Theos-Talk Archives (July 2006 Message tt00310)

Carlos Aveline and Radha Burnier have been corresponding with respect to
re-opening The Judge Case.  Carlos recently sent me his follow up letter
to Radha's response.  I wanted to make a few comments on the contents of
this exchange.  Carlos started as follows:  Like our previous
letters, this is an open text dealing with public issues.   In April
2006, I wrote you about the importance of Adyar Theosophical Society
re-examining and repairing the injustice done to William Judge in
1894-95. In May 22nd, you kindly answered:    "Dear Brother Aveline,
I am in receipt of your letter of 13 April,  and thank you for  the
suggestions made. Being confined to a small area, at least physically,
perhaps you do not realize how much work there is to be done for the
dissemination of Theosophy, and strengthening bonds of brotherhood
everywhere.  I do not see the point of reopening the Judge case and
using one's time and  energy on events long past. Except for a few
people like you, nobody is preoccupied with past affairs, because they
are more focused with the work to be done now.  With best wishes, yours
fraternally, Radha Burnier."   Assuming Radha to be a fair
individual with no agenda, her response must be understood in the
following manner.  Presumably, Carlos presented an argument for opening
the Judge Case.  Radha responded that she was not persuaded by the
argument and consequently felt that her efforts would be more wisely
placed in other areas of work.  What we do not know is why Radha felt
unmoved by Carlos' arguments.  In addition, I am not certain as to why
Radha felt that she had to personally do anything other than make an
executive decision to allow responsible historians into the archives. 
Those historians who are presumably interested in the case would be
doing all the work.  If Radha chose to, she could ignore the whole
debate and continue focussing "on the work to be done now."  By denying
access, this demonstrates paradoxically, that Radha is indeed interested
in past affairs and is willing to expend time and resources in fending
off responsible historians' free access to the archives.  It would seem
then that the obvious course of action would be to pin down Radha's
objections to the arguments put forward by Carlos, ask her to do nothing
other than make an executive decision to allow access to the archives,
and point out the paradox of refusing to do so.  After discussing the
history of the Movement, Carlos brings forward the following point:  
As to the danger in keeping the wrong kind of secrets, please take
into consideration this sentence from  the full text of the 1900 Letter,
which is said to have been sent by one of the Masters to Annie Besant,
but which was kept secret by Adyar as long as Adyar could:  
"MISLEADING SECRECY HAS GIVEN THE DEATH BLOW TO NUMEROUS
ORGANIZATIONS."(1)  It is important to consider, here, that such a
sentence does not refer necessarily to the  physical death blow. For a
spiritual organization, moral and ethical death is worse than the
physical one.    I am not suggesting  that Adyar is morally dead; yet  I
believe that its vitality – and the vitality of the theosophical
movement as a whole – suffers badly  from various unresolved issues
in the past.  The fact is  that one can only get rid of the past after
one learns the lessons from it. "Liberty from the past" cannot
be an escape from it, nor its denial.   The quote from "The Letters From
the Masters of the Wisdom" series is often attributed to a genuine
Mahatma Letter.  When this letter is read as coming from an elemental
reflecting back at Besant all her doubts and concerns from that time, it
reads equally fascinating.  Instead of a warning from the Master we read
Besant's concern that her "MISLEADING SECRECY" is going to destroy the
Society.  Besant is telling us that she has been misleading the Society.
Further, the above concerns about learning the lessons of the past is
considered in my previous post:
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/theos-talk/message/34565 This post makes
it clear why these injustices of the past have to be addressed and why
they are considered by some as the MOST IMPORTANT theosophical work of
our time.  After further discussing the history of the Movement, Carlos
makes the following observations:   It is amazing how useful
History can be.  The more we learn from the past, the more liberty we
have from it.             Due to the importance of the Adyar TS for the
movement as a whole, the effects of its past mistakes have extended
their influence over the ever-changing "present time" of the
movement, from the 1890s through 2006. And this influence may take some
more time to find its due karmic compensation.   At this point, as a
student, I must say that I deeply and sincerely thank you, Ms. Radha, 
for something I consider of real importance.     I will always recognize
– provided you do not change your position – the fact that you
kept away from the attempt, led by your vice-president John Algeo, to
adopt as part of the theosophical literature, and in fact as part of H.
P. Blavatsky's own writings, a collection with some of  the  worst
and most  infamous  libels and slanders ever fabricated against H.P.B.
A shameful act indeed, perpetrated by your vice-president.  I wonder how
that could ever happen to  the Adyar T. S.  Whatever the answer, Ms.
Radha,  at least your June 2004 letter about Mr. Algeo's spurious
volume of "HPB Letters" helps clarify the  facts to the many
honest students who are members of the Adyar TS.  Although it is
regrettable that you could not stop Mr. John Algeo, your 2004 letter to
me is significant because it shows that he does not have your
"presidential blessings" to slander H.P.B.,  or to unjustly
attack her in the  poorly disguised  way he did.    Circulating old lies
and criminal slanders against Helena Petrovna – and doing this in
the name of a "Theosophical" Publishing House  –  is 
certainly a strong sign that History lessons have been forgotten.    I
think it is valuable that Carlos brought up this paraphrasing of Radha's
stance with respect to "The Letters".  It will be valuable to have her
confirm this understanding as another reading of her stance might be
that of indifference.  Could it be that she does not endorse Algeo's
editorial stance because she doesn't care?  Perhaps Radha is more
interested in Krishnamurti and his teachings and perceives all this
Blavatsky nonsense as  a distractions from "the work to be done now." 
Finally Carlos ends by bringing the focus back to Judge:   The
same happens with the ambiguous position of the Adyar TS about the
persecution against William Judge.  Thinking of this,  I wrote to you
and suggested that the Adyar TS could either show proofs of Judge's
guilt or declare him innocent of  "forging  messages from the
Mahatmas".   In the meantime, as no one should be afraid of truth,
historians and researchers could be authorized by you to examine 
related documents in the Adyar Archives.   In taking such important
decisions, you might consider that even the Vatican, under John Paul II,
has apologized for its past mistakes made many centuries ago with regard
to the Jewish people, to the American indigenous peoples,  to
individuals considered "heretics", etc.  I hope Adyar can follow
that example sooner than later.   Carlos points out the minimum that
should be expected from Adyar, getting out of the way of the historians
and challenging Adyar to surpass this low bar as set by the Catholic
Church in recognizing the wrongs of the past.  I hope the president is
not preoccupied by the important "work to be done now".  Bruce


[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]