In our [the Mahatmas] sight there is no crime worse than
ingratitude and injustice; and to see one who suffers them without
protest is equal to seeing in him a passive confederate to them.
Evil has no existence per se and is but the absence of good
and
exists but for him who is made its victim. It proceeds from two causes,
and no
more than good is it an independent cause in nature. Nature is
destitute
of goodness or malice; she follows only immutable laws when when she
either
gives life and joy, or sends suffering (and) death, and destroys what
she
has created. Nature has an antidote for every poison and her laws a
reward
for every suffering. The butterfly devoured by a bird becomes that
bird,
and the little bird killed by an animal goes into a higher form. It is
the
blind law of necessity and the eternal fitness of things, and hence
cannot
be called Evil in Nature. The real evil proceeds from human
intelligence
and its origin rests entirely with reasoning man who dissociates
himself
from Nature. Humanity then, alone is the true source of Evil.
Pure primeval magic does not consist in superstitious
practices and
vain ceremonies, but in the imperial will of man.
Peace is not the same as truth.
A lively discussion on the policy of the Magazine turns largely on what are sometimes described as personalities. The Constitution (*) requires that every member shall have the right to believe or disbelieve any teaching or doctrine and the right to express that belief or disbelief. Correspondents and contributors should observe good taste and good sense in exercising these privileges. But it is not the business of an editor to falsify his contributors' sentiments. The proper practice which we believe has always been observed editorially is to deal with the opinions and doctrines only of those under debate. Those who cannot bear to hear the opinions of their friends or themselves discussed pro and con are still in an elementary stage of thought.
In this new year I'm starting a series of longer quotes from H.P. Blavatsky on death and what is beyond. The first two are from the book The Letters of H.P. Blavatsky, Volume 1, 1861-1879.
The latest issue of The Theosophist (December 2005) is very good. Radha Burnier echoes some of the sentiments of my last editorial and adds some thoughts on vegetarianism versus veganism - in response to the news that scientists are developing artificial meat (i.e. meat grown in the lab, though from original meatcells). Mrs. Burnier notes that though this kind of meat is still animal in nature, like eggs and milk, its production does involve less suffering than ordinary meat. A vegan herself, ordinary (western) lacto-vegetarians don't seem like real vegetarians to her. Coincidence or synergy - I don't know, but this issue of Lucifer7 has some info on veganism as well.
Wisdom and happiness to all in 2006.(*) The Constitution of the Theosophical Society with headquarters in Adyar, India, are referred to.
Donald Watson, founder of the Vegan Society and originator of the word ‘vegan’, has died at his home in Keswick at the age of 95. More on Donald Watson on the website of the Vegan Society.
The more I see of mediums - for the United States are a true nursery, the most prolific hot-bed for mediums and sensitives of all kinds, genuine and artificial - the more I see the danger humanity is surrounded with. Poets speak of the thin partition between this world and the other. They are blind: there is no partition at all, except the difference of states in which the dead and the living exist and the grossness of the physical senses of the majority of mankind. Yet - these senses are our salvation. They were given to us by a wise and sagacious mother and nurse - Nature; for otherwise individuality and even personality would have become impossible: the dead would be ever merging into the living and the latter assimilating the former. Were there around us but one variety of 'spirits' - as well call the dregs of wise, spirits - the reliquiae of those mortals who are dead and gone, one could reconcile oneself with it. We cannot avoid in some way or the other to assimilate our dead, and little by little and unconsciously to ourselves we become they - even physically, especially in the unwise West where cremation is unknown. We breathe and eat, and devour the dead - men and animals - with every breath we draw in; as every human breathe that goes out makes up the bodies and feeds the formless creatures in the air that will be men some day. So much for the physical process; for the mental and the intellectual and also the spiritual it is just the same: we interchange gradually our brain-molecules, our intellectual and even spiritual auras, hence - our thoughts, desires, and aspirations with those who preceded us. This process - rather novel in its ultimate views to physiology and biology - is one for humanity in general. It is a natural one and one in the economy and laws of nature, owing to which one's son may become gradually his own grandfather and one's aunt to boot, imbibing their combined atoms and thus accounting for the possible resemblance (atavism?!) - but also one in which the latter could never become their grandson or nephew. But there is another law, an exceptional one and which manifests itself among mankind sporadically and periodically: the law of forced post-mortem assimilation; during the prevalence of which epidemic, the dead invade from their respective spheres the domain of the living - only within the limits of the regions they lived, very luckily, and in which they are buried. In such cases the duration and intensity of this epidemic depends upon the welcome they receive, upon whether they find the doors opening widely to receive them or not, and whether the necromantic plaque will be increased by magnetic attraction, the desire of the mediums, sensitives, and the curious themselves, or whether again, the danger being signalled, the epidemic will be wisely repressed.
An organized religion can produce mere social reform and superficial changes. A Church exists only within the framework of a Society. And I am talking of a religious revolution which will take us beyond the psychological structure of society, of any society. A truly religious man is free of all fear, for he is free of the patterns created by the many civilizations over thousands of years. He is also free from the past, personal and collective, and his future is not distorted by the pressure of his own actions. He is free, vital and totally silent. Silence is important, which is a measureless state, knowable as beyond experience, beyond words, beyond thought, an uncreated energy. Without this creative silence there can be no brotherhood and peace and no true religion ...
Freedom is the very heart of true religion. Religious organizations deny man this essential freedom, in spite of their assertions to the contrary. Self-knowledge is not prayer, it is the door to meditation. Freedom is not based on a set of psychological theories nor is it a state of surrender in the expectation of grace. It destroys the constraints imposed by religion or society. It is a state of total attention, and not of concentration on the particular.