Theos-Talk Archives (May 2005 Message tt00065)

Following are my comments to two threads on abortion many
years ago on theos-l. (At that time, theos-talk hadn't
started yet.)

-- Eldon

---- start of threads ----

Daniel:

(Note this "Daniel" is not Daniel Caldwell, but someone elso
on theos-l, acting out the role of "Daniel in the lion's
den" in his fundamentalist point of view.)

If your intent is to offer a position, and make an
appealing case for that position, you need to present your
ideas in a form that invites discussion. Extremist
language invites people to react to you in an equally
extreme fashion.

>Planned Parenthood is a organization bent on performing
>millions of abortions for one reason "MONEY".

You cannot attribute motives to other people. You can
guess at motives, but the final authority on why someone
does something is the person themselves. It is true that
Planned Parenthood may charge money. Churches also collect
money, often in the form of offerings and pledges. Are
they solely in the business of making money? Or do they
consider themselves as performing a public service, and
find it necessary to charge a fee in order to meet
expenses?

>Pro-Choice?
>99.9% of all preganancies were determined by prior
>choices. You make the choice when you lay down.

Often there is some attempt to not get pregnant, where some
form of birth control is used. Then the pregnancy is by
chance, an accident, and not intentional. When we drive a
car, we try to avoid crashing into other cars. If we're
involved in a freeway accident, did we *intend* to crash,
because we were on the road and slightly at risk, despite
our best efforts to drive safely?

>Selfishness is the arm behind the sword on this one.

Is it selfish to drive on the freeway when you know there's
a slight chance of an unavoidable accident?

>When is a baby a human?

The soul has been human for countless lifetimes. The
process of coming into incarnation again starts before
conception. If the birth into one particular family fails,
the soul can try again, or try other parents.

>Is a zygote human?

Is your fingernail human? It's an outer aspect of your
life, but *you*, the inner person, are the Ego, which
survives many lifetimes, each with its own body and
personality. When you lose a body, if it is premature and
early in life, you may simply start again.

>The answer is soooo simple. Answer this question.
>When is the DNA formed to create the unborn?

It is formed by the interaction between the soul seeking
incarnation and the physical process going on. This is
much in the same way as thought, in the mind, influences
the brain, rather than simply being a byproduct of neural
activity.

>DNA determines what type of life will be formed
>and DNA is formed immediately during conception.

It does not *cause* us, it is the physical mechanism by
which our *pattern* for the new lifetime is maintained, so
that we can maintain a certain appearance and certain
disposition over that lifetime.

>The genes are permanent. The natural choice is life.

I recall reading in "Turbulent Mirror" a reference to a
situation where a creature changed its genetic structure in
adaptation to a hostile external environment. (This is an
individual creature, not a species, over multiple
generations.) If it's true, and can happen, it shows that
it's possible to change the personality/body structure that
we make for ourselves at the time of physical conception.

>Wake up...

You're calling us to wake up to a problem that is not as
serious as you seem to think. Your concern comes from an
incomplete philosophical grasp of what is happening.

>A third tri-mester abortion is gruesome.

Any form of death is gruesome. It's not something that
would be considered lightly. Certainly if an abortion has
to be done, it should be done earlier, except in perhaps
extreme circumstances. The question for a particular case
is: Why was it done? And we have to realize that the soul
that was denied birth will still get its nearly-immediate
repeat chance at human life, with perhaps new parents.

Situations in life are never so clear-cut that you can
apply a single moral principle, like "don't kill" and apply
it with qualification. Why is this? Because there are many
moral principles that come into play in a situation, and
sometimes they are in conflict, where we make a choice
based upon which action has the most overall good to it.

>SHOW me one unwanted baby and I will show you
>one hundred wanting parents.

True, there are many infertile parents in America seeking
babies, and unable to have them. But is also a single
factor to weigh in making a decision, and not a deciding
factor. Perhaps the same soul will be happer with
different birth parents that want it, which it may achieve
through the abortion, than being put up for adoption and
never knowing its birth parents? We cannot make a general
rule, based upon a single factor that enters into our
decision.

>ABORTION is MURDER. And abortionists should be put to death.

I hope that this is just rhetoric where you're using
extreme language in order to make a strong emotional
impact. Otherwise, someday you may find yourself in jail
if you take these words too literally, and act on them.

An appeal to emotion is not helpful, though, since you then
give people the impression that you lack the necessary
logic and rational arguments to support your position.

One thing that we learn in Theosophy is that false, but
sincerely held beliefs is the biggest obstacle that we face
in following the spiritual path. We are taught to
continually review what we believe in, to look it over and
freshly rethink our positions. In this case, I think that
you can learn from us. This is something useful for all of
us to do -- including you -- and it is not done often
enough.

----

JRC:

> In fact most of those who believe in a determinative law of
> karma will hold that the incoming soul does not blindly
> pick parents, but does so delibrately ... hence an
> incoming soul cannot be blind to whether or not a
> particular set of parents hold within them the predilection
> that would make it likely that an abortion would result
> from a pregnancy.

But I would say that karma is not deterministic. Our karma
has made us what we are today. The "karmic content" is
really the living relationships that we hold, deep in our
natures, with others. Coming into birth may be by chance
in the sense that when we are ready to be born, we are
drawn to suitable parents. The parents are suitable
because of their natures being sympathetic to our own.
We'd have to study the particular past-life history of both
the child and the parents to see how much this attraction
resulted from previous experiences together, in past
lifetimes, and how much we are talking about establishing a
new relationship with unfamiliar, but compatible people.

> That is, just as (again, if one operates within the "karma"
> paradigm) many births into bad families or brutal cultures
> are explained by saying that the child "knew" the
> conditions and "chose" them, so (it seems) it might equally
> be said that some incoming souls "chose" the experience of
> abortion - either to "pay off" past karma, or for other
> reasons.

This seems to over-simplify the idea of karma. We are not
responsible for the actions of others. We may know that
they are predisposed to certain types of action, like
so-and-so has an explosive temper. But we are not
responsible for that person's temper, and have not
associated ourselves with that person because we're looking
forward to experiencing it.

The choice of parents is like the choice of friends. When
we go to a new place, and meet new people, perhaps some of
them will end up being friends. How do we choose those
friends? How much of it is old karmic ties being
reactivated, and how much is new ties being forged? We'd
have to be able to read the past to really tell, but that
doesn't help much, because in a certain sense *the past
does not exist*! What exists of the past is in terms of
*living content* in our Shandhas and consciousness, and so
it is a moot point, from this point of view, if the karma
is based upon old or newly-formed ties with other people.

> Very difficult to ascribe to the incoming soul a remarkable
> enough prophetic insight to be able to "choose" the
> parents, economic status, culture & etc. and somehow also
> be alledged to be blind to the probabilty of the
> parent/parents having an abortion.

When we say that we choose our parents, we are using terms
we understand to describe a process and state of
consciousness that is outside the experience of our normal,
waking personality. How are we prophetic enough to pick
the right spouse?

>> Rather, abortion seems destructive all around.
> And you will never have to experience trying to raise a
> child alone with no education and nothing but poverty
> conditions even without a child.

It's hard to pass judgement on the quality of life of a
child-to-be, based upon the economic status of its western
parent or parents. Even the worest conditions in America
are better than in some countries. I've heard examples on
the news, for instance, how in a famine in Africa a mother
may have to let one of her two babies die, because she does
not have enough breast milk to feed both of them. When we
start to judge quality of life based upon an arbitrary
standard that we set up (and I'm not saying that you're
doing so here), we are going too far in forcing our
judgements on others. Should retarded or mentally-ill
women be sterilized? Should the state impose abortions
based upon the economic policy of the land (like China with
its women)? The decision needs to be carefully made by the
mother, but I'm not sure that economic reasons are
sufficient justification for the decision to have an
abortion.

> Additionally, our species' population problem is also
> immensely destructive, and to many lifeforms *other* than
> those within our own kingdom.

I expect that the human population won't be able to grow at
its current rate, but will reach a maximum, then decline,
with an onset of either infertility or some diseases and
natural disasters to bring the population back down.
Nature adjustes itself, and too big a percentage of the
human lifewave in birth at any moment of time won't be
tolerated.

> > Rich
> >
> > Does this mean we should go around making women who have
> > had or will have abortions feel miserable? No, this would
> > be cruel.
> >
> >Right ... and it is only your opinion that abortion is wrong;

Most people would agree that it is wrong, but not in an
absolute sense where other factors cannot come into play,
and lead to a balanced, perhaps heart-rending decision for
or against it in a particular situation.

> as Liesel so well stated, women are not chattel - who are
> men, who will never have to have an abortion, nor will ever
> be able to fully grasp the subjective state behind that
> decision, to chose to make women feel bad or not feel bad?

A woman who has not had an abortion *in this lifetime* is
in the same position as a man. We've all had lifetimes as
women, and had the various experiences of childbirth and
childrearing. Women not having been put to the real-life
situation of choosing an abortion are in the same position
as men, physical plumbing notwithstanding.

Agreed that women are not chattel, nor are men "meal
tickets". There are many social roles that are pressured
upon us by current society. We can play the roles or
improvise our own manner of living.

> The curious thing is that the vast number of people
> currently in power, who are deciding whether abortion is
> "right" or "wrong", are men - who generally speak as though
> their standing to make such decisions isn't even open to
> question.

Blavatsky was not a man. The ideas that Theosophy are
based upon do not come from the particular social order of
any particular society. We cann't use the shortcomings of
modern society or of some culture in the recent past to
bias our thinking.

> [JRC commenting to Rich]
>
> Education of what nature? If you mean education about a
> particular spiritual perspective, I cannot agree - as this
> implies a sort of moral/intellectual superiority, in which
> those who have abortions are implied to simply be those who
> have not yet "seen the light", and that naturally when they
> do, they will stop and repent of their "crime".

We see this "education" usually from the
politically-correct crowd, who would "train" us in the
proper way to think, act, speak, write, and live our lives
according to their multicultural values. We're given a
long list of slogans to use in our communications. The
same is true of fundamentalism and the religious right,
where people are ready to tell us what to think. This is
why many people are at a loss when it comes to Theosophy,
because it doesn't not give us all the answers on a sliver
platter, but makes us work for those fragments of Truth
that we can discover.

> Perhaps what is really necessary is alterations of a whole
> number of the attitudes and economic structures surrounding
> the valuation of children and childraising in this current
> world.

The raising of children is highly important, and we often
undervalue it. There were a number of approaches tried by
Theosophists, including Maria Montessori and by Katherine
Tingley at Point Loma with her Raja Yoga School. The real
issue regarding abortion and many other subjects that come
up for discussion is: How do we live up to various ideals
in actual life? Each idea, apart from actual life,
considered as a thing in itself, is quite clearcut and can
be agree with. Take one: Don't kill. It is just fine and
we can agree to it in the abstract. But when we apply it
to a particular situation in life, we have problems. Why?
Because the situation is complex, there are many factors to
weigh and balance, and perhaps a dozen ideals are coming
into play, come in conflict with others. The complexity of
life comes from our having to sort out the conflicts and
come up with a "good" choice in each sitation. This
requires a deeper kind of insight than the contemplation of
the ideas, apart from life, and is something we all could
work on.

----

> HPB ... says that even if the mother survives, her life
> will be shortened and her stay in Kamaloka will be
> lengthened. This does not sound like a reliance or a
> concern with 19th century science or demographics, and I am
> surprised you would limit HPB and her Teachers in that way.

I was just reading this and made a connection with
something that I had read in "The Mahatma Letters" to the
effect that they remain cool, passionless, avoiding the
extremes of emotion, in order to conserve their life
energies. Perhaps the trama, regret, and grief associated
with an abortion is a major source of such grief, and the
resulting dissipation of life energies leads to the
shortening of life.

Regarding kamaloka, it would probably be an individual
thing, although HPB could generalize and speak for the
typical case. Kamaloka is not a form of punishment for the
bad that we did in life. It is a state where we exhaust
all the unspent desire and passion life energies. If there
are regrets, bitterness, and other clouds over a mother's
mind and heart that she carries through life, that would
certainly contribute to her kamaloka.

----

> [JRC writing to Rich]
>
> If you mean I don't simply *believe* everything HPB and
> other Theosophists wrote, why no I don't, as I don't simply
> *believe* in *anything* another person writes.

What about something like Jerry H-E's "reasoned certitude".
Do you study with deferred judgement the writings of
authorities on a subject, until you know about it
sufficiently? If you grant this status to a college
professor, you are more likely to learn from him than if
you come to the classroom filled with personal views that
block further learning. We're not asked to "believe in"
what Blavatsky wrote, since it is not offered as nor
intended to be another belief system, for somelike Daniel
H. to drop his religion and take up with equal conviction.

The materials often go beyond the power of the written word
to convey their meanings. A guru or knowledge of the
materials from prior lifetimes is almost necessary to pick
out some of the deeper Teachings. While we cannot take
what Blavatsky wrote in a dead-letter sense, because there
is much more to it than that, we can use the intellect and
see how far we can go with a logical application of what
she wrote. I would, myself, give much more weight to a
passage by Blavatsky, than, for instance, to an except from
a Cayce reading. We're still left, though, having to
answer the question, in looking at the words: What does
this really mean?

> I have read HPB extensively, but also literature from other
> large occult systems, as well as from a dozen or so modern
> sciences ... and have reached the point of *believing*
> that the world and its multidimensional reality is just out
> and out too vast for any particular point of view to
> anything other than one angle of vision on that immensity.

There are limits to any manner of expressing the occult
side of life. Life is vast, and exceeds our ability to
comprehend it. All we can do is to open up to it in all
directions, and take in what we can. Part of this opening
up is to benefit from the wisdom and learning of those far
ahead of us. There's much to be gained, for instance, from
HPB's works. Without the training and assistance of others
ahead of us, the road is long, slow, and much more
difficult. If we grew up on a desert island, surrounded by
nature and with no other people about us, we would not be
able to derive a knowledge of mathematics on our own. By
growing up around others that know and teach us
matehmatics, we learn far more than we could have achieved
on our own.

The idea of the Path and the Masters is that there is a
tremendous amount of learning and wisdom that we can take
advantage of, if we choose, wisdom that represents an
entire Round's worth of evolution.

> And I fear I have a difficult time telling the difference
> between being considered "wrong" about an issue because I
> don't believe HPB's ideas and opinions are absolute, being
> considered wrong because I don't believe "Jesus's" ideas
> are absolute, and being considered wrong because I don't
> accept the assumptions current in the sciences I study.

In a discussion of *personal views*, you are not wrong.
And Daniel H. is not wrong. And I'm not wrong. In a
discussion of Theosophy, when we focus on the source
Teachings, any of us can be wrong and subject to
correction, when our writings stray from that which has
been given us.

> You seem to ground your opinion in HPB's, and claim it to
> have some sort of additional authority because you do so.
> You imply that your opinion is identified with the
> (alledgedly "correct") Theosophical "teachings".

If Rich is writing from the source Teachings, and
identifies his views with it, that is fine. He can claim
no personal authority for those views, but just say that he
is trying to accurate present Theosophy *as it has been
taught us*. He may also at times write his own personal
ideas, and label them as such.

> All of which is certainly fine so long as you don't expect
> everyone to accept that authority as absolute in some way.

When writing on behalf of the theosophical philosophy, Rich
can agree with you at times, and say you're wrong at other
times. When he is doing so, this is simply intellectual
honesty. It is often possible to tell when something is in
accord with what we have been taught, and in the name of
further studying it we can examine things that are said for
consistency with it.

When Rich does this, though, he is not saying that you or
any particular person has to *believe in* the whole
package. The choice is yours as to what degree of
authority you ascribe to the Teachings, as presented
through Blavatsky.

> That said, I still stay around Theosophy because 1) I
> greatly admire HPB, (who I actually believe would be
> somewhat appalled to be used as an absolute authority of
> any sort),

She would not want to be considered an absolute authority.
We share an admiration of her. But what she wrote about is
not just her personal opinion.

> 2) "There is no religion higher than truth" is a positively
> smashing attitude, as I *am* seeking *truth*, and will seek
> it through every avenue available - including many that
> have nothing to do with the Theosophical canon,

This is something that we all try to do in our own ways.
The problem is that personal opinion can be as misleading
as psychic vision, in clouding and biasing and distorting
what we perceive.

> 3) I have met some absolutely splendid people in the
> Theosophical current, people who are very intense, sincere
> seekers of truth who have also thoroughly integrated a
> profound service ethic in their lives,

We find these people everywhere. The theosophical groups
are one of many junior colleges or extension courses for
those of us wanting to enroll in the Mystery Colleges.

> and 4) one of the main currents of "angels" with whom I
> serve in the innerland, and who have taken the time to
> teach me much about the nuances of using energy in service,

I would not accord special status to what any particualar
person or being tells me, be it physical or non-physical.
We pick our friends and teachers, be they physical or not,
and learn from interaction with them. What authority you
might give to your angels is a personal thing, since you
are in charge of what external sources you tap for
information and guidance. If you were to want others to
also give weight to what they tell you, you would have to
demonstrate their nature and status to us.

> has indicated that while the original generating current
> that began this current century's notions of what
> "Theosophy" is has mostly expended itself,

The current presentation of Theosophy in the world is
losing energy, in its role working to "spice up" western
thought life. For this role, it could use a workover. The
other aspect to it, as Mystery Teachings, does not age, and
refers to aspects of life that were as true millions of
years ago as in millions of years to come.

> it still contains at least a possibility to be of some
> partial service for another century (despite its currently
> severely introverted and self-involved state) if it can
> open itself far enough to entertain another burst of energy
> and thought suitable for the *next* century.

True, with regard to its role as "spice". Not needed with
regard to its role as "junior college to the Mysteries".

> The ideas articulated by HPB are in some places completely
> unverifiable one way or another, in others very interesting
> premises, in others the glimpse of a paradigm that is
> useful, and in others a good contribution to the body of
> spiritual and religious thought of our species.

The further we get into the ideas, the harder they will
become to verify, except by personal experience through
initiation. The metaphors and philosophical concepts that
Blavatsky used are partial expressions of a type of
thinking and understanding that I don't think we have a
good understanding of. The thoughtlife and mental
faculties of a Fifth Rounder are not just quantitatively
greater than our, but also qualitatively different; there
are additional faculties of understanding that are *simply
different* than what we now know and use.

> But articulations of the "ancient wisdom" are all over the
> place,

The articulations are not the truths themselves. These
truths, in the care of the Masters, are something that we
in time will learn, Most of the wisdom is hidden under
exoteric blinds, or reqiring certain keys to unlock the
deeper meanings. Some of these keys are taught to us by
our early theosophical writers. I especially appreciate
Purucker for what I've found in his writings with regard to
these "keys".

> and there is no way of knowing, for instance, that the
> intense mathematics of chaos and complexity theorists
> (which is where I'm drawing the concepts required to try to
> find a principle far more expanded than the current "law of
> karma") are not *this century's* articulations of part of
> the "ancient wisdom",

There is rich symbolism in the field of chaos. We can
learn much from studying it. By itself, though, it
provides no philosophical or metaphysical understandings.
It is an area of mathematical symbolism.

> being released now because our science and math have
> reached a point of development that allows a fuller
> articulation of the "ancient wisdom".

The base of knowledge of our current society is rapidly
growing. The field of chaos depends upon computers, which
depend upon electricity, etc. Everything we have is build
upon what has come before it. The same is true of the
great truths that the Mahatmas preserve. They have had not
a few hundred or a few thousand years to build upon
previous experience, but literally millions of years.

> Current Theosophy is not a truth, but one of many rooms -
> and while it may be used for guidance, should not be used
> in attempts to dominate: It is a foundation, not a shackle.

When we talk about a particular expression of Theosophy,
I'd agree that it can be used for guidance, but not to
dominate the thought life of a student. And as a
foundation, we build upon it. Building upon something
means that you've firmly attached yourself to it, and make
it a part of the structure of your life. The word
"shackle" means the same thing, except that it also implies
the holding of an unwilling person to a place when that
person wants to move on. Our relationship to Theosophy can
appear in either form. We can see ourselves firmly rooted
in something that goes deep into the earth, and is solidly
a part of our lives. Or we can see it as something that
imprisons us, that holds us back from exploring other
places. How should we view it? It's an individual choice.
We both make the choice for ourselves and should allow
others to make their own choices as well. Fellow Student,

----

Alexis:

> Abortion is entirely a woman's business! No male has any
> right to input. Not even husbands. If you aren't going to
> go throught the pain and danger, if you aren't going to
> have to bear the weight for nine months, and no man does.
> Then men need to stand aside and literally "mind their own
> business".

I'm not sure that even this aspect of abortion is that
black-and-white. Say the fetus is viable, though requiring
exceptional medical care to survive outside the womb. Nine
months is not that long a time. How about the 20 to 30
years that it takes to raise the child?

The decision to have an abortion is a difficult one, and
needs to be arrived at by all affected parties. I would
think that a stronger case could be made for the right to
suicide -- "This is my body and I can do what I want with
it, without regard to how my action affects the lives of
others" -- that for that of abortion, since abortion
doesn't just affect, but terminates the life of another.

Deciding for an abortion is difficult, painful, and
heart-rending. Sometimes it is necessary. But it should,
I think, be an cooperative decision, including all affected
parties, and not absolutely denied women by others nor
solely decided by the expectant mothers. The important
term here is *cooperative decision*.

----

Donna:

> Eldon, your comments seem well thought out and
> compassionate. I feel, however, that they assume the
> decision is made within a family unit or between a couple
> who have a relationship of some sort.

You're right. The state attempts to step in and through
the values of far-removed social engineers, attempts to
intrude far too much into the personal lives and decisions
of individuals. We've been victimized too much by moral
authoritarianism!

> Too often nowadays pregnancy is not thought out or planned
> in the least. There are too many children who are getting
> pregnant because they don't know better. Consequently,
> there are too many children getting sexually transmitted
> diseases, as well.

We can come up with different examples where it's easier to
decide pro abortion and others where it's difficult to
justify it. A general rule wouldn't cover all situations,
although often people like to think in terms of moral
absolutes, e.g. "doing/not-doing this is always/never
right". The problem with moral absolutes is that they only
work in a vacuum, where there are no other factors
involved. This is never the case in real life; there's
always a difficult balancing act required between often
conflicting moral principles and responsibilities.

When someone is injured, their will-to-live can determine
if they will recover or die in the hospital. There are
stories of yogis that know it is their time to die, and
they sit down in meditation, and die. When a pregnancy is
going wrong, the mother's body or perhaps the fetus will
somehow cause a miscarriage. Maybe in later ages, our
bodies might be more responsive to the circumstances of our
lives, and both deaths and miscarriages will happen in
response to what a person really feels.

> This is a topic whose tendrils are vast and very clingy ...
> dare we even go there?

We avoid the den of monsters lurking nearby, when we stop
short of stating any absolute rules, when we stop short of
telling everyone the way *they* must do things.

----

Alan:

> > Deciding for an abortion is difficult, painful, and
> > heart-rending. Sometimes it is necessary. But it should,
> > I think, be an cooperative decision, including all affected
> > parties, and not absolutely denied women by others nor
> > solely decided by the expectant mothers. The important
> > term here is *cooperative decision*.
> >
> Some years ago I came across a case where "cooperation"
> meant a majority decision by all of the family concerned
> *except* the pregnant daughter. She did ghastly things
> with a toothbrush handle and was very ill.

We can give aweful examples of what happens when someone
does a self-abortion, because of not getting any help from
others. Those examples show us situations where a
consensus was not reached, where the mother was determined
to go ahead with it, but was forced to keep silent about
her intention.

> This is an issue which cannot be "decided" in an abstract
> intellectual way by anyone who is not pregnant, or has not
> *been* pregnant, or who never *will be* pregnant.

You're right that this cannot be decided in the abstract,
but needs to take into account the specific people
involved. Regarding getting pregnant, we can all do things
that bring upon us a lifetime of responsibility, including
carrying a child. When either of us tries to define a rule
that *always* applies, we're talking in the abstract and
getting it wrong for some particular cases.

You're coming back to the argument that one cannot know
about something without actually trying it. With that
argument, no one can comment on suicide, since no one
survived one to learn from the experience! <grin> On the
other hand, we've all had lifetimes as men, and others as
women, and carry with us the accumulated wisdom (or lack of
wisdom) from those experiences, albeit unconsciously.

> There are a lot of horror stories surrounding the question
> of pregnancy termination, whether we call it abortion or
> not. I will not repeat them here, but I wouldn't want to
> be party to a cooperative decision that went wrong ....

I think that you're saying "cooperative situation" when you
mean "decision externally forced upon the mother." I
certainly don't agree with forcing the decision.