Theos-Talk Archives (July 2006 Message tt00687)

Dear Friends,

War seems to be the passtime of our Age.  Battles are being fought on
every front.  The battles on the pages of Theos-Talk are a microcosm to
the battles being fought with bullets and bombs elsewhere in the world
today.  Perhaps if we could find a way of establishing a Peace within
our own Society, we might see how such a methodology might be esablished
elsewhere.

It is always good to begin with what you can agree on.  The following
are a set of axioms that I hope that all members of the Theosophical
Movement might agree on:

1. The truth that the Theosophical Movement (tTM) has no dogmas.
2. The truth that tTM puts truth above all.
3. The truth that tTM ecourages Universal Brotherhood as a means to self
growth.
4. The truth that tTM encourages the study of Comparative Religion,
Science, and Philosophy as well as the study of the Laws of Nature and
Powers latent in Man as a means to self growth.
5. The truth that HPB, WQJ, and the Masters produced a body of work that
provides a particular vocabulary for use in the Movement.
6. The truth that the Movement's only reason for being is for its own
propogation with the understanding that a search for truth and a
practice of Universal Brotherhood as advanced by the Movement will make
Humanity nobler.
7. The truth that all members of the Movement are beholden to protect
the Movement and further its interests to the best of their abilities.

The Movement must be distinquished from theosophy in general.  There can
be theosophists who practice theosophy in its general sense who have
never heard of the Movement or its founders.

Just because the writings of HPB, WQJ and the Masters provide the
foundation for discussion within the Movement does not mean there are
not other or even theosophically nobler writers.  All that is meant here
is that we have to have a common foundation for discussion and because
of the axioms of the Society that foundation must be the founders for
nobody has the authority to provide any better.  This is due to axiom 1.

Here then is the argument that flows from the above axioms.  When Olcott
accused HPB of using the authority of the Masters to lend credence to
her opinions as found in the "Prayag Letter", Olcott should have been
ruled out of order according to Axiom 1.  His allegation was not
provable so the only reason the members had for agreeing with him at
that time is because they viewed him as an authority on HPB and her
writings.  This was in direct oposition to Axiom 1 and consequently
Axiom 7 (through their ignorance).   Besant committed the same error
when she accused Judge.  Even, if as she says, the Masters put her up to
it, this would be a case of making the Masters the Authority, and
thereby introducing dogma into the Movement.  True Masters would have
realised this and not have done it, and if they did it was Besant's duty
to argue against such a course as she had no way of independantly
proving it.  What if in either case the Masters had provided testimony
by letter.  Such testimony would be believed by some, regarded as fraud
by others.  In other words it would have been evidence but not proof as
there would be no way to ultimately verify the letters.  The only
verification for each theosophist is his own conscience.

If you believed Besant and or Olcott, you could be accused of creating
authorities and destroying the Movement as founded by HPB and the
Masters.  If you tried to argue that HPB and Judge must be put above all
else, again you are creating authorites.  Members of the Theosophical
Society should have ruled Besant and Olcott out of order not because
they were right or wrong, that is irrelevant.  They should have been
ruled out of order because they undermined the Axioms of the Society
that they were supposed to uphold, thereby paving the way for dogmas to
be introduced into the Movement.  The members who did not understand
this are the ones who destroyed the Society by splitting one way or the
other.  The battles being fought on the pages of Theos-Talk are not
historical battles, they are moral battles.  THERE ARE NO GOOD REASONS
TO LEVEL UNPROVABLE PERSONAL ALLEGATIONS AGAINST ANOTHER THEOSOPHIST. 
There is nothing to be won as there are no dogmas at stake, only the
axioms that the Movement was founded upon.

This is a logical analysis of the splitting of the Movement.  Most of
the axioms did not have to be used in this analysis althought they might
be valuable in determining where to go from here.  Any comments on the
analysis itself or on the axioms are welcome.  Any personal attacks will
be viewed as coming from the typical type of agitators that infiltrate
all groups for the purpose of destruction.  When you can't argue
logically, smear your opponents (something the Movement was created to
prevent).

Bruce