Theos-Talk Archives (October 2003 Message tt00049)

Hi all of you,

A few words on books, learning methods etc.
could be helpful to some readers.

So here is a little something...

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Books and beyond books


Q: What is the compatibility, if any, of the Theosophical book and the
Theosophical teaching beyond books?



A: Many people say that they cannot learn from books.

INSTRUMENTAL FUNCTION



Of course they cannot: because they have first to learn that,

Correctly guided, they can learn from books, or from grasshoppers,
or from anything.

A book, for the Theosophists, is an instrument as much as it is something
to give information.
Information and action are both necessary.
The key is the teacher.
If he says: 'Read this book' then you should read it.
If your answer is: 'I cannot learn from books', then you are in
fact refusing his teaching.
If you refuse teaching, do not be surprised if you do not learn
anything.
You may be one of those whose problem is that you do not
want to learn, and your saying 'I want to learn' is a protection
against ever learning: an incantation, in fact.
No real teacher will mistake a man or woman who merely says:

'I want to learn' for one who undoubtedly wants to learn.
That is why so many people have to go through stages which
will show them that their condition (while the claimed that they
wanted to learn and could not find the materials) was an unsuitable
basis for learning.





REALITY AND POTENTIALITY



Man has to come to understand how to see himself as he really is,
so that he can achieve something in the area which he calls 'what
he might be'.

Again, it is the teacher who knows what is indicated: whether
his student has to develop through linear or other modes. As
one Teacher says, traditionally, direct teaching beyond books, the
mystery unification, was taught to the spiritual elite, while the
linear Holy Law (the Orthodox religion) was given to the ordinary
people. In this way the limited could rise via discipline, the Orthodox
learning, and the elite were able to descend to the Law by means
of the Truth of immediate perception.
According to the Theosophist, there is only one Essence, Reality
(= Truth). Derived from this is appearance, Form, referred
to by the Great Sufi - Ibn al-Arabi, in his Fusus al-Hikam, 
and others, as Khalq,
that which is created, secondary. To mistake the secondary for the
primary is usual and humanity has to learn how to avoid this.
But living in a secondary realm, 'the world', humanity must learn
the value and limitations of the secondary, of phenomena. The
limitations include the fact that such derivatives cannot help one
beyond a certain stage with anything. The value is the occasions
and circumstances in which such things can be of help, and the
kind of use they can be.





VALUE OF THE RELATIVE



'The Relative is the Channel to the Absolute' (according to the sufi
Al-majazu qantarat al-Haqiqa) encapsulates this statement. 
The Theosophical experience informs him in relation to knowing 
how to deal with the secondary factors, and hence enables him to teach.

The Theosophical teaching through books, or through the use of scholastic
methods applied to indicate their absurdity or limitations, was
demonstrated one day by a an initated when a would-be Seeker visited 
him seeking wisdom.

THE VALUE OF A KINGDOM



The King, in all his magnificence, was in need of a lesson in
the relative nature of power and possessions. 'Ask a favour of me',
he said.
The Initiate asked him whether he would give one-half of his realm
to someone who would give him a drink of water, if he were
dying of thirst in a desert.
The King said that he would.
And, continued the Theosophist, would he give the other half to someone
who enabled him to pass the water, if he had become unable
to do so?

The King said he would.
Now the Initiate asked the King to reflect why he valued his
kingdom so highly, when it was something which could be given
away in return for a drink of water, which itself does not stay with 
one.

People assume, like the King, that they have something of
value and that by giving some of it away they can gain something
of even greater value. They tend, too, to offer not what they have
to get rid of, but something which they can give because they want
to, - (and not necessarily spiritually seen need to).

Therein lies the genesis of trade, and a desirable thing it is,
too - if confined to trade. Therein, too, lies the desire to prescribe
one's own studies, one's own path: 'Ask a favour of me', as the
King put it.

But, as the Theosophist never tire of saying, the Path or Way has its own
requirements, and the things which people want to do are likely to
be those which will help them to continue in the way in which they
are already set, rather than in a direction which will break through
their limitations.
Because Theosophical affairs do not seem to resemble the kind of
organisation of studies familiar to most people, they imagine that
they have to be carried out in a completely incoherent manner. It
is worth listening to what a certain Sufi named Ahmad has to say about
this, in his introduction to a version of a Sufi book.



SUFISM AS A SICENCE



'The word "mysticism" [employed in English for Sufism] has an
elusive atmosphere about it, whereas tasawwuf [Sufism] is a
regular science with its set laws and a full scheme in detail. It is
based on palpable experiences which can be reproduced, like in
any other science, under set circumstance. Every pilgrim or seeker has to

pass through the same stages in his spiritual journey and these
stages are readily recognisable by their detailed descriptions given
unanimously by all masters. The landmarks and pitfalls are described
in equally exhaustive particulars. Just as in any other
course of study, there are methods in it to test the progress of the
disciple and his merit. As in any other branch of knowledge, there
are geniuses in this branch of study who create a stir in the 
world.'*



* Aftab-ud-Din Ahmad: Futuh al-Ghaib, Lahore: Ashraf 1949, p. ix.





GARBLED MESSAGE



Books and other methods of mass-communication are used selectively
by Theosophical teachers. And there are cases where the message is
garbled, so that they do not use certain versions of them at all.
Some translations, for instance, contain ludicrous errors, even
when made by experts. This sort of garbling can happen with
anything, and only a human guide can put things to rights.



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from

M. Sufilight with peace and love...






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