Theos-Talk Archives (January 2005 Message tt01007)

--- In theos-talk@yahoogroups.com, "Daniel H. Caldwell"
<danielhcaldwell@y...> wrote:


> I have collated BELOW several statements from some
> of your recent postings on Leadbeater.
> 
> If what you say is correct then I think there is
> at least one VITAL difference or distinction between what
> Blavatsky claimed she was doing and what 
> Leadbeater claimed he was doing.
> 
> First the quotes from your previous postings and following
> those are several quotes from HPB and her Teachers:
> 
> 
> PEDRO'S STATEMENTS
> 
> 
> ++++++++++++++++++++++
> 
> He claimed he was a clairvoyant but I have never found a claim of his
> that he was an Adept. But then, I haven't read everything he wrote.
> 
> ++++++++++++++++++++++
> 
> As I already said, he took responsibility for what he wrote. I also
> never found any claim by him that the Masters had validated, certified
> and authenticated what he wrote. But then again, one's time for
> reading is limited.
> 
> I think he was left to his own counsel. See what K.H. wrote to him:
> 
> TAKE courage. I am pleased with you. Keep your own counsel, and
> believe in your better intuitions. The little man has failed and will
> reap his reward. Silence meanwhile.
> ++++++++++++++++++++++++
> 
> I have posted two quotes recently - one from the Introduction to THE
> ASTRAL PLANE and the other from MAN: WHENCE, HOW AND WHITHER - showing
> that both AB and CWL took responsibility for their books and publicly
> took the weaknesses and errors in them upon themselves, having stated
> that "there is no certainty that the idea presented before the
> hearer's mind will be an adequate representation of the truth."
> 
> Would they have written that if their books had been certified,
> validated or authenticated by the Masters?
> 
> ++++++++++++++++++++++++
> 
> I have read it and I can't find any indication that he claimed that
> the book THE ASTRAL PLANE, or for that matter, any of his books, was
> certified, validated or authenticated by a Master! The books were
> written under his name and were the results of his own investigations.
> Regarding the subject of training on the astral plane, he is basically
> offering an opinion. I have said many times here on this list that
> Leadbeater did not expect people to believe his clairvoyant 
> descriptions.
> 
> ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
> 
> Why should he do this [that is, point out to his readers and 
> followers how his teachings clashed with those of the Adept teachers 
> of Blavatsky]? 
> 
> He was presenting the results of his own studies. And
> 
> "The fact is, that to the last and supreme initiation every chela -
> (and even some adepts) - is left to his own device and counsel." (ML
> 92, chronological)
> ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
> 
> 
> 
> STATEMENTS FROM HPB AND THE MAHATMAS
> 
> The sole advantage which the writer has over her predecessors, is 
> that she need not resort to personal speculations and theories. For 
> this work is a partial statement of what she herself has been taught 
> by more advanced students, supplemented, in a few details only, by 
> the results of her own study and observation. HPB
> ------------------------------------
> 
> When the present work was commenced, the writer, feeling sure that 
> the speculation about Mars and Mercury was a mistake, applied to the 
> Teachers by letter for explanation and an authoritative version. Both 
> came in due time, and verbatim extracts from these are now 
> given....Again, here are more extracts from another letter written by 
> the same authority. This time it is in answer to some objections laid 
> before the Teachers. HPB
> 
> -------------------------------------
> 
> I have also noted, your thoughts about the "Secret Doctrine". Be 
> assured that what she has not annotated from scientific and other 
> works, we have given or suggested to her. Every mistake or erroneous 
> notion, corrected and explained by her from the works of other 
> theosophists was corrected by me, or under my instruction. It is a 
> more valuable work than its predecessor [Isis], an epitome of occult 
> truths that will make it a source of information and instruction for 
> the earnest student for long years to come. -- Master K.H.
> 
> ----------------------------------------
> 
> ...The Secret Dcotrine when ready, will be the triple production
> of M, Upasika and the Doctor's most humble servant. K.H.
> 
> ------------------------------------------------------
> 
> ...portions of the Secret Doctrine have been copied by the pen
> of Upasika into its pages, though without quotation marks,
> from my own manusript.... K.H.
> 
> ---------------------------------------------------------
> 
> ". . . we employ agents — the best available. Of these for the
> past 
> thirty years the chief has been the personality known as H.P.B. to 
> the world (but otherwise to us). Imperfect and very troublesome, no 
> doubt, she proves to some, nevertheless, there is no likelihood of 
> our finding a better one for years to come — and your
> theosophists 
> should be made to understand it. Since 1885 I have not written, nor 
> caused to be written save thro' her agency, direct and remote, a 
> letter or line to anybody in Europe or America, nor communicated 
> orally with, or thro' any third party. Theosophists should learn
> it. 
> You will understand later the significance of this declaration so 
> keep it in mind. Her fidelity to our work being constant, and her 
> sufferings having come upon her thro' it, neither I nor either of
> my 
> Brother associates will desert or supplant her. . . . This you must 
> tell to all: — With occult matters she has everything to do. . .
> . 
> She is our direct agent. . . . " KH
> ----------------------------------------------------------
> 
> . . . every word of [esoteric] information found in this work [Isis 
> Unveiled] or in my later writings, comes from the teachings of our 
> Eastern Masters; and . . . many a passage in these works has been 
> written by me under their dictation. HPB.
> 
> -----------------------------------------------------------
> 
> 
> These statements by HPB and KH indicate that HPB's "mission" was 
> to present the esoteric teachings of the Adepts. And the Masters
> worked closely with her in this endeavor. Notice that in the Mars-
> Mercury issue, HPB did NOT try to use her clairvoyance to ascertain 
> if Mars and Mercury were part of the Earth chain. She asked the 
> Adepts. She was in effect a "transmitter".
> 
> I don't get the impression that she was trying to clairvoyantly 
> investigate nature herself. She was simply unveiling "The Secret 
> Doctrine" ALREADY in the custody of the Adepts:
> 
> "The Secret Doctrine is the accumulated Wisdom of the Ages....The 
> facts have actually occupied countless generations of initiated seers 
> and prophets to marshal, to set down and explain. The flashing gaze 
> of those seers has penetrated into the very kernel of matter, and 
> recorded the soul of things there....No vision of one adept was 
> accepted till it was checked and confirmed by the visions --- so 
> obtained as to stand as independent evidence --- of other adepts, and 
> by centuries of experiences." 
> 
> What you write about Leadbeater appears to be a totally different
> kind of claim.


Daniel:

Thank you for your post. It is a bit eerie, to say the list, to have
one's statements compared with statements by HPB and the Mahatmas!
After all, I was just offering an opinion in answer to your own
questions about Leadbeater's writings.

You have clearly shown that HPB's writings - the original teachings of
Modern Theosophy - were CERTIFIED, VALIDATED AND AUTHENTICATED by the
Masters, and that she was their DIRECT AGENT. I certainly have no
problem with that. But an important question to me is: should every
writer on Theosophy after her resign himself or herself to REPEAT HER
WORDS or her Masters' words? Should they abstain to undertake their
own investigations, even when they fail or make mistakes?

This is what Annie Besant wrote in 1913. Remember: the Order of the
Star was still in existence then, with Krishnamurti as its Head:

"In fact, differences of opinion among the members ought to be
regarded as safeguards to the Society rather than as menaces, for our
one greater danger, as HPB recognised, is the danger of getting into a
groove, and so becoming fossilised in the forms of belief that many of
us hold today; this will make it difficult for people in the future to
shake off these forms, and thus will involve posterity in the same
troubles which so many of us have experienced with regard to the
teachings among which we were born. The Society is intended, always
has been intended, to be a living body and not a fossil, and a living
body grows and develops, adapting itself to new conditions; and if it
be a body which is spiritually alive, it should be gaining continually
a deeper and fuller view of truth. It is absurd for us to pretend, at
our present stage of evolution, that we have arrived at the limit of
the knowledge which it is possible for men to obtain. It is absurd
for us to say that the particular form into which we throw our beliefs
at this moment is the form which is to continue for ever after us, and
to be accepted by those who follow us in time. All of us who study
deeply must be fully aware that our conceptions of truth are
continually deepening and widening, that, as we might reasonably
expect, we find new avenues opening up before us; and nothing could be
more fatal to a Society like ours than to hallmark as true special
forms of belief, and then look askance at anyone challenging them,
trying to impose these upon those who will come after us. If the
Society is to live far into the future, as I believe it will, then we
must be prepared to recognise now, quite frankly and freely, that our
knowledge is fragmentary, that it is partial, that it is liable to
very great modifications as we learn more and understand better; and
especially is this true of everything which goes under the name of
investigation." 

(Investigations into the Superphysical, Adyar Pamphlets No. 36,
Theosophical Publishing House, Adyar, Madras, 1913)

In the Bowen Notes, 

(http://www.katinkahesselink.net/metaphys/th-bowen.htm)

HPB remarks:


"If one imagines that one is going to get a satisfactory picture of
the constitution of the Universe from the S.D. one will get only
confusion from its study. It is not meant to give any such final
verdict on existence, but to LEAD TOWARDS THE TRUTH. She repeated this
latter expression many times.

It is worse than useless going to those whom we imagine to be advanced
students (she said) and asking them to give us an "interpretation" of
the S.D. They cannot do it. If they try, all they give are cut and
dried exoteric renderings which do not remotely resemble the Truth. To
accept such interpretation means anchoring ourselves to fixed ideas,
whereas Truth lies beyond any ideas we can formulate or express.
Exoteric interpretations are all very well, and she does not condemn
them so long as they are taken as pointers for beginners, and are not
accepted by them as anything more. Many persons who are in, or who
will in the future be in the T.S. are of course potentially incapable
of any advance beyond the range of a common exoteric conception. But
there are, and will be others, and for them she sets out the following
and true way of approach to the S.D.

Come to the S.D. (she says) without any hope of getting the final
Truth of existence from it, or with any idea other than seeing how far
it may lead TOWARDS the Truth. See in study a means of exercising and
developing the mind never touched by other studies."

Later on, she comments on the approach to the study of the SD:

"This mode of thinking (she says) is what the Indians call Jnana Yoga.
As one progresses in Jnana Yoga one finds conceptions arising which
though one is conscious of them, one cannot express nor yet formulate
into any sort of mental picture. As time goes on these conceptions
will form into mental pictures. This is a time to be on guard and
refuse to be deluded with the idea that the new found and wonderful
picture must represent reality. It does not. As one works on one finds
the once admired picture growing dull and unsatisfying, and finally
fading out or being thrown away. This is another danger point, because
for the moment one is left in a void without any conception to support
one, and one may be tempted to revive the cast-off picture for want of
a better to cling to. The true student will, however, work on
unconcerned, and presently further formless gleams come, which again
in time give rise to a larger and more beautiful picture than the
last. But the learner will now know that no picture will ever
represent the Truth. This last splendid picture will grow dull and
fade like the others. And so the process goes on, until at last the
mind and its pictures are transcended and the learner enters and
dwells in the World of NO FORM, but of which all forms are narrowed
reflections."

Note her statement: "But the learner will now know that no picture
will ever represent the Truth." 

And please also note Leadbeater's statement at the end of the
Introduction to THE ASTRAL PLANE:

"there is no certainty that the idea presented before the
hearer's mind will be an adequate representation of the truth."

And to conclude a too long a post, a quote of Leadbeater on HPB:

"It is not the method of great spiritual teachers to make everything
easy for us. I first came into touch with occultism through Madame
Blavatsky. She gave occasional crumbs of knowledge to her people, but
she constantly applied rigorous tests to them. It was a drastic
method, but those who really meant business remained with her, while
others very soon abandoned her. She cured us of conventionality, but
there was much searching of hearts among her followers in the process.
Many people said she did things which a great spiritual teacher ought
not to do. My own feeling was always this: "Madame Blavatsky has this
occult knowledge, and I am going to get that knowledge from her, if
she will give it to me. Whatever else she does is her affair. I am not
here to criticize her; to her own Master she stands or falls, and not
to me. She may have her own reasons for what she does; I do not know
anything about that. She has this knowledge, she speaks of these
Masters. I intend to get this knowledge; I intend, if it is humanly
possible, to reach the feet of those Masters." I gave up everything
else to follow her lead, and I have never regretted the confidence I
placed in Madame Blavatsky. If one is critical by nature it is his
karma; he will learn much more slowly than the man who is prepared to
accept things reasonably." (TALKS ON THE PATH OF OCCULTISM, vol. 1, p.
247, TPH Adyar, 1930)

Is it any wonder then that she wrote on the copy of THE KEY TO
THEOSOPHY which she presented to him in 1891 (see The Theosophist,
February 1927, for a reproduction of the facsimile of her handwriting):


"To my old and well-beloved friend
Charles Leadbeater.
from his fraternally
H. P. Blavatsky."



Pedro



Pedro