Theos-Talk Archives (April 1996 Message tl01361)

Alex,
Shame on you for expecting me to act like one of the pharisees.
Here it is.  I view an adept as someone with extraordinary preternatural
ability who has the ability to control it.  They rarely appear directly in
history, but work behind the scenes when they bother with politics at all.
 Being beyond such petty considerations of ethics, morality, good and evil,
they are capable of any action which serves their purposes.
Adepts are interesting to study, fascinating to look for and never to be
trusted, not because they intend malice, but because they are working in
areas that are very difficult for ordinary folks to understand.
I am inclined to think the big problem with the orthodox theosophical
misunderstanding of adeptship is black/white way the older writers had of
looking at the world. The split in their minds between the Masters and the
Dugpas was the result of getting a glimpse into the broader reality and not
being really able to process the information, so they formulated two opposing
camps, one nice, one not nice.  This has proven unfortunate because it places
both out of reach of the aspirant.
My personal belief is that many of the people you consider to be adepts were
merely very talented people who took advantage of the historical situation in
which they found themselves.  It is not impossible for a true adept to simply
use such people while being totally unknown himself, as my own experiments in
the 1980's with political magick have proven.
The adepts are out there, but they do not fly carpets, live in villas in the
Himalayas and would not waste their time with the likes of the Bishop or
George Arundale.
And they can be very, very dangerous.

Chuck the Barbarian MTI, FTSA, M G of 5
Heretic
Troublemaker

"Well, that's another fine mess you've gotten us into."