Theos-Talk Archives (December 2001 Message tt00179)

Steve: "She says her teacher was smoking. Olcott might
as well have been smoking since he was inhaling all
kinds of fumes. Blavatsky's cigarettes might have
contained a combination of ingredients not commonly
found in modern brands. She was constantly smoking
when these phenomena occurred. This sort of thing was
fairly common among people who were into that sort of
thing in the 1880s. What is your take on that?

My point is merely that the phenomena you cite were
observed and recorded under conditions which rendered
most of them useless as scientific evidence, even
though they are charming stories which I am glad have
been preserved. They are entertaining but they are
unfortunately not evidence of anything in the absence
of supporting evidence collected under better
conditions."

Many serious Theosophical historians like for example Patrick 
Deveney and Joscelyn Godwin will confirm that Blavatsky took drugs.

For example John Patrick Deveney writes in "Theosophical History 
Occasional Papers" Vol.VI (published by James Santucci);
"H.P.B.'s use of hashish in the New York days is well attested 
though the subject is ussually dismissed as an idiosyncrasy rather 
then seriously discussed.- It is perhaps to the use of such drugs by 
Theosophists (or at least H.P.B.) that Emma Hardings Britten is 
referring in "Art Magic" when she condemns "all the hazy 
metaphysicians that have essayed to found new sects, on the basis of 
tobacco,hasheesh, and opium visions."

J.Godwin in "The Theosophical Enlightenment" ads to that; "Hashish 
was tipically used with the intention of communicating with angels 
using a magic mirror , and magnetists used it to enhance the 
perceptions of their somnam bulists" (mediums)


Brigitte