Theos-Talk Archives (September 1995 Message tl00456)

Brenda:

>>Eldon: Theosophists would generally disagree with the idea that we are but
>>clay fashioned out of some potter's hand. That is a story for
>>children's sunday school, not for people who want to think and understand
>>how life really works. We *made ourselves*, we are our own potters.

>Eldon, you are missing the point here entirely. I like this illustration a
>lot because this is a gray area of which we have little information. Where
>did the soul come from? Where did the mind come from? When we
>individualized, the teaching suggests, we received a soul? Didn't God (or
>natural law) provide us with this soul? Is this soul a temporary apparatus
>which becomes filled to a point, but then replaced? Perhaps the soul is
>another life form which benefits greatly by aiding us, but then when we are
>capable of living without it and a more direct line of transmission from the
>Monad to the Personality takes place, where does this being that was our
>soul go to? Does it repeat this work somewhere else in the universe?

There's a lot that could be said if we went into the subject in detail.
The basic point is that in the final analysis we are responsible for our
own growth and evolution. We were not "made" by some other being, like
clay being fashioned into pottery, except in the sense that we are
the potter ourselves.

>The same thing occurred with the mind. When we were ready to eixst in a
>gross material sense, some great dhyani chohans quickened our minds? What
>does this mean? Did they provide us with a temporary apparatus until ours
>could become more useful? Did our lives contribute to the growth of this
>temporary presence or did our lives go towards our own minds becoming more
>operable at the required level?

We are all interrelated in life. We must take responsibility for ourselves
and offer assistance to others as well. With Theosophy, we have a spiritual
ecosystem that spans all the planes of existence, with higher Kingdoms of
Nature in interaction and helping the lower Kingdoms. But that "helping"
is not a "fashioning out of clay," it is assistance and stimulation, but
does not take away the free will or self-initiative of the beings that
are helped.

>I think Daniel is right in saying we don't choose what becomes built into
>our auric aid. Karma does this. It is God's divine plan which makes certain
>qualities eternal and which associates those qualities with our activities,
>mental, emotional and physical.

We *do* choose, because our karma is not some external mechanism to ourselves,
it is the essential nature of our our being. Karma is not like a bank account
that someone else manages for us, where we make deposits and withdrawals.
It is a metaphysical way of describing that we are made up of living connections
with the rest of life, and it is what we put in those connections that comes
back to us.

>Once this buddhic body is developed, what
>does it do? Leave us to a fate similar to Christ dying on the cross perhaps?

With the awakening of each faculty of consciousness, we have a greater
enjoyment and appreciation of the experience of life. With Buddhi, we have
a living awareness of our relatedness to the rest of life, a sense of ethical
and moral consciousness, a sense of how we are not distinct from others, but
are inseparably linked with the rest of life.

>When I look up and address the potter I want to say it is good to be
>unselfish and even though I am living for the benefit of another "being" I
>can be fulfilled.

Being concerned for others, and enfilled with compassion, is a good quality.
But we are not a potter for others, each is their own potter.

>By furthering the life which has aided me I can repay that
>life and bring benefit to the universe as a whole. We find so many
>references in our literature regarding forgetting the self, becoming
>selfless, etc.

>[quoting from "How to Study Theosophy":]

>"As one progresses in Jnana Yoga, one finds conceptions arising which, though
>one is conscious of them, one cannot express nor yet formulate into any sort
>of mental picture. As time goes on these conceptions will form into mental
>pictures. ... As one works on, one finds the once admired picture growing dull
>and unsatisfying, and finally fading out or being thrown away. This is
>another danger point, because for the moment one is left in a void without
>any conception to support one, and one may be tempted to revive the cast-off
>picture for want of a better to cling to. The true student will, however,
>work on unconcerned, and presently further formless gleams come, which again
>in time give rise to a larger and more beautiful picture than the last. But
>the learner will now know that no picture will ever represent the TRUTH.
>This last splendid picture will grow dull and fade like the others. And so
>the process goes on, until at last the mind and its pictures are transcended
>and the learner enters and dwells in the World of NO FORM, but of which all
>forms are narrowed reflections."

This is something that we've talked about at times. With each understanding
we have of the Teachings, it has a useful period, then we must move on to a
deeper understanding. The process is on-going, and never ends. We must freshly
rethink our ideas each time we consider them, and eventually we come up with
something different, deeper, more insightful than before.

There are two sides to this. We have the evolving content, our current
ideas about things. And wew have the process itself, equally important,
where we do not allow that content to stagnate and become rancid, through
the lack of continual reevaluation.

How do we pass beyond specific ideas and approach the formless? By really
looking *in another direction*. Apart from the process of evolving, fluid,
flexible mindwork, we can come to some direct understanding of things that
does not involve the use of words and mental concepts. We do not do this
by killing out or stopping the jnana yoga process of mental or manasic
growth. It is just *a different thing to do*. How do we do this? Talking
about it would make an interesting topic of discussion. Perhaps you could
start off with your own ideas?

-- Eldon