Theos-Talk Archives (July 2003 Message tt00204)

Thursday, July 17, 2003

RE: Jesus, Reform, Truth, illumination


Dear Janaki and Friends:

Thanks for the observations. Let me offer the following, it
being understood that this is only my research and therefore
liable to be faulty. Check it with your own knowledge and with
universal principles. Excuse my language which will probably be
found to be abrupt.


Every ancient religious text is not to be read literally from the
surface words. We all labor from the early "religious
instruction, training" of this incarnation. And that includes
misinformation.

Every such text was originally an attempt to perpetuate wisdom,
using formulae, metaphors and symbols, codes and synonyms. Just
as the notes I am now writing -- it is thought concretized for
the time being, and for a specific purpose. It relies on eternal
Laws and truths, but in its condensed aspect (the present) it is
limited by the language of choice and the sequence of question
and response.

Historically, we are handed texts held to be evidence of sacred
Religion.

What is the source of those? [ Study the INTRODUCTION to ISIS
UNVEILED and to The SECRET DOCTRINE for a review of these.]

The overlays by translators, priests and shamans evolved (in
time) dogmas, rites, rituals, ceremonies and tribal customs,
which often have nothing to do with the original truth or the
teachings of the original TEACHER, and subsequent Wise Reformers
or Prophets.

Again, each student has to discover and prove this for
themselves. It takes years. Each of us has spent years at school
and college. This is post-graduate work, and may not invariably
secure a charter or parchment to hang on our study walls. There
is no "quick fix" or "quick study." If you want wisdom, then you
have to dig it out of your deepest spiritual selves. It is
there. The problem is: what method will you use ?

Those original teachings (every one of them) all started with the
ONE SET OF FACTS.

WE ALL LIVE IN A UNIVERSE THAT RUNS ACCORDING TO EXACT IMPERSONAL
LAWS.

IT HAS ALWAYS EXISTED. IT IS ETERNAL.

WE ARE IMMORTAL THINKERS -- "ETERNAL PILGRIMS."

WE REINCARNATE.

OUR DECISIONS CREATE KARMA (GOOD AND BAD) FOR US.

Can we trace these in those "sacred texts?"

We are interiorly, at the living center of our own BEING, a
unified part of that WHOLE. And we share in all aspects of it.

Hence WISDOM and KNOWLEDGE are interior to us and can only be
secured by the disciplined mind, using discrimination,
introspection and strict logic.

Wisdom is never given to the selfish. Even when given they don't
recognize it, and try to abuse it.

If we are "ignorant," then becoming aware of that, we have to
seek and find the reason for our confusion, and the delay between
any aspiration and its ultimate achievement. The problem lies
invariably in our mind and our emotional nature, which usually,
are at variance with each other. These are areas of our
"ignorance" that need to be discovered and studied.

The only sure tools are universality and impersonality. Wisdom
cannot be patented or concealed. It belongs to all, but like the
diamond, it has to be unearthed by each one who searches for it,
and then recognized.

We need to discover what we do know, right now, of Universal Law.
And also what we do not know, and what we would rather not know.
Our likes and dislikes will be found to conceal TRUTH from us.
We have to discipline and control them to shorten the path to
true KNOWLEDGE.

Science occupies itself with the unpeeling of the sheaths that
cover the operative layers of life in physical nature -- and
from observation, it formulates LAWS of repetitive cycles of
events. Thus we have mathematics, geometry, calculus, astronomy,
physics, chemistry, geology, biology, psychology, ecology and
sociology.

Religious studies are another aspect that requires special
attention as history shows us that the recording has usually
brought about distortions. Witness the continuing attempt to
secure an accurate "first text" rendition of the Bible texts.

What are we to trust? What "authorities" are we to depend on?
Firs we need to discover our own spiritual soul -- the SELF
within. Next, we have to realize it is one with all other SELVES
everywhere. Hence that which is impersonal, universal,
cooperative and brotherly ALONE will withstand selfishness and
partiality, politics and parochialism.

The area in which most of us, and our "Science" are least
knowledgeable is psychology, the science of our own SPIRIT-Soul,
mind and desire-nature. They form our closest environment and are
sometimes also called our character, our talents and our
limitations. We are usually very protective of them and fear the
intrusion of other minds into our "secrets." Does this increase
our "ignorance.?"

Wisdom relates, as said above, to Universal Truth and Knowledge.
It is not "outside" of us, but inside. We ARE A PART OF THE
WHOLE, and this includes all knowledge and access to it through
the eternal UNITY of ones own SOUL, through its single unvarying
CONSCIOUSNESS, which penetrates all planes and disciplines of
knowledge, human terrestrial and cosmic.

One has to study the Theogony of those religions and their myths
and stories (as Campbell did). If you read through ISIS UNVEILED
you will find the keys given there. Those are continued in The
SECRET DOCTRINE.

It has to be individual study assiduously pursued, and each makes
his own progress. No wisdom can be imparted suddenly. The
student has to prepare him or herself. But, I can assure you the
keys are there.

Illumination, Initiation, realization are all descriptive in
general of the ability we construct for ourselves to penetrate
our own character, consciousness and latent capacities.

The "turtle" story indicates immediately the limited but
credulous nature of the disciple.

It also suggests the means to change that to knowledge.

Best wishes,

Dallas

======================

Consider the following:


WAS JESUS A REAL PERSON?


An impression seem to have arisen that H.P.B. denied that Jesus
ever lived at all.

My understanding is that she never said that but only denied the
historicity of the Gospel's "Jesus," -- i.e., Jesus, as portrayed
in the four Gospels, she says is a fabrication, a concoction.

She brings forward esoteric teaching to show that the Gospel
account is an historizing of the zodiacal signs and cycles of the
most ancient philosophers, under which they concealed some of
their Cosmogonical facts as myths, and she adds there indeed
lived a great reformer, the Adept Jesus.

Let me offer some notes made in the course of studying ISIS
UNVEILED and The SECRET DOCTRINE.

ISIS UNVEILED II 132 and 133 :-

Whether Jesus belonged to the sect of the Nazarenes or Essenes is
difficult to establish but Jesus preached the philosophy of
Sakyamuni, the Buddha.

While Nazars of olden time were the Chaldean Kabalists, the
Essenes were the converts of Buddhist missionaries who had
overrun the Middle East, Egypt, Greece and even Judea at one
time, since the reign of king Asoka [Glos. pp. 55-6], a zealous
Buddhist, who sent out missionary Buddhist monks far and wide --
even as far as Ireland it is rumored.

The Essenes [Glos. p. 115] were Buddhists, and have the honour of
the Nazarene reformer, Jesus, as a pupil, yet, the latter is
found disagreeing with his early teachers on questions of formal
observance. "He cannot strictly be called a Nazar, or a nazaria
of the older sect. What Jesus was, may be found in the Codex
Nazaraeus, in the unjust accusations of the Bardesanian
Gnostics." (we must note this hint and inquire into the Codex and
accounts of Bardesanian Gnostics).
[Glos. pp. 226, 129, 50]

What does the Codex Nazareus [Glos., p. 86] say ? "Jesu is Nebu,
the false Messiah, the destroyer of the old orthodox religion."
It is further said in ISIS UNVEILED : He is the founder of the
sect of the new nazars -- a follower of the Buddhist doctrine.
Nebu is from naba, meaning inspiration in Hebrew, and Nebo is god
of wisdom. "But Nebo is also Mercury, and Mercury is Buddha in
the Hindu monogram of planets. Moreover, we find the Talmudists
holding that Jesus was inspired by the genius of Mercury
[Bodha - Wisdom. Glos. p. 226]."

He preached the philosophy of Buddha--Sakhyamuni. He belonged to
one of these sects who were cursed by the Sanhendrin and was
secretly persecuted by the orthodox.

Both in the KEY TO THEOSOPHY and ISIS UNVEILED we see parallels
drawn between the two great Reformer--Teachers : Jesus and
Gautama Buddha. [see ISIS UNVEILED II p. 133] It is said that
both of them had the same motive:

1. to reform the current popular Jewish religion, and,

2. teaching pure Ethics, the true teaching having been concealed
as an exclusive property of certain esoteric sects.


ISIS UNVEILED II 135 :- Jesus is there said to be over 40 years
of age, according to Kabalisits, when he arrived at Jerusalem.

I U II p. 136 and 137 -- an account is given of how
Iranaeus manipulated the Gospels to make it appear that

(a) Jesus did not belong to the sect of Nazarenes, the school of
John the Baptist, and

(b) that his appellation Nazarene is derived from the fact that
his father 's residence was at Nazareth, and not because he
belonged to the sect of Nazarenes.

I U II p. 127	We are given a clue that Jesus was a true
Nazarene. With ideas of reform, we must not look for evidence in
the Gospels, which are fabrications, but seek in the true
original Christianity -- the remnants of the Gnostics. H P B
writs: "Thus, if we take into account all that is puzzling and
incomprehensible in the four Gospels, revised and corrected as
they now stand, we shall easily see for ourselves that the true,
original Christianity, such as was preached by Jesus, is to be
found in the so-called Syrian heresies. Only from them can we
extract any clear notions about what was primitive Christianity".

ISIS UNVEILED II p. 144. Jesus belonged to and received
initiation from Nazarenes in the desert and separated himself
from them and became an independent wandering Nazaria -- a
travelling therapeutae, a healer.

Here we see parallel between Gautama Buddha and Jesus. The former
received initiation from Brahmin Initiates and learnt all from
them, and seeing that the great life-giving truths were withheld
by this proud and exclusive caste from the masses, he separated
himself from his teachers and began preaching pure ethics and the
non-violent life to despised out-castes, servants, villagers, and
pariahs.

I U II p. 144	"Both Jesus and St. John the Baptist preached
the end of the Age ; which proves their knowledge of the secret
computation of the priests and Kabalists, who with the chief of
the Essene communities alone had the secret of the duration of
the cycles. The latter were kabalists and theurgists." We are
told that the meaning of the division of time into ages is
esoteric, and Buddhistic. The uninitiated Christians never
understood this, and accepted the words of Jesus literally,
believing the world would end abruptly.

ISIS UNVEILED II p. 145 : Virtues such as renunciation,
charity, non-violence, etc., taught by Jesus were practiced by
both Essnes and Nazarenes. Christ was a teacher of
'metempsychoses' or reincarnation -- repeating the Essenean
teachings. The Essenes were Pythagoreans in their doctrines and
habits. Jesus spoke in parables and metaphors that can be traced
to the Essenes and Nazarenes.

ISIS UNVEILED II p.147 :	Like Pythagorean-Essenean methods
Jesus divided his teachings into the exoteric and the esoteric,
and divided his followers into "neophytes," "brethren" and the
"perfect." "But his career at least as a public Rabbi, was of a
too short duration tallow him to establish a regular school of
his own ; and with the exception, perhaps, of John, it does not
seem that he had initiated any other apostle."

I U II p. 148 : Sadducees (Zadokites) accused and crucified
Jesus for practicing the magic of Egyptians.

I U II p. 150 : Here Jesus is shown to be a real historical
character, a great reformer.

"All this points to the fact, that except a handful of
self-styled Christians who subsequently won the day, all the
civilized portion of the pagan world who knew of Jesus honoured
him as a philosopher an adept whom they placed on the same level
with Pythagoras and Apollonius.

Whence such a veneration on their part for a man, were he simply,
as represented by the Synoptics, a poor, unknown Jewish carpenter
from Nazareth ?

As an incarnated God there is no single record of him on this
earth capable of withstanding the critical examination of science
; as one of the greatest reformers, an inveterate enemy of every
theological dogmatism, a persecutor of bigotry, a teacher of one
of the most sublime codes of ethics, Jesus is one of the grandest
and most clearly-defined figures on the panorama of human
history...."

I U II p. 152 : Early Nazarenes believed Jesus to have been
over-shadowed by the Divine and that its influence waned when he
was on the cross.

'THEOSOPHIST' for March 1883, has an article on the "Real
Jesus." There it states that Jesus was never a historical
personage but a myth built on the historical Jeshu of Lydda -- a
Jewish Adept who lived from 120 to 70 BC, and that the real
founder of Christianity was St. Paul.

Jesus was also known as Ben Panthera [also PANDERA] (son of
Panthera) [Glos. p 248,
I U II p. 201, H P B Articles III 173].

For the origin of non-existent Jesus of the Gospels we must turn
to accounts of the Gnostic sect of Marcion. [ Glos. p. 207]

In I U II p. 137 we are told, "To assure ourselves that Jesus
was a true Nazarene-- albeit with ideas of a new reform--we must
not search for the proof in the translated Gospels, but in such
original versions as are accessible...Thus, if we take into
account all that is puzzling and incomprehensible in the four
Gospels, revised and corrected as they now stand, we shall easily
see for ourselves that the true, original Christianity, such as
was preached by Jesus, is to be found only in the so-called
Syrian heresies. Only from them can we extract any clear notions
about what was primitive Christianity."

Who were the Syrian Gnostics ? They are early sects founded by
Marcion and Bardesanes. Hence it would be highly profitable to
study whatever is available of these two sects and their
philosophy. C. W. King recalls (GNOSTICS AND THEIR REMAINS) that
according to tradition they were of Persian origin and Magians by
religious training. In I U II 157-60 and 161-164 and in the
Glossary more information is available.

Hers is a brief summary of these references :

Gnostic doctrines held that Christ did not and cannot ever die
but only the bodily form which he had occupied died.

But the Church regards this as a heresy.

Gnostics taught the doctrine of Maya--Illusion, of the Real and
the Unreal, as Buddhists and Vedantins do.

Orthodox Christians called the Gnostics 'Illusionists' for
believing that Christ did not and never could die.

Gnosis was an off-shoot of Buddhism and held the same
metaphysical ideas. They made a clear distinction between
Christos and the illusionary Jesus.

Christos was for them what it is for Theosophists -- the Higher
Manas, Ego, Son of the Universal Mind, MANASA-PUTRA, the Vedic
VISWAKARMAN, who sacrificed himself to himself [his Higher Self
to serve the Lower Self, and thus to redeem the worlds]. [S D II
167]

Christos or Christ--Krishna is explained as: "...the incarnating
Egos have taken upon themselves, voluntarily and knowingly, the
burden of all the future personalities. Thence it is easy to see
that it is neither Mr. A nor Mr. B, nor any of the personalities
that periodically clothe the Self-sacrificing Ego, which are real
sufferers, but verily the innocent Christos in us."
Transactions of Blavatsky Lodge, p. 68. [ BCW Vol. X ]


VICARIOUS ATONEMENT

The Church dogma of Vicarious Atonement arose from the
mystico-metaphysical doctrine that Jesus died on the cross to
save the world. This imposed as dogma and enforced by the Church
is productive of immorality (another can take our blame) and this
is the source of much evil in society.


THE FIRST SON OF GOD

Gnostics held the old theosophical doctrine that described Christ
as the Logos, the first emanation from the invisible ABSOLUTE
[the God-Head] manifesting itself as tangible in Spirit. It is
the same as the Greek Logos, the Hebrew Messiah, the Latin
Verbum, the Hindu Viraj -- they are viewed metaphysically as
"collective entities, flames detached from the one eternal centre
of Light."
(I U 1 p. 59).

"Thus Christos, as a unity, is but an abstraction : a general
idea representing the collective aggregation of the numberless
spirit-entities, which are the direct emanations of the infinite,
invisible, incomprehensible FIRST CAUSE--the individual spirits
of men."	(I U II p. 159)

In the majority of mankind this Christos [the HIGHER SELF] is
latent. It only overshadows the mortal, (which are its
radiations [Rays] on earth, but also, actively manifesting in
such god-like figures as the Buddha, Jesus, Krishna, etc.,
because all these succeeded earlier in uniting themselves
permanently with their divine prototype, their "Father in
Heaven."

Gnostic sects held this view of Christ, and of the perfectibility
of all men, which the ambitious, ignorant Church Fathers sought
to destroy and declared, as "pre-existence" to be anathema.

Marcion, [Glos p. 207] one of the prominent Gnostics, wrote
"Antithesis" challenging the Church corruptions of the pure
philosophy regarding the true nature of the Christos, and the
Church responded with its "Refutations" -- full of lies and
falsehoods -- Tertulian and Epiphanius, also early Church
Fathers, excelling in the art of falsification. The Church
destroyed most of the works of the Gnostics, yet preserved a
record of their doctrines in the "Refutations."

Marcion recognised no other Gospel than a few Epistles of Paul.
He rejected totally the anthropomorphism of the Old Testament and
drew a clear line of demarcation between old Judaism and the new
"Christianity."

He looked on Jesus as neither a king, nor a Messiah of the Jews,
nor a "son of David." He declared that he was "... a divine
being sent to revel to man a spiritual religion, and a God of
goodness and grace hitherto unknown"	( I U II p. 162).

Jesus ignored Jehovah and preached against the religion of the
Siniatic god.

The Marcionites showed that the Church made a great blunder in
identifying Jehovah as the "Father in Heaven" of Jesus.

Marcion said that the mission of Jesus was to terminate the
concept of Jehovah being the Lord-God of the Israelites, and,
instead, to establish a pure spiritual religion, a universal
faith based on unadulterated Truth. The Universal Wisdom-Religion
he desired to establish, he had learned at the feet of the Gurus
in the Himalayas, not on mount Sinai. Marcion shows the
contradictory character of Jehovah and denies any relationship to
Jesus, hence the so-called Messianic prophecies of the Old
Testament are done away with.

I U II p. 164 shows a set of tables that compare the teachings
of Manu, Buddha and Jesus and thus demonstrate them to be
identical.

In summation, we could observe that the amount of evidence
brought forward is overwhelming.

One might repeat: Theosophy, is not a creed or dogma invented by
theologians, by fallible men, but ANCIENT and UNIVERSAL
KNOWLEDGE. It is the cumulative testimony of an innumerable,
endless series of Seers. [S D I 272-3] It is not a religion,
not a creed nor does it have dogmas. It is not built on anything
but that ancient foundation upon which every one of the religions
of the world have been based.

Concerning the Knowers of the Wisdom of the Universe, We find H P
B wrote:

"Their spiritual visions, real explorations by, and through,
physical and spiritual senses untrammeled by blind flesh, were
systematically checked and compared one with the other, and their
nature sifted. All that was not corroborated by unanimous and
collective experience was rejected, while that only was recorded
as established truth which, in various ages, under different
climes, and throughout an untold series of incessant
observations, was found to agree and receive constantly further
corroboration." [Key, p. 85]

"Let no man set up a popery instead of Theosophy, as this would
be suicidal and has ever ended most fatally" has been the plea of
H.P.B. to students.
( "Five Messages to American Theosophists" from H. P. Blavatsky.
First Message).

Students are invited to seek for and make their own in-depth
study for of all the keys H.P.B. gives out in her books: ISIS
UNVEILED, SECRET DOCTRINE, and other of her numerous articles
pertaining to the roots of Christianity, the pagan origins of
Church rituals and dogmas ; of those Keys, we might mention: the
Anthropological, Mystical, Historical, Astrological,
Astronomical, Metaphysical, Cosmogonical, Psychical,
Physiological, Numerical, Ethnological Keys she has furnished in
respect to both Old and New Testaments, especially, the Book of
Genesis, the Gospels and the Revelations, and some Kabalistic
texts.

=============================

-----Original Message-----
From: pepi333@webtv.net [mailto:pepi333@webtv.net]
Sent:	Wednesday, July 16, 2003 7:12 AM
To:	Blavatsky_Study@yahoogroups.com
Subject:	Re: [Blavatsky_Study] Fw: illumination


Were there no inner sight or intuition, the Jews would never have
had
their Bible,
______________________________________
I have never really understood how the Jewish Bible could be
considered
the result of illumination. The notion of deity that is presented
is not
of any high realization, but rather a tribal god, more often
ruthless
and barbaric than not. The laws commanded in the Bible are not
admirable, but rather reflect the thinking of ancient tribal
customs in
which the horrible murder of millions of innocent animals is
required to
appeased a savage god. If illumination is somehow mirrored in the
Bible,
humanity would be better off to look for a higher standard.
______________________________________
nor the Christians Jesus.
______________________________________
>From what I have read of Blavatsky, she suggests that nothing is
known
of a Jesus in the first century, and the notion of Jesus is based
on a
Jewish teacher who lived more than a hundred years earlier. So,
if this
is the Jesus you mean, we have not one line of his teachings, nor
do we
know anything about him that would indicate that he was a
"realized
soul." We do however have a mythical character that appears in
the
gospels, who is obviously a literary creation, with no history to
support his existence, and who is nothing more than a hodge-podge
of
many mythical deities and demi-gods.
______________________________________
What both Moses and Jesus gave to the world was the fruit of
their
intuition or illumination.
______________________________________
I wonder what Moses gave to the world. According to Blavatsky,
the
Torah, the law of Moses, is only a couple hundred years older
than the
New Testament (Isis ii, 526). If that is the case, then certainly
Moses
could not have written it. On the other hand, if Moses made a
decisive
move in history, which we call the Exodus, then modern
scholarship has
failed to discover him, because the weight of the evidence is on
the
side of those who deny that the Exodus ever took place.
______________________________________
What their subsequent elders and teachers allowed the world to
understand was -- dogmatic misrepresentations, too often
blasphemy.
______________________________________
There is a story of a chela asking his guru about what supports
the
world. The guru says, "A great turtle." The chela asks, "Then
what
supports the turtle?"

The guru replies, "Another turtle."

The chela asks, "But what supports that turtle?"
The guru again responds, "Another turtle."

The chela starts to speak again, but the guru interrupts him to
say,
"It's turtles all the way down."

______________________________________

The man who has conquered matter sufficiently to receive the
direct
light from his shining Augoeides feels truth intuitionally; he
could not
err in his judgment,

______________________________________

I have noticed that all the religious illuminati claim that they
cannot
err in judgment, and yet they disagree so vehemently among
themselves.

One of the things that drew me to Blavatsky was her willingness
to admit
her fallibility from the beginning. I don't think we should claim
infallibility until we are supported by the last turtle down.

______________________________________
notwithstanding all the sophisms suggested by cold reason, for
he
is ILLUMINATED. Hence prophecy, vaticination, and the so-called
Divine
inspiration are simply the effects of this illumination from
above by
our own immortal spirit.
______________________________________
I wouldn't sell reason too short. It may be one of the turtles
too.
And we may be just shuffling turtles here.

Janaki