Theos-Talk Archives (September 1994 Message tl00106)

I'm new in this group, but let me try my 2cents worth.  Your
discussion has set me to thinking as to what my own beliefs are
re good & evil.  I most often just try to see the plus side, to
work darn hard on my own character traits, those which I find
undesirable, & to ignore what I consider evil in others.  (unless
they get into my hair too much, in which case I give them a
biting piece of my mind.).

For one thing, I go along with the idea that thinking & talking
about evil things like black magicians & black brotherhoods
reinforces undesirable thought forms.  Reading all that e-mail
has made me feel that maybe I'm evil too, & I bet it has given
you/all the same feeling too at times..  (When you stop to really
think about it, you realize that you're not.  We're human with
favorable & unfavorable traits, as Jerry Schueler stated)
Thinking/talking about negative things has that effect, because,
as Serge King taught us, the Unconscious doesn't differentiate
between Myself & Other.  Say something negative, either about
yourself or someone else, & the Unconscious reacts negatively.
Say something nice either way & the Unconscious tends to become
more genial with pleasure.  So, with that in mind, I don't watch
hardly any cops & robbers etc.  stories on TV.  The news brings
enough horrible happenings to suit me.  When I want to relax, I
watch sitcoms, or concerts.  So how should I deal with the ideas
of "good" & "evil", & black magicians?

I imagine most of the subscribers of the Theos-L network grew up
under the very strict Puritan-American guilt trip which
emphasizes being a lowly sinner, born in evil.  I grew up with
the same ethic in Germany.  Nowadays, we're trying to deal with a
world full of violence, both physical & mental.  In my life, I've
been influenced enough by Buddhism to talk about "ignorance"
instead of "sin".  If people do the wrong thing because they
don't know any better, at least they can learn to change their
ways, at some time.  So if I hear of kids toting guns to school,
I try to do something to help change them, with the altruistic
(Ithink) assumption that not killing each other is less injurious
to their health.  I might, for one thing, take the easiest way &
send them thoughts/feelings of peace & harmony.  If I could, I'd
take part in an activity which would teach them to settle things
by means other than fists & guns.  Groups who think along those
lines are springing up all over these days.  I try not to think
of these as evil kids.  "Hate the deed, but love the doer."
MLKing.  I don't know whether anyone can change a black magician.
Someone like that, Serge taught us, gets at you through your
fears, so I'd try not to be afraid.  To me, these are all
positive rules to live by, but somewhere inside me there's still
a vestige of the negative ethics I was brought up with.

Now about people more advanced in Wisdom vs.  black
magicians.  From "Isis Unveiled" V.I,p.218 ...."from first to
last, from Pythagoras down to Eliphas Levi, from highest to
humblest, everyone teaches that the magical power is never possessed
by those addicted to vicious indulgences.  Only the pure in heart
'see God' or exercise divine gifts - only such can heal the ills
of the body, and allow themselves, with relative security, to be
guided by the 'invisible powers'....  'magic has nothing supernal
in it'; it is a science, & even the power of 'casting out devils'
was a branch of it, of which the Initiates made a special study.
'That skill which expels demons out of human bodies, is a science
useful & sanative to men' says Josephus."

If you should be meandering through AB's "Path of Discipleship",
I think you can get the idea that one must be ethically pretty
solid before one is initiated into the more advanced esoteric
wisdom.  That's always helped me when I've thought of black
magicians.  Serge told us that he'd met any number of them when
he served in Africa.  And again, he told us that they rule by
fear.  As for instance, if one of them wanted to cast a spell,
he/she makes sure the "victim" would know about what he was doing
and then the victim would get scared, & do all the damage to
himself.

How different were the qualities I noted upon meeting Serge
(there were 70 of us at that workshop) He's a very loving person,
very much at ease, & unafraid.  He taught us the rudiments of
what he knows, a philosophy & techniques based on establishing
harmony & peace.  He also told us there was a group of Hunas
working together around where he lives.  I've met 2 more people
like him.  They were both Theosophists.  Both have, in different
ways, had a very positive influence on my life.  Soooo I'd rather
talk about them any old time, than those old looking but not
being black magician.  Besides, I never knowingly came across one
of them.

>From CWL, "Inner Life", 4th ed.  '67, V.I, p.127 ff "There is no
hierarchy of evil.  There are black magicians certainly, but the
black magician is usually merely a single solitary entity.  He is
working for himself, as a separate entity, and for his own ends.
You can not have a hierarchy of people who distrust one another.
(Jerry H-E said that in one of his letters) In the White
Brotherhood every member trusts the others; but you cannot have
trust with the dark people, because their interest is built upon
self....

"Matter is not evil.  Spirit & matter are equal.  Matter is not
in opposition to spirit.  We find matter troublesome because of
the bodies we have to use; but we are here in order to learn what
without the physical life could not be conveyed to us.  The
physical plane experiences give a definiteness & precision to our
consciousness & powers which we could never acquire on any plane,
unless we had spent the necessary time on this.  But why do
people bother about evil? There is plenty of good in the world,
and it is better to think of that, for your thought strengthens
that of which you think.  To think & talk so much about black
magicians unquestionably attracts their attention to you, and the
results are often exceedingly undesirable."

To end with a vague quote from Hoeller's Ojai lectures on
Alchemy.  The black period along the path to the Philosopher's
Stone is a difficult one, but it's a very creative time.  Hoeller
at one point states that "black" often has a negative connotation
for us, and mentions in passing that at times the connotation is
racially biased.  I guess that's why we talk about "African-
Americans" today.  I don't know what kind of bias it is to talk
negatively about Stephan Hoeller.

Well, that's my contribution.  For what it's worth.

Liesel