Theos-Talk Archives (March 2007 Message tt00170)

Hi Nigel,

Find my comments interspersed below:

> You write above in context, "We need not concern ourselves with the 
> iniquities of others."
> 
> How then are we to approach those teachings that distort, subvert or 
> betray original teachings?

Use our own understanding. Compare what we read or encounter with 
what we know from our own experience to be true. Listen to the Knower 
within Which guides us if we allow it. Allow others to do the same.

> How, for example, are we respond to the Koran's interpretations by 
> the Taliban which deny women the right to walk freely on the street 
> unaccompanied and/or with their faces showing?
> How are we to respond when these same women are denied access to 
> schooling and employment?
> Furthermore, where a women claims to have been raped, under putative 
> Islamic Sharia law in some jurisdictions, she needs four independent 
> male witnesses to validate her claim otherwise she is guilty of 
> adultery if already married and subject to be stoned to death.

Now why would we need to make a judgement about these issues? Are we 
Muslims, living in a Muslim country, under Islamic law? How else 
could we ever hope to come to an understanding of these issues? Why 
do we feel it incumbent on us to make a response? Do we think that it 
is useful to apply our Judeo-Christian values to the Muslim world? 
Why would we think that? Is it perhaps that it is easier to point out 
the iniquities of others, as we judge them, than it is to address the 
inhumanity in our own world? It is pretty easy to find targets to aim 
at in our own back yards.
> 
> What would be your course of action in these cases? Should we 
> challenge these mostly inaccurate interpretations of the Koran or do 
> we leave to karma to resolve. Or are we actually agents of karma?

Are you a student of the Koran? If so, perhaps you might find it 
important to go to the country in question and work to right the 
wrongs you perceive. If not, it might be more useful to address the 
problems nearer to hand. Karma will adjust the balance everywhere, no 
matter what we try to do. It is preferable to try to behave according 
the the Higher Law, in order not to create more Karmic retribution.  
for ourselves and our loved ones if possible. It looks to me like the 
Western world has piled up an astonishing amount of retribution, when 
we consider a few centuries of colonialism and their attendent 
atrocities.

As for the question, "Are we agents of Karma?" we could say that yes, 
we are agents of karma, of our own karma, but that we have no power 
over the karma of another. We create our own future, as we created 
our own present, as does everyone else.  
> 
> Please excuse the strength of these examples but these are matters 
> which I have thought through as deeply as I am able, particularly vis 
> a vis what we might term the Theosophical approach.
> 
> What do you think?

I think that we are very fortunate to have the freedom to discuss 
these issues and that whenever we feel confused of conflicted, we owe 
it to  ourselves to go back to the source and find an underlying 
principle that helps us figure things out. Unity of all life is a 
good place to start. These principles are living entities, able to be 
assimilated into our own consciousness to be forever available to 
guide and protect us.

Adelasie