Theos-Talk Archives (August 2001 Message tt00245)

MKR:

After one has been around theosophy and theosophical organizations for
some time, one will discover that while organizations may be chartered
with a democratic legal framework, the leadership (and many of the
followers ) for years since early in this century and perhaps to this
day seemed to strongly believe in hierarchical (autocratical) model. The
later is strengthened by the parallel esoteric organization whose
members seem to be pledged to personally obey and follow the
instructions of the leader. One only needs to recall how in the days of
Annie Besant, she used to claim that most of the members of the General
Council were members of the esoteric section along which goes to the
fact they were to follow her instructions. Many organizations -
spiritual and otherwise do have an explicit hierarchical (autocratic)
setup with a lot of followers quite happy and content to follow the
wishes and orders of the leader without question.

We are now in the 21st century and New Age and no longer in the
Victorian Era. Over the last 100 years in many countries, government by
democracy has slowly been replacing the hierarchical and hereditarial
system and the key ingredient is the importance and sacredness of the
individual and individual's freedom of speech and action. So today's
generation is growing up in this kind of environment and perhaps it is
one of the indications of direction in which New Age and New
Civilization is going to bloom. If the present trend of two track
approach is taken, how do we induce the present and coming generations
to take interest in theos-sophia and hopefully change human nature for
the betterment of humanity? This is a question that should be addressed
in all earnestness if we want more of the upcoming generation to benefit
from the knowledge of theosophy.

Few days back I happened to see a very interesting statement in Aryel
Sanat's book on The Inner Life of Krishnamurti, in which he examines
theosophy, theosophical society, Krishnamurti's statements and all the
relevant historical events. Sanat writes:

Sanat:

As HPB suggested in passages quoted ...., perennial elements have
always been present in all societies, religions and philosophies. What
makes America different is that several of the pillars on which its
society rests were crafted in perennial shops. The notions of equality,
fraternity, and freedom had been integral to the perennial philosophy
for millennia. They became first widely known in France..., but they
were publicly declared by the American Revolution.... Members of these
societies... (Rosicrucians, Masons and other secret societies)... had
worked for centuries toward the creation of a society in which the
individual rather than a political structure or a belief system, would
be considered 'sacred'. Such a social environment would be appropriate
for transformation on a large scale.

Before the founding of America, all societies were based on
hierarchical models. Even in Asian countries, where the perennial
philosophy developed its more significant publicly known strongholds in
recent centuries, the hierarchical model, with all its ruthlessness and
lack of respect for the individual, has been the blueprint for social
behavior. Given the model's long history and pervasivness, people have
been deeply conditioned to accept it. That may be why even in America,
where elitist attitudes and practices are often prosecutable in court,
throughout the twentieth century numerous people still adhered to tribal
assumptions, and even identified themselves as Americans in terms of
their prejudices rather than their beliefs in freedom and equality
before the law....

Even two centuries after America was founded, the universalist,
perennial values have still not taken hold on the population and are not
truly part and parcel of daily life.. Thus today we find that the same
hierarchical models are still in effect in every part of the world--
including the US. On the other hand, it seems that if no America,
however imperfect, had been created in the eighteenth century, very
likely there would have been no theosophical movement (with its emphasis
on universal brotherhood) in the nineteenth, and no Krishnamurti (with
his uncompromising exposes of the dangers of any kind of identification
or authority) in the twentieth... Notably K's expositions took place in
the milieu created by HPB's work, and exclusively in countries that had
been touched somehow by the spirit of the American Revolution.


___MKR___