Theos-Talk Archives (May 2004 Message tt00104)

Hi Pedro,

The way I heard it the Lama didn't say the Voice was an original
Tibetan Buddhism book, but that it did contain Mahayana teachings. The
preface by Boris de Zirkof to the Centenary edition of the Voice
(quest) suggests a Tamil original... the mysteries are long from
solved. But in the meantime it does remain a jewel of a text, whatever
its source.

Katinka
--- In theos-talk@yahoogroups.com, Pedro Oliveira <prmoliveira@y...>
wrote:
> While in India, in the mid 1990's, I had the
> opportunity of meeting and having discussions with a
> former professor of the Benares Hindu University who
> is also an earnest student and practitioner of Tibetan
> Buddhism of the Gelugpa school. He goes to Dharamsala
> regularly and has contact with senior lamas there.
> 
> I wanted to know particularly his view on "The Voice
> of the Silence". He said he had read it and that it
> certainly contained teachings related to the
> Bodhisattva Path, like the Paramitas or transcendental
> virtues. But he also said that because Madame
> Blavatsky did not give clear indications about the
> source text of "The Voice" (The Book of the Golden
> Precepts), nor had anyone seen it or been able to
> study it, it could not be considered to be a book
> belonging to the Tibetan Buddhist tradition.
> Apparently, in that tradition any teaching needs to be
> validated by expounding doctrines originally contained
> in a "root text" like, for example, the Prajnaparamita
> Sutras, the Madhyamikakarika, the Heart Sutra, etc.
> 
> I am aware that in the Peking edition of "The Voice of
> the Silence" Alice Leighton Cleather claims that the
> teaching in "The Voice" had the seal approval of the
> then Panchen Lama. It is doubtful that Buddhist
> scholars from within the tradition would uphold the
> same view nowadays.
> 
> I am also aware of the efforts of David Reigle in
> trying to trace the geographical location of the Book
> of Dzyan. As far as I know, there are no successful
> results yet.
> 
> Modern scholarship seems to frown upon the idea of any
> book being kept secret for esoteric reasons. Perhaps
> scholars may consider that until the source of HPB's
> teachings - "The Book of the Golden Precepts" - is
> produced before the world, her teachings may not be
> considered valid and authentic.
> 
> But what scholars seem to ignore is that the teachings
> in "The Voice of the Silence" harmonize and resonate
> so profoundly with the classics of world spirituality,
> like the Bhagavad Gita, parts of the New Testament,
> the Dhammapada and the writings of mystics from many
> cultures, that they find their intrinsic validation in
> the universal and all-compassionate ethics that they
> both embody and express. After all, "The Voice" is a
> book on mysticism and it points to a depth of
> experience and insight that can never be reached by
> the discursive intellect. In other words, HPB's
> sources may be unfathomable.
> 
> Pedro