Theos-Talk Archives (November 1995 Message tl00031)

Hi all

Rich recently replied to the list:

> ...
> 03 We should begin preparing sophisticated introductory courses that will
> take people from the street as it were assuming NO BACKGROUND KNOWLEDGE
> and get them into the original texts with the aid of overviews of the
> teachings examples of Theosophical works through history Plato's Allegory
> of the Cave in the REPUBLIC Gnostic works Buddhist and Vedanta works
> current works by Theosophical thinkers etc. All with the aim of getting new
> students to the original stuff as quickly and thoroughly as possible ...

I hope everyone will excuse the Christian reference here but
... AMEN!

I know some of you remember me ranting on this topic six or so
months ago but I still believe it and agree totally with Rich. I
have been involved with training albiet computer/Unix training
for over eleven years. The stuff that I've seen pass for educa-
tional material in the TS is poor at its best. I've written a
number of courses/textbooks myself over the past eleven years and
I've been to a number of confrences/programs related to adult ed-
ucation and this experience tells me that something more is need-
ed.

As a member of the TS for the past five years I certainly
have had the inclination to write such material myself. However
in that five year period I have been struggling to learn the ba-
sics from those poorly written educational materials that use all
of those undefined obsolete words all over the place with very
little success. Even if I had the time these days which unfor-
tunately I don't I have no where to turn to no one to turn to
except this list -- which at times can be very useful to get
me started on such a project which I agree is sorely needed.

> ... I
> believe this is exactly the kind of course Jerry and Apr H-E are preparing
> for public use. I look forward to it expectantly hoping it will truly
> improve the generally fair to poor level of Theosophical education which as
> a rule ignores HPB and Mr. Judge's original stuff altogether.

Jerry mentioned in a reply to one of my previous posts that he
had an introductory course available. Is the one mentioned here
another one? What ever the case I eagerly look forward to look-
ing over the course as well and will always be on the lookout for
other "course material" on Theosophy that we can use in our lit-
tle Study Group here in Cincinnati.

Thanks for listening. I just felt a need to throw in my
$0.02. May you always grok in fullness ...

Bill--
...who believes pro is to con as progress is to Congress.
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