Theos-Talk Archives (December 2005 Message tt00049)

December 9, 2005

Dear Sveinn Freyr and Friends:

Let me quote from a recent letter:

"	One of the stimulating factors we can take into consideration when
we think of defending HPB and her work is that she is not really dead.
There is no death for a soul like the one who was once born under the name
of Helena Petrovna von Hahn. 

Another practical reason is that the work and life-example of such a soul is
now, as it will be in the future, of great importance as an occult and
magnetic bridge between mankind and the Elder Brothers." 


You ask: "Can you please tell me, why has "HPB has fallen in discredit" ...
and what is the meaning of the word: "neotheosophy"?"


It would be better to ask directly the author of those questions to explain,
than for any of us to speculate -- 

Lets get some ideas clear:


A	HPB is alive and not "dead." 

B	The Mahatmas exist.

C	THEOSOPHY is the continuous record of the laws, processes and
history of manifestation.  

D	The trace of its age-old presence is shown to us in ISIS UNVEILED
and the SECRET DOCTRINE and in HPB's many articles.

---------------


1	HPB will always be in "discredit" among the materialists and those
who desire to argue white is black.

2 "neo" (new ?) theosophy" has nothing to do with ancient and
immemorial THEOSOPHY 


Consider this:

>From the prefaces of ISIS UNVEILED and SECRET DOCTRINE :


ISIS UNVEILED [1877] "It was while most anxious to solve these perplexing
problems ... 

[" We believe in no Magic which transcends the scope and capacity of
the human mind, nor in "miracle," whether divine or diabolical, if such
imply a transgression of the laws of nature instituted from all eternity.
Nevertheless, we accept the saying of the gifted author of Festus, that the
human heart has not yet fully uttered itself, and that we have never
attained or even understood the extent of its powers. Is it too much to
believe that man should be developing new sensibilities and a closer
relation with nature? The logic of evolution must teach as much, if carried
to its legitimate conclusions. If, somewhere, in the line of ascent from
vegetable or ascidian to the noblest man a soul was evolved, gifted with
intellectual qualities, it cannot be unreasonable to infer and believe that
a faculty of perception is also growing in man, enabling him to descry facts
and truths even beyond our ordinary ken. Yet we do not hesitate to accept
the assertion of Biffι, that "the essential is forever the same. Whether we
cut away the marble inward that hides the statue in the block, or pile stone
upon stone outward till the temple is completed, our NEW result is only an
old idea. The latest of all the eternities will find its destined other
half-soul in the earliest." When, years ago, we first travelled over the
East, exploring the penetralia of its deserted sanctuaries, two saddening
and ever-recurring questions oppressed our thoughts: Where, WHO, WHAT is
GOD? Who ever saw the IMMORTAL SPIRIT of man, so as to be able to assure
himself of man's immortality? ] ...
that we came into contact with certain men, endowed with such mysterious
powers and such profound knowledge that we may truly designate them as the
sages of the Orient. To their instructions we lent a ready ear. 

They showed us that by combining science with religion, the existence of God
and immortality of man's spirit may be demonstrated like a problem of
Euclid. For the first time we received the assurance that the Oriental
philosophy has room for no other faith than an absolute and immovable faith
in the omnipotence of man's own immortal self. 

We were taught that this omnipotence comes from the kinship of man's spirit
with the Universal Soul — God! The latter, they said, can never be
demonstrated but by the former. Man-spirit proves God-spirit, as the one
drop of water proves a source from which it must have come. Tell one who had
never seen water, that there is an ocean of water, and he must accept it on
faith or reject it altogether. But let one drop fall upon his hand, and he
then has the fact from which all the rest may be inferred. After that he
could by degrees understand that a boundless and fathomless ocean of water
existed. Blind faith would no longer be necessary; he would have supplanted
it with KNOWLEDGE. When one sees mortal man displaying tremendous
capabilities, controlling the forces of nature and opening up to view the
world of spirit, the reflective mind is overwhelmed with the conviction that
if one man's spiritual Ego can do this much, the capabilities of the FATHER
SPIRIT must be relatively as much vaster as the whole ocean surpasses the
single drop in volume and potency. 

Ex nihilo nihil fit; prove the soul of man by its wondrous powers — you have
proved God! In our studies, mysteries were shown to be no mysteries. Names
and places that to the Western mind have only a significance derived from
Eastern fable, were shown to be realities. Reverently we stepped in spirit
within the temple of Isis; to lift aside the veil of "the one that is and
was and shall be" at Saοs; to look through the rent curtain of the Sanctum
Sanctorum at Jerusalem; and even to interrogate within the crypts which once
existed beneath the sacred edifice, the mysterious Bath-Kol. The Filia Vocis
— the daughter of the divine voice —
responded from the mercy-seat within the veil,* and science, theology, every
human hypothesis and conception born of imperfect knowledge, lost forever
their authoritative character in our sight. The one-living God had spoken
through his oracle —man, and we were satisfied. Such knowledge is priceless;
and it has been hidden only from those who overlooked it, derided it, or
denied its existence. 
   
    
1	From such as these we apprehend criticism, censure, and perhaps
hostility, although the obstacles in our way neither spring from the
validity of proof, the authenticated facts of history, nor the lack of
common sense among the public whom we address. 

2	The drift of modern thought is palpably in the direction of
liberalism in religion as well as science. Each day brings the reactionists
nearer to the point where they must surrender the despotic authority over
the public conscience, which they have so long enjoyed and exercised. ...
   
Centuries of subjection have not quite congealed the life-blood of men
into crystals around the nucleus of blind faith; and the nineteenth is
witnessing the struggles of the giant as he shakes off the Liliputian
cordage and rises to his feet. Even the Protestant communion of England and
America, now engaged in the revision of the text of its Oracles, will be
compelled to show the origin and merits of the text itself. The day of
domineering over men with dogmas has reached its gloaming. 
    
    
3	Our work, then, is a plea for the recognition of the Hermetic
philosophy, the anciently universal Wisdom-Religion, as the only possible
key to the Absolute in science and theology. To show that we do not at all
conceal from ourselves the gravity of our undertaking, we may say in advance
that it would not be strange if the following classes should array
themselves against us: 
———————	FOOTNOTE	————————————

* Lightfoot assures us that this voice, which had been used in times past
for a testimony from heaven, "was indeed performed by magic art" (vol. ii.,
p. 128). This latter term is used as a supercilious expression, just because
it was and is still misunderstood. It is the object of this work to correct
the erroneous opinions concerning "magic art." ...

4	The Christians, who will see that we question the evidences of
the genuineness of their faith. 
    
5	The Scientists, who will find their pretensions placed in the
same bundle with those of the Roman Catholic Church for infallibility, and,
in certain particulars, the sages and philosophers of the ancient world
classed higher than they. Pseudo-Scientists will, of course, denounce us
furiously. 

6	Broad Churchmen and Freethinkers will find that we do not
accept what they do, but demand the recognition of the whole truth. 
Men of letters and various authorities, who hide their real belief in
deference to popular prejudices. 

7	The mercenaries and parasites of the Press, who prostitute its
more than royal power, and dishonor a noble profession, will find it easy to
mock at things too wonderful for them to understand; for to them the price
of a paragraph is more than the value of sincerity. From many will come
honest criticism; from many — cant. But we look to the future. 
    
8	The contest now going on between the party of public conscience
and the party of reaction, has already developed a healthier tone of
thought. It will hardly fail to result ultimately in the overthrow of error
and the triumph of Truth. We repeat again — we are laboring for the brighter
morrow. 

9	And yet, when we consider the bitter opposition that we are
called upon to face, who is better entitled than we upon entering the arena
to write upon our shield the hail of the Roman gladiator to Cζsar:

MORITURUS TE
SALUTΒT! 
New York, September, 1877. 

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


>From SECRET DOCTRINE [ 1888 ] Preface

This scheme, it must be added, was not in contemplation when the
preparation of the work was first announced. As originally announced, it was
intended that the "Secret Doctrine" should be an amended and enlarged
version of "Isis Unveiled." It was, however, soon found that the
explanations which could be added to those already put before the world in
the last-named and other works dealing with esoteric science, were such as
to require a different method of treatment: and consequently the present
volumes do not contain, in all, twenty pages extracted from "Isis Unveiled."


The author does not feel it necessary to ask the indulgence of her
readers and critics for the many defects of literary style, and the
imperfect English which may be found in these pages. She is a foreigner, and
her knowledge of the language was acquired late in life. The English tongue
is employed because it offers the most widely-diffused medium for conveying
the truths which it had become her duty to place before the world. 

These truths are in no sense put forward as a revelation; nor does the
author claim the position of a revealer of mystic lore, now made public for
the first time in the world's history. For what is contained in this work is
to be found scattered throughout thousands of volumes embodying the
scriptures of the great Asiatic and early European religions, hidden under
glyph and symbol, and hitherto left unnoticed because of this veil. What is
now attempted is to gather the oldest tenets together and to make of them
one harmonious and unbroken whole. The sole advantage which the writer has
over her predecessors, is that she need not resort to personal speculations
and theories. For this work is a partial statement of what she herself has
been taught by more advanced students, supplemented, in a few details only,
by the results of her 
viii
own study and observation. The publication of many of the facts herein
stated has been rendered necessary by the wild and fanciful speculations in
which many Theosophists and students of mysticism have indulged, during the
last few years, in their endeavour to, as they imagined, work out a complete
system of thought from the few facts previously communicated to them. 

It is needless to explain that this book is not the Secret Doctrine in
its entirety, but a select number of fragments of its fundamental tenets,
special attention being paid to some facts which have been seized upon by
various writers, and distorted out of all resemblance to the truth. 

But it is perhaps desirable to state unequivocally that the teachings,
however fragmentary and incomplete, contained in these volumes, belong
neither to the Hindu, the Zoroastrian, the Chaldean, nor the Egyptian
religion, neither to Buddhism, Islam, Judaism nor Christianity exclusively.
The Secret Doctrine is the essence of all these. Sprung from it in their
origins, the various religious schemes are now made to merge back into their
original element, out of which every mystery and dogma has grown, developed,
and become materialised. 

It is more than probable that the book will be regarded by a large
section of the public as a romance of the wildest kind; for who has ever
even heard of the book of Dzyan? 

The writer, therefore, is fully prepared to take all the responsibility
for what is contained in this work, and even to face the charge of having
invented the whole of it. That it has many shortcomings she is fully aware;
all that she claims for it is that, romantic as it may seem to many, its
logical coherence and consistency entitle this new Genesis to rank, at any
rate, on a level with the "working hypotheses" so freely accepted by modern
science. Further, it claims consideration, not by reason of any appeal to
dogmatic authority, but because it closely adheres to Nature, and follows
the laws of uniformity and analogy. 

The aim of this work may be thus stated: to show that Nature is not "a
fortuitous concurrence of atoms," and to assign to man his rightful place in
the scheme of the Universe; to rescue from degradation the archaic truths
which are the basis of all religions; and to uncover, to some extent, the
fundamental unity from which they all spring; finally, to show that the
occult side of Nature has never been approached by the Science of modern
civilization. 

If this is in any degree accomplished, the writer is content. It is
written in the service of humanity, and by humanity and the future
generations it must be judged. Its author recognises no inferior court of
appeal. Abuse she is accustomed to; calumny she is daily acquainted with; at
slander she smiles in silent contempt. 

De minimis non curat lex. 
H.P.B. 
London, October, 1888. 
 



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

Best wishes,

Dallas

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

-----Original Message-----
From: On Behalf Of Sveinn Freyr
Sent: Friday, December 09, 2005 10:28 AM
To: 
Subject: Can you please tell me ? someone on the mail list.

Can you please tell me, why has "HPB has fallen in discredit" ...
and 

what is the meaning of the word: "neotheosophy"?

Sveinn Freyr
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