Theos-Talk Archives (February 2005 Message tt00632)

--- In theos-talk@yahoogroups.com, Vladimir <forums@s...> wrote:
> 
> Dear Paul,
Dear Vladimir,

This will have to be my last post for a while as I am getting behind schedule on a current project. Online discussions are a real drain on time and energy, especially when they concern highly charged subjects. If all goes according to plan by the end of March I should be free to indulge myself. (Am facing 400+ pages of documents and 125 pages of text, and trying to get started turning this into a book-- intro done but chapter one is behind schedule.)
> 
> Sunday, February 20, 2005, 5:41:06 PM, kpauljohnson wrote:
> 
> > First, a suggestion: if you are addressing a particular listmember it
> > might be best to copy it to that person.
> 
> Sorry, I don't get your point. What do you mean by "copy it to that
> person"?

I mean that some subscribers get the digest, and others just go to the website. I alternate between the two. If a message is addressed to an individual who is not reading all messages, you can either use cc in your email program and put their address in the box, or you can put (to Paul) or whatever in the header. In both of your posts addressed to me there was nothing in the header indicating that. The second time I guessed you were following up to me, but the first time it was pure chance that I read it. Don't have time to read all or even most posts.

May I see an example? And is your name or nickname in the
> "To" field not enough to discern what concerns you?

That is OK too.

> > "Assert" somehow seems too aggressive but is not as bad as the 
> > term "claim" that really hostile Theosophists use as the verb. The 
> > truth from my POV is that I *conclude* from evidence that is 
> > presented with an invitation to others to draw *their own 
> > conclusions.*
> 
> Apparently their conclusions differ significantly from yours, that's
> why your statements are not much welcome by them.

There have been no alternative conclusions presented AFAIK by anyone else on the body of evidence presented in my books. That is, no one has examined HPB's relationships with this 32 individuals (or any of them individually with one exception) and given any alternative explanation. Those who have attacked the books haven't concluded anything about those individuals and their significance in HPB's life. They had prior conclusions about her and have ignored any evidence that would challenge those conclusions. (The one exception is that a recent book on the Tarot disagrees with my suggestion that Max Theon was a pupil of Paolos Metamon.)

The judgment of one's peers must ultimately be the standard of appraising the success or failure of a scholarly book. In the case of my three SUNY books, those "peers" are authors of books on history or biography based on original research and published by scholarly publishers. I could not ask for better reception in that quarter. Anyone writing about religious history runs a risk of offending religious fanatics and evoking an aggressive and dogmatic reaction from them. The same is true of organizational leaders who perceive the scholarship as threatening to the interests of their organizations. I suggest when weighing any scholarly books that have angered religious leaders or fanatics, you take into account the judgment of other disinterested scholars rather than take at face value the criticisms of believers. 
> 
> 
> > But your questions wasn't about lying about them only, it was about
> > lying about *their nature.*
> 
> The word "nature" bears quite a broad sense, AFAIK. I meant their
> various characteristics (including names, ranks, ages, etc.) versus
> the very fact of their existence.
> 
Here's a quote from 1889 that should give some context on HPB's earlier stories about her travels and contacts: "to even my best friends I have never given but fragmentary and superficial accounts of my travels, nor do I propose to gratify anyone's curiosity, least of all that of my enemies." This does not imply lying but it certainly implies concealing the truth. As for the motivation being protecting the privacy of her Masters, here is a quote from a letter from Morya to Sinnett, pp. 271-2 of the MLs: "There is more to this movement than you have yet had an inkling of, and the work of the T.S. is linked with similar work that is secretly going on in all parts of the world...know you anything of the *whole* brotherhood and its ramifications? The Old Woman is accused of *untruthfulness, inaccuracy* in her statements. 'Ask no questions and you will receive *no lies*. *She is forbidden* to say what she knows. You may cut her to pieces, and she will not tell. Nay-- she is ordered *in cases of need to mislead people.* (* indicate italics in printed source.)

> 
> > Yes, she lied about their names and other details
> 
> This is a strong assertion (if not a claim) and I would like to see
> some evidence. Sorry, I'm too lazy to dig through your voluminous
> books

They're not at all voluminous and the only one that concerns this subject is The Masters Revealed. 

in search of such, especially if they are offline. :-) Could you
> please drop here a precise quotation showing how she lied? I suppose
> by the word "lie" you mean that she stated one thing about them while
> in reality it was another thing.
> 
Sorry, you ask too much out of context. I can show her lying, e.g. "In Milwaukee and Nevada all the ladies were all the time walking near our windows" in a letter to her aunt. HPB claimed she and Olcott went to those places with "Krishnavarma" but that simply is not true. But in the book what I show is that there are two conflicting stories about M. and K.H. being in North Indian and in Tibet, and when you examine the evidence about her known and probable contacts in these places it becomes clear that a disinformation campaign is underway. I can also point out that she lied, repeatedly, about Morya, simply by showing that she told four mutually incompatible stories about him. 

1. In Caves and Jungles she calls him Gulab-Singh (but writes to Prince D-K that this is Morya) and says he is a prince living in central India whom she met in London but had no further contact with for 20 years until getting a letter from him in New York.
2. But she told Sinnett and others that he was a Buddhist living in Tibet where she had studied with him for a period of several years.
3. She told Prince Dondukov-Korsakov that her first contact after their London meeting was a letter she got in Odessa directing her to go to India. She said that she never once saw him although he directed her itinerary by mail for more than two years until they finally met in Yokahama, Japan-- where he had summoned her from New York. (HPB did not go to Japan from New York, and there is no evidence she was there at any other time.)
4. But she wrote to her aunt that he was a Nepalese Buddhist living in Ceylon with whom she had renewed acquaintance via a letter he wrote to her in New York.

There are thus three different versions of Morya conflicting with the "standard" version told to Sinnett. Theosophists can dismiss the C&J version as fictionalization (here they will admit that's what she was doing because Olcott makes it so clear). But why three other conflicting versions? Look to those earlier quotes I gave for a clue as to motive and method here. 

> 
> > If "of course not" isn't a simple, final no I don't know what is. NO.
> > I am not now trying to prove anything.
> 
> Okay, okay. Summing up all the above it seems to me that you simply
> assert without bothering to prove.
> 
I have nothing to prove to you or anyone here. My books on HPB are 10 and 11 years old and have gotten tremendous respect in the scholarly world. Even most Theosophical reviews were favorable. Note that I never claim to present conclusive proof but only a most-likely interpretation of evidence. 
> 
> > Many or most of the characteristics attributed to various Masters in
> > HPB's writings can be traced to real individuals she knew and was 
> > influenced by, but that being sworn to conceal their identities she 
> > threw in enough blinds to protect their privacy. 
> 
> Your critics, as far as I understand them, assert that this hypothesis
> of yours is baseless. 

No, they have concerned themselves only and endlessly with M. and K.H. and ignored the other 30 characters. No one has asserted that the overall hypothesis is baseless AFAIK.

But certainly you can hypothesize whatever you
> deem fit, although "can be" does not equal "is" and can hardly support
> any assertion.

"Can be" meaning "have been" in the books.
> 
> 
> Vladimir