Theos-Talk Archives (December 2004 Message tt00339)

You are right. It doesn't happen always. Perhaps because of Christmas.
--- In theos-talk@yahoogroups.com, "Eldon B Tucker" <eldon@t...> 
wrote:
> 
> Everyone:
> 
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> 
> Eldon Tucker
> 
> --- In theos-talk@yahoogroups.com, "Anand Gholap" 
<AnandGholap@A...> 
> wrote:
> > [ www.AnandGholap.net - Online books on Theosophy ]
> > 
> > " I want to put before you, if I can in these three lectures, a 
> certain view of the world, and of the way in which that world is 
> guided and directed. As this meeting is a public meeting, there is 
> one state­ment I think that I ought to make, which it would not be 
> necessary to make, if it were composed of members of the 
> Theosophical Society. It is important to remember that in the 
> Theosophical Society we have no authority on matters of opinion. 
> Every member is free to work out his own theory of life, to choose 
> his own line of thought, and no one has the smallest right to 
> dictate to any member what he should choose or what he should 
think. 
> In the Theosophical Society there is only one condition which binds 
> a member, namely, the recognition of Universal Brotherhood. Outside 
> that every member is absolutely free. He may belong to any 
religion, 
> or he may belong to no religion at all. If he belongs to a 
religion, 
> he is never asked to leave it, to change it, but only to try to 
live 
> up to its teachings of spiritual life, recognising the unity of 
all, 
> to live in harmony with people of his own faith and people of other 
> faiths. When we speak of Theosophy, we may take the word in one of 
> two senses. The first, what it should be to the individual. In that 
> sense there is no difference between Theosophy and the ancient 
> Brahmavidya of India, the Para Vidya, and the Gnosis of the Greek - 
> no difference at all. It is the recognition that man can realise 
> God. It is called, in the Upanishad "the knowledge of Him by whom 
> all things are known". It is a difficulty rather of our language 
> that we speak in that sense of "knowledge", because knowledge 
> implies a duality, or indeed a triplicity - the Knower, the Known, 
> and the Relation between them - whereas when the Spirit of man, who 
> comes forth from Ishvara, realises his own nature, it is no longer 
a 
> case of thinking or of knowing. It is a case of realising that 
> identity. You know it is written again in the Upanishad: "He who 
> says `I know', he knows not," because the very word knowledge is an 
> error in this realisation. In that, we do not say, "I know"; we 
> say, "I am". This gives the primary meaning of the 
word "Theosophy". 
> Then it is also used in a secondary sense: a certain body of 
> teachings. No one of these particular teachings is binding on any 
> member. The whole of these teachings together are the teachings the 
> Society is formed to put forward in the world, but it does not make 
> them binding on its members. That policy rests on a very sure 
> foundation. The foundation is that no man can really believe a 
> truth, until he has grown to the extent which enables him to see it 
> as truth for himself. A teaching is not really a part of your 
> spiritual life; it comes within the mental life, into that part of 
> your nature which is said to be knowledge, the intellect; and that 
> is able to see that which is akin to itself. The truth in you 
> recognises the truth outside you, when once the inner vision is 
> open. Hence, in the Society, the study of the great fundamental 
> truths of all religions is one of its objects. Members are not 
asked 
> whether they believe in them or not. They are left to study them, 
in 
> the full conviction that just as when the eyes are open the man who 
> is not blind sees by the light of the sun, he is not asked to 
> believe in the light, so is truth in the mental world. As soon as 
> the eyes of the inner nature, the eyes of the intellect, are open, 
> it is not a question of argument, but a question of sight. You 
> recognise the truth because the faculty of truth in your own nature 
> shows that it exists. You see by it, as you see by the light of the 
> sun. As long as a man is blind, the sun to him as light is nothing. 
> When the eyes are opened then no argument is necessary as to the 
> existence of the light by which he sees. Truth is regarded in that 
> way, and hence the student is left to study until for himself he 
> knows the truth of any doc­trine. The teachings which are spread by 
> the Society are those which you find in every great religion. If, 
> for instance, you take a book published by the Central Hindu 
College 
> as a text-book for Hindu boys, and an Advanced Text-book for Hindu 
> young men in the College, you will find in them certain truths. 
They 
> are given in the Hindi form. If you take the Theosophical text-
book, 
> used for teaching in schools where all religions are taught, where 
> there are boys whose parents hold particular religions, you have 
> those truths given which are common to all religions. The only 
> difference is that in the Theosophical text-book, the various 
> Scriptures of the world in different religions are quoted in 
support 
> of them, while in the Hindu text-book only the Hindu Scriptures are 
> quoted. That is the only difference so far as the great ideas are 
> con­cerned; the ideas are identical.
> >                   
> 2. You will 
> understand that in all that I say now, I am dealing with things as 
> they appear to me. They are not binding upon any particular member, 
> for the duty of each is to think for himself. They do not commit 
the 
> Society as a Society, because that only puts forward acceptance of 
> Universal Brotherhood as a condition of admission. That which I 
say, 
> I am responsible for. What I say is the result of my own study. It 
> is for every one of you, Theosophists or non-Theosophists, member 
or 
> non-member, to use your own intellect, your own judgment, your own 
> conscience, in weighing every statement that I make. You ought not 
> to take them ready-made as truth for you. Everyone must use his own 
> thought, and not simply go by that of another. Especially is that 
> so, because I am going to deal with abstruse subjects. Speaking of 
> them as truths, I am speaking largely on my own knowledge and also, 
> in addition to that, taking certain statements congruous with what 
I 
> know, but applied to a much larger area of facts then I myself am 
> yet able to reach. For I am going to say a few things about the 
> larger Kosmos of the solar systems, which I am not able to examine 
> for myself. I am only dealing with the subject before you as a 
> whole, and will deal with that part briefly. But it is necessary, 
in 
> order to give you as it were a fairly complete view, because there 
> are many other solar systems about which I know nothing. Most of us 
> speak about many facts of science which we have not been able to 
> verify; for instance, I am unable in astronomy to verify the 
> statements of great astronomers as regards the situation and the 
> relations of our vast solar system. I have not studied astronomy. 
If 
> I had studied, I could not have attained to the knowl­edge of great 
> experts in that particular science. But if I find them teaching on 
> the solar system the facts that they have observed and collected by 
> telescope and by the many other ways, like the spectroscope, that 
> they have of examining the composition of planets other than our 
> own, I should take this from them, if their new facts were, 
> generally speaking, congruous with what we know as regards our own 
> constitution, its relationship to certain other bodies 
> mathematically worked out, and so on. We are exactly in a similar 
> position in dealing with what are called occult state­ments; namely, 
> statements of facts as regards a partic­ular order of existence, 
with 
> some of which we can come into contact in our own world, the 
> existence of which to some extent we can find out from the history 
> of our own world; there are others as to which we find ourselves 
> unable to make discoveries, to gain first-hand knowledge; as to 
> them, a large number of statements have been made about them by far 
> more highly developed persons than ourselves. It is as true of 
> occult science as it is true of astronomy, that a large part of it 
> is taken on trust from experts. Certain parts of it may be found 
out 
> by ourselves, by our own study; other parts cannot. The conditions 
> are similar to those in astronomy, or in any other science. We must 
> give to the study a large amount of time. We must study along 
> certain lines which have been verified over and over again. We must 
> go on to first-hand knowledge, which is the best but the most 
> laborious way of acquiring knowledge. This, however, demands, to 
> begin with, a certain amount of faculty for the particular science. 
> You may find, for instance, a man who could never become a great 
> astronomer - no matter how long he studied; a man who is deficient 
> in mathematical power could never become a really great astronomer, 
> because the higher mathematics are wanted in much of the astro­
> nomical study. If a man is by nature very stupid in that science, 
he 
> could never become a great astro­nomer. So it is also with occult 
> study. There are a number of persons who have not got the faculty 
to 
> begin with. It depends upon their past, upon the line of evolution 
> along which they have come. Pro­gress depends upon whether they have 
> the faculty, how much time they are ready to give to the study, how 
> far they are conforming to the rules laid down by experts for 
> beginners in the study, and so on. But admitting that there is a 
> great difference between the reception given to occult science and 
> the reception given to astronomical statements made by experts, 
> everybody, practically every educated person, is willing to receive 
> the testimony of the greatest astronomers to facts which they are 
> themselves unable to observe or to verify. It is not a matter of 
> life and death if they are wrong. But when you come to deal with 
> statements of occult science, some of which you find in the great 
> Scriptures of the world, some of which you find in the ancient 
> histories of the world, there is much unfair scepticism in modern 
> thinkers. Histories are thrown aside as legendary and mythical. 
> Scriptures are thrown aside as superstition, though they contain 
the 
> ideas of ancient peoples, much more learned than ourselves. Hence 
> the difficulty of Occultism in justi­fying itself; a man must take 
it 
> just on the lines I have put to you as to astronomical science. But 
> the man of the day is ready to receive science which are based on 
> apparatus. Where people make very elaborate apparatus, such as 
> telescopes, spectroscopes, all kinds of things of extraordinary 
> fineness and delicacy, they appeal to the mind of the day, 
> especially in the West; they for the moment are most advanced, it 
is 
> said, in ordinary sciences. That is the way the mind works. It 
looks 
> out to the objects and builds up its theories by observation, 
> comparison, classification, and so on. Anything that goes along 
that 
> line easily justifies itself to the ordinary modern mind. They do 
> not challenge. Occultism works in a different way. It works by the 
> development of new organs which are within the man, instead of by 
> the manufacture of apparatus which is outside the man. Now the 
> development of the inner senses, the inner powers of observation, 
> can only be done under certain rules, rules which affect the body 
> and the conduct of the man. It is much easier to buy a telescope 
and 
> look at the moon through it, than it is to develop your own nature 
> along lines to which evolution has not as yet accustomed us. There 
> lies the difficulty of occult study. A person will be willing to 
> submit to a discipline, will not resent it, if it is carried on in 
> the laboratory of science, but he does resent it if it comes to him 
> with the authority of the great Knowers of the past. It is along 
the 
> line of facts thus obtained that I am going to speak to you. 
> Therefore you must take them from that standpoint, and understand 
> that I am not asking you to believe a thing because I say it. I am 
> only putting before you a theory of the Government of the World 
> which has many facts to recommend it in his­tory and in religion, 
but 
> which may be challenged by those who do not accept ancient history, 
> who do not accept the great Scriptures of the world of religion­ - 
> and some which I am going to add from my own study, I will begin 
> with that which I am unable definitely to verify. I can only put to 
> you certain reasons for accepting it. Now broadly stated they are 
> these. We have a solar system consisting of certain planetary 
bodies 
> revolving round the central sun. These bodies are studied, and said 
> by ordinary science to be moving under certain definite forces, 
> under certain definite laws of nature, as we call them, which by 
> observation have been established and re-verified over and over 
> again. According to that scientific view, our solar system is to a 
> certain extent a self-contained body. The central sun in a sense 
> controls the movements of the planetary bodies which circle round 
> it. And outside the solar system you have space, practically empty 
> space. But science tells us there are a great many solar systems. 
We 
> are only one out of a group. It tells us that the solar systems are 
> in groups; and that we belong to a group - the whole group circling 
> round another sun far, far, far off in the depths of space; so that 
> we are not wholly self-contained. We are under other influences and 
> are moving in obedience, as a whole group system, to other laws. We 
> do not trouble much about that because we have little opportunity 
of 
> observation. Any part of the argument of science there is 
> practically an induction from certain ascertained facts. You make a 
> theory that if there were a body exercising certain powers of 
> attraction and repulsion, if your partic­ular part moves in a way 
> which is not accounted for by anything you can discover, then there 
> must be something as yet unknown to you causing these other move­
> ments which you cannot trace to any force existing within our own 
> solar system. I know very little about that, and do not want to say 
> anything more about it."
> > 
> > Complete book can be read at
> > 
> > http://www.anandgholap.net/Inner_Government_Of_The_World-AB.htm
> > 
> >             
> > 
> > 
> > [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]