Theos-Talk Archives (September 2006 Message tt00299)

Carlos writes:

"Out of the 136 'letters' published by Mr. John Algeo, at least 27
documents are certainly false.(1) 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."

But the question to ask:

Who is to determine which letters are false and which letters are
true?

For example, Michael Gomes in his book THE DAWNING OF THE
THEOSOPHICAL MOVEMENT quotes from two of these letters claimed by
Mr. Aveline to be false.

In each instance, Mr. Gomes attributes what is said in these two
letters to H.P.B.

For example, Mr. Gomes writes (p. 185):

"She wrote to Alexander Aksakov in October 1877..."

and goes on to give a quote from one of the letters Mr. Aveline
believes is false.

Nowhere when quoting H.P.B.'s words from this letter, does Mr. Gomes
warn the reader of his book that he is quoting from false letters!!

Boris de Zirkoff in his writings does the same thing. He quotes
H.P.B.'s words from various letters to Askakoff. The very letters
Mr. Aveline considers false. And no where does Mr. de Zirkoff in
these instances warn the reader that he is quoting fake HPB!!!

So maybe both Michael Gomes and Boris de Zirkoff believed the
letters in question were true!

[I believe Sylvia Cranston also quotes from one of these false
letters in her HPB biography. She quotes as though the words in the
letter are HPB's. And nowhere does she warn the reader to beware of
this letter or the similar letters from Aksakoff as being false. I
will doublecheck this since I quote from memory.]

Previously on Theos-Talk, Mr. Aveline has stated that Patrick
Deveney is now a member of the HPB Letters Commmittee and has
indicated that hopefully Mr. Deveney will improve the scholarship of
the volumes published.

But does Mr. Aveline know whether Mr. Deveney agrees with his
opinion that at least 27 letters are false? Furthermore, would Mr.
Deveney be wanting to REMOVE these letters from a revised edition
volume I?

My impression is that Mr. Deveney does NOT agree with Mr. Aveline's
assessment of the letters in question.

I suggest that Mr. Aveline might write to Mr. Deveney and ask him
pointblank if he considers the said letters false and does he favor
REMOVING them as they will be removed, for example, in the
expurgated volume (edited by Mr. Jerome Wheeler?).

Food for thought.

Daniel
http://hpb.cc