RE: BASIC THEOSOPHICAL CONCEPTS
Jan 26, 2006 06:33 AM
by W.Dallas TenBroeck
1/26/2006 6:23 AM
Dear Gerry:
I cannot make any statements on the “esoteric” (secret and hidden) since, by
definition, the moment they are published they cease being so, and become
EXOTERIC.
We may title some explanations “esoteric” but are they ?
In considering, for instance, our UNIVERSE, yes, it is the only one we
cognize in part, But behind that has to be cause and law that together
project it into objectivity and the kind of life e know – speaking
generally.
I would say that those ancient and still unknown energies an purposes may be
logically inferred, but not defined.
Behind and within our known universe I am sure there is a Universe, and
behind and within THAT there are UNIVERSES UPON UNIVERSES unending.
Infinity and eternity, to my mind, stand for only partial expressions of the
inexpressible. And still the Buddha’s expression: “All compound things are
perishable,” remains as a truism.
“Reality” lies within the mind of their present THINKER. But where does
that THINKER draw its origin? Why is there the concept (logically derived)
of “Independence” and “FREE-THOUGHT?”
My point of view is of necessity from the level of the embodied mind
(KAMA-MANAS). It is “real” for me, but also can be seen as a perch in a
transitory and ever changing Universe.
To me the real question is: “Why do we need in each configuration a “perch”
or a sense of continuing permanency? How far back does MEMORY extend?
We know this body of ours – the temporary and ever changing physical vesture
-- expires – and then, the experiences (stored as memories) go where? Is
this not the basis for the Jataka Tales? -- and the doctrine of
REINCARNATION (which is based on KARMA – everlasting LAW) ?
Please see notes below.
Dallas
==================================================
-----Original Message-----
From: Gerald Schueler [mailto:gschueler@earthlink.net]
Sent: Tuesday, January 24, 2006 6:31 AM
To: Theosophy Study List
Subject: RE: BASIC THEOSOPHICAL CONCEPTS
GS I find Dal's Theosophical Concepts to be very exoteric and so I am
interjecting a little esotericism. The Theosophical teachings from Dal here
are from the viewpoint of imputational reality, and my comments are laregly
from the viewpoint of ultimate reality. There is no real conflict.
TB BASIC THEOSOPHICAL CONCEPTS
1. The Universe is All. IT has no limits, either in space
or in time. It is Immortal. It is Life.
GS Our universe is limited to this time and this space. Time and Space
are
themselves limited and come into existence with the universe and also go
out with it. Our universe is only one of countless universes. HPB defines
our solar universe and our family universe separately, and so how we
describe it depends on how we define it.
====================================
TB AGREED – But what is behind those ? What causes them?
=====================================
TB 2. The Universe operates under cyclic Law. Law cannot be
broken. It supports universal progression.
Morally It can be said to provide justice and compassion to
all beings. Universe = Nature in toto.
GS Universal progression is a mayavic illusion based on a false
assumption.
Morality and justice are not necessarily on the same page, and both are
human conceptualizations that do not exist outside our own human minds.
==========================================
DT If morality and justice are “human conceptions” what is their
probable UNIVERSAL OR kosmic SOURCE ?
Does KARMA play a part there ? I mean both universal and individual Karma.
============================================
DT 3. Each being is a unit of Life. In its essence it is
a ray of the Universal One. The unit is variously
called" Monad, or "Life-atom," etc... it is a
"perpetual motion machine" and is an immortal
entity, it passes through all evolutionary
processes, acquiring intelligence and
experience.
It is analogous to a solar system, or to a galaxy.
GS There is no such thing as an "immortal entity" because all things in
conditional reality are compounds, not entities. Entities are imputations
and exist only in imputational reality.
===============================================
DT If the idea and the word designation “entity” are phantasms, where
does the concept arise? What necessitates it ?
Does NATURE (UNIVERSE) do anything unnecessary?
================================================
DT 4. Every being shares in the immortality of the One in its
essence. It therefore cannot be destroyed or
annihilated as a Unit of Life. Life or energy
is universal, and in its diversity it animates
every "unit of life."
GS Nothing whatever in conditional or imputational realities are
immortal or
eternal. Nothing exists independently. Every "unit of life" is a mayavic
illusion and has only an imputational reality.
===================================================
DT I agree that nothing material or conditioned has either eternity or
fixed and immutable form.
I think if everything is the result of interdependence, the perceptive
consciousness out-lives any form. If correct, then what is IT ? ]
=================================================
DT 5. In essence each "part" (Unit of Life), is united
through 'electro-magnetic' links with all others.
There is one whole; only the 'units' seem to be
separate, divided from one-another in terms of our
gross perceptions of "matter." Their unity is the
basis for cooperation expressed in brief as
Universal Brotherhood. >>
We cannot really separate out a single "unit of life" except in an
imputational and relative sense. The "electro-magnetic link" is called
Fohat. The unity of the entire living and conscious network that is our
manvantaric universe is called conditional reality. When we impute beings
and objects to this, we create imputational reality. Ultimate reality, our
true thoroughly established nature, is monadic which means nondual.
========================================
DT 5. To make a physical form each 'unit' draws together
other units of lesser experience than itself on the
"Ladder of Being."
The idea of hosts of monads combining together to form material objects is
an imputational reality and is fraught with logic problems such as, How can
immaterial monads have spacial extension? Beings per se are imputational,
let along those posited to have "lesser experince."
====================================================
DT As I understand it the MONAD is NOT defined by the physical plane of
existence at all. It ever remains the cause We may think of it as an
“energy” –
And, to make it logical to us, we endow it with the attribute of eternity,
impersonality, and permanence – also, capable of traversing any plane of
manifested existence (as in Samadhi) as a unit of SPIRIT-MATTER.
=======================================================
DT In doing that it makes itself responsible for their growth and
well-being.
GS The idea of responsibillty for the monads that comprise our body is
based
on the false asumptions of our own personal self and of the selves of those
monads. We make imputatons and then we feel responsible for them and we do
so because we worry more about ethics than compassion.
================================================
DT Can the “falseness” be elaborated on ?
If we impress immature Monads with errors and false values of living
(anti-law) are we not responsible ? What is “evil?”
================================================
DT Just as a "teacher" makes himself responsible for the
progress of many pupils. It should be noted that
while the "Teacher" offers instruction based on
his experience, it is the responsibility of the
"pupils" to test and adopt it when they are
satisfied as to its accuracy. We call this, in
general terms : Evolution, when viewed as a whole.
GS What "lessons" our life-atoms learn from comprising our body, we can
only
wonder. The idea that there are living beings who need to learn and evolve
is an imputational idea based on false assumptions. Evolution is a human
conceptualization, an interpretation of our experiences in timeful
imputational reality.
==================================================
DT Of what value is any speculation unless it is an extension of
knowledge and / or wisdom already understood?
What "false assumptions" permit "imputational thought ?"
Even "imputation" needs a basis -- either true or false, not may be ????
=================================================
DT 6. Any "form," serves temporarily as a place for
those beings of lesser experience to acquire more ex-
perience and thus have opportunity to "advance."
Under the operation of LAW, Karma, they acquire,
each in its own way, a wider experience, a higher
degree of consciousness. All those who have not
yet reached the "human-mind" state, are called
non-self-conscious "life-atoms." They are
incipient men-to-be. They inform for the moment,
the elemental, mineral, vegetable and animal
kingdoms, or divisions, of Nature.
GS Form is one of the five skandhas, and requires the elements for
material
substances. As a skandha, it is conditional, but the forms themselves are
imputational. The whole notion of "wider experience" and "higher degress of
consciousness" implies a linear evolutionary development that is totally
illogical. The scientific model of evolution, the Big Bang, starts with the
illogical assumption of a dense hunk of matter that explodes. This is an
example of the logic problems associated with origins, such as the old
chick and egg problem. Conditional reality logically has no beginning and
no end.
============================================
DT To me "imputational" means "imagined" or thought-formed.
An image in the mind is formed. Why? How? What purpose has it? A
"skandha" to me implies a modification has been imposed on the basic Monad.
Are "Monads" unacceptable?
I agree that the "Big Bang theory" is illogical. Yet where does the idea
come from?
If one starts with "matter only" then whence is energy and such limits as it
might devise or impose?
Who or where is the "Image maker?"
The question of CAUSE remains to be answered.
"Linear AND Spherical (all sensitive) evolution are to me, only a way of
looking at either the whole picture, or at the progress of a single
INTELLIGENCE (Monad). Since both are employed there must be a reason for
them to exist. By themselves they disregard too many factors of evidence.
How are they to be reconciled?
Yes "form" is one of the 5 skandhas ---- so I agree it is transitory, a
tool, an instrument -- but no "skandha" is "ME."
As a thinking UNIT (Monad), I recognize that I have to live in a "form" and
its deficiencies on this material plane in this life until it falls apart
from old age and decrepitude. ?
That does not mean that my MIND ages or becomes inoperative. Neither does
it imply that the CONTROLLER OF THE MIND [ the "ME" ] vanishes, either
wholly or partially. The brain as a part of the form obviously deteriorates
in its main work as a kind of a translator.
=================================================
DT 7. When the level of self-consciousness (mind, manas,
man, soul) is achieved by any of the "lives," it
proceeds further, as a human being, through the
process of reincarnation, using many successive
physical bodies. All live in the same framework
of law, progression and mutual support. The
whole evolutionary scheme is a vast brotherhood.
In the man-mind condition/stage, progress is by
trial/error, and thus the awareness or attentive
faculty is developed as the individual studies
the operation of universal laws operating in and
around him.
GS Linear evolution is not logical. The human need for meaning in life
is
the sole goad to us to impute evolutionary entities. We find comfort in
thinking that we are growing and evolving, that we evolve through
reincarnarnation just like we grow during a single life. But death just
starts a new life. HPB's evolutionary scheme, like any and all evolutionary
schemes, is imputational.
================================================
DTB I don't see what "linearity" has to do with this. No one can
abandon the central and all-enveloping fact that we are surrounded by
sentient entities of various levels of intelligence (including humans) - so
in fact we are at the center of a "sphere" and simultaneously impinge of
others' spheres as they do on us. So sphericity is synthetic, and draws all
of us out of the errors of pure linearity. How do we learn to deal with so
many ? Our eyes and ears do it and the brain learns to handle this vast
multiplicity on behalf of the ME -- SINGULARITY ? Yes / NO ?
What is the ENTITY that note and receives or rejects such experiences? Why
is / was such a system (to use for consideration) evolved ?
Is living solely for sensation of pleasure? Can pleasure or bliss be
created without contrast? Whence comes pain and sorrow? {Buddha's FIRST
TRUTH)
How is this brought to a close [ 2nd TRUTH ] ?
==================================================
DT 8. Like the Universe, man is seven-fold in constitution:
1. Spirit - Atman, (a "Ray" of the Divine.
2. Discrimination-Intuition-Conscience
- Buddhi, ( memory of experiences)
3. Thinking, Intellection, Reason,
- Mind - Manas, (choice & free will
4. Emotion, Sensation, Selfishness -
- Kama, ( desire, passion )
5. Vitality, Life-energy, magnetism -
- Prana, Jiva (vitality, life-force)
6. Electro-magnetic model form -
- Astral body, (electro-magnetic form)
7. Physical Body. (Known to us.)
GS Like the universe, man is imputational. Skandhas and elements and
principles are all conditional. Take a hard look at the list here and try
to find a "human being" in it. We observe elements and skandhas working
though principles, and we impute a human being based on that but no human
being really exists as such.
=================================================
DT That's because the HUMAN BEING is behind or within.
==================================================
DT 9. The Universe, Man, and all other beings go through an
evolutionary cycle which is seven-fold, covering an immense time,
during which each being passes through every one of the seven phases
that this seven-fold scheme provides, so that each may secure the
highest degree of perfection by its own experiences and voluntary
decisions. All progress is by self-effort.
=========
GS The Theosophical separation of seven, our so-called sevenfold
nature, is an
interpretation, an arbitrary division, a model. Other schemes, other
models, also exist and can be used. Not only is all progress by
self-effort, but all progress is also a dream-like illusion.
==================================
DT Not according to the "Ancient Wisdom." and Buddhism.
What can a "dream-like" illusion be ? Any analogy ?
==================================
DT 10. The self-conscious man, in which Manas (mind) or
self-consciousness is the active principle, makes decisions.
===============
GS Because there is no self except imputationally, there can be no
self-consciousness. Self-consciousness is an illusion. The manovijnana look
inward and sees the alayavijnana and imputes a self to it, but no
self-consciousness exists. [ MEANS WHAT ? ]
Consciousness as manas can focus on the other
principles, can focus on the skandhas, and can focus on the elements, but
cannot focus on itself because there is none, only what we impute based on
what we can focus on. The self is not findable. There is a difference
between not being findable and not existing per se. The self does exist. It
exists as an imputational entity. We can impute it, but we cannot find or
observe it.
================================
DT I agree that from the point of view of the "form" and its limited
consciousness this is true. But the form is indeed a passing thing. So one
has to seek something with greater validity. I know perfectly well that "I"
exist. The rest may be maya of various kinds and on various planes, But that
does not make them useful to me, to all of us, and to themselves, as we may
impute to them an entitative existence to make their presence logical and
useful to themselves and the rest of the UNIVERSE.
=================================
DT Motive actuates Karma.
==============
GS Karma mean "action" and so it is inherent in our continuum of Space
and
Motion. If I stand in the rain, I will get wet no matter my motive.
==================
DT Why stand in the rain without good reason? Motive = reason, to
me.
==================
DT If the decisions are universally-based, 'good' and progress
for the unit, and the whole accrues rapidly. Should decisions be
self-focused, as opposed to the general good, 'evil' results. Karma thus
actuated, teaches the unit through disciplining circumstances what the
ideal decisions ought to be. Thus evolution proceeds. All karmic events
are the direct result of the choices that are individually made.
===============
GS Karma, the law of conditional reality, has taught most of us what is
called
imputational reality. Karma teaches most of us more "bad" things than
"good" things. Karma is conditional and timeful. Causality is imputational
and timeful, an interpretation based on our imputational observations over
time. The notion that we are entities with choices is imputational. There
is no karma, and there are no choices, in the timeless.
==================
DT Karma IS A UNIVERSAL AND IMPERSONAL LAW -- if we contravene it then
we distort the smooth evolutionary "path." The response from impartial
Nature (through karma) is corrective, as I see it. Of course the purpose and
nature of LAW require discussion and definition -- as the Buddha did in the
3 RD TRUTH -- bringing pain and sorrow to a close through understanding
-- and then the 4 TH TRUTH -- the WAY (or PATH ) OPENS.
============================
DT 11. Graduates from this "School-of-Life" face the choice or
responsibility of becoming, in their turn, "teachers." That is, of
actively
assisting in the process of diffusing and explaining this universal
process. They are superior men. [ Similar to the Professors in our
Universities.]
====================
GS As a "school of life" our world is dismal to say the best. Graduates
graduate in spite of reincarnation and karma, not because of it. The
statistical average goes through seven Rounds. A few lag behind. A few go
faster than the norm. All of this is imputational interpreting.
=====================
DT 12. These are designated Sages, Wise Men, Adepts,
Masters-of-Wisdom, Arhats, Bodhisattvas, Buddhas, Dhyan Chohans,
Tathagatas, Prophets, etc...
[ In history we may name Jesus, Gautama the Buddha, Krishna,
Pythagoras, Lao Tse, Plato, Shankaracharya, Apollonius of Tyana, and many
others.] They all came as reformers, if their original teachings are
compared -- they all taught the same metaphysical doctrines and practical
ethics.]
=======================
GS The only difference between Joe Sixpack and Buddha is in their
respective
viewpoint. Joe accepts an imputational viewpoint. Buddha accepts an
ultimate viewpoint. Otherwise, there is no difference whatsoever.
DT ok 6-PACK HAS atma-buddhi-manas IN LATENCY ?
DT 13. The process of securing experience by mankind is
called reincarnation. The "Life-atom" that is self-
conscious, or the Real Man, uses a physical body which is
assembled, as above described for it to live in. In this
life process it not only advances (or recedes) depending on
its choices, but at the same time serves to assist and
elevate by its example the whole mass of "life-atoms" for
which it has specific karmic responsibilities. >>
GS Reincarnation is an interpretation based on our observations in
imputational reality. Only the skandhas reincarnate.
=================================
DT Are skandhas and Monads synonymous?
==================================
DT At death the man-consciousness passes first into a
state called Kama-Loka, where a separation between the
moral and the immoral occurs.
GS Kamaloka has nothing to do with morality. The idea that it does so
is an
imputational interpretation. Kamaloka is an event or experience on the
astral plane; the separation of the lower four principles from the upper
three. It has nothing to do with morality or ethics or the duality of
good/evil.
========================================
DT Then what is the use of DEVACHAN ? If that is permitted
========================================
DT A “Second death" occurs in a
short while and the immoral side of one's nature is allowed
to disintegrate gradually in the astral plane of Kama-Loka.
=======================================
How can an "immortal side of one's nature" disintegrate? This kind of
illogic makes non-Theosophists laugh at us.
=======================================
DT Theosophy of course goes a lot further: [To reinforce that which I
had abbreviated: Read The KEY TO THEOSOPHY, or The OCEAN OF THEOSOPHY to
secure the complete doctrine -- The skandhas (monads) separate as the life
power [Prana/jiva] that has held the form together during earth-life
dissipates.
===========================================
DT The higher, immortal Ego, the moral side of our being,
=======================
GS The Ego has nothing to do with morality. It is the three principles
of
atma, buddhi, and manas, operating together as if it were a single entity,
which it is not. Above these is the paramatman, and beyond that is the
Monad.
DT [see bellow please]
=================================================
DT ... passes into a state called Devachan, which has three stages
1st the rupa-loka, where the consciousness of the Ego is
occupied with the aspirational and noble feelings, thoughts
and actions of the last personal life. This process of
assimilation being over, the MIND-EGO enters a spiritual
plane where, united with the "Ray" of the Universal Spirit,
it is quasi-omniscient.
DT [see bellow please]
===================
GS The devachan of HPB is not the spiritual dewachan of Tibetan
Buddhism as
they are on two different planes. Devachan is on the mental plane. It is
the "land of the gods" where "god" is the highest of the six living beings
described by Buddha. In devachan, we are in the realm of the gods, and
there are two kinds, asauras and devas. In Buddhism rupa-loka is the form
realm which equates to HPB's three upper spiritual planes, which appear
formless to us in the kama-loka or desire realm (Buddhism's kama-loka is
not HPB's kamaloka). This first stage is one of mental dream-like
projection.
DT [see bellow please]
================================
DT This 2nd stage is called the
arupa-loka [formless stage]. In that condition it is able
to review the life last lived within the perspective of all
previous lives, and thus trace the line of its Karma.
===================================
GS This arupa-loka is not the same as Buddhism's arupa-loka which
equates to
the highest three planes in the ten-plane Theosophical universe model. The
ability to be conscious in this state is not available to most of us.
===================================
DT The 3rd stage is one of preparation for a new incarnation, and
it begins to draw to itself those personal elements
(skandhas) which will be used to make up its new
personality.
======================
GS While the Ego is in devachan, the upper Higher Self is traveling
through
the outer rounds of the family universe. Preparation for rebirth is not
done in devachan, which is on the mental plane, but in the kamaloka of the
astral plane, where those four lower principles await the re-uniion. All of
this is imputational. When we leave devachan and return to the kamaloka in
preparation for rebirth in one of the six realms we "die" in that
devachanic state. This is the only real "pain" and "suffering" experienced
in devachan.
=========================================
DT THE doctrines of THEOSOPHY state it differently -- I can print them
out for you to consider -- I have already done this earlier. Let me know.
In brief:
"The first question, however, must be "What is the cause for passing into
Devachan?" Some have said that it is good Karma or good acts that take us
and keep us there, but this is a very incomplete reply. Of course, in the
sense that it is happiness to go into that state, it may be called good
Karma. But it does not follow that the man whose life is good, passed in
constant unselfish work for others without repining, and free from desire to
have somewhere his reward, will go to Devachan.
Yet his Karma must be good; it must act on him, however, in other lives, for
the earth-life is the place where such Karma has its operation. But if at
the same time that he is thus working for others he wishes for release or
for some place or time when and where he may have rest, then, of course, he
must go to Devachan for a period which will be in proportion to the
intensity of those desires.
Again, it should not be forgotten that the soul must have some rest. Were
it, before becoming bright as the diamond, hard as adamant, and strong as
steel, to go on working, working through earth-life after earth-life without
a break between, it must at last succumb to the strain and come to nothing.
Nature therefore has provided for it a place of rest -- in Devachan; and
that we should thankfully accept if it falls to our lot.
But does Devachan suffer in the comparison made between it and this life on
earth? To me it seems not. Human life is as great an illusion as any. To the
sage Ribhu, Vishnu said it was the longest-lived reign of fancy. To say that
it is a terrible thing to think of a mother in Devachan enjoying its bliss
while the child is suffering on earth, is to prefer one illusion over
another, to hug a philosophical error to the breast. Both states are out of
the true, while the Ego, who is the real witness, sees the lower personality
struggling with these phantoms while it, whether the body be living or its
other parts be in Devachan, enjoys eternal felicity. It sits on high
unmoved, immovable.
The great verse in the Isa-Upanishad settles this matter for me in these
words:
"What room is there for sorrow and what for doubt in him who knows that all
spiritual beings are the same in kind, though differing in degree."
Therefore if I believe this, I must also know that, no matter whether I and
my best beloved are in Devachan or on earth, they and I must forever partake
of the highest development attained by the greatest of sages, for, as they
and I are spiritual beings, we must have communion forever on the higher
planes of our being.
Then, again, the fact seems to be lost sight of that each night we go into a
sort of Devachan - the dream state or sleep without dream. The loving
mother, no matter how unfortunate or evil her child, must sleep, and in that
state she may have dreams of her loved ones around her in just the very
condition of mind and body she would have them enjoy. If Devachan be
objectionable, why not also rebel against our necessary sleep which acts on
our physical frame to give it rest, as Devachan does upon our more ethereal
parts? ...
And from watching the mental processes in dreams we know that, in the space
of time taken for a bell to drop from the table to the floor, one may dream
through a whole lifetime, with all the incidents of each day and hour packed
into such a limited period....
Devachan, however, is not a meaningless or useless state. In it we are
rested; that part of us which could not bloom under the chilling skies of
earth-life bursts forth into flower and goes back with us to another life
stronger and more a part of our nature than before; our strength is revived
for another journey between deaths. Why shall we repine that nature kindly
aids us in the interminable struggle; why thus ever keep the mind revolving
about this petty personality and its good or evil fortune? "
W.Q.J. PATH Sept. 1890
---------------------------------------------------------
Best wishes as always, and thanks
Dal
------------------------------------------
Jerry S.
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