Theos-Talk Archives (March 2005 Message tt00637)

	Mar 25 2005

RE: AFTER-DEATH STATES & CONSCIOUSNESS


Dear C:

I would say that "consciousness" is universal.

"Intelligence" is a faculty that is developed through individual and
personal experience.

In the SECRET DOCTRINE (I 181-2) HPB speaks of three lines of evolution
converging.

It is of two broad kinds (or more) : (1) that which pertains to the
reincarnating EGO ( Buddhi-Manas) and that (2) which is acquired by the
embodied mind (Kama-Manas or the Lower Manas) during any one incarnation.

At death it is taught that a separation occurs in regard to the storage of
such acquired intelligence as either the permanent memory of the EGO
(Buddhi-Manas in the Akasa) or that which being imperfect, is dissipated
with the astral corpse in Kamaloka but not annihilated as it forms the
Skandhas, which are the conveyors of personal Karma to the next
incarnations..

This is very brief, and if further explanation is needed it will be sent.

As to a "Hierarchy of Evil ? It is not possible. Good synthesizes,
protects and educates. And it draws every votary and disciple to the
Central Spiritual Center that is everywhere.  

Evil always analyze, isolates and dissipates, yet in this proces, those who
become "wise in evil," need assistants, and they draw those who are
thoughtlessly willing to do evil to them, but they neither support nor
defend them -- rather they laugh at their struggles and eventual death. One
needs to grasp the meaning of the Seven Principles of Man and the Universe
in this.

Best wishes,

Dallas

PS  

THEOSOPHY teaches on After Death events:

THE ORIGIN OF EVIL - HPB (below)
======================


ON REINCARNATION


[A collection of ideas derived from classic theosophical literature.]


PREMISE

All beings in all worlds are subject to rebirth again and again under the
law of general evolution. Every atom is alive and has the germ of
self-consciousness.


All humans (as immortal Monas) have passed through many births. The wise
remember the details of those experiences, the average man has to regain the
faculty of doing this. The law of evolution and of relationships is just and
universal: "Never to an evil places goes one who does good. Being born
again, one comes in contact with the knowledge which belonged to him in his
former body and striving with all his might, he obtains perfection because
of efforts continued through many births." (B. Gita, p. 51)


THE MIND IS THE THINKER 

The immortal thinker, man, has vast powers and possibilities because of his
intimate connection with every part of Nature, from which he has been built
up. He stands at the top of an immense and silent evolution.



SPIRIT - THE HIGHER SELF - IS THE PERCEIVER


Spirit is the Knower. It is never born, nor dies; nor is it from anywhere,
nor did it become anything. Unborn, eternal, immemorial, this Ancient is not
slain when the body dies. This Higher Self (Atma) is hidden in the heart of
man.

Man is an immortal Soul, a Thinker. All nature is sentient, down to the
smallest atom. All beings are intelligent. The whole is made up of Spirit,
Soul (mind) and matter (form). Every being is constantly in evolution, ever
progressing under the rule of law, which, deriving from Spirit, is inherent
in the whole.


NATURE SURROUNDS US


Nature (the Universe) exists for the purpose of the Soul's experience. Our
Earth, as well as the Universe, should be considered a vast School in which
a great range of intelligent and immortal pupils are the students. Their
consciousness ranges from that of the lowest mineral atom to that of the
highest most divine of Sages or Prophets, and the Dhyani Buddhas. Since they
are immortals, their experiences are recorded in every aspect of Nature,
their memory and forms the basis of their advance. Nothing is unimportant. [
S D I 272-3]

This Universe exists for the experience and emancipation of the soul-mind.
The soul has the responsibility of raising the entire mass of manifested
matter up to the stature, nature, and dignity of conscious god-hood. The
great aim is to reach self-consciousness by and through the perfecting after
transformation of the whole mass of matter as well as what we now call soul.


The aim for present man is his initiation into complete knowledge. As to the
whole mass of matter, the doctrine is that it will all be raised to man's
estate when man has gone further on himself.


MONADS - THE LIFE-ATOMS


At every conceivable point in the Universe there are 'lives' (Monads);
nowhere can be found a spot that is "dead" or "void." [S D I 289] and
each 'life-atom' is forever hastening onward to higher evolution.

Man's soul, or mind-consciousness is that of an individualized "life-atom"
which has risen to the level of self-consciousness. He is, through his own
power of independent choice, shaping, accelerating, or retarding his
progress towards perfection.

Nature intends us to use the matter which comes into our bodies and astral
body for the purpose, among others, of benefiting the matter by the impress
it gets from association with the human Ego. All the matter retains the
stamp or photographic impression of the human being who uses it; the
material elements (life-atoms) transmigrate to the lower level when given an
animal impress by the Ego. The units of what we now use as our organic or
fleshy matter will change, by transformation through evolution, over a great
period of time, into self-conscious thinkers.


SOUL-MIND - ITS EVOLUTIONARY JOURNEY


We are not appearing for the first time when we come upon this planet; but
have pursued a long, an immeasurable course of activity and intelligent
perception on other systems on earlier globes. We only move to another when
the work on this one is completed.

Man is a spiritual being. The Ego (Buddhi-Manas) of each man is immortal,
reappearing clothed in bodies, on each occasion different. Yet the economy
of Nature provides that the matter used earlier may be attracted again to
the Soul when it returns. It (the Soul-Mind we know in ourselves --
Kama-Manas) only appears to be mortal; in its higher aspect (Buddhi-Manas) t
always remains the substratum and support for the personality which is the
"actor" upon the stage of life.

Reincarnation is the pilgrimage of our whole nature. The end to be reached
is self-dependence with perfect calmness and clearness.

Starting from the great ALL, radiating like sparks from the central fire,
man gathers experience in all ages, under all rulers, civilizations and
customs. Ever engaged in a pilgrimage to return to the shrine from which he
came. He is now the ruler and now the slave; today at the pinnacle of wealth
and power, to-morrow at the bottom of the ladder, perhaps in abject misery,
but ever the same identity. The whole of life is a persistent pursuit of the
fast-moving soul, which, although appearing to stand still, can outdistance
the lightening.

Recognition (of loved ones) cannot depend, in the spiritual and mental life,
on physical appearance. Those who are like unto each other, and love each
other will be reincarnated together, whenever conditions permit.
Recognition depends on inner sight, and not on outward appearance.

When we come again, we do not take up the body of someone else, nor
another's deeds; but, we are like an actor who plays many parts. The great
life of the soul is a drama, and each new life and rebirth is another act in
which we assume another part.

The friends and relatives which are like unto each other must incarnate
together, they cannot undo the law of attraction, or, depart to work
elsewhere. Not unless and until they become different in character do they
separate from each other. Those whom you help will help you in future lives.
The very moment we come near to where they are, they at once extend
assistance. Thus the members of the whole human family reciprocally act on
one another.


SIMILARITY AND CHANGE - LAW OF KARMA


The nature of each incarnation depends upon the balance, as struck, of the
merit and demerit of the previous life or lives -- upon the way the man has
lived and thought; and this law is inflexible and wholly just.

The powers of mind and the laws governing its motion, its
attachments and its detachments, show that its re-embodiment must
be here. To permit the involved entity to transfer itself to
another scene before it had overcome all the causes drawing it
here, and without having worked out its responsibilities to other
entities would be contrary to the powerful forces and laws of
nature which continually operate upon it.

One short human life gives no grounds for the entire refinement
and perfection of the inner nature. There is a vast range of
powers latent in man, which can be developed if opportunity is
given. Knowledge, infinite in scope and diversity, lies before
us. We have high aspirations with no time to reach up to their
measure, while the passions and desires, selfish motives and
ambitions, war with us and among themselves. All these have to
be tried, conquered, used, subdued. The process continues until,
after having developed character up to its possible limit, when
every experience has been passed through, all knowledge and all
potentiality is thoroughly grasped by the man.


EGOITY - THE SENSE OF "SELF"


Each feels he has an individuality of his own, a personal
identity which bridges over gaps made by sleep, and temporary
lesions in the brain. This identity never breaks from beginning
to end of life in the normal person, and only the persistence and
eternal character of the soul will account for it.

Inherent ideas, common to the whole race, are due to recollection
of great and universal ideals and ideas implanted in the human
mind at the very beginning of its evolutionary career by those
Brothers and Sages who were perfected from among the mankind of
former ages, long before the development of this globe began.
Hence, they are called our "Elder Brothers."


A UNIVERSAL RECORD EXISTS OF ALL EVENTS


The images made in the "Astral Light" (an imponderable, tenuous
medium of an electro-magnetic nature, which inter-penetrates the
entire globe, and in which the acts and thoughts of every man are
felt and impressed, to be afterward reflected again) persist for
centuries. Upon returning to earth-life we are affected for good
or evil by the conduct, the doctrines and the aspirations of
preceding nations and men, and of our previous incarnations.


IMPRESSING OUR ENVIRONMENT


Since we as personalities, are made up of a mass of lives, our
thoughts and acts affect those atoms or lives, and impress them
with a power of their own. Each man is seen as the fashioner of
the fate for his next fleeting earth personality. In his own
hand is the decree and the execution. No one but ourselves
punishes or rewards in this or any life.

That which is known as 'I,' or 'you,' is the result of the
continuous, unbroken existence of an Entity. Your present body
and your soul (or the personality and its mind) are the results
of a series of co-existences. The Individuality, or Spirit, is
the cause for the Soul, and personality, or what is called 'you.'
You are the manifestation of a Spiritual Entity and are the
result of many appearances of that entity upon the stage of
action -- our Earth -- in a series of various personalities.


MEMORY OF PAST LIVES


Memory of a prior life does not prove we passed through that, nor
is non-remembering an objection. We forget the greater part of
the events of the years and days of this life. The entire effect
on the character is kept and made a part of our immortal selves.
The whole mass of detail is preserved in the inner man to be one
day fully brought back when we are perfected. All of us are
subject to the limitations imposed on the Ego by the new brain in
each life. We are the ones who, in that past, as we are now in
the present, creating by the use of the will our own future.


CHOOSING TO BECOME AN IDEAL PERSON


By living according to the dictates of the Soul, the brain may at
last be made porous to the Soul's recollections. We should be
very miserable if the deeds and scenes of our former lives were
not hidden from our view until by discipline we became able to
bear a knowledge of them.

The course of evolution is the drama of the soul. There are
beings in the universe whose intelligence is as much beyond ours,
as ours exceeds that of the black beetle. It is they, who,
because of continued responsibility, and compassion, take an
active part in the government of the natural order of things.
The most intelligent being in the universe, man, has never been
without a friend, but has a line of "elder brothers" who
continually watch over the progress of the less progressed,
preserve the knowledge gained, and continually seek for
opportunities of drawing the developing intelligence of the race
to consider the great truths concerning the destiny of soul.



THE "WISE" - OUR "ELDER BROTHERS"


The Elder Brothers of humanity are men who were perfected in
former periods of evolution, when, out of the Great Unknown,
there came forth the visible universes which are eternal in their
coming and going. The object of these mighty waves is the
production of perfect Man, the evolution, after the struggle to
acquire piety, of the soul, which consists in knowing "God" and
injuring none, such a soul becomes all intelligence. The process
of evolution up to reunion with the Divine is, and includes,
successive elevation from rank to rank of power and usefulness.
The process of spiritual development includes the entire

Eradication of selfishness, the cultivation of broad, generous
sympathy in, and effort for the good of others, cultivation of
the inner, spiritual man by meditation, control of fleshly
appetites and desires, and, the careful performance of every
duty.

The impious soul, however, punishes itself. It cannot enter the
body of an animal devoid of reason. Law preserves the human soul
from such an infamy. Once a man, always a man. Evolution,
having brought Manas, the Thinker and Immortal Person on to this
plane, cannot send him back to the brute which has not
Manas-mind.


AFTER-DEATH PROCESS


When a being dies, he emits, as it were, a mass of force or
energy, which goes to make up the new personality when he shall
have reincarnated. In this energy is found the summation of the
life just lived.

The passional parts of us coalesce with the astral body after
death, and makes a seeming being, (called the Kama-Rupa, or,
desire form) that has a short life to live while it is
disintegrating. It disintegrates gradually as it is no longer
sustained by the indwelling Spirit, which leaves for other
experience in the "Heaven-world" or Devachan.

The man whose progress has been broken off by death goes to the
"regions of the righteous" (Devachan, or "Heaven"). There he
dwells for an immensity of years proportionate to the merit he
has accumulated during the life last lived. When the store of
merit he accumulated in the past life is exhausted as a subject
for review, assimilation and meditation, he is born again on
earth in a pure and fortunate family; or even among those who are
spiritually illuminated. Being thus born again, he comes in
contact with the knowledge which belonged to him in his former
body, and resumes the struggle towards perfection. With that
objective, recognizing the brotherhood of all beings, he assists
all beings around him in their efforts to progress.

Devachan is the "land of reward," the domain of spiritual
effects. It is the threshold to another life on earth. It is a
state of prolonged subjective happiness after the death of the
body. 

In Devachan we dream until we are reborn. It is a place
or state were germinating aspirations, restricted by earth life,
can have their full development. Altruistic and noble psychic
energies also have their outlet in Devachan. It provides rest
for the soul, opportunity for the development of its deepest
desires, its highest needs, which are there enjoyed, and where
every hope blooms out in full and glorious flower. By this
method the character and the capacity of man's developing
virtuous qualities are enhanced and progress.

Between adjacent incarnations, after grosser elements are purged
away, comes a period of comparative refreshment called
Devachan -- the soul being therein prepared for its next advent
into material life. The state of spiritual but comparative rest
known as Devachan is not an eternal one. Nor does 'hell'
correspond to Kama-loka. All such painful states are transitory
and purificatory states.


REINCARNATION - PROCEEDS UNDER LAW-KARMA


Reincarnation is the law of nature. The complete trinity of
Atma, Buddhi, Manas does not yet fully incarnate. They use and
occupy the body by means of the entrance of Manas (mind), the
lowest of the three, and the other two shine upon it from
"above." The head, Atma and Buddhi, are yet in "heaven," and the
feet, Manas, walk in "hell," which is the body and physical life.



CONSCIOUSNESS - INTELLIGENCE     
             

The Spirit is the persisting individuality. It connects all
reincarnations, as if it were the thread of a necklace; and has,
hence, been called the Sutratma, the "thread-Soul." All is
impermanent in man except that pure bright essence of the
Universal SOUL. Man is its crystal ray -- a beam of light
immaculate within; a form of clay material upon the lower
surface. Man is to rely on the One Consciousness, which in him
is that ray -- his Higher Self -- the Spirit. The One Consciousness
of each person is the Witness or Spectator of the actions and
experiences of every state we are in or pass through.

Man is not yet fully conscious, and the experience of many
reincarnations is needed to at last complete the incarnation of
the whole spiritual trinity [Atma-Buddhi-Manas] in the body.
When that has been accomplished the race will have become as
gods, and as the godlike trinity being in full possession, the
entire mass of matter will be perfected and raised up for the
next step. It is said that this will occur at the end of the
seventh Round for humanity as a whole.



HEREDITY AND THE BODY


Heredity in giving us a body in any family provides the
appropriate environment for the Ego, which goes only in to the
family which either completely answers to its whole nature, or
which gives an opportunity for the working out of its evolution.
Heredity provides the tenement, and also imposes those
limitations of capacity of brain or body, which are often a
punishment, and sometimes, a help; but it does not affect the
Real Ego. The limitations of any family heredity are exact
consequences of that Ego's prior lives.

Each human has a definite character, different from every other.
These differences, both individual and national, are not due to
education. Heredity furnishes the appropriate place for
receiving reward and punishment, and is not the cause for the
essential nature shown by everyone.



EARTH - HOW IT EVOLVES


The Earth evolves just as man does. It is presently conditioned
as the actual result of its past. It is born, grows old, dies,
and is reincarnated. This goes on many times, and during those
incarnations it suffers and enjoys in its own way for its
previous evolutions.

Our Earth is one of a chain of planets, it alone being on the
visible plane. Humanity passes from "globe" to "globe" in a
series of 'rounds,' first circling about each globe, and
reincarnating upon it a number of times. This incarnation is not
single, but repeated; each Individuality [Atma-Buddhi-Manas - or 
MONAD] becomes re-embodied during numerous existences in 
successive races and planets of our chain, and accumulating the 
experiences of each incarnation towards its perfection.



POPULATION CHANGES


So far as this globe is concerned the number of Egos belonging 
to it is definite. The total is vast. Each Ego, for itself, varies
the length of stay in the Post mortem states. Whenever there
occurs a great number of deaths by war, pestilence, or famine,
there is at once a rush of souls to incarnation, either in the
same place or in some other place or race. A hall or stadium
can, at each performance, be filled with differing quantities of
participants. The over-all number of residents in the city in which 
that facility is located remains the same.



SAVAGERY AND CIVILIZATION


Savagery and civilization have always co-existed at any one time.
Today we have "savages" in our 'inner' cities, in the slums, and we
have savages in the Amazon, in Africa, Asia, and elsewhere.
Savagery remains because there are still Egos whose experience is
so limited that they are still savage, or inexperienced. Races
die out because the Egos had enough of the experience that sort
of race gives, other souls who have had no higher life in the
past enter into the bodies of the race to go on using them for
the purpose of gaining such experience as the physical heredity of
that race body will give. Then that race dies out.



ETERNITY AND PERSISTENCY


The universe is envisioned as an endless evolution and
re-involution (or re-absorption) of the Kosmos; a process which
is without a beginning, or an end. Our Kosmos and Nature will
run down only to reappear on a more perfect plane after every
Pralaya (universal 'night' of dissolution and rest). The Human
Ego, the immortal Monad [Atma-Buddhi-Manas] never perishes
Nor is it ever obliterated. After the greatest of Pralayas, or 
Periods of Universal "rest," the immortal Ego-Monad returns to
Continue its majestic pilgrimage towards All-Knowingness

We come back to earth because on it and with the beings upon it
our deeds were performed; it is the only proper place where
punishment and reward can be justly meted out; here is the only
natural spot in which to continue the struggle toward perfection,
development of the faculties we have, and the destruction of any
"wickedness," selfishness or perversion in us.

No man can by any possibility, favor, edict, or belief escape the
consequences of the causes he sets up, and each one who grasps
this doctrine will be moved by conscience, and the whole power of
nature, to do well in order that he may receive good and become
happy. Reward and punishment must be the just desert for prior
conduct. Nature's law of justice is not imperfect. In a prior
life the doer was then quite aware of what he did, and, nature
affixes consequences to his acts, being thus: just.  

The law of Reincarnation drags us into life again and again,
bringing with us uncounted times the various Egos whom we have
known in prior births, in order that the causes generated in
company with those Egos may be worked out and harmony restored.
We are, in this life, responsible for the civilization in which
we now appear.

No human body is formed without the union of the sexes, and the
germ of such production must come from food, so it is obvious
that foods have something to do with the reincarnation of the
Ego.

Man is in essence a spiritual soul-being, and this soul takes on
different bodies from life to life on earth, in order, at last,
to arrive at such perfect knowledge, through repeated experience,
as to enable one to assume a body fit to be the dwelling place of
a Mahatma or noble, perfected Soul.


==============================================

>From THE ORIGIN OF EVIL -- HPB 	
[HPB Articles I 124...]


P. 125	The idea that matter and its Protean manifestations are the
source and origin of universal evil and sorrow is a very old one, 

P. 125	Gautama Buddha .the Sage and Philosopher, who sacrificed himself
for Humanity by living for it, in order to save it, [in living, not in
running away from life] by teaching men to see in the sensuous existence of
matter misery alone.his efforts were to release mankind from too strong an
attachment to life, which is the chief cause of Selfishness--hence the
creator of mutual pain and suffering. 

P. 126	His doctrine shows evil immanent, not in matter, which is
eternal, but in the illusions created by it: through the changes and
transformations of matter generating life--because these changes are
conditioned and such life is ephemeral. [ WHY ?]

P. 126	.if we would discern good from evil, light from darkness, and
appreciate the former, we can do so only through the contrasts between the
two.

P. 126	Buddha's philosophy points [to].its esotericism, the hidden soul
of it, draws the veil aside and reveals to the Arhat all the glories of LIFE
ETERNAL in all the Homogeneousness of Consciousness and Being.a fact to the
Sage and esoteric Pantheist. 

P. 126	.the root idea that evil is born and generated by the ever
increasing complications of the homogeneous material, which enters into form
and differentiates more and more as that form becomes physically more
perfect, has an esoteric side to it .

P. 126	Its dead-letter aspect, however, became the subject of
speculation with every ancient thinking nation.in India the primitive
thought.has been disfigured by Sectarianism, and has led to the ritualistic,
purely dogmatic observances of the Hatha Yogis, in contradistinction to the
philosophical Vedantic Raja Yoga. 

P. 127	It thus follows that the deeply religious Pantheism of the Hindu
and Buddhist philosopher.[lead him to consider that].pain as well as sorrow
are illusions, due to attachment to this life, and ignorance. Therefore he
strives after eternal, changeless life, and absolute consciousness in the
state of Nirvana

P. 127	For the [Hindu]. philosopher there is but one real life, Nirvanic
bliss, which is a state differing in kind, not in degree only, from that of
any of the planes of consciousness in the manifested universe. [He].in his
spiritual aspirations [ignores].even the integral homogeneous unit.He knows
of, and believes in only the direct cause of that unit, eternal and ever
living, because the ONE uncreated, or rather not evoluted. 

P. 127	Hence all his efforts are directed toward the speediest reunion
possible with, and return to his pre-primordial condition, after his
pilgrimage through this illusive series of visionary lives, with their
unreal phantasmagoria of sensuous perceptions. 

P. 128	.the Eastern Pantheist.submits to the inevitable, and tries to blot
out from his path in life as many "descents into rebirth" as he can, by
avoiding the creation of new Karmic causes. [JAINS] The Buddhist philosopher
knows that the duration of the series of lives of every human being--unless
he reaches Nirvana "artificially" ("takes the kingdom of God by violence
").is given, allegorically in the forty-nine days passed by Gautama the
Buddha under the Bo-tree.And the Hindu sage is aware, in his turn, that he
has to light the first, and extinguish the forty-ninth fire before he
reaches his final deliverance. Knowing this, both sage and philosopher wait
patiently for the natural hour of deliverance

P. 128 Fn	This is an esoteric tenet.the Theosophist.may compute the 7
by 7 of the forty-nine "days" and the forty-nine "fires," and understand
that the allegory refers esoterically to the seven human consecutive
root-races with their seven subdivisions. Every monad is born in the first
and obtains deliverance in the last seventh race. Only a "Buddha" is shown
reaching it during the course of one life. 

P. 128	The seeds of evil and sorrow were indeed the earliest result and
consequence of the heterogeneity of the manifested universe. Still they are
but an illusion produced by the law of contrasts, which, as described, is a
fundamental law in nature. Neither good nor evil would exist were it not for
the light they mutually throw on each other. 

P. 129	Ignorance alone is the willing martyr, but knowledge is the
master, of natural Pessimism. 

P. 129	If, instead of that, man proceeding on his life-journey
looked.but within himself and centered his point of observation on the inner
man, he would soon escape from the coils of the great serpent of illusion.
>From the cradle to the grave, his life would then become supportable and
worth living, even in its worst phases. 

P. 130	Eastern wisdom teaches that spirit has to pass through the ordeal
of incarnation and life, and be baptised with matter before it can reach
experience and knowledge. After which only it receives the [second] baptism
of soul, or self-consciousness, and may return to its original condition of
a god, plus experience, ending with omniscience. 

P 130	In other words, it can return to the original state of the
homogeneity of primordial essence only through the addition of the fruitage
of Karma, which alone is able to create an absolute conscious deity, removed
but one degree from the absolute ALL. 

P. 135-6 Modern Society is permeated with an increasing cynicism and
honeycombed with disgust of life. This is the result of an utter ignorance
of the operations of Karma and the nature of Soul evolution...Once the basis
of the Great Law is grasped--and what philosophy can furnish better means
for such a grasp and final solution, than the esoteric doctrine of the great
Indian Sages-- 

P.136	The reasonableness of Conscious Existence can be proved only by
the study of the primeval--now esoteric--philosophy. And it says "there is
neither death nor life, for both are illusions; being (or BENESS) is the
only reality." . "Life is Death,"... The life of the superior whole requires
the death of the inferior, the death of the parts depending on and being
subservient to it. And, as life is death, so death is life, and the whole
great cycle of lives form but ONE EXISTENCE--the worst day of which is on
our planet. 


---------------------------------------
 
-----Original Message-----
From: silva_cass 
Sent: Tuesday, March 22, 2005 9:39 PM
To: 
Subject: The Hierarchy of Evil ( ? )


Sorry folks to bring this up again, but I cant get it out of my head.  

Theosophy says that All is a Hierarchy of beings, from the smallest atom to
the Boddhisattva. 

If the Masters can impress the good, in the form of ideas, dreams etc on the
lesser evolved, can we also be impressed by Masters on the dark side. And
if so, how do we recognize this?  

If some of our political leaders are being used by them what prevents us
from being 
contaminated? I am sure that these politicians do not accept this
phenomenon.

With respect

Cass