Theos-Talk Archives (April 1997 Message tl00113)

In a message dated 97-04-16 17:22:41 EDT, Thoa wrote:

(quoting me)
> >Thus a highly evolved
>  >soul (e.g., Martin Luther King) could easily incarnate into one of the
>  ><groan> "lesser evolved" races to perform a given task and this probably
>  >happens more often than we may think.
>  
>  "Lesser evolved" races seem too harsh to describe a whole race.  Also, all
>  this talk about evolution, what does it mean?  Does it mean genetic
coding.
>  Does it mean mental capacity?  Or does it mean culturally?  Even an
>  inclusion of a whole race is too general.  An Asian person in the
>  industrialized section of a country is different from an Asian person in a
>  tribal section of a country.  If you are referring to a specific group
that
>  seem to be disadvantaged, maybe the best thing is to describe a specific
>  group of a specific society, and perhaps realize how they got that way
>  historically.

Hi Thoa,

Thanks for the welcome!!!! I agree with you about the term "lesser evolved
races" which is why I preceded it with <groan> and placed it in quotes in my
post. I personally do not like it at all when applied to anthropological
races. (And even anthropologists are debating whether "race" is at all useful
in classifying humans, but that's another subject.) Whenever I used the term
"evolution" or "evolved" in that post, I specifcally meant spiritual
evolution or, more specifically, the progress that a soul makes in expressing
itself through its vehicles and in mastering the three worlds. "Evolution" in
that same context could also refer to a higher turn of the spiral where the
spirit is increasingly expressing itself through the soul itself. What I was
trying to say was that anthropological race, socioeconomic status, etc.
should *not* be used to judge how far an indwelling soul has progressed along
the Path.

If we discussed, as you suggest, how disadvantaged groups historically became
that way within this particular context, I think we would be again
intertwining physical or anthropological races with spiritual evolution,
which are the very two concepts I was trying to separate in my post. I don't
think we are in actual disagreement on this issue, BTW. Am I right in
believing that you don't agree with the concept of "lesser evolved races"? If
you don't, then we are in agreement. :-)
>  
>  >I agree that the frequency of purely lust-driven unions is attracting a 
> large
>  >number of lesser evolved souls prematurely into incarnation and that it 
> does
>  >cause problems.
>  
>  Maybe theosophists have this need to try to figure out everything in terms
>  of soul.  However, the answer is right in front of our face.  Suppose
>  you're in a group that was enslaved or immigrated from another country.

<friendly snip of description of very real social ills>

Most of humanity has been looking mostly on the lower planes (what you say is
"in front of our face") for answers to its problems for millenia. Have we
solved them? I don't think so. So, what's wrong with exploring other methods,
trying something else for a change?

The problems that you listed, IMHO, result from selfishness and hatred.
Selfishness and hatred, in turn, result from our ignorance of the true nature
of the soul and the spirit. We see ourselves as totally separate from each
other, an illusion fostered by being consciously aware of only the lower
worlds. These are the same worlds that you are urging to me look at for the
source of the solution to our problems. What is the logic of looking further
into the mists of ignorance to solve problems resulting from that same
ignorance (including my own)?

This attempt to discover the inner causes of the societal ills we see around
us is not at all an attempt to escape dealing with them. It is, IMHO, the
only way we can find the means to effectively deal with them. Running around
helter-skelter, born on transitory winds of emotional sentiment, slapping a
band-aid here and there will not permanently solve anything, though it may
give transitory comfort to a few who are suffering and to those who actually
only need a band-aid. We cannot truly help humanity unless we truly love
humanity (a principle that originates from above the emotional plane), IMHO,
and that can only come by aligning the personality with the Soul. I do not
see the utility of trying to manifest compassion for our fellow humans
without also trying to become One with the principle of compassion itself.
The two go hand in hand. Without this, we may do a bit of good here and
there, but we mainly succeed in feeding our own egos, inwardly patting
ourselves on the back for the "good" we've done. 

All we need to do is look at the sorry history of so-called reformers,
revolutionaries, etc. who may have started their movements with the best of
intentions and ended up inflicting all types of horrors, major and minor, on
humanity. The usual scenario, IMHO, is "this social problem exists so let's
solve it by forcing people [often by any means necessary] to do thus and
such". The blood begins to flow, personal freedoms (which I think are
essential to human growth) are lost, etc. Contrast this with Ghandi's
non-violent, non-coercive philosophy which succeeded in liberating India from
the British Empire. Or with Martin Luther King's similar philosophy and civil
rights victories. Both were men who were motivated by selflessness and a true
love of humanity, illustrating the point I hope I made in the preceding
paragraph.

>  I say all average human beings will not be able to transcend such an
>  environment without help.  Once in a while I hear of one who has.
 However,
>  that is such a rarity that I see the same person on all the talk shows
>  telling his heart-wrenching story regarding his addicted mother, his
jailed
>  father, his stepfather who stole all their belongings, and his being a
>  surrogate father to his own brother.  Maybe it has to do with very
advanced
>  souls who can transcend such things.  But if you're going to talk about a
>  group of souls, I say most souls will not be able to overcome such
>  adversity.  We are all very average.  Just remember that all of us able to
>  read and write has the advantage over those who were never in an
>  environment to promote intellectual investigations.  Thus, if adversity
>  suddenly hits us, we can probably deal with it with some grace.

Who are we to say that any number of those who we don't see on TV haven't
"transcended their environment"? What does that actually mean anyway? What
about the father who joins with other fathers, for example, to stop gang
warfare in his neighborhood, not as a leader but simply a member of the
group? This, in itself, may be an important accomplishment for him, yet he
stays in that horrible neighborhood until the day he dies, still poor and
totally unnoticed. For another, simply actively participating in the local
storefront church could be a huge step. We can't just sit here and decide who
has or has not transcended anything, IMHO, without knowing an individual's
dharma and karmic issues to be resolved in a particular incarnation.

>  >I think the major source of the gnarliness of this whole issue is that we

> are
>  >trying to make sense of it at the level of the personality from where we
>  >cannot see of the relevant karmic relationships/necessities nor determine

> the
>  >actual point in evolution of all of the souls involved.
>  
>  Since we can't see the unseen, but just theorize.  How about looking at
>  what we can see?  Seeing what we can see is a lot closer to the situation
>  than theorize something to pieces.  It's as I was taught in life drawing,
>  look at your subject, don't look at the paper.

Yes, we need to look at the trees, but with the detachment born out of the
realization that they are not the entire forest. We need to step back,
transcending it, so to speak, to see it all. When you referred to "theorizing
something to pieces", you apparently missed the main point of my message
which was: we cannot make judgements without sufficient information. I've
lived in the hard-core ghetto myself, BTW. I know those particular "trees"
rather well. ;-D

Being that this post has become pretty long, I'll respond to what you said
about hemophiliacs with AIDS, group karma, etc. in another message.

Lynn