Auras of Books
Mar 11, 2006 08:10 AM
by carlosaveline cardoso aveline
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ON THE ‘AURAS’ OF SOME BOOKS
Carlos Cardoso Aveline
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Latin American writer Jorge Luis Borges (1899-1986) considered books as
semi-magic objects. Although he would not use the word aura, he clearly
sensed the presence of a subtle energy around them. A student of Kabalah
and ancient literature, Borges seems to have known many a deep aspect of the
occult philosophy in the last years of his life.
In the 1970s – while I lived in Buenos Aires – two friends and I had a
long conversation with him. Those four hours and a half had a lasting
impact on my perception of things. By then Borges was already old and
blind, and had to write his books by dictation. But he kept buying books
for himself and made no secret of the reason. During one of his public talks
in Buenos Aires, he said to hundreds of persons, keeping his lifeless eyes
typically fixed at some vague, abstract region in the space immediately
above his head:
“I have this cult for the book. (...) I keep playing at not being blind;
I keep buying books and filling my house with them. Someone gave me the
other day the Brockhause Encyclopedia. I felt the presence of the book at
home. I felt it like a kind of happiness. There they were, over twenty
volumes with their gothic characters which I can’t read, with the maps
and illustrations that I can’t see, and yet the book was there. I felt like
a friendly radiation coming from that book. The book is one of the
possibilities of happiness that we have as men.” (1)
Books do have “auras’, indeed. Unfortunately, not all of them are quite
healthy. Life is not easy, and some books have rather sickening auras, as
one of the Adept-Teachers who inspire the theosophical movement indicated.
Referring to a book edited by Mrs. Annie Besant in the years before she
entered the Theosophical Society, the Master said:
“I would rather avoid the unpleasant discussion (...) I have not read the
work – nor ever will; but I have its unclean spirit, its brutal aura
before me (...) The sooner we leave the subject, the better.” (2)
More than one century later, the book entitled “The Letters of H. P.
Blavatsky - Volume I” , edited by Mr. John Algeo and published by the USA
T.P.H. in 2003, might be in the same broad category of books with an
“unhealthy aura”. Mr. Algeo included in it forged texts full of disgusting
lies and libels, cleverly mixed among authentic documents. In those pages
H.P. Blavatsky – the woman who worked day and night for the good of mankind
and who gave the world such wonderful books as “The Voice of the Silence”
and “The Secret Doctrine” – is made to describe herself as a mean person;
a Russian spy (“letter” 07); someone who helped torture a cat to death
during “occult” experiences (“letter” 76); someone who would like to sell
her soul (“letter” 53); and someone whom the devil got into trouble in her
youth (“letter” 69) – to name but a few examples of Mr. John Algeo’s
“work”.
Out of the 136 “letters” published by Mr. John Algeo, at least 27
documents are certainly false.(3) That makes 20 percent of the total. One
out of five letters of the volume is false. Nearly all the 27 forged
documents are deeply offensive to H .P. Blavatsky, and more treacherously so
since they are presented as if signed by HPB herself. Mr. Algeo, who happens
to be the international vice-president of the Theosophical Society, Adyar,
has accomplished what no anti-theosophical initiative had done so far: a
serious, partially successful attempt to have the worst falsehoods against
the Old Lady included in the so-called theosophical literature and, worse,
in the very body of books which are ascribed to Helena Petrovna Blavatsky.
A single woman travelling around the world in that rigid and authoritarian
society of the 19th century, H.P.B. used her brilliant pen to tirelessly
denounce the blind dogmas of the different religions and churches; to
propose universal brotherhood as the only real basis for world peace; to
criticize the scientific ilusions of her time, and to bring to the world the
wisdom of all times, which is always simultaneously new and ancient. But in
the short term she disturbed many established routines and could only offer
to people a dangerous, difficult, steep and narrow way to inner truth in
their own hearts. She had but a few loyal friends to help her face many
powerful enemies, who were ready to do anything to stop or hinder her work.
Libelling her was one of the first things to do.
More than one century later, it seems we are dealing with a renewed
attempt to destroy her at the moral level and thus prevent or make it more
difficult for Adyar theosophists to come back to the original teachings and
“rediscover” them, now that the neo-theosophy of Mr. Charles Leadbeater
loses its strength.
NOTES:
(1) "Conversando com Jorge Luis Borges" (Talking to Jorge Luis Borges),
Carlos Cardoso Aveline, a text published in the portuguese magazine
“Biosofia”, Lisbon, Summer 2001, pp. 10-13, see p. 12.
(2) The Mahatma Letters to A.P. Sinnett, TUP edition, 1992, Letter
LXXXVI, page 405, lower half of the page. In the 1972 Adyar edition of t he
Mahatma Letters, see p. 399. In the Philippines TPH, 1993, Chronological
edition, it is the Letter 119, p. 408.
(3) This is an initial assessment. Further research may reveal the number
is actually greater and – besides the 27 false letters – one of the three
versions presented by Algeo of his “Letter 117” is certainly false, too.
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[ The full text of this article can be seen in “The Aquarian Theosophist”
Supplement, March 2006, pp. 11-15. Its title is “Why We Need a Volume
With the Authentic Letters of H.P.B.”. You will find it in
http://teosofia.com/AT.html ]
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