Theos-Talk Archives (November 1999 Message tl00301)

Randy writes:
> Continuing.  Now it gets hard.
> 3.  Since reason has led me to this point, why not use it to determine what
> the universal truth is?  By reason I mean logic, direct experience, trust and
> faith in the experience of credible others, experimental results, practical
> utility(there's that abhorent western thing again, I just can't hold it
> back), intuition, etc.  These are all good tools.  But the results gleaned by
> one should fit the others according to the rule of universal truth.
> 4.  Now just get to it.  Assemble the truths and see what they say.  Maybe
> this will not get too far but it is a safe way to go and will prevent wasting
> a lot of time on detours(which most of the thousands of religious beliefs
> are).

> In the alternative to #3, one could go to school under any number of masters,
>  Tammy Faye Baker,  Jesus(Although who really knows what he even said  Never
> mind that though, learn the language of christology and show some respect for
> the clergy masters, right?),  Jerry Falwell,  Confucious, HPB(oops--covers
> head defensively to ward off blows) etc.  We could trust in the great
> intellect of these masters, learn the vocabulary they invent,  not question
> their foundations, not apply reason(too western), just follow, that's the
> essential key here.
Well, no, not exactly. just be patient enough to hear us
out, and then ask questions.

> If theosophy, like any other useful system of thought, has anything of value
> to say, the  essential  elements must be able to be clearly articulated with
> common language and the proofs made obvious.  My feeling is that if you are
> saying that theosophy cannot do this then I am saying it has nothing of value
> to offer other than mental calisthenics.
I am interpreting this as a question. translation: what are
the basic elements? As there are different theosophy's on
this list, I will give you my list of fundamentals, that
are based mainly on those same mahatma's and hpb:

1) there is physical world.
2) there is thought (and emotion, and spirituality)
3) thought and emotion influance each other, and not merely
physically.
4) what I do, influances others and ultimately influances
me again (also called karma)
5) there is something divine in all of us.

I could go on, of course, but not being able to give a
proof for any of these (except perhaps the first three), I
will stop here and see how you respond and what proof you
need...

Katinka

----------------------
NHL Leeuwarden
hesse600@tem.nhl.nl