Theos-Talk Archives (November 1995 Message tl00533)

Coherence: > They fairly
>straightforwardly stated the beliefs of the participants i.e. 1Theosophy
>offers no practices to follow 02 Theosophy offers little that is
>spiritually nourishing and 03 self-sacrifice duty and good works will not
>lead to knowledge and power.

I cannot answer these three statements with a direct agree or
disagree. To the first statement I would add "for me" at the end. I feel
that I followed the offered practices about as far as they would take me
and I wanted to go farther. However this was never a big concern with
me because I had already learned Kundalini Yoga and other "techniques"
prior to joining the TS. I found spiritual nourishment right from the
start but only because I was ready for it at that time. Many find history and
long-winded sentences difficult and confusing terminology outdated
and meaningless Hindu and Buddhist names and technical terms instead
of spiritual nourshiment. Your third statement is silly because no one
should even be looking for "power " whatever that means and just how
would duty and selfless behavior give one "knowledge?" If you change
"knowledge and power" to "spiritual insight" then I would agree with the
statement. Spiritual insight in the sense of Adepthood requires duty and
self-sacrifice but duty and self-sacrifice alone are not enough to gain
spiritual insight. Witness Mother Terresa whose self-sacrificing is famous
but who doesn't acknowledge any of the basic theosophic principles such
as karma reincarnation or cycles our infamous "core teachings". BTW
I have never said that duty and good works i.e. karma yoga was not a
valid Path. It is. But it is not for everyone certainly not for me anyway.
There are other Paths swifter but also steeper/harder. However I
think that you will find that all Paths will eventually include karma yoga
within them; but our good deeds and duty should be spontaneous
not forced. This is due to the simple fact that selflessness and
compassion are essential to cross the Abyss safely. And we will
all have to cross the Abyss at some point along our chosen Path.
Thus all true spiritual Paths will bring us to compassion eventually.

> We should daily watch for the smallest appearance of our personality
>because when it appears it is usually due to selfishness and dwelling
>on the impact some action has on US.

I think I catch your drift here but you need to reword this. It
is completely impossible to "watch for the smallest appearance of our
personality" etc. Who prey tell is doing this watching? Without a
personality we cannot act or react or interact on this plane at all. The
idea is to transform the personality by making us to be as good as
possible and I guess this is what you meant and then go beyond or
transcend it by shifting consciousness into the individuality. To eliminate
the personality is like trying to eliminate the physical body. In one sense
neither are real and in another sense both will dissipate soon enough
anyway. Sorry if I seem to be nit-picking here.

Jerry S.