Theos-Talk Archives (April 2001 Message tt00098)

Tuesday, April 17, 2001


A study in KARMA -- How it operates



THE PERSIAN STUDENT'S DOCTRINE



BEFORE the flashing diamond in the mysterious mountain behind the
Temple began to lose its brilliance, many foreigners had visited
the Island. Among them were students who came from Persia.


Coming that great distance they sought more
knowledge, as in their own land the truth was already beginning
to be forgotten. It was hidden under a thick crust of fanciful
interpretations of the sayings of their sages which were fast
turning into superstitious notions. And these young men thought
that in the Island, the fame of which had spread over land and
sea, they would find learning and wisdom and the way to power.
But yet while in such a frame of mind, they regarded some things
as settled even for sages.

What they said did not have much influence on me until they began
to quote some of the
old writings from the prophets of their country, attempting to
prove that men, though god-like and immortal, transmigrated
sometimes backwards into beasts and birds and insects. As some
old Buddhist monks had years before given out the same idea with
hints of mystery underneath, the sayings of these visitors began
to trouble me.

They quoted these verses from the prophet the Great Abad:

Those who, in the season of prosperity, experience pain and
grief, suffer them on account of
their words or deeds in a former body, for which the Most Just
now punisheth them.

Whosoever is an evil doer, on him He first inflicteth pain under
the human form; for sickness, the sufferings of children while in
their mothers womb, and after
they are out of it, and suicide, and being hurt by ravenous
animals, and death, and being subjected to want from birth till
death, are all retributions for past actions; and in like manner
as to goodness.

The lion, the tiger, the leopard, the panther, . . . with all
ravenous animals, whether birds or
quadrupeds or creeping things, have once possessed authority: and
every one whom they kill hath been their aider or abetter, who
did evil by supporting, or assisting, or by the orders of, that
exalted class; and having given pain to harmless animals are now
punished by their own masters.

The horse submits to be ridden on, and the ox, the camel, the
mule, and the ass bear
burdens. And these in a former life were men who imposed burdens
on others unjustly.

Such persons as are foolish and evil doers, being enclosed in the
body of vegetables, meet with the reward of their stupidity and
misdeeds. And such as possess
illaudable knowledge and do evil are enclosed in the body of
minerals until their sins be purified; after which they are
delivered from this suffering, and are once more united to a
human body; and according as they act in it they again meet with
retribution.

These young men made such good arguments of
these texts, and dwelt so strongly upon the great attainments of
Abad, who was beyond doubt a prophet of insight, that doubts
arose in my mind. While the verses did not deny the old doctrine
of man's reincarnation, they added a new view to the matter that
had never suggested itself to me before.

The students pointed out that there was a very wise and
consistent doctrine in
those verses wherein it was declared that murderers, tyrants, and
such men would be condemned to inhabit the bodies of such
murderous beasts as lions and tigers. They made out a strong case
on the other verses also, showing that those weak but vicious men
who had aided and abetted the stronger and more violent murderers
should be condemned to precipitation out of the human cycle into
the bodies of defenseless animals, in company with ferocious
beasts, by the strength and ferocity of which they would at last
be destroyed themselves.

And thus, said these visitors, they proceed in each other's
company, lower and lower
in the scale of organized life, reaching at last those kingdoms
of nature like the mineral, where differentiation in the
direction of man is not yet visible. And from there the condemned
beings would be ground out into the great mass and slime at the
very bottom of nature's ladder.

Not wishing to admit or accept these doctrines from strangers, I
engaged in many
arguments with them on the matter, until at last they left the
Island to continue their pilgrimage.

So one day, being troubled in mind about these sayings of Abad,
which, indeed, I
heard from the students were accepted in many countries and given
by several other prophets, I sought out the old man who so often
before had solved problems for me.

He was a man of sorrow, for although possessor of power and able
to open up the
inner planes of nature, able to give to a questioner the inner
sight for a time so that one could see for himself the real truth
of material things, something ever went with him that spoke of a
sorrow he could not tell about. Perhaps he was suffering for a
fault the magnitude of which no one knew but himself; perhaps the
final truths eluded him; or maybe he had a material belief at
bottom.

But he was always kind, and ever ready to give me the help I
needed provided I had tried myself in every way and failed to
obtain it.

"Brother," I said, "do we go into animals when we die?"

"Who said that we do?" was his answer.

"It is declared by the old prophet Abad of the Worshippers of
Fire that we thus fall down from our high estate gained with pain
and difficulty."

"Do you believe it; have you reasoned it out or accepted the
doctrine?"

No," I said, "I have not accepted it. Much
as I may reason on it, there are defects in my replies, for there
seems to be consistency in the doctrine that the ferocious may go
into the ferocious and vicious into the wild animals; the one
destroying the other and man, the hunter, killing the ferocious.
Can you solve it?"

Turning on me the deep and searching gaze he used for those who
asked when he would
determine if curiosity alone moved them, he said, "I will show
you the facts and the corrupted doctrine together, on the night
of the next full moon."

Patiently I waited for the moon to grow, wondering, supposing
that the moon must be
connected with the question, because we were said to have come by
the way of the moon like a flock of birds who migrated north or
south according to their nature. At last the day came and I went
to the old man.

He was ready. Turning from the room he took me to a small cave
near the foot of the Diamond Mountain. The light of the diamond
seemed to illuminate the sky as we
paused at the entrance. We went in by the short passage in front,
and here, where I had never been before, soft footfalls of
invisible beings seemed to echo as if they were retreating before
us, and half-heard whispers floated by us out into the night. But
I had no fear. Those footfalls, though strange, had no malice,
and such faint and melodious whispering aroused no alarm. He went
to the side of the cave so that we looked at the other side. The
passage had a sharp turn near the inner entrance, and no light
fell around us. Thus we waited in silence for some
time.

"Look quietly toward the opposite wall," said the old man, "and
waver not in thought."

Fixing an unstrained gaze in the direction of the other side, it
soon
seemed to quiver, then an even vibration began across it until it
looked like a tumbling mass of clouds. This soon settled into a
grey flat surface like a painter's canvas, that was still as the
clear sky and seemingly transparent. It gave us light and made no
reflection.

"Think of your question, of your doubts, and of the young
students who have raised them; think not of Abad, for he is but a
name," whispered my guide.

Then, as I revolved the question, a cloud arose on the surface
before
me; it moved, it grew into shapes that were dim at first. They
soon became those of human beings. They were the living pictures
of my student friends. They were conversing, and I too was there
but less plain than they.

But instead of atmosphere being around them they were surrounded
with ether, and streams of ether full of what I took to be
corporeal atoms in a state of
change continually rushed from one to the other. After I had
accustomed my sight to this, the old man directed me to look at
one of the students in particular. From him the stream of ether
loaded with atoms, very dark in places and red in others, did not
always run to his fellows, but seemed to be absorbed elsewhere.
Then when I had fixed this in my mind all the other students
faded from the space, their place taken by some ferocious beasts
that prowled around the remaining student, though still appearing
to be a long distance from him.

And then I saw that the stream of atoms from him was absorbed by
those dreadful
beasts, at the same time that a mask fell off, as it were, from
his face, showing me his real ferocious, murderous
mind.

"He killed a man on the way, in secret. He is a murderer at
heart," said my guide. "This is the truth that Abad meant to
tell. Those atoms fly from all of us at every
instant. They seek their appropriate center; that which is
similar to the character of him who evolves them. We absorb from
our fellows whatever is like unto us. It is thus that man
reincarnates in the lower kingdoms. He is the lord of nature, the
key, the focus, the highest concentrator of nature's laboratory.


And the atoms he condemns to fall thus to beasts will
return to him in some future life for his detriment or his
sorrow. But he, as immortal man, cannot fall. That which falls is
the lower, the personal, the atomic. He is the brother and
teacher of all below him. See that you do not hinder and delay
all nature by your failure in virtue."

Then the ugly picture faded out and a holy man, named in the air
in gold
"Abad," took his place. From him the stream of atoms, full of his
virtue, his hopes, aspirations, and the impression of his
knowledge and power, flowed out to other Sages, to disciples, to
the good in every land. They even fell upon the unjust and the
ferocious, and then thoughts of virtue, of peace, of harmony grew
up where those streams flowed.

The picture faded, the cloudy screen vibrated and rolled away. We
were again in the
lonely cave. Faint footfalls echoed round the walls, and soft
whispers as of peace and hope trembled through the
air.

BRYAN KINNAVAN

Path, October, 1892

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