Theos-Talk Archives (November 2004 Message tt00022)

Nov 2 2004

Dear Friend:

Perhaps the following will help answer some of your queries:


 
THE MAHATMAS AS IDEALS AND FACTS

A visitor from one of the other planets of the solar system who might learn
the term Mahatma after arriving here would certainly suppose that the
etymology of the word undoubtedly inspired the believers in Mahatmas with
the devotion, fearlessness, hope, and energy which such an ideal should
arouse in those who have the welfare of the human race at heart. Such a
supposition would be correct in respect to some, but the heavenly visitor
after examining all the members of the Theosophical Society could not fail
to meet disappointment when the fact was clear to him that many of the
believers were afraid of their own ideals, hesitated to proclaim them, were
slothful in finding arguments to give reasons for their hope, and all
because the wicked and scoffing materialistic world might laugh at such a
belief.

The whole sweep, meaning, and possibility of evolution are contained in the
word Mahatma. Maha is "great," Atma is "soul," and both compounded into one
mean those great souls who have triumphed before us not because they are
made of different stuff and are of some strange family, but just because
they are of the human race. 

Reincarnation, karma, the sevenfold division, retribution, reward, struggle,
failure, success, illumination, power, and a vast embracing love for man,
all these lie in that single word. 

The soul emerges from the unknown, begins to work in and with matter, is
reborn again and again, makes karma, developes the six vehicles for itself,
meets retribution for sin and punishment for mistake, grows strong by
suffering, succeeds in bursting through the gloom, is enlightened by the
true illumination, grasps power, retains charity, expands with love for
orphaned humanity, and thenceforth helps all others who remain in darkness
until all may be raised up to the place with the "Father in Heaven" who is
the Higher Self. 

This would be the argument of the visitor from the distant planet, and he in
it would describe a great ideal for all members of a Society such as ours
which had its first impulse from some of these very Mahatmas.

Without going into any argument further than to say that evolution demands
that such beings should exist or there is a gap in the chain -- and this
position is even held by a man of science like Professor Huxley, who in his
latest essays puts it in almost as definite language as mine -- this article
is meant for those who believe in the existence of the Mahatmas, whether
that faith has arisen of itself or is the result of argument. 

It is meant also for all classes of the believers, for they are of several
varieties. Some believe without wavering; others believe unwaveringly but
are afraid to tell of their belief; a few believe, yet are always thinking
that they must be able to say they have set eyes on an Adept before they can
infuse their belief into others; and a certain number deliberately hide the
belief as a sort of individual possession which separates them from the
profane mortals who have never heard of the Adepts or who having heard scoff
at the notion. To all these I wish to speak. 

Those unfortunate persons who are ever trying to measure exalted men and
sages by the conventional rules of a transition civilization, or who are
seemingly afraid of a vast possibility for man and therefore deny, may be
well left to themselves and to time, for it is more than likely they will
fall into the general belief when it is formed, as it surely will be in the
course of no long time. For a belief in Mahatmas -- whatever name you give
the idea -- is a common property of the whole race, and all the efforts of
all the men of empirical science and dogmatic religion can never kill out
the soul's own memory of its past.


We should declare our belief in the Adepts, while at the same time we demand
no one's adherence. It is not necessary to give the names of any of the
Adepts, for a name is an invention of a family, and but few persons ever
think of themselves by name but by the phrase 'I am myself.' To name these
beings, then, is no proof, and to seek for mystery names is to invite
condemnation for profanation. The ideal without the name is large and grand
enough for all purposes.

Some years ago the Adepts wrote and said to H.P.B. and to several persons
that more help could be given to the movement in America because the fact of
their existence was not concealed from motives of either fear or doubt. 

This statement of course carries with it by contradistinction the conclusion
that where, from fear of schools of science or of religion, the members had
not referred much to the belief in Mahatmas, the power to help was for some
reason inhibited. This is the interesting point, and brings up the question
"Can the power to help of the Mahatmas be for any cause inhibited?" The
answer is, It can. But why?

All effects on every plane are the result of forces set in motion, and
cannot be the result of nothing, but must ever flow from causes in which
they are wrapped up. If the channel through which water is meant to flow is
stopped up, the water will not run there, but if a clear channel is provided
the current will pass forward. 

Occult help from Masters requires a channel just as much as any other help
does, and the fact that the currents to be used are occult makes the need
for a channel greater. The persons to be acted on must take part in making
the channel or line for the force to act, for if we will not have it they
cannot give it. Now as we are dealing with the mind and nature of man, we
have to throw out the words which will arouse the ideas connected with the
forces we desire to have employed. 

In this case the words are those which bring up the doctrine of the
existence of Adepts, Mahatmas, Masters of wisdom. Hence the value of the
declaration of our belief. 

It arouses dormant ideas in others, it opens up a channel in the mind, it
serves to make the conducting lines for the forces to use which the Mahatmas
wish to give out. Many a young man who could never hope to see great modern
professors of science like Huxley and Tyndall and Darwin has been excited to
action, moved to self-help, impelled to seek for knowledge, by having heard
that such men actually exist and are human beings. Without stopping to ask
if the proof of their living in Europe is complete, men have sought to
follow their example. 

Shall we not take advantage of the same law of the human mind and let the
vast power of the Lodge work with our assistance and not against our
opposition or doubt or fear? Those who are devoted know how they have had
unseen help which showed itself in results. Those who fear may take courage,
for they will find that not all their fellow beings are devoid of an
underlying belief in the possibilities outlined by the doctrine of the
existence of the Adepts.

And if we look over the work of the Society we find wherever the members
boldly avow their belief and are not afraid to speak of this high ideal, the
interest in theosophy is awake, the work goes on, the people are benefited.
To the contrary, where there are constant doubt, ceaseless asking for
material proof, incessant fear of what the world or science or friends will
think, there the work is dead, the field is not cultivated, and the town or
city receives no benefit from the efforts of those who while formally in a
universal brotherhood are not living out the great ideal.

Very wisely and as an occultist, Jesus said his followers must give up all
and follow him. We must give up the desire to save ourselves and acquire the
opposite one, -- the wish to save others. Let us remember the story in
ancient writ of Arjuna, who, entering heaven and finding that his dog was
not admitted and some of his friends in hell, refused to remain and said
that while one creature was out of heaven he would not enter it. 

This is true devotion, and this joined to an intelligent declaration of
belief in the great initiation of the human race will lead to results of
magnitude, will call out the forces that are behind, will prevail against
hell itself and all the minions of hell now striving to retard the progress
of the human soul.

The Path, March 1893 

(Eusebio Urban) W. Q. JUDGE

------------------------------------------------------
 
 
WHAT THE MASTERS HAVE SAID

In 1888, speaking of Col. Olcott, an article in this magazine quoted from
letters from the Adepts sent to Mr. Sinnett at a time some objections were
made to the work of the Society on the ground that enough attention was not
paid to men of science and to science itself. Since the year in which those
letters were written many persons have joined the Theosophical Society and
its sphere of work has greatly extended. 

And now no less than then, the workers have begun to pay too much attention
to the intellectual side of Theosophy and too little to that phase on which
the Masters who are behind insist and which is called by H.P.B. in The Voice
of the Silence the "heart doctrine." Others also have said that they do not
want any of the heart doctrine, but wish us to be highly respectable and
scientific. Let us consult the Masters, those of us who believe in them.

When the letters to the Simla Lodge were written it was said by objecting
Theosophists that it was time now to take a different tack and to work for
men of science, and there was a slight suspicion of a repulsion between the
Hindus, who are black, and the Europeans, as well as an openly expressed
condemnation of the methods of Col. Olcott and H. P. Blavatsky. 

The reply from the Adepts, made after consultation with others very much
higher still, runs in part:

"No messenger of truth, no prophet, has ever achieved during his lifetime a
complete triumph - not even Buddha. The Theosophical Society was chosen as
the corner-stone, the foundation of the future religion of humanity. To
achieve the proposed object a greater, wider, and especially a more
benevolent intermingling of the high and the low, of the alpha and omega of
society was determined on."

Who determined this? The Adepts and those who are yet still behind them,
that is to say, for the Theosophist, the Dhyan Chohans who have control of
such matters. 

Why was it decided? 

Because the world is sunk in sorrow and in selfishness which keeps the one
side of society from helping the other. The letter goes on:

"The white race must be the first to stretch out the hand of fellowship to
the dark nations. This prospect may not smile to all alike. He is no
Theosophist who objects to the principle... and it is we, the humble
disciples of the perfect Lamas, who are expected to allow the Theosophical
Society to drop its noblest title, The Brotherhood of Humanity, to become a
simple school of philosophy. Let us understand each other. He who does not
feel competent enough to grasp the noble idea sufficiently to work for it
need not undertake a task too heavy for him."

The depth of the sarcasm here cannot be measured, and at the same time it is
almost impossible to fully understand the opportunity pointed out in those
words and the loss of progress one may suffer by not heeding them. They
apply to all, and not merely to the persons they were written to, for the
Masters always say what applies universally. The letter continues:

"But there is hardly a Theosophist in the whole Society unable to
effectually help it by correcting the erroneous impression of outsiders, if
not by actually himself propagating this idea."

Later on, near the time when H.P.B. was in Germany, others came and asked
what they might do, how they might work, and what "sphere of influence" they
might find. The Master known as K. H. then wrote a letter to one, and at the
same time sent copies with fuller notes on the communication to others. A
part of that letter has lately been published in the German magazine, the
Sphinx. In it the Master said among other things:

"Spheres of influence can be found everywhere. The first object of the
Theosophical Society is philanthropy. The true Theosophist is a
philanthropist, who "Not for himself but for the world he lives." This, and
philosophy, the right comprehension of life and its mysteries, will give the
"necessary basis" and show the right path to pursue. Yet the best "sphere of
influence" for the applicant is now in [his own land]."

The reference to a basis and a sphere of influence is to the idea of those
who held that a scientific or at least a very long preparation to get a
basis and a sphere for work was needed first. But the answer shows the Adept
as not agreeing, and as pointing out the way to work along the line of the
heart doctrine. And some of the fuller notes annexed to the copy of this
letter sent at the same time to others read:

"My reference to "philanthropy" was meant in its broadest sense, and to draw
attention to the absolute need of the "doctrine of the heart" as opposed to
that which is merely "of the eye." And before, I have written that our
society is not a mere intellectual school for occultism, and those greater
than we have said that he who thinks the task of working for others too hard
had better not undertake it. The moral and spiritual sufferings of the world
are more important and need help and cure more than science needs aid from
us in any field of discovery. "He that hath ears to hear, let him hear." -
K.H.

After seventeen years of work it is now time that the whole Society should
pay a little more attention to the words of those Masters of wisdom who have
thus indicated the road, and these are the "original lines" traced out and
meant to be followed. All those who do not follow them are those who feel
dissatisfied with our work, and those who try to go upon these lines are
those who feel and know that help is always given to the sincere Theosophist
who ever tries not only to understand the philosophy but also to make it
forceful for the proving and the exemplifying of the doctrine and object of
Universal Brotherhood.

ONE OF THE RECIPIENTS	Path, February, 1893

 
 




Dallas
 

-----Original Message-----
From: cassilva4
Sent: Sunday, October 31, 2004 8:52 PM
To: 
Subject: How do the masters relate to these higher heirarchies


In response to this question, I would like to begin with the following
extract.

All that the Mahatma may do is natural to the perfected man; but if those
powers are not at once revealed to us it is because the race is as yet
selfish altogether and still living for the present and the transitory. 
Though the true doctrine disappears for a time from among men it is bound
to reappear, because first, it is impacted in the imperishable center of
man's nature; and secondly, the Lodge forever preserves it, not only in
actual objective records, but also in the intelligent and fully
self-conscious men who, having successfully over-passed the many periods
of evolution which preceded the one we are now involved in, cannot lose
the precious possessions they have acquired. And because the elder
brothers are the highest product of evolution through whom alone, in
cooperation with the whole human family, the further regular and
workmanlike prosecution of the plans of the "Great Architect of the
Universe" could be carried on, it is well to advert to them and their
Universal Lodge before going to other parts of the subject.


Arne't we all rungs on a ladder? or a divine spiral if you like. I see
the Masters as the radio receivers of higher knowledge, but they too are
continually evolving, perhaps not in the material world anymore, but in
the universal( for want of a better word) Where does it end? Will anyone
truly know the unmanifest God? I like to think that the masters work as
intermediary's between our world and vast worlds unknown to us and that
even they are limited, they cannot pass beyond the point of their own
knowledge. How does the Boddisatva communicate to the world? Through the
masters? what method is used, through a blessing? A direct transference
of knowledge (we know this is possible through hypnosis?. I don't know.

According to what we know, the masters work with those souls that are able
to change the course of mankind, and we learned through HPB that the world
was ready for a re-impetus of spiritual knowledge, because we were going
off track and losing the inner, by developing a philosophy of psychism and
outdated religions that miscued the truth, a religious belief based on a
fragment of the truth and not the whole, and everyone knows that a little
knowledge is a dangerous thing. Instead of working to be good at being a
man, we would be working on good at being good in this lifetime- and the
payoff - an eternity of bliss. Theosophy reintroduced the inner core of
all past beliefs of man, the inner has always been there but upto this
point most men didnt have the intelligence to grasp many of the concepts
and therefore the need for parabels, analogy and myths for the sheep- an
exoteric meaning which kept man good "reasonably good" while living his
one life, and an esoteric meaning for the shepherd, a belief in
reincarnation and immortality. Everyone got something out of it. Anyway,
what does everyone else think?

Cass