was in 
> very truth Esoteric Buddhism.>>

But were there any esoteric schools of buddhism in the history of 
buddhism, like gnostics and platonics were in western tradition?

-Marko-