Theos-Talk Archives (August 2006 Message tt00709)

Jake,

You write:

=======================================================
Thanks to Daniel for the information - source
of quote BCW XII, p. 696. I still think it is a wrong
practice, or not explained sufficiently, and dangerous.
If it didn't "just slip by Judge," I think Judge is wrong.
Is a facsimile of the original instruction online? I
don't like the idea of visualizing in general. When
we are in a world of illusion, why create more illusion?
'Also think it is a big mistake to put too much weight
on Judge's or anybody's personal diary. Who knows
what anything might mean, they are just notes to
oneself, or keys of things to think about.
=======================================================

Concerning your comment that 

"If it didn't 'just slip by Judge,'..."

and 

"Also think it is a big mistake to put too much weight
on Judge's or anybody's personal diary. Who knows
what anything might mean, they are just notes to
oneself, or keys of things to think about."

Think about it....

(1)  Judge saw fit to transcribe in his 1888 diary these
quotes from KH.

Then....

(2) in E.S. Instruction V published several years later, 
Judge decides to add these quotes FOR ALL esoteric members to read
and study.

How can one reasonably entertain the idea that the quotes
may have "JUST slip by Judge" into this instruction?

I would suggest that he make a conscious
decision to add the quotes or they would not have
appeared in this instruction.

(3) Furthermore, starting in 1889 and 1890 Julia Keightley,
a trusted associate of Judge, starts quoting and
paraphrasing this SAME KH material in the pages
of THE PATH.  Keep in mind that THE PATH was for the
PUBLIC and that Judge was the editor.  Surely one can
conclude that it was NO accident or NO "slip" that lead
to the public publication of some of this material in THE PATH.

(4) Plus there are indications that this material from
KH was distributed to other members of the E.S. DURING
HPB's lifetime.

Surely Judge and HPB were aware of what was published in THE PATH
or given to members of the ES.

And both Alice Cleather (member of HPB's Inner Group)and Basil Crump 
quote some of this material indicating that they knew of the 
existence of this KH material.

etc.

So the situation is much more than simply finding supposed
KH quotes in Judge's personal private diary.

And since this discussion brings up the issue of "phoney"
Mahatma letters, one might consider what HPB herself wrote
in Oct. 1888:

==========================================================
...We have been asked by a correspondent why he should not "be free 
to suspect some of the so-called 'precipitated' letters as being 
forgeries," giving as his reason for it that while some of them bear 
the stamp of (to him) undeniable genuineness, others seem from their 
contents and style, to be imitations. This is equivalent to saying 
that he has such an unerring spiritual insight as to be able to 
detect the false from the true, though he has never met a Master, 
nor been given any key by which to test his alleged communications. 
The inevitable consequence of applying his untrained judgment in 
such cases, would be to make him as likely as not to declare false 
what was genuine, and genuine what was false. Thus what criterion 
has any one to decide between one "precipitated" letter, or another 
such letter? Who except their authors, or those whom they employ as 
their amanuenses (the chelas and disciples), can tell? For it is 
hardly one out of a hundred "occult" letters that is ever written by 
the hand of the Master, in whose name and on whose behalf they are 
sent, as the Masters have neither need nor leisure to write them; 
and that when a Master says, "I wrote that letter," it means only 
that every word in it was dictated by him and impressed under his 
direct supervision. Generally they make their chela, whether near or 
far away, write (or precipitate) them, by impressing upon his mind 
the ideas they wish expressed, and if necessary aiding him in the 
picture-printing process of precipitation. It depends entirely upon 
the chela's state of development, how accurately the ideas may be 
transmitted and the writing-model imitated. Thus the non-adept 
recipient is left in the dilemma of uncertainty, whether, if one 
letter is false, all may not be; for, as far as intrinsic evidence 
goes, all come from the same source, and an are brought by the same 
mysterious means. But there is another, and a far worse condition 
implied. For all that the recipient of "occult" letters can possibly 
know, and on the simple grounds of probability and common honesty, 
the unseen correspondent who would tolerate one single fraudulent 
line in his name, would wink at an unlimited repetition of the 
deception. And this leads directly to the following. All the so-
called occult letters being supported by identical proofs, they have 
all to stand or fall together. If one is to be doubted, then all 
have, and the series of letters in the "Occult World," "Esoteric 
Buddhism," etc., etc., may be, and there is no reason why they 
should not be in such a case-frauds, "clever impostures," 
and "forgeries," such as the ingenuous though stupid agent of 
the "S.P.R." has made them out to be, in order to raise in the 
public estimation the "scientific" acumen and standard of 
his "Principals."
==============================================================

So if one might consider the material under consideration
as "phoney" (your term) then one might also consider Olcott's
view on the Prayag Mahatma Letter (Letter #134 in the first three 
editions of the Mahatma Letters).  Apparently Olcott believed
this letter was "phoney" and did NOT originate from the Mahatma.
It would appear Olcott could NOT believe that the Mahatma could have
written what was in Letter #134.  Is this SIMILAR to your contention
that Mahatma KH could NOT have possibly written about visualizing 
the Master within???

Food for thought...

Daniel
http://hpb.cc