Theos-Talk Archives (July 2004 Message tt00216)

Hi Pedro,

On the group blavatsky study (
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Blavatsky_Study/ ) we have a resident
Tibetan Buddhist who also knows about theosophy (though disillusioned
with the TS-Adyar) and you may find an answer to some of your
questions in the (recent) archives there. 

As far as intellectual concepts go - I'm not sure Blavatsky's oneness
is meant as an intellectual concept at all. It is at the heart of her
meditation diagram for instance. Sunnyata is, as much as our oneness,
a constant source of intellectual debate - so that in this respect at
least, they are not that different. 

Your explanation of sunnyata brings it close to Nihilism, which is one
of the extremes Nagarjuna tried to avoid, as I understand it. But it
is why I relate emptiness to maya: the idea that everything we see,
feel, think and can imagine is illusionary in nature and temporary as
well. Still, sunnyata itself is the one constant. 

Personally I don't really see the connection of sunnyata with space,
but since HPB uses it in that sense, I added that fact to my summary
of the term. 

The mahatmas weren't classical buddhists - I think that much is clear
from the Mahatma Letters. They revered Buddha, but that doesn't mean
they were main-stream Tibetan Buddhists. On the other hand, atma as it
is taught in the Mahatma Letters isn't really the same atma that
Buddha denied in the an-atma (= anatta = no soul) doctrine. A useful
article on this is, I think:
http://www.katinkahesselink.net/tibet/atmsun.htm . Another way of
showing this is that in Mahayana Buddhism we all have a Buddha-nature
and this Buddha-nature is in everything. Sounds like Atma, doesn't it? 

Since the teachers and not just the teachings came west, we can assume
that some esoteric knowledge also came west. Still, I'm not sure the
esoteric teachings as HPB talked about them are so easily accessible.

As to question 2 - I don't think so. Important aspects of sunnyata
were taught, just not with that terminology. 

Question 3 is easy: YES. Ultimate truth is beyond words. This can be
found in Blavatsky and the Mahatma Letters as well. 

Katinka 
--- In theos-talk@yahoogroups.com, "prmoliveira" <prmoliveira@y...> wrote:
> --- In theos-talk@yahoogroups.com, "Katinka Hesselink" <mail@k...> 
> wrote:
> 
> > First of all - HPB and the Mahatmas were of an esoteric buddhist
> > lineage, not an exoteric one. What's come out to the west is by
> > definition exoteric. 
> 
> Thank you both, Katinka and John, for your replies. As I am not a 
> Buddhist scholar, I am trying to understand the question of the 
> Mahatmas' Buddhism as a student of Theosophy.
> 
> Most Buddhist practitioners may not agree with your view, Katinka, 
> that the Buddhist teachings that came to the west are exoteric ones. 
> It appears that there are two great streams in Mahayana Buddhism: 
> the "sutrayana" and the "vajrayana" (also referred to 
> as "tantrayana"). The first focusses on the study and assimilation of 
> core traditional texts, like the Heart Sutra or the Diamond Sutra. 
> The second involves several levels of spiritual practice, including 
> meditation, mantras, ritual gestures, visualisations, etc., and is 
> considered esoteric because admission to its more profound teachings 
> is through some form of initiation. A number of highly recognised 
> sources affirm that Sunyata is at the very heart of Tantric 
> (esoteric) Buddhism. The sand mandala in the Kalachakra Tantra, for 
> instance, has Sunyata as its core meaning.
> 
> As you suggested, Katinka, one possible point of contact between 
> esoteric Buddhism, as it is known today, and the Mahatmas' Buddhism 
> is to interpret Sunyata as the One Life. But that also creates more 
> problems for Sunyata, as presented by its most illustrious 
> philosopher, Nagarjuna, means the ending of all views, of all 
> notions, of all theories, of all scholasticism, revealing the vast 
> emptiness of all phenomena as the ultimate reality. Incidentally, 
> John, although stimulating, Gariaev's theory is still conceptual. 
> Nagarjuna insisted that Sunyata is not a doctrine, it is the ending 
> of all doctrines.
> 
> I find your point, Katinka, that the Mahatmas and HPB had to address 
> the world view of their time quite compelling. "Science is our great 
> ally", KH wrote. But let us remember that in one of his letters to 
> Sinnett, he said: "Our terms are untranslatable". This suggests a 
> teaching which was unheard of in the western culture. There are so 
> many things that we do not know and perhaps we shall never know. 
> 
> HPB mentioned that there were Adepts connected with other traditions 
> (Egyptian, Coptic, Rosicrucian, Masonic, Gnostic, etc.). A few 
> questions come to mind:
> 
> 1) In view of the difficulties of tracing the Mahatmas' Buddhism (a 
> form of Buddhism that accepts concepts such as Atma, Soul, Monad, 
> evolution, etc.), is it possible that their tradition is completely 
> outside the existing Buddhist schools of thought and practice?
> 
> 2) Did they avoid the radical teaching of Sunyata in order to better 
> relate to the western mind at that time which, as we know, seeks to 
> understand reality through the use of categories?
> 
> 3) Is there a level within every great spiritual tradition wherein 
> discourse, intellectual concepts and category-bound awareness give 
> way to a perception of things as they are and to the realisation of 
> a "power that makes all things new"?
> 
> 
> Pedro