Theos-Talk Archives (June 2006 Message tt00401)

6/28/2006 3:56 PM

This exchange deserves careful attention in my esteem.

Best wishes.

Dallas

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-----Original Message-----
From: mlr  per:  
	From: Elaine Bitterman 

Sent: Monday, June 26, 2006 7:00 PM
To: 
Subject	RE: Origin of Evil

	MLR writes and quotes:

Let us look at the views expressed from another angle, from a theosophical
perspective--inserted in the text of the post.

	================================================

	Elaine wrote:
 
I did not mean to imply that it is Only the fundamental Muslim community
that takes their holy book as literal, and seems to determine their current
morality, or lack thereof.  
Of course the same literalism exists within the Christian population (and
other orthodox religions,)  That said however, you do not currently find
suicide bombers willing to die to kill infidels within the fundamental
Christian, Jewish communities - where parents are congratulated for the
death of their child serving God, nor do you find an acceptance of honor
killings for the rape of girls, women who have shamed their families in the
same - even though shame might be felt. This is done in the name of God in
Muslim countries.  

=================================

What crimes have not been committed in all lands in the name of 'God?' 

Have not hundreds of thousands of men and women, helpless poor mediums
and the "heretics" been burnt at the stake during murderous  Inquisition in
Europe during the middle ages ? Is it any less heinous, or more honourable,
than the crimes Islamists are accused of committing ?

Slave trade [sanctioned in European kingdoms of the middle ages] let loose a
swarm of curses upon the earth.

In the name of the 'Holy Trinity' the Spanish government, under the aeiges
of the 'Holy Church' concluded 10 treaties authorizing the sale of 500,000
human beings in 'barbarous' Ivory Coast, Africa. 

For 400 years men, women and children were torn from all they knew and
loved, and were sold on the coast of Africa to European Christian Traders.
They were chained to the deck--dead often with the living--during the
passage across the seas. Bancroft, an impartial historian, said that 250,000
out of three and quarter millions were thrown into the sea and remainder
consigned to nameless misery in the mines, under the lash, in the cane and
rice fields. 

Sir John Hawkins ferried slaves from Africa to the West Indies in a ship
which bore the name of JESUS, and Elizabeth, the Protestant queen of
Portugal, rewarded him for his successful mission in human trafficking and
presented him an insignia, in honour of his ignominious mission, depicting a
manacled negro slave. In what way are these black deeds less heinous than
those Islamists are accused of [today] ?

This is religious fundamentalism. 

What about 'secular fundamentalism,' if we may call scientific materialism
so,  in the form of fierce national selfishness, greed and inhumanity --
poorer nations colonized, plundered and economically, culturally emaciated
by the conquering West, and continue the same to this day indirectly through
globalized market economy; invading and waging war against other weaker
countries, killing millions by weapons of mass destruction, diabolical
inventions of modern science and technology, leaving a trail of untold
misery--is this all more honourable than Islamic fundamentalism ?

 Could not have Islamic fundamentalism we so much dread today been fuelled
by the aggressive, greedy, self-aggrandizing international politics of
Western nations ? An impartial inquiry into the current events show this to
be true, quite plainly.

It is a mistake to point the finger of accusation against any individual or
religion or group. As surely as three fingers point back at ourselves when
we point our accusing finger at others, we will, on honest self-examination,
find that we share in no small measure some of those very evils/vices we see
in others. Let us rather try to remove the beam in our own eyes before
taking critical look at the speck in another's, as admonished by the Master
[Jesus].

The idea is not to blame anyone but to underscore the fact that as long as
mankind labours under false ideas concerning life and nature, ignorant of
the true nature of self, of the universe, of the law of our being, such
monstrosities will continue, and much worse things will follow--to the point
of self-annihilation.

[DTB--	THEOSOPHY teaches that the "Self" resides as a 'ray' of the
UNIVERSAL DEITY in every human as also in every other form or element.  One
the three definitions of GOD, we must remember is OMNIPRESENCE.  It is
spiritual Self -- a RAY -- that is impartially and universally present in
the WHOLE OF NATURE.  

Thus we may say logically that the 2nd deific quality or, GOD'S OMNISCIENCE,
is both ETERNAL [as "He" is] and UNIVERSAL  

>From this concept is also to be considered the 3rd deific quality of
OMNIPOTENCE -- that which requires equal and honest dealing at all times. (
Visualize our life to be in a fish-bowl -- under constant scrutiny as to the
motive of our choices.)   These LAWS govern with equal JUSTICE and RIGOR the
behaviour of ourselves as of all living things.	KARMA. 

If we say UNIVERSAL BROTHERHOOD all this is implied.	-- DTB

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I do question why there seems to be no sense of inherent morality in a
culture such as that. 

====================================

This is a serious charge made having chosen to be wholly blind to 

(1) the higher, nobler, true Islam, full of knowledge and wisdom, the
catalytic role it played in liberating the Western mind from centuries of
religious obscurantism and helping its renaissance; great souls in that
tradition--the Sufis, especially--who have and continue to be a power for
good in the world; and 

(2) ugly features of one's own house, one's own tainted and stained past. 

====================================== 

 As someone with a deep seated sense of right vs. wrong - feeling it Has
been hardwired in human beings - I'm left to ponder..... 

Are these people simply misguided by blind faith?  

Are they truly evil?  

Or are they meant to provide us with the challenge to find ways to bridge
the great divide, that grows wider every day (and, [seemingly] for the first
time in history offers the opportunity for major devastation if not
destruction of a large part of the earth's population.)  [ In the history of
our past,  SECRET DOCTRINE  Mme. Blavatsky states the Atlanteans -- 4th Race
-- developed a highly intellectualized civilization [ S D   I  189-92;  II
222, 273, 760, ].  This degenerated into sorcery of the most dangerous type
[ S D   I  397,  419;  II 93-4, 222-3, 272, 286, 350, 491, 495, 503, 636,
772, 786 ]  

Finally a great war ensued [ S D   II  222-3 ]  Quote:

"Only, as they were rupa or material Spirits, these Dhyanis were not always
good. Their King Thevetata was one of the latter, and it is under the evil
influence of this King-Demon that . . . the Atlantis-race became a nation of
wicked magicians. 

"In consequence of this, war was declared, the story of which would be too
long to narrate; its substance may be found in the disfigured allegories of
the race of Cain, the giants, and that of Noah and his righteous family. The
conflict came to an end by the submersion of the Atlantis, which finds its
imitation in the stories of the Babylonian and Mosaic flood. The giants and
magicians '. . . and all flesh died . . . and every man.' All except
Xisuthrus and Noah, who are substantially identical with the great Father of
the Thhnkithians in the Popol-Vuh, or the sacred book of the Guatemaleans,
which also tells of his escaping in a large boat like the Hindu Noah ?
Vaivasvata.
 
"If we believe the tradition at all, we have to credit the further story
that, from the intermarrying of the progeny of the hierophants of the island
and the descendants of the Atlantean Noah, sprang up a mixed race of
righteous and wicked. On the one side the world had its Enochs, Moseses,
various Buddhas, its numerous 'Saviours,' and great hierophants; on the
other hand, its 'natural magicians' who, through lack of the restraining
power of proper spiritual enlightenment, . . . perverted their gifts to evil
purposes. . ." 

We may supplement this by the testimony of some records and traditions. In
the "Histoire des Vierges: Les Peuples et les Continents Disparus," the
author says: ? 

"One of the most ancient legends of India, preserved in the temples by oral
and written tradition, relates that several hundred thousand years ago there
existed in the Pacific Ocean an immense continent which was destroyed by
geological upheaval, and the fragments of which must be sought in
Madagascar, Ceylon, Sumatra, Java, Borneo, and the principal isles of
Polynesia." 

"The high plateaux of Hindustan and Asia, according to this hypothesis,
would only have been represented in those distant epochs by great islands
contiguous to the central continent . . . According to the Brahmans, this
country had attained a high civilization, and the peninsula of Hindustan,
enlarged by the displacement of the waters, at the time of the grand
cataclysm, has but continued the chain of the primitive traditions born in
this place. 

These traditions give the name of Rutas to the peoples which inhabited this
immense equinoctial continent, and from their speech was derived the
Sanscrit. . . .And the Indo-Hellenic tradition, preserved by the most
intelligent population which emigrated from the plains of India, equally
relates the existence of a continent and a people to which it gives the name
of Atlantis and Atlantides, and which it locates in the Atlantic in the
northern portion of the Tropics." 

"Apart from this fact, the supposition of an ancient continent in those
latitudes, the vestiges of which may be found in the volcanic islands and
mountainous [223] surface of the Azores, the Canaries and Cape de Verdes, is
not devoid of geographical probability. The Greeks, who, moreover, never
dared to pass beyond the pillars of Hercules, on account of their dread of
the mysterious ocean, appeared too late in antiquity for the stories
preserved by Plato to be anything else than an echo of the Indian legend.
Moreover, when we cast a look on a planisphere, at the sight of the islands
and islets strewn from the Malayan Archipelago to Polynesia, from the
straits of Sunda to Easter Island, it is impossible, upon the hypothesis of
continents preceding those which we inhabit, not to place there the most
important of all. 

"A religious belief, common to Malacca and Polynesia, that is to say, to the
two opposite extremes of the Oceanic world, affirms 'that all these islands
once formed two immense countries, inhabited by yellow men and black men,
always at war; and that the gods, wearied with their quarrels, having
charged Ocean to pacify them, the latter swallowed up the two continents,
and, since, it has been impossible to make him give up his captives. Alone,
the mountain-peaks and high plateaux escaped the flood, by the power of the
gods, who perceived too late the mistake they had committed.'
 
"Whatever there may be in these traditions, and whatever may have been the
place where a civilization more ancient than that of Rome, of Greece, of
Egypt, and of India was developed, it is certain that this civilization did
exist, and it is highly important to science to recover its traces, however
feeble and fugitive they may be" (pp. 13-15). 

This last tradition corroborates the one given from the "Records of the
Secret Doctrine." The war mentioned between the yellow and the black men,
relates to a struggle between the "sons of God" and the "sons of giants," or
the inhabitants and magicians of Atlantis. 

The final conclusion of the author [HPB], who personally visited all the
islands of Polynesia, and devoted years to the study of the religion,
language, and traditions of nearly all the peoples, is as follows: 

"As to the Polynesian continent which disappeared at the time of the final
geological cataclysms, its existence rests on such proofs that to be logical
we can doubt no longer. 

"The three summits of this continent, the Sandwich Islands, New Zealand,
Easter Island, are distant from each other from fifteen to eighteen hundred
leagues, and the groups of intermediate islands, Viti, Samoa, Tonga,
Foutouna, Ouvea, the Marquesas, Tahiti, Poumoutou, the Gambiers, are
themselves distant from these extreme points from seven or eight hundred to
one thousand leagues. 

"All navigators agree in saying that the extreme and the central groups
could never have communicated in view of their actual geographical position,
and with the insufficient means they had at hand. It is physically
impossible to cross such distances in a pirogue . . . without a compass, and
travel months without provisions. 

"On the other hand, the aborigines of the Sandwich Islands, of Viti, of New
Zealand, of the central groups, of Samoa, Tahiti, etc., had never known each
other, had never heard of each other, before the arrival of the Europeans.
And yet each of these people maintained that their island had at one time
formed part of an [2240 immense stretch of land which extended towards the
West on the side of Asia. 

And all, brought together, were found to speak the same language, to have
the same usages, the same customs, the same religious belief. And all to the
question, 'Where is the cradle of your race?' for sole response, extended
their hand toward the setting sun" (Ibid., p. 308). 

Geographically, this description clashes slightly with the facts in the
Secret Records; but it shows the existence of such traditions, and this is
all one cares for. For, as there is no smoke without fire, so a tradition
must be based on some approximate truth. 

In its proper place we will show modern Science fully corroborating the
above and the traditions of the Secret Doctrine with regard to the two lost
continents. 

The Easter Island relics are, for instance, the most astounding and eloquent
memorials of the primeval giants. They are as grand as they are mysterious;
and one has but to examine the heads of the colossal statues, that have
remained unbroken on that island, to recognise in them at a glance the
features of the type and character attributed to the Fourth Race giants. 

They seem of one cast though different in features ? that of a distinctly
sensual type, such as the Atlanteans (the Daityas and "Atalantians") are
represented to have in the esoteric Hindu books. 

Compare these with the faces of some other colossal statues in Central Asia
? those near Bamian for instance ? the portrait-statues, tradition tells us,
of Buddhas belonging to previous Manvantaras; of those Buddhas and heroes
who are mentioned in the Buddhist and Hindu works, as men of fabulous size,*
the good and holy brothers of their wicked co-uterine brothers generally, as
Ravana, the giant King of Lanka was the brother of Kumbhakarna; all
descendants of the gods through the Rishis, and thus, like "Titan and his
enormous brood," all "heaven's first born." 

These "Buddhas," though often spoilt by the symbolical representation of the
great pendent ears, show a suggestive difference, perceived at a glance,
between the expression of their faces and that of the Easter Isle statues.
They may be of one race ? but the former are "Sons of Gods"; the latter the
brood of mighty sorcerers. All these are re-incarnations, however, and apart
from unavoidable exaggerations in popular fancy and tradition, they are
historical characters.?  When did they live? How long ago lived the 
 
FN   * An approach to the statues at Bamian ? also a Buddha 200 feet high ?
is found near a Jain settlement in Southern India, and appears to be the
only one that remains at present. 

? Even Wilson admits that Rama and Ravana were personages founded on
historical facts: ?"The traditions of Southern India uniformly ascribing its
civilization and the settlement of civilized Hindus (the Fifth Race) to the
conquest of Lanka by Rama" (Vishnu Purâna, iii., p. 318) ? the victory of
the "Sons of God" over the Atlantean sorcerers, says the true tradition.
[225]  ...

two races, the Third and Fourth, and how long after did the various tribes
of the Fifth begin their strife, the wars between Good and Evil? We are
assured by the Orientalists that chronology is both hopelessly mixed and
absurdly exaggerated in the Puranas and other Hindu Scriptures. We feel
quite prepared to agree with the accusation. Yet, if Aryan writers did allow
their chronological pendulum to swing too far one way occasionally, beyond
the legitimate limit of fact; nevertheless, when the distance of that
deviation is compared with the distance of the Orientalists' deviation in
the opposite direction, moderation will be found on the Brahminical side. It
is the Pundit who will in the long run be found more truthful and nearer to
fact than the Sanskritist. Surely, it is not because the curtailing of the
latter ? even when proven to have been resorted to in order to fit a
personal hobby ? is regarded by Western public opinion as "a cautious
acceptance of facts," whereas the Pundit is brutally treated in print as a
liar, that everyone has to see this in the same light. An impartial observer
may judge it otherwise. He may either proclaim both unscrupulous historians,
or justify both, each on his respective ground, and say: Hindu Aryans wrote
for their Initiates, who read truth between the lines, not for the masses.
If they did mix up events and confuse Ages intentionally, it was not in view
of deceiving any one, but to preserve their knowledge from the prying eye of
the foreigner. Otherwise, to him who can count the generations from the
Manus, and the series of incarnations specified in the cases of some
heroes,* the meaning and chronological order are very clear in the Puranas.
As for the Western Orientalist, he must be excused, on account of his
undeniable ignorance of the methods used by archaic Esotericism. "    S D
II  222-4

We, who lived in the bodies of the Races of those times, brought on the
destruction of the Race and the lands that supported them. [ S D   II
222-3, 313-16, 757, 762-3, 786 ]  Deluges & floods:  [ S D   II  124, 140-1,
256, 266, 310-14, 352, 395, 433, 693, 751, 778, 786, ]
	DTB
=====================================================================


How do we challenge mainstream religion which many revert back to in times
of fear and become rigid and fixed in their belief out of that fear?  How do
we help sprirituality evolve to full consciousness of there being only One? 
We talk the talk, do we walk the walk?  Conversations need to be able to
take place - where people who, though coming from different places at least
share ideas in reasonable ways.  This has to take place first within our Own
communities where we can begin tearing down the walls of religiosity that
divide us and the labels the define us and begin to really see/know our
unique whole.  
Elaine

==============================

If we approach the problem with the current ideas based on religions as
practiced and science as known to day, we will only end up confused, angry
and frustrated, none the wiser for all that. What is required in the world
to day is the right knowledge of man's true self and nature, his inherent
divinity, 

indissoluble fundamental unity that binds all mankind, nay all beings, in
one Universal Brotherhood, that none can escape the consequences of one's
thoughts and actions, that the hurt one cause to others is hurt done to
oneself, and that we come again and again to reap the effects of our own
actions, "to rejoice and weep from life to life chained to thy previous
actions," till we learn the lessons of life and become wise. 

"If the action of the one reacts on the lives of all, and this is the true
scientific idea, then it is only by all men becoming brothers and women
sisters, and by all practicing in their daily lives true brotherhood and
sisterhood, that the real human solidarity, which lies at the root of the
elevation of the race, can ever be attained. It is this action and
interaction, the true brotherhood and sisterhood, in which each shall live
for all and all for each, which is one of the fundamental Theosophical
principles that every Theosophist should be bound not only to teach, but to
carry it out in his or her individual life." 
	(Key to Theosophy, p. 232, Indian Ed.)

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