Theos-Talk Archives (November 1995 Message tl00012)

Liesel ...
Well that was one of the more remarkable posts I've read in a
good long time ... would that it were published in the AT and other
publications for consideration by Theosophical memberships.
I arrived at the conclusion some years ago that much as I would
have liked the TS to be a genuine spiritual family that in fact the
official organizations are often about as viscious as any "spiritual"
organization currently working on the planet. I have come to believe that
organized Theosophy is a place where people are *introduced* to
Theosophy but if actual growth begins happening if the urge to serve
begins rising out of the core of the person that is if a person
actually *becomes* a Theosophist the organization often begins rejecting
them and the person themself often just leaves completely - as the
*living* of Theosophy is not modelled in nor supported by Theosophical
organizations.
The study of "source" literature and the understanding of the
immense cosmic model briefly sketched in things like the ML & SD is all
well and good but can be every bit as selfish as the study of anything
else is. The desire for intellectual stimulation is really no better or
worse than the desires of the emotions or the desires of the flesh. And
if the ML are any guide it seems the approach to chelaship has to do
with disciplining the personality levels ... but more than anything else
*filling oneself totally with the urge to serve*. The most "Theosophical"
people I know have never studied "occult" doctrines ... but have so fully
internalized the urge to serve that it is automatic and virtually
unconscious ... any situation they are placed in finds them asking the
question "what can I *do* for the people here; what do they need?" Very
few people need to know what damn planetary chain we are on. And these
people if they entered a Theosophical lodge in the middle of a study
session on the SD would certainly listen ... but would also notice
instantly if another member was deeply hurting with a soundless pain ...
and their minds would wander off the subject of the SD and dwell on what
they could do to *aid the person* considering philosophy always
secondary to service.
I am not saying the study of the "ancient wisdom" has no merit
.. only that it has a *purpose* and the purpose is not to spend endless
energy mulling it over but to take it as truths that can be used to more
effectively serve. Sometimes I think the Masters decided to experiment
with the TS - to release the barest corner of a body of knowledge and
see what people would *do* with it. Well mostly they have just sat on
it enjoyed the pleasure of studying it but done little else. The
Masters were clearly shooting for something universal and instead would
now see the original current shrunk into tiny little pinpoints keeping
"alive" a few books that clearly appeal to an absolutely miniscule
percentage of the population as though the Masters need *us* to keep
anything alive fer Christ's sake fully convinced that the small
numbers *.002%* of the US population ... that is *not* a nucleus - it
isn't even a single gene are due the unelevated nature of society the
fact that so few are exalted enough to be "ready" for Theosophy that the
lowly peasents just want cheap thrills and aren't ready for "real"
spiritual work. What utterly condescending garbage.
There's growing numbers of people all over this planet who *are*
pouring their hearts out in service daily and a lot of them wouldn't
have anything to *do* with Theosophy - which is perceived by many to be
if not dead then simply full of hyper-intellectualized discussions that
long ago ceased to do a *thing* for humanity as a whole.
Sitting in Theosophical ideas are the seeds of for instance the
thoughts ethics and practical mechanisms from which could arise IMO
unique and creative solutions to the ethnic and religious strife that
increasingly tears our race apart - strife that arises because population
has grown incredibly large very quickly and modern communications have
further shrunk distances so that many ideologies that never came into
contact with one another now perceive themselves to be rubbing up against
one another - even in *competition* with one another - is it just
possible that perhaps the Masters saw this eventuality coming and
attempted to introduce a set of ideas that could provide the harmonizing
tools ... the idea of the common roots of all religions & etc. - but that
whether this worked or not was dependent upon whether people took those
seed ideas and *worked them into practical applications*?
The study and discussion of theoretical occult doctrines has
become IMO the primary Theosophical activity - and the prominent
theosophists are those who have studied the tiniest details of the stuff
and now parade "humbly" as "teachers" ... argue endlessly over what we
"should" teach to *whom*? the two people out of every 10000 that are
vaugely interested in understanding multi-billion year cosmic creation
models? ... missing the rather larger point that *it no longer makes a
damn bit of difference *what* is taught: The SD and ML could *go out of
print* and the major crises our race faces the growth and spiritual
development of of humanity as a whole and the amelioration of the
enormous suffering of our own and other kingdoms WOULD NOT BE AFFECTED
ONE IOTA*. The tiny number of people in the next generation for whom the
study of such things might be pleasurable would miss the opportunity but
of all the possibilities inherent in the Theosophical literature almost
none have been tapped. The study of intellectual occultism has become a
massive "attractor" that drains almost all Theosophical activity into
itself ... it is a comfort zone ... but to continue happily arguing over
minor points of doctrine all the while oblivious to the fact that what
started as a revolutionary set of ideas that could ... if worked into
application have changed the world and very possibly was intended by
the Masters to do just that - and could even now be providing
powerful insights into some of our race's deepest and most painful
problems - has turned in barely more than one century into a frozen
little clique arguing loudly over issues whose resolution one way or the
other wouldn't have the slightest effect on humanity ... modern Theosophy
is little more than a quiet little fiddling as Rome burns.
In the Bible is the parable of the talents coins - coins were
given to three men ... one spent his and wasted it one took risks
invested it and caused it to grow and the third kept it "safe": Looking
at the ideas that launched the TS as a "coin" and looking at our present
world the 05 billion actual living humans and their societies and the
ideas that rip them apart *which of the three men in the parable does
modern Theosophy resemble*?
Who's on the road to becoming a chela? Not one who can quote HPB
chapter and verse but one who has taken but a single paragraph and
served a whole community by unfolding the wisdom within it. Were any of
us to be called to the Himalayian heights would we be asked how well we
*understand* "occult" doctrines ... or what we've *done* with the little we
do understand? Who would be admitted? The one who said "After long and
careful study I grasp everything you've allowed to be written so far
and I now feel ready for the "inner" knowledge" ... or the one that said
"I'm sorry I only had a chance to read one of HPB's books and I didn't
even understand that very well but I got too busy raising my children
well and once they were raised became so compelled to try to resolve
race relations in my community that I scarcely had time to read
anything and could only find time to meditate once a month".
There's been large amounts of talk about "what" to "teach" ...
and in fact "teaching" is now considered to be the principle if not
virtually the only actual "service" modern Theosophy does. [Say to
Theosophy "you aren't serving humanity at all" ... and it will likely say
back "we are teaching the Secret Doctrine and expend much energy and
consider it our solemn responsibility to keep the teaching pure"]. How
much of this however is really sublimated *selfishness* ... the study
done because the person is one of the few who enjoys studying this sort
of stuff and the "teaching" done because of the pleasure of showing
others that it is known ... and of "helping" others who similarly enjoy
this particular form of the "mysteries". In fact anyone who studies
*anything* for very long will find an almost irresistable
*personality-based* urge to talk about it to "teach" it ... but this is
*not* true teaching not true service:
To teach is to be "other-focussed" ... to take fully into account
the nature of the energy-system of the person involved the life they are
placed within ... to encourage the growth of the person - *as the person
wants to grow* ... not as we believe the person "should" grow. To serve is
not to provide what it gives *us* pleasure to provide but to provide
*what the person or situation needs* - and this may be *way* outside of
our comfort zone. To teach and serve is not to impose our own models of
what spiritual "growth" is on others but to determine what paradigm the
person themself exists within and to nourish and encourage growth *as
the person understands it and speaking in the terms of the person's
world*. In the long indeed almost endless discussions in modern
Theosophy about what we "should" teach and the list discussion is just a
brief incarnation of a several-decades-long ongoing argument I have yet
to hear the topic of *WHO* is being *taught* even broached ... save for
the periodically condescending suggestions that there are so few "ready"
to learn what Theosophy has to "teach".
Can you imagine any school system worth its salt going through a
nearly three month long intense curriculum discussion and not once
even mentioning let alone engaging in a thorough analysis of the actual
*students*? Such a faculty might be teachers in their own imaginations
but they sure wouldn't be in fact ... and the curriculum produced would
be almost certainly doomed to disaster - to fail to reach anything but a
tiny number of students.
Well enough of this for now Liesel I got kinda carried away
-: ... but take heart! In the late 19th century one means of
approaching chelaship was to join a Theosophical Lodge - but it is quite
possible that in the late 20th century one qualifies oneself by getting
kicked *out* of one -:.
Chuckles JRC