Theos-Talk Archives (February 2005 Message tt00561)

Dear Vladimir,

Since you show some interest in the subject
about the Masters and Johnson's intepretatins,
let me try to show you some simple comparisons.

Look at the chart on the following webpage:

http://blavatskyarchives.com/masterschart.htm

See the Ooton Liatto case given by Olcott at:

http://blavatskyarchives.com/chart4stepootonliattobm.htm

What is Paul Johnson's interpretation of this case??

His previous words can be found at:

http://blavatskyarchives.com/johnsonooton.htm

Now here I agree with him.

Now let us look at another case also given by
Olcott which is at:

http://blavatskyarchives.com/chart4stepmorya79bm.htm

You might think that Johnson would also agree that
Olcott possibly met a real physical man who was an adept.

But here Olcott tells us that this was the Master Morya
coming to Bombay T.S. Headquarters on horseback.

In light of Johnson's "theory" which he summarizes
near the beginning of his book THE MASTERS REVEALED as
follows:

"Thakar Singh Sandhanwalia, founding president of the Amritsar Singh
Sabha, corresponds in intriguing ways to clues about Koot Hoomi's
identity in the writings of Olcott and HPB....

"Maharaja Ranbir Singh of Kashmir has many correspondences to Morya
as described by HPB....

"Although much of HPB's portrayal of Morya and Koot Hoomi was
designed to mislead in order to protect their privacy, enough
accurate information was included to make a PERSUASIVE CASE for
their identities as these historical figures...."

I say in light of the above, is the person on horseback
at T.S. Headquarters Maharaja Ranbir Singh??

I asked Johnson that one time and he wrote:

"I don't regard it as impossible, but implausible. [I] could not 
find evidence as to Ranbir's whereabouts at the time, but at any 
rate he was unlikely to travel alone."

And I said in reply:

Yes, I agree with Johnson that the monarch of a kingdom would 
probably not travel alone but in fact would travel with his guards, 
servants, etc. If Ranbir Singh traveled all the way from Kashmir to 
Bombay, his visit should be documented in historical records such as 
the various Indian newspapers, etc. So a perceptive reader might 
ask: Is something wrong here? Is Johnson's hypothesis (about Ranbir 
Singh/Morya) untrue? Or is something wrong with Colonel Olcott's 
testimony?

If Master Morya was physically in Bombay on that date
while the Maharajah Ranbir Singh was physically in Kashmir on the
same date, then that would show that Johnson's hypothesis is not
true.

Johnson has repeatedly tried to discount this testimony as given
by Olcott concerning Morya in Bombay in 1879.

He wrote:

"If you want to use it as weight against another identification 
[like Johnson's own Ranbir Singh identification??]....fine. But it 
lacks much weight when there is no confirmation of the account...."

And then Johnson even wrote to me apparently in an attempt to
discount even more the 1879 incident:

"You...assume the accuracy of accounts [of meetings with the 
Masters] by the Founders [Olcott and H.P.B.] even when there is no 
evidence to confirm them. This will only fly with a Theosophical 
audience."

But as I pointed out at the time in the Ooton Liatto account there 
is no more evidence to confirm that account than the 1879 account yet
Johnson in his book had written about the Ooton Liatto account as 
follows:

"The names Ooton Liatto and Hilarion Smerdis have been equally 
impossible to find in biographical and historical reference books. 
While both may be pseudonyms, there is little doubt that two real 
adepts visited Olcott in New York." 

Using the same critiria, one could say something very similar about 
the 1879 account in Bombay involving the Master Morya.

Yet since this 1879 case if taken at face value seriously undermines 
Johnson's speculation about Ranbir Singh/Morya, Johnson has 
continued over the years to pooh-pooh a similar intepretation of the 
1879 account and other related accounts.

See the "reasons" Johnson later came up with to devalue and/or
discount these cases at:

http://blavatskyarchives.com/johnsonparanormal3.htm

And my analysis of his reasons clearly show that they have little if 
any support from a careful study of the relevant cases and evidence.

This is why I concluded one of my studies with the following:

===================================================
I am convinced that A. P. Sinnett's assessment of Richard 
Hodgson's "method" of handling the evidence about H.P.B. and the 
Masters also applies to Johnson's own "modus operandi" in 
researching the same subject:

". . .he merely staggers about among the facts, ignoring one [fact] 
while he is framing a hypothesis [A], incompatible with it, to 
explain another [fact], and then attempting to get over the first 
fact by suggesting alternative hypothesis [B] incompatible with the 
second [fact]. The multiplication of theories on this principle ad 
nauseam is not legitimate argument. . . ." (A.P. Sinnett, 
The "Occult World Phenomena" And The Society For Psychical Research, 
1886, pp. 32-33.) 

All in all, Johnson's "identifications" of the two Masters
don't 
withstand a critical analysis of the sum total of evidence and 
testimony concerning the adepts involved. I believe that anyone who 
carefully studies the evidence and seriously thinks thorough the 
issues involved will reasonably conclude that Johnson's so-
called "persuasive case" about the Masters M. and K.H. is nothing 
but a "house of cards." Even as "suggestions", Johnson's
conjectures 
on these two Masters are highly implausible and dubious when 
carefully scrutinized in light of all the known facts.
===========================================================

For more background on the above, see:

http://blavatskyarchives.com/johnson.htm

Daniel
http://hpb.cc