Theos-Talk Archives (May 2008 Message tt00873)

> What I meant was that the notion of God, for the western world, is 
> very much conditioned by the Judeo-Christian notion of God. Consider, 
> for example, the very first sentence in the Bible: "In the beginning 
> God created the heaven and the earth." (Genesis, 1:1) Since the Bible 
> has been in 'print' for many, many centuries, and the text translated 
> to many languages, the notion has spread far and wide. 

I don't see anything wrong in this idea. According to Theosophy of
Besant, Leadbeater, the Logos of the solar system creates that system. 
According to Hindu scriptures God said ecoham, bahusyam which means
God said "I am alone, let me become many" Because of this will of God,
number of people in His own image get created.  
Genesis tells that God created everything, and that is quite true
according to Besant-Leadbeater Theosophy and also according to Hindu
scriptures. 

> > Christians 33.32% (of which Roman Catholics 16.99%, Protestants 
> 5.78%,
> > Orthodox 3.53%, Anglicans 1.25%), Muslims 21.01%, Hindus 13.26%,
> > Buddhists 5.84%, Sikhs 0.35%, Jews 0.23%, Baha'is 0.12%, other
> > religions 11.78%, non-religious 11.77%, atheists 2.32% (2007 est.)
> 
> 
> Thank you for the statistics. There may a number of historical 
> reasons for them. Let me attempt to list some:
> 
> 1. Buddhism was never the religion of a colonial empire.
> 2. There is no practice of forced conversion in Buddhism.
> 3. Buddhism did not flourish in India because the dominant 
> Brahmanical caste rejected it and opposed it systematically.

But Christianity also had opposition, which it overcame because of the
merit of the religion. 

> 4. Buddhism is not a belief-based religion, but an insight-based one.
> 
> In the words of the Mahachohan, 
> 
> "Mystical Christianity, that is to say that Christianity which 
> teaches self-redemption through our own seventh principle�this 
> liberated Para-Atma (Augoeides) called by some Christ, by others 
> Buddha, and equivalent to regeneration or rebirth in spirit�will be 
> found just the same truth as the Nirvana of Buddhism. 

Here Mahachohan accepts that Christianity contained Truth. He is
saying that Truth in Christianity and Truth in Buddhism are same. It
means Mahachohan recognizes that Christianity had Truth. Strangely
some students of Blavatsky consider Christianity as opposite of
Theosophy. 

>All of us have 
> to get rid of our own Ego, the illusory apparent self, to recognize 
> our true self in a transcendental divine life. But if we would not be 
> selfish, we must strive to make other people see that truth, to 
> recognize the reality of that transcendental self, the Buddha, the 
> Christ or God of every preacher. This is why even exoteric Buddhism 
> is the surest path to lead men towards the one esoteric truth."

Again the same point is explained. And importance of this passages is
Mahachohan recognizes that mystical Christianity had Truth which is
the same Truth in Buddhism.


> Note that he equates 'God' with the transcendental self in us, and 
> not with an external, blood-thirsty tribal deity that suffers from 
> destructive mood swings.

God is omniscient, omnipotent, omnipresent creator of the universe.
Tribal people have their different ideas about God, and I think many
of these ideas are wrong. We need not focus on ideas of God of tribes.
We can think about idea of God as appeared in major religions and
Theosophy.

> So you now declare that Theosophy is a religion. 

Here is dictionary meaning of religion.
"people's beliefs and opinions concerning the existence, nature, and
worship of God, a god, or gods, and divine involvement in the universe
and human life "
Theosophy does have it's opinions about existence, nature and worship
of God. So in that sense it is religion. 
When I called Theosophy as religion, I had another meaning in mind. It
is this. Religions are given by the Great Ones, for guiding humanity,
to keep people on the path of virtues, to give people knowledge of the
ultimate reality. Purpose of giving Theosophy to the world is also the
same. So in that sense Theosophy is a religion. Some people say
Buddhism does not ask beliefs. But still Buddhism is considered as
religion. So belief or no belief don't decide if certain teaching be
called as religion.

Did you read CWL's 
> thoughts on the subject:
> 
> "In Theosophy we strongly deprecate the attitude of blind belief, for 
> we say that it has been the cause of a vast amount of the evil of the 
> world. On this point the teaching of the Eastern Masters is emphatic, 
> for they regard superstition as one of the fetters which it is 
> absolutely necessary that a man should cast off before he can hope to 
> make any progress on the occult Path. They also regard doubt as a 
> fetter, but they say that the only way to get rid of doubt is not by 
> blind faith, but by the acquisition of knowledge. It would be quite 
> useless for a man to exchange blind faith in orthodox Christianity 
> for a similar blind faith in those who happened to be writing or 
> speaking on Theosophy.  To say: "Thus saith Madame Blavatsky or Mrs. 
> Besant," is after all only a small advance on saying: "Thus saith S. 
> Paul of S. John."" ("The Attitude of the Enquirer", The Adyar 
> Bulletin, February 1911)

It seems quite correct. Leadbeater does not say here that Theosophy
should not be called as religion. If I am remembering correct,
according to Blavatsky Theosophy is the Religion.


> 
> It was not one jesuit. It was the official theological instruction of 
> the jesuits that came to Brazil with the Portuguese colonizers. One 
> of the core elements of the Christian theology at that time was 
> that "there is no salvation outside the Christian faith". 

Even now according to Christian philosophy there is no salvation
outside Christian faith. I am a member of many Christian groups, so I
know what ideas Christians hold.  The New Testament clearly tells that
salvation is only through Jesus Christ. Verse from John's Gospel says
" I (Jesus) am the Way, the Truth, and the Life. No one comes to the
Father except through me" So according to Bible salvation is only
through Christ. I think many staunch followers of Christianity believe
that salvation is only through Christ. 
I think jesuits and Christian priests made many mistakes till 1800
C.E. because earlier printing technology was not there, people did not
have easy access to Bible and other Christian writings. Most people
were illiterate. There was general lack of knowledge about Bible and
Christian faith. Because of this ignorance, many mistakes were made.
Now, as Bible is easily available to every one, such mistakes will be
less. It is because whatever orders may come from above, priests and
jesuits can compare it with Bible teaching and they will generally
avoid doing things against Bible teaching. 
Just as adolescent struggles in puberty and adjusts, grows with
struggle, Christian faith also struggled and now it will mature
slowly. I mean original Christian teaching will be digested by many
and that should enable priests and the laity to live true Christian
life. Of course many won't become fundamentalists, but they will know
that essence of Christianity is love, service, kindness, brotherhood,
and such virtues and they will try to live it.

>Many 
> Christian groups still uphold it today. Therefore the native indians 
> in Brazil were already "pre-doomed" before 'civilisation' arrived. 

Many Christiand do belive so. 

> An incalculable amount of violence and butchery was done throughout 
> history in the name of an anthropomorphic, Eurocentric, 
> bloodthirsty, 'God'. If you doubt, have a look at the Holy 
> Inquisition files which are being made available.

As I said earlier, this violence was because of lack of understanding
of Christian faith. They are not because Bible gives wrong teaching.
VIOLENCE WAS THERE BECAUSE OF THE LACK OF KNOWLEDGE OF THE BIBLE AND
NOT BECAUSE OF THE BIBLE.


> 
>  
> > Few years back I think you had given reference where HPB rejected
> > Buddhist no-God theory and accepts existence of God. May be you can
> > bring that reference again.
> 
> 
> If you refer to my article on the subject it can be seen here:
> 
> http://www.austheos.org.au/magazine/pedro-god.htm

I will read this article. 
Here is another shock. In Mahatma Letters it is said that "in our
system there is no God, personal or impersonal"
I say in certain sense God is personal and also impersonal. I will
explain it why I say so. 

Anand Gholap