Theos-Talk Archives (March 2004 Message tt00659)

Hallo Leon and all,

My views are:

1. Firstly. It was Gurdjieff, who was the first to use the term "New Age" in
the sense Bailey also sort of used it.
2. Secondly. These tendencies are not new. Even when Blavatsky lived these
things happended.

3. An interesting example: Early Tantra in the western Esoteric teaching.

Let me also put the fingers at the following websites
a) Pierre A. Bernard known by some as Jerome Moreward Haig in the book "The
Initiated" by Cyril Scott - http://www.vanderbilt.edu/~stringer/virsad.htm
--- also known as - THE OMNIPOTENT OOM
b) Oom the Omnipotent: http://www.esoteric.msu.edu/VolumeIII/HTML/Oom.html
c) The latest trick - an new order :
http://www.tantraworks.com/tantrausa.html
d) Sir Richard Francis Burton (1821-1890 - the old one) on Tantrika - also
Pierre Bernard: http://www.esoteric.msu.edu/VolumeIII/HTML/Oom.html
also - http://www.sacred-texts.com/sex/

e) I quote from the below website about --- THE OMNIPOTENT OOM - Tantra and
Its Impact on Modern Western Esotericism - written by
Hugh B. Urban - Ohio State University:
"In the first decades of the twentieth century, a few brave scholars made an
effort to defend and re-valorize the Tantras, arguing that there is far more
to this ancient tradition than mere illicit sexuality. The most important
figure in this moralizing reform of Tantra was Sir John Woodroffe, a.k.a.
Arthur Avalon, the enigmatic High Court Judge and secret Tantrika, who made
it is his life's work to defend the Tantras against their many critics. In
Woodroffe's rather sanitized and rationalized account, Tantra is a noble
philosophical tradition, basically in line with the Vedas, and even
comparable in its symbolism to the liturgy of the Catholic Church (20).
Despite Woodroffe's valiant attempt to present a sanitized and rationalized
version of Tantra, however, the mistaken equation of Tantra with sex would
persist throughout the Western imagination, both popular and scholarly. And
it was soon also identified and mixed with Western sexual-magical
traditions, such as the teachings of the mysterious American Rosicrucian and
"sex-oriented occultist," Paschal Beverly Randolph, and of course the
self-proclaimed "Great Beast, 666," Aleister Crowley, who, many believe,
actually had been involved in Tantric practices in India (see below, part
IV). One of the key figures in the transmission of Tantra to the West and in
the transformation of Tantra into something sexy, scandalous, scintillating
and exotic, was the enigmatic Dr. Pierre Arnold Bernard."
http://www.esoteric.msu.edu/VolumeIII/HTML/Oom.html

------

A few comments just to show how closely Alice A. Bailey did monitor the 'New
Age' trend in her time:

Now we all know, that Bailey quoted Sir John Woodroffe, a.k.a. Arthur Avalon
and his book "The Serpent Power".
Alice A. Bailey does more than one time, - and also in the book named - "The
Soul and its Mechanism" written 1930 - (page 93-94) :

"Sir John Woodroffe (Arthur Avalon) has done much, through his books, to
bring a knowledge of this Eastern teaching and of this technique of soul
development to the West; he has, through the form in which he has presented
it, safeguarded the public also from a too quick comprehension of a most
[93] dangerous science. A little book by a Hindu physician, well grounded in
Western medicine and science, entitled The Mysterious Kundalini (Vasant G.
Rele) is of real value also.

The danger of this science is well recognized by those who know anything
about it. It lies in the fact that through a knowledge of a certain
technical method it becomes possible for a man to work actively with the
forces of his own nature, as they function through the medium of the vital
body. Modern physicians are recognizing increasingly the energy factor in
connection with man. The electrical nature of the human unit is a natural
outgrowth of a necessary recognition that the physical body is formed of
atoms, as are all forms in the natural world."
http://beaskund.helloyou.ws/netnews/bk/soul/soul1027.html

In this book by bailey - a few pages later or earliere - a variety of
persons such as Swami Vivekananda, Dr. Paul Deussen, Rele G. Vasant,
Ramacharaka Yogi, Rama Prasad, P. T. Srinivasa Iyengar, René Guénon, Maurice
Maeterlinck, Edward Carpenter, Daniel H. Leary, and Bhagavan Das - and EVEN
Arthur E. Powell's book "The Etheric Double" all quoted, as if they have
something important to say.
http://beaskund.helloyou.ws/netnews/bk/soul/soul1043.html


Especially Arthur Avalon are quoted extensively.
As if Alice A. bailey wanted to emphasise, something - or maybe rather
wanted to attract a certain audience connected with
the Cyril Scott and Pierre Arnold Bernard group.
Perhaps she wanted - in a sweet manner - to say, that the Krishnamurti -
scheme was a wrong path or not the Path which the Masters wanted to support
in the year 1930 when the Bailey book was published.
The book The Reappearence of Christ was published in 1948 - although some
papers or
lectures was out somewhat earliere as far as my memory tells me.

The truth is, that a lot of New Age people in fact has misued Alice A.
Bailey's teachings because they deliberately have misunderstood
them - or - rather only listened to those passages in her books they
themselves wanted to. But it is also a fact, that SOME of the Alice A.
Bailey groups studied - as an addition - the books of Arthur E. Powell - and
other relevant books.

The other fact, that Bailey misused Blavatsky's teachings to a certain
degree in the period 1922-1990'ies or so is of less importance today -
although it has importance. It is just in the recent 10 or perhaps 20 years
that the Alice A. bailey books are equal to a real problem. The reason being
we have fast transportation, Internet and Satellite TV - and highly evolved
sciences of different kinds. The Bailey books lack of global perspective
starts to make themselves felt - and a karmic circle has been created among
the followers.

That is one reason why I from time to time recommend, that one reads the
books written by the esoteric Middle Eastern - Sufi - named Idries Shah so
to balance the teachings within the Wisdom Tradition and thereby teach the
aspirants and interested students in a manner that will give them a much
more GLOBAL outlook upon the world.

This I say even when Bailey (+ D.K.) says:

The Bailey book - "The Rays and the Initiations - Appendix" page 749-50:

"The prevalent spirit of expectancy and of a truly divine discontent are the
guarantees that this second spiritual event is a real factor in our time.
Many factors contribute to this awakening. In most countries, through the
radio, through the newspapers, through books, magazines and travel, through
lectures and forums and simplified human intercourse (to which the
automobile and the airplane have greatly contributed) men everywhere are
free to know and to understand. This is, of course, not true of those
countries where the freedom of the human spirit is attacked. There are two
ways in which that freedom of choice can be infringed: First, as in Russia,
by keeping the citizenry in ignorance of world affairs, and secondly, by
giving them biassed news and misinformation, or a garbled or distorted slant
on world affairs, as is the case in most other countries, particularly in
the United States. An instance of this can be seen in the fact that the
Arabs never got a true hearing in the American newspapers or on the radio;
the American people were "pressured" (I think that that is the word you use)
into an acceptance of the Zionist position - the motive being oil and
mineral riches.

But the mentality of man is daily developing and his ability to grasp world
affairs is growing. That is one of the greatest of spiritual events and is
the foundational fact which makes the life of the soul and the growth of
intuitive perception possible on a large scale. This is a by-product of the
clash of the ideologies, but is the true and beautiful result of the
universal educational system which - faulty though it may be and is - has
made it possible for all men to read, to write and to communicate with each
other."
http://beaskund.helloyou.ws/netnews/bk/rays/rays1281.html

I say this - Because the Bailey books - in general - has a lack of emphasis
on the Middle Eastern esoteric teachings and the strong emphasis on a
Chrisitan vocabulary creates trouble.





All This is quite interesting is it not ?

from
M. Sufilight with peace and love...







----- Original Message ----- 
From: <leonmaurer@aol.com>
To: <theos-talk@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Saturday, March 27, 2004 11:28 AM
Subject: Re: Theos-World PROMULGATION OF THEOSOPHY


>
> In a message dated 03/26/04 9:17:22 AM, global-theosophy@adslhome.dk
writes:
>
> >Let us remembet this !
> >Let the students learn the Laws of Karma and Reincarnation on a very high
> >leverl before the get swallowed by one of these Psychic-based New Age
> >groups, which are so prevalent these days.
>
> And all of them, apparently, based on the magical gobbledygook taught them
by
> the mother of the New Age, Alice Bailey. (But no argument with what you
said
> about learning.) So, maybe the old books are useful after all.
>
>
>
> Yahoo! Groups Links
>
>
>
>
>