Theos-Talk Archives (August 2004 Message tt00084)

Hallo all,

My views are:

The following might be helpful to read.
http://www.kheper.net/topics/Kabbalah/SeferYetzirah.htm

And also this about the Sufis and thier relation to the Kabbalah...

"The accepted modern authority on Jewry, The Jewish Encyclopaedia, declares
that it
came from Basra, as one of the treaties composing the
Encyclopaedia of the Faithful Brethren published in 980 !

The statement seems unequivocal. "...The Faithful
Brothers of Basra originated the eight elements which form
God..." Then perhaps comes the clue to all the square pegs and
round holes that have followed: "...changed by a Jewish
philosopher in the middle of the 11th century into ten".
"The People of the Secret" by Ernest Scott; page 76

Any comments on that - anyone ?

Now this was not written by Blavatsky.
But in her book The Secret Doctrine she does a great job
of making the 10 elements into 8 in the Eastern Gupta-Vidya version of the
Cabbala.
A view: Blavatskys diagram on the TREE are for obvious reasons not the same
as the ordinary sort of distorted New Age versions - of the Cabbala, - with
their 10 sephiroths.
http://www.theosociety.org/pasadena/sd/sd1-1-10.htm
(THE SECRET DOCTRINE; Vol. 1, Page; 200 . )
THE SECRET DOCTRINE; Vol. 1, The pages 199-202, 236, 241 could for instance
be considered.
THE SECRET DOCTRINE; Vol. 2, The page; 44, 97, 384, 388, 545, 625 .

The three upper Sephiroth are in fact also only ONE - when viewed
esoterically.
The number ten is exoteric - and the number seven is esoteric. (H. B.
Blavatsky).

The Middle Eastern esoteric teachings uses the numbers 7 and 8 - rather than
7 and 10.
The epic Gilgamesh tells an early tale.

Maybe some of the readers has some additional comments ?


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The following could maybe enhance something, while keeping in mind, that I
hold the below word "Sufi" to be the same as the word "Theosophist" - as the
Ancient Wisdom Teaching of all ages past:


The Sufis are also called -
"heart spies", "the lovers", "the builders", "the people of truth", "the
near ones", "the Masters", "the pillars", "the rose", --- or ---
"Mutassawif", "the Blamworhty", "those in white clothes" (a kind of
'clairvoyant' version), ...etc.
...
The Sufis claim that a certain kind of mental and other activity can
produce, under special conditions and with perticular efforts, what is
termed a higher working of the mind, leading to special perceptions whose
apparatus is latent in the ordinary man, Sufism is therefore the
transcending of ordinary limitations

...
It would maybe reduce the problems of the student to learn that it is said,
with all the authority of the Jewish Encyclopedia, that the Hebrew experts
regard the Cabbala and the Hasidim, the Jewish mystics, as originating with
Sufism or a tradition identical with it.
(*Jewish Encyclopedia, vol. XI, pp. 579,580,581 et passim. Jewish sages
regarded by Western Scholars as following the Spanish Sufi Schools include:
Juda Halevi of Toledo, in his Cuzari; Moses ben Ezra of Granada; Josef ben
Zadiq of Cordoba, in his Microcosmus; Samuel ben Tibbon; Simtob ben
Falaquera.*)
Neither would it encourage him/her to hear, that although the Sufis
themselves claim that their knowledge has existed for thousands of years,
they deny that is is - derivative, - affirming that it is equivalence of the
Hermetic, Phytagorean and Plantonic streams. (Identity of Sufi ideas with
ancient Egyptian, Phytagorean and Platonic schools noted; by M.A. Ubicini,
Letters on Turkey (London, 1856).

Our still uninitiated student may by now be thoroughly confues; but he/she
had a glimpse of the problems of studying Sufi ideas, even if only because
he for himself can witness for himself the unproductive struggle of the
scholastics.

...
Since Sufi study is carried out mainly by direct methods (and it has known
to be conveyed entirely by gesture, symbol and demonstration), when we lose
this element in our study, relying upon books, we must be at the mercy of
those who advance al kinds of subjective theories.
...
Serious problems in locating genuine and relevant Sufi ideas and practises
exist, too, for any student who has alreday met a watered-down, generalized
or partial variety of Sufism, wheather in the East or in the West. There are
many hundreds of people in America and Europe who practise 'dervish dance,
whirling or turning' in spite of the fact that it is psecifically on record
in easily accessible dervish litterature, that this practise was especially,
precribed, for local reasons, by Rumi (A great Sufi and poet; d. 1273) for
the people of Asia Minor in the region of Iconium.
(Shamsudin Ahmad El-Aflaki, Munaqib El-Arfin: trans. Redhouse as "The Acts
of Adepts" (London 1881); reprinted in facsimile ed. Kingston as "Legends
of the Sufis" (London 1965). See also El-Ghazali, "Alchemy of Happiness".)

******

There is the awkward fact, that the so-called Companions of the Bench - the
Ashab as-Safa - are traditionally soppposed to be the sufis of the time of
Mohammed (d. 632). It is said, that they formed themselves in to an esoteric
group in the year 623 A. D. And that their name is a derivation from the
phrase Ashab as-Safa.
"Sawfa" meaning "piety" and "saff" (contracted from the phrase 'First Rank
of the Worhty').

"saff" - "safran" - "sif" - "sign" - "design" .....

***
These are the words taken in part from the Afghan Sufi - Idries Shah
(d.1996), who lived England.
***




from
M. Sufilight with some new sounds of..."free cultural mixing"...<:-)


----- Original Message ----- 
From: <samblo@cs.com>
To: <ham>; <theos-talk@yahoogroups.com>
Sent: Thursday, August 05, 2004 7:20 PM
Subject: ham,Re: Theos-World From: Carlo Suares' "Cipher of Genesis"


> Andrew,
> As far as I can remember your the only one to have mentioned " The
Cipher
> of Genesis " by Carlos Soarez on this list, I have a copy I bought back in
> the 70's.
>
> John
>
>
> [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
>
>
>
>
> Yahoo! Groups Links
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