Theos-Talk Archives (February 2005 Message tt00780)

Mrs. Besant's latest assertions and claims examined


"Believe not what you have heard said; believe not in traditions 
merely because they have been transmitted through many generations; 
believe not merely because a thing is repeated by many persons;... 
believe not conjctures... believe not solely upon authority of you 
Masters and elders. When upon observation and analysis a principle 
conforms to reason and leads to the benefit and welfare of all, 
accept it and hold it". (Buddha, Anguitura Nikaya)

We have seen that upon `observation and analysis' the `unfailing' 
wisdom of Mrs. Besant is no more than a massa of inconsistences, 
injustices, sectarian tatics in administration, error and 
mystification in esoteric announcements. Far from leading to `the 
benefit and welfare of all', this `unfailing' wisdom is leading to 
the most miserable slavery of souls, the emasculation of minds... And 
at the present time we are all feeling that we shall not be living up 
to the wise exhortations of the grat Being who was the Buddha, unless 
we clearly denounce the lamentable aberrations of these two (Besant 
and Leadbeater) in the hope of drawing all the souls we possibly can 
away from their pernicious influence. With this end in view, and 
faithful to this duty, we shall camly and firmly continue our 
investigation of facts.

I practically lost all faith in Mrs. Besant when she dissimulated and 
tried to mislead the Inner Goup Council on her return from her visit 
to India in 1894, She ten informed us that she had been "Ordered by 
the Master to acuse Judge". On being closely croo-examined, however, 
she finally admited that she had not recieved any `order'...

Note – COUNTES WACHTMEISTER, who was a good friend to me, WAS SADLY 
DISILLUSIONED, AND DIED BITTERLY BEWAILING THE RUIN OF THE T.S.

Besant's life may be summed up in some words she applied recently to 
Mr. Gandhi. It is "the tragedy of a soul". Her criticisms on what she 
calls his "failure" apply fully and literally to her own.

"The grave charges against Mr. Leadbeater were supported by 
documentary evidence which has never been rebutted, and they have to 
do with something far worse than personal moral laxity, as we have 
seen. Mrs. Besant knows she cannot meet these charges, and so seeks 
to brush them aside by voluble talk about "hatred", "defamation" 
and "vilification". The only justification she offers for having 
reinstated him in 1907 is that she had discovered that it was 
a "cruel lie that he had confessed to wrongdoing"!... Did Mrs. Besant 
follow this procedure in her "Case agains W.Q.Judge"? Not at all; far 
from "acquitting" him when he refused to "confess to wrongdoing" and 
asked for porduction of the incriminating documents, she calmly 
confessed that she had destroyed them!!!

Mrs. Besant is becoming seriously discomposed, even alarmed, by the 
growing strength of the "Back to Blavatsky" movement, which is in 
itself a reaction against her own neglet.

Has Mrs. Besant frgotten that when, only ywo years after H.P.B's 
death, she came under the direct hypnotic influence of a Brahmin, and 
she threw doubts upon her old Teacher's bona fides and her occult 
knowledge; and, in the course of formulating her charges against her 
fellow dsciple (a chela of many years standing before she ever even 
heard of Theosophy) suggested to Mr. Judge that, "misled by a high 
example", he had fallen " a victim".

... in 1919 Mrs. Besant published a small volume of the Master's 
Letters (most of which hadpresumably been lying in the archieves of 
the Society at Adyar for nearly forty years!), obviously for no other 
reason than because among them are to alleged to have been received 
by Mr. Leadbeater. This she did in order to bolster up extravagant 
claims she now makes for him as a `Great Teacher". But there were 
many who received Letters in the early days, and there is no reason 
why similar claims should not be mado for all the recipients!

In the Article entitles "Whom will ye Serve?" Mrs. Besant says that 
H.P.B "formed an inner circle of her pupils, that it might bear 
witness to te truth and reality of the inner side of life." This was 
the "Inner Group" of which she and I were two of the six women 
members. But as, unfortunatelly Mr. Leadbeater was not included, 
altough he had become a member of the T.S some years before, she 
adds: - "And behold! Ere she passed away, she had lead others to the 
Light, and bade them bear witness to it.." Considering that we, of 
the Inner Group, were constantly with her and have never heard of 
these "others", this statement is manifestly untrue. Mrs. Besant also 
refers to Mr. Leadbeater as "one of H.P.B's nearest and most trusted 
pupils" [absolutely untrue – A.L.C]. I challenge Mrs. Besant to 
produce anything in writing by H.P,B to warrant this audacious 
assertion. I was a pupil of H.P.B (and through her was accepted as "a 
chela on probation" in 1889) before Mrs. Besant joined the T.S., and 
saw H.PB expel one of her most gifted and valued workers from the 
Esoteric Section for offences agains the occult and moral law similar 
to those with which Mr. Leadbeater's name has now been associated 
fore nearly twenty years. H.P.B was always extremely strict on this 
particular point.
I joined the T.S in 1885, my diploma was signed by Colonel Olcott as 
President and C.W.Leadbeater as secretary (he was at Adyar), BUT I 
NEVER HEARD HIM EVEN MENTIONED BY H.P.B OR ANYONE ELSE AT THE LONDON 
HEADQUARTERS, AS A PERSON OF ANY IMPORTANCE WHATEVER, in the occult 
sense... Mr. Leadbeater WAS NOT EVEN ON OF H.P.B's PUPILS. HOW COULD 
THESE TWO (Besant and Leadbeater), TO THE EXCLUSION of ALL H.P.B 
PUPILS – some of them accepted chelas on probation – be specially 
selected, taught, and prepared, and above all, to promulgate the sort 
of "teachings" of which I have given a few speciments, without any of 
us hearing even a hint of it! Moreover, I never saw, or even heard of 
Mr. Leadbeater at the London Headquarters while H.P.B was alive. I 
might just as well claim such mission for myself, or Mr. Mead, or Dr. 
Keightley, or any other member of the Inner Group who has remained 
true to the pledge and the Teacher, and with greater justice, for 
Mrs. Besant has not. The truth is that Mr. Leadbeater was never heard 
of in connection with any occult teaching until he was taken up by 
Mrs. Besant.


<< NOT ONE MEMBER OF THE INNER GROUP SATYED WITH Mrs. BESANT.
- AS A MEMBER OF THE INNER GROUP SHE IS EQUAL TO THEM. AND WHAT THEY 
PROFESS AND THEIR OPINION IS AS RELEVANT AS HER (Besant) OWN.
We have Mrs. Cleather, Mr. Mead, the Countess of Wachtmeister, Mrs. 
Isabel Cooper Oakley, Mr.Kingsland (who wasn't of the inner group but 
was a member of the esoteric section), Mr.Keightley and the others 
all found that H.P.B was being disrespected and could not aprove it 
and so left the society.. Besant is just ONE of them... and they all 
left...