Theos-Talk Archives (March 1995 Message tl00298)

While I welcome Bazzer to the list and feel he has every
right to speak his mind, just like everyone else,
nevertheless I simply must take some exception to his
comments (nothing personal intended - I have a right to
speak my own mind too).  In short, this is not a flame,
but merely a presentation of an alternate opinion.


Bazzer: <"The Secret Doctrine", for example, stands or
falls on one simple plane fact:  Master's did or did not
help in it's production.  >

IMHO this is nonsense.  I read the SD over 25 years ago
and loved it.  At that time I took her Masters with a
large grain of salt.  I have always assumed that HPB wrote
the SD with or without anyone's help.  But whoever wrote
it, whether with or without the hand of an Adept, (and HPB
was an Adept herself, don't let her modesty fool you) the
SD, like any other book, must stand on its own merits.
The argument that it stands or falls on Masters sounds to
me like the Christian fundamentalist attitude that the
Bible must be believed because it is the very word of God.
Sorry Bazzer, I can't buy into either your idea of that
of the fundamentalists.


Bazzer: <If HPB *did* write the Letter's then she was a
fraud and liar, for *she* claimed that she did *not* write
them.  One would hope that anyone who believes HPB was/is
a fraud and a liar does not go by the title of
"theosophist".>

I agree with your first statement.  I do not agree with
your second.  A theosophist, IMHO,  is someone who
believes in the reality of universal brotherhood.  Period.
Whatever else a theosophist may believe in is mental fluff
and my fluff is as valid as anyone elses.


Bazzer: <Truth is One.  It is not and can not be 'open' to
debate.>

This again, IMHO, is pure nonsense.  Truth has been open
to debate since Adam and Eve ate the apple from the Tree
of Knowledge (i.e., after they descended below Daath).


Bazzer: <...founded by a tool of the Opposition (ie CWL)
being largely responsible for the fragmentation and
destruction of HPB's and Master's work. >

Please...  I understand that you are new here, but folks
have bashed poor ol' CWL unmercifully on this net for
months.  Let him rest in peace, OK?  Now the poor guy
is accused of working for the Dark Brotherhood of all
things!


Bazzer: <Celibacy is a cin qua non for Practical Occultism
(these are the basics any theosophist should know and
understand).  HPB was a practical/practicing Occultist.
Her virginity was proven by medical examination.  It was
physically impossible for her to be otherwise after an
'accident' she had falling from a horse at an early age.>

This statement, IMHO, suggests to me that you know little
of true occultism.  You are simply quoting some of HPB's
words which you kindly provide us as well, but I suspect
that you don't understand them.  If the quote was intended
to help sink your point home, it certainly failed with me.
Perhaps one of the historians among us will tell me I am
wrong here, but as I recall, her accident on the horse
only prevented her from getting pregnant.  She was accused
of having an illigitimate child and offered the doctor's
certificate as an excuse as to how it was impossible for
her to have a child.  I don't ever recall anyone saying
anywhere that she couldn't have sex (she did, however, say
that she never consumated her marriage with old General
Blavatsky, preferring to leave Russia instead.  This
sounds so much like her that I would guess it to be true).
And whether she did or did not have sex with anyone has
nothing whatever to do with her being an Adept or her
conversing with Masters.


HPB as quoted by Bazzer: <"The aspirant has to choose
absolutely between the life of the world and the life of
Occultism.  It is useless and vain to endeavour to unite
the two ..." and so on >

This is pure exotericism, and she is speaking in general
about what would apply to most (i.e., the average) person.
Being unmarried makes it easier to tread the Path.
Period.  Lots of Masters were married (Swami Ramakrishna
comes to mind as one).  And anyone who thinks that you
can't have sex and stay on the Path is simply whistling
in the wind.  For every celibate Adept that you can find,
I can show you an Adept who enjoyed his or her sexuality.
The two are simply unrelated, except in your own mind
(i.e., if you think of sex as dirty and sinful, then yes,
it will be a block for your spiritual development; but so
will anything else that you think is dirty or sinful).  I
suggest you read LUST FOR ENLIGHTENMENT: BUDDHISM AND SEX
by John Stevens (Shambala, 1990) for the way things really
are.  From this book, I too will give a quote.  It is
from the great Zen Master, Sengai:

       Falling in love is dangerous,
       For passion is the source of illusion;
       Yet being in love gives life flavor,
       And passions themselves
       Can bring one to enlightenment. (p 108)


I am always amazed at the strong current of puritianism
found among theosophists.  It comes, I suppose from HPB
(e.g., from taking Bazzer's quote too literally).  But she
was writing during a very puritanical time, and wanted
people to read her material and to join her society (she
did admit to holding some things back, after all).  She
wrote in the way she had to, leaving out things that she
had to leave out (such as the fact that several very high
Adepts in Tibet were women, which she had to have known).


If this posting makes me less a theosophist, then so be
it, but I must be honest and speak my mind.  As a magician
as well as a theosophist, I have discovered that sex
magic works as well as any other kind, and that sex and
celibacy are two sides of a coin (picture a coin with
one clean side and one dirty side and you get the
picture).

             Jerry S.