THE Founders of the modern Theosophical Society and Masters behind the wider Movement, labored tirelessly during the late 19th Century to document and publicize the lost teachings concerning man, nature and the universe.
The restoration of this ancient Wisdom came at a critical juncture — the rise of materialistic science was threatening to deliver a death-blow to mysticism, and the immortal soul of man.
“Modern science believes not in the ‘soul of things,’” Blavatsky wrote then, “and hence will reject the whole system of ancient cosmogony.”
She called upon the two autocrats, science and religion, to end their combative ways — and collaborate towards a higher synthesis. As it turned out, both got their comeuppance from an unexpected source.
The End of Materialism
The turn of the Century, as predicted by Blavatsky, resulted in the recognition of the infinite divisibility of atoms, the discovery radiation and the x-ray, and atomic energy — the dogma of “solid” matter disappeared into quantum abstractions, putting an end to an easy-going materialism.
It was a mortal blow from which neither camp has fully recovered.
A must-read is Dr. Charles Tart’s new book, “The End of Materialism: How Evidence of the Paranormal Is Bringing Science and Spirit Together”- (IONS/ New Harbinger).
For more discussion and videos on this, go to Science or Spirituality and the intriguing post: Designing Mind.
Changing Minds
The metaphysical truths underlying cosmogenesis and anthropogenesis followed soon after Isis Unveiled with Blavatsky’s magnum opus, The Secret Doctrine — the unacknowledged platform of the New Age.
Some 135 years later, Theosophical light is still brightening the end of the tunnel.
Those who have had a near-death experience have already seen the light — including children, reports noted researcher P.M.H. Atwater.
Out-of-body experiences (OBEs) are still the most compelling evidence for the existence of a cognitive self that exists independently from the physical body, and an argument for reincarnation of the same entity from life to life.
See the blog post: Scientists study ‘out of body experiences’
Frontier sciences are providing more and more experimental results demonstrating the existence of a mind-soul existing beyond the boundaries of physical matter.
Organizations like the Institute of Noetic Sciences are transforming contemporary worldviews on the relationship between consciousness and matter.
Such important scientific documentation was not available in the early days of Theosophy.
For further discussion and videos about near-death, click to view: So Far, So Near
Twin Doctrines
Mme. Blavatsky was adamant that a true understanding of reincarnation and karma was the ultimate salvation of humanity — notably remarking in her Third Letter to the Fourth Annual Convention of the American Section of the Theosophical Society, the following:
“We are outwardly creatures of but a day — within we are eternal. Learn, then, well the doctrines of Karma and Reincarnation, and teach, practice, promulgate that system of life and thought which alone can save the coming races.”
These twin doctrines of responsibility (karma) and hope (reincarnation), are keys to getting us out of the woods — a logical way of making sense out of two of humanity’s most persistent mysteries — the purpose of life and the meaning of death.
Bonded Entities
Such is the law of love and mercy, says the teaching. The omniscient soul, “clothes itself, so to say, with the reflection of the ‘personality’ that was.”
“For the time being, then, the Ego becomes the ideal reflection of the human being it was when last on earth — Death comes to our spiritual selves ever as a deliverer and friend.”
Oscar: Friend of the Dying
Higher Evolution of Man
People have wondered why H. P. B. and others “lay so much stress on doctrines like Karma and Reincarnation,” wrote William Q. Judge. It is not only because these ideas are logical and easy to understand, and they “benefit individuals,” he said. But also because
“they furnish a solid foundation for ethics, or all human conduct — they are the very key-notes of the higher evolution of man. Without Karma and Reincarnation, evolution is but a fragment …”
“These same concepts were expressed in the Bhagavad-Gita,” writes Eloise Hart in Reincarnation and Karma.
“In Krishna’s conversation with his pupil, Arjuna, he said (ch.2:4) — ‘both I and thou have passed through many births … mine are known unto me, but thou knowest not of thine.’” Then says…
“As a man throweth away old garments and putteth on new, even so the dweller in the body, having quitted its old mortal frames, entereth into others which are new.”
Changing our Clothing
(Excerpt from The Path: Afterlife)
For most of us, life is a process whose “beginnings are unknown, and whose outcome cannot be discerned.” Mr. Judge continues. It’s “a glimpse of what might be, a hope of what should be.”
“But in the light of Karma and Reincarnation evolution becomes the logic of what must be,” he says, and
“the links in the chain of being are all filled in, and the circles of reason and of life are complete. Karma gives the eternal law of action, and Reincarnation furnishes the boundless field for its display.”
After Life Visions
Theosophy’s Big TOE
Theosophy, is the ultimate “theory of everything” (TOE), and was the dream of Einstein. But Theosophy’s true agenda was not the pushing of abstruse metaphysics on humanity.
If we understand H. P. Blavatsky and her co-worker W. Q. Judge correctly, their main object was restoring the rightful place of the Soul, and establishing a true understanding of consciousness and its states — including the whole of Nature.
The well known comment in The Secret Doctrine comes to mind: “we men must remember that because we do not perceive any signs — which we can recognise — of consciousness, say, in stones, we have no right to say that no consciousness exists there.”
“There is no such thing as either ‘dead’ or ‘blind’ matter, as there is no ‘Blind’ or ‘Unconscious’ Law. These find no place among the conceptions of Occult philosophy [which] never stops at surface appearances — for it, the noumenal essences have more reality than their objective counterparts.”
After Life – Contact
Source Wisdom
“The Upanishads are to the Vedas what the Kabala is to the Jewish Bible,” Blavatsky wrote, and “They treat of and expound the secret and mystic meaning of the Vedic texts.”
“They speak of the origin of the Universe, the nature of Deity, and of Spirit and Soul, as also of the metaphysical connection of mind and matter. In a few words: They contain the beginning and the end of all human knowledge…”
Jung: Stepping Out of the Mist
“That was in my eleventh year,” Carl Jung eagerly admitted to his interviewer’s question, “On my way to school, I stepped out of a mist .. I stepped out of it and knew ‘I am’ — I am what I am.”
When asked about death, if it is an ‘end,’ he replied: “and there we are not quite certain, about this end.”
SHELLEY
“The world’s great age begins anew,
The golden days return,
The earth doth like a snake renew
Her winter weeds outworn.”
(from H. P. Blavatsky, “Our Cycle and the Next”)
The founders of modern Theosophy worked diligently in the 19th and early 20th Centuries to present and validate the old occult teachings about man and nature.
High on the list in Blavatsky’s Isis Unveiled were restoring “calumniated” reputations of ancient scientific and religious thought. The publication of Isis was meant to “do even justice,” and “to speak the truth alike without malice or prejudice.” It would show
“neither mercy for enthroned error, nor reverence for usurped authority. It demands for a spoliated past, that credit for its achievements which has been too long withheld. It calls for a restitution of borrowed robes, and the vindication of calumniated but glorious reputations.”
“TRUTH, high-seated upon its rock of adamant, is alone eternal and supreme.”
The metaphysics underlying cosmogenesis and anthropogenesis followed soon after in The Secret Doctrine.
Saludos,
An extract in letter No. XLVII of the Mahatma Letters:
“The Sun of Theosophy must shine for all, not for a part. There is more of this movement than you have yet had an inkilng of, and the work of the T.S. is linked in with similar work that is secretly going on in all parts of the world”. . . this from Master Morya.
I understand H.P.B. to be the Master´s Messenger of the Modern Theosphical Movement bringing back the teachings of the Ancient Wisdom and also one of the founders of the organization TheTheosphical Society. To say that the “Founders of the Modern Theosophical Movement” labored tirelessly in the late19th. century, to document and publicize the lost teachings of man, nature and the universe seems to me incorrect. It was the Founders of the Theosophical Society that did this work as part of the Modern Theosophical Movement. We just have to go back to the Mahatma Letter…to me it says it all.
Gracias,
Marion
Thank you Marion, you’re point is well taken, and the post has been updated to reflect more accurately the efforts of that era. We’d been looking for that particular quote from the Letters for some time — thank you again for it! We wanted to keep the opening simple, and also paint a larger picture, so that’s why the word “Movement” was used as we did. The Master suggests the same idea of a broader effort behind the scenes.
Jung had the experience of the interrelatedness of all things. Do you think at the end of his life that he accepted the doctrine of rebirth and karma?
Yes Joan, we do think that Jung clearly understood and accepted reincarnation. There are many places in his writings that strongly hint of it. Thank you for your comments!
“My life often seemed to me like a story that has no beginning and no end. I had the feeling that I was an historical fragment, an excerpt for which the preceding and succeeding text was missing. I could well imagine that I might have lived in former centuries and there encountered questions I was not yet able to answer; that I had been born again because I had not fulfilled the task given to me.” —Carl Jung
I was reading about Manichean beliefs. Does anyone know much about Mani? He lived 200 years after Christ. The belief system extended from Tibet all the way to Egypt and was wiped out by Augustine and Christians after the council of Nicea. Think how much better life would have been had this ancient widom been accepted.
Manichaeans were a sect which originated in the 3rd century in Persia and rapidly diffused itself in Mesopotamia and beyond the Oxus, lasting under one or another form down to the 13th century. Its founder was Mani, said to have been a Persian, whose name in Greek became Manes or Manichaios. Little can be ascertained about him, but he is said to have been a natural mystic, conscious of a mission, and endowed with the breadth of view and concentrated zeal…
(Definition of Manichaeans is extracted from the home page of The Theosophical Society, International Headquarters, Pasadena, California)
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Perhaps the most comprehensive of these publications was Manichaeische Dogmatik aus chinesischen und iranischen Texten (Manichaean Dogma from Chinese and Iranian texts), by Waldschmidt and Lentz, published in Berlin in 1933.[23] More than any other research work published before or since, this work printed, and then discussed, the original key Manichaean texts in the original scripts, and consists chiefly of sections from Chinese texts, and Middle Persian and Parthian texts transcribed with Hebrew letters. (After the Nazi party gained power in Germany, the Manichaean writings continued to be published during the 1930s, but the publishers no longer used Hebrew letters, instead transliterating the texts into Latin letters.)
Additionally, in the early 1900s, German researchers in Egypt found a large body of Manichaean works in Coptic. Though these were also damaged, many complete pages survived and were published in Berlin before World War II. Some of these Coptic Manichaean writings were destroyed during the war
For real Theosophy IS ALTRUISM, and we cannot repeat it too often. It is brotherly love, mutual help, unswerving devotion to Truth. If once men do but realize that in these alone can true happiness be found, and never in wealth, possessions, or any selfish gratification, then the dark clouds will roll away, and a new humanity will be born upon earth. Then, the GOLDEN AGE will be there, indeed.
But if not, then the storm will burst, and our boasted western civilization and enlightenment will sink in such a sea of horror that its parallel History has never yet recorded.
Lucifer, May, 1889
H. P. Blavatsky