Theos-Talk Archives (January 2002 Message tt00299)

The first appearance was in "Portae Lucis"1516, on the title
page a seated man is shown holding a tree with the ten sephirot.
Blavatsky's Globes correspond with the Sephiroth, and her planes
are identical with those on the Tree of Life. All she did was to re-
arrange their positions so that they are circular or chain-like .
Giordano Bruno's De monade is is intertwined with the
Renaissance literature of the "christian kabbalah which was 
widespread in 16th century thought. Renaissance 
representatives of the christian kabbalah are Pico della Mirandola, 
Johannes Reuchlin, Cornelius Agrippa or Guillaume Postel.


The Kabbala (I never know what the real spelling is in english, 
Blavatsky spmethimes wrote Cabalah, so I often chance spelling), 
contains elements of both Gnosticism and Neo-platonism, and was 
concerned with the nature and structure of all creation from the 
divine to the material worlds. Western or Christian Kabbalism grew 
from German and Lurianic Kabbalism. According to the bible wich was 
believed to be historical fact esotericists in the Renaisance tought 
that the Kabbala was the ancient wisdom religion of the world, and 
wich explains maybe why Blavatsky believed this also, so that she 
included the basic Kaballistic structure in the "Secret
Doctrine". 

However these "roots" of Blavatskyan Theosophy are similar
to what earlier Theosophists, before Blavatsky, from Jacob Boehme 
to Swedenborg also used. And is off course an historical error, but 
allows us to trace the source of Blavatskyan Theosophy.
In fact the belief in an "Ancient Wisdom Tradition" was a
very popular in Renaisance Europe. The first to make an attempt to 
write a large book about it was Giovanni Pico della Mirandola, 1463 - 
1494 ,Syncretism in the West: Pico's 900 Theses (1486) (see: 
http://www.safarmer.com/pico/fractalcosmologies.html)

Blavatsky according to what was available in the 19th century versus 
to Pico in the 15th, was able to include much more, and thus we see 
Indian kalpa theory and Kabbalistic aeonic configurations, 
Rosicrucian material, all coming together in a synthetic 
universalism that is unique for its time. But although from the 
beginning Indic materialswhere included in her work the vocabulary 
of this was already available from classical models of time and 
history, such as those of Hesiod (c. 750 B.C.E.) and Aristotle (384-
355 B.C.E.), or from the expansive visions of Boehme and Swedenborg 
or P.B.Randolph who alledgedly had studied in the east.
There is however a suspicion expressed by not least Brendan French 
in his thesis about the Masters, that Blavatsky added only oriental 
terms and fragments in order to emphasise the universalist 
aspirations of her work.

The person who is said to planted the idea in Blavatsky's ear to 
write a new synthesis in the form of Isis was Sotheran, who at least 
in one newspaper report of the time is claimed to be the real K.H..
The Lurianic Kabbalists used a mediational technique to travel to 
the Lower World to rescue the divine sparks and bring them to the 
Upper World. God's exiled light was being brought together with
its source, the snake bites itself in the tail. And that is what is 
contained in Blavatsky's circular or chain-like structure.
I think she got this idea from Boehme who employed the model of a 
clockwork ("Uhrwerk") as a metaphor for progression through harmony. 
Blavatsky explained Boehme's metaphysics by claiming that he was a 
reincarnation "of one, who, in a previous birth, had attained through 
extreme purity of life and efforts in the right direction almost to a 
Yogistate of holiness and saintship": Blavatsky, Collected Writings, 
vol. XII, 371-372.

But wasn this basic structure of Blavatskyan Theosophy already 
implied in the Mahatma letters, or would you say that during she was 
in correspondence with Yarker in India, and during the New York days 
when she received rights to administer degrees of the Sat B'aih that 
had as its higher degrees the Royal Order of Sikha, that there 
already where influences of Wynn Westcot and the like, along with 
P.B. Randolph ?

Joscelyn Godwinn makes certain hints about that and I reffered to it 
briefly by bringing in E.H.Britten who was working long before 
already as a scryer for ... from the Royal Order of the Swastika and 
Blavatsky is known to have put a circle (snake biting itself in the 
tail) around the Swastika where we have this circular motive that we 
discussed lay at the foundation of Blavatsky's cosmology. Although 
this could also be "The Ring Pass-not is at the circumstance of the 
manifested Universe" about wich she tought her students in London 
Sept.10,1890.

Spierenburgs publication of "The Inner Group Teachings of 
H.P.Blavatsky"(1985) that has on p. 130 the meditation diagram that 
you earlier referred to, also agknowledges at the beginning on p.x :
"The Golden Dawn'.H.P.B. maintained relations with it; several 
members of her 'Lodge' were also members of the 'Golden Dawn' and 
vice versa."

William Wynn Westcott (1848-1925), appears to have been admitted 
honoris causa, and received copies of all correspondence. The Inner 
Group members were encouraged to identify themselves, psychically and 
physically, with the Master, by engaging their creative imagination.
Wynn Westcott contributed much to "The Theosophical Glossary" of 1892.

Brigitte

PS Yarker in his letter to Blavatsky in India on January 2, 1878, 
gives Blavatsky instructions about coming to see him (all the way via 
London or Liverpool to his own Channel Island home, something 
Blavatsky in her previous letter from India, must have asked him for) 
Yarker also mentioned: Sometime when you see Hyneman, will you ask 
him who was the Piat mentioned in some of Marconis' letters. Piot 
published a diagram of the degree of Master of Masters from the 
symbolic 'Orient of Memphis' in 1876--- are they the same man? I am 
obliged to Hyneman for the good opinion which you say he holds of
me."

Anybody in this group has more information about Hyneman , or 
would this be a nick name for Hartmann ? 

Notice the term "Masters" during the time of
Blavatsky's stay in India in the "Orient of Memphis''litterature.

At the end of his letter Yarker mentioned:" We sent the Maharajah of 
Burdwan a Mandate with a complimentary letter, but he did not reply. 
Archer had formerly dined with him once or twice when in India."
Archer was the one responsible for the Order of Sikha.

--- In theos-talk@y..., Steve Stubbs <stevestubbs@y...> wrote:
> Brigitte: "Yes, this is from the end of her life in
> London where she had access to all kinds of things.
> The question I would have is particularly if she maybe
> developed the idea for the circular tree of life (her
> basic structure for the rounds) by lets say mirror
> gazing under influence possible of drugs, or was this
> already a pathway meditation formula in a particular
> secret society that time where she would have had some
> inside knowledge 0f, and if so, wich ?"
> 
> Since this idea came to light during the London
> period, it is worthwhile to say that she knew Wynn
> Westcott personally, read and cited Mathers' book in
> her opus, the SD, had William Butler Yeats as a
> personal student, and is believed by Ellic Howe at
> least to have founded her "esoteric section" to keep
> losing members to the GD.
> 
> GS might want to reconsider his decision to abandon
> Blavatsky's original diagram in favor of Purucker's
> stuff. But his & her idea that the sephiroth might
> well be considered as a ring instead of a tree makes
> perfect sense. You probably know that the "tree of
> life" symbol cannot be traced back further than the
> middle ages. But the sephiroth are hinted at in some
> of the Gnostic texts cited by Irenaeus, which means
> they were known at least 1,000 years earlier. (This
> fact is noted in the footnotes to the translation of
> Irenaeus which is found in the ANTE-NICENE FATHERS.) 
> It is therefore fairly certain that the idea of
> sephiroth developed long before the idea of the "tree
> of life" and that a ring structure similar to the one
> she describes could be as valid an interpretation of
> the original concept as the more orthodox model.
> 
> I was thinking about one of the distractions someone
> posted to try to cover up something he did not want
> discussed. He went into a long lecture on how the TS
> was founded in 1875, which had nothing to do with the
> matter he was contesting. Then it suddenly occurred
> to me that old mahatma P.B. Randolph shot his brains
> out at just about the same time the TS was founded. 
> That may be a mere coincidence, but consider this: if
> Randolph's organization was falling apart or in
> process of changing hands in 1875, then the founding
> of a new organization composed of previous members of
> the old one would have made sense,
> 
> Also notice the "meditation diagram" article briefly
> recommends the practice of Mindfulness, which is
> peculiar to Buddhism.
> 
> Brigitte: "W. Q. Judge interesting to note reported
> that 
> Blavatsky in contrast to other members in the early TS
> had a difficult time to learn and ?see? Planetary
> Spirits.
> 
> Which could be why she discouraged further
> experimentation after the end of the New York period.
> 
> Brigitte: "I think you mentioned you wonderred one
> time what or if she herself believed in the
> possibility of materialisation.)
> 
> I think you can distinguish three strata in this
> stuff, although of course that statement will be
> anathema to some who wish to keep the discussion
> superficial.
> 
> The first and oldest is the part of the theory which
> is supposed to provide a model for understanding
> psychological, psychical, and mystical phenomena. 
> This is the part which is the best thought out.
> 
> The second has to do with the origin of the universe. 
> This clearly comes from Blavatsky's belief that spirit
> mediums really could materialize objects out of thin
> air, and that that phenomenon, once explained, could
> provide insight into the origins of the universe
> itself. Bear in mind here that there are three
> distinct issues to be considered:
> 
> (1) Blavatsky's belief that this could be done,
> whether right or not,
> 
> (2) whether or not she personally could do it, and
> 
> (3) whether or not it is a physical possibility.
> 
> If (3) is false, then (2) must also be false. But (1)
> is independent of (2) and (3). She might have taken
> the idea quite seriously whether or not she personally
> could do it. Her modern devotees do not have a clue
> as to how it could be done, and yet many of them take
> it quite seriously as we have seen from previous
> posts. (3) could also be true, whether or not (1) and
> (2) are true. I mention this because somebody is
> going to recycle the tired argument which goes:
> "Believe everything I believe and believe it exactly
> the way I prefer to believe it, or everything falls to
> the ground and we might as well find something more
> worthwhile to do with our time. Nobody wants that so
> be warned!" That argument is garbage. It is almost
> as bad as the "dead woman" defense which says only
> Sylvia Cranston can comment on a "dead woman."
> 
> This second strata, which brings in Kapila's theories
> and more modern ideas such as the nebular hypothesis,
> strikes me as extremely interesting, and yet less well
> grounded in fact that the first strata. I am not
> saying it is not true, but I am saying that it is
> relatively much more speculative. The probability
> that it is true is much smaller, in other words. The
> problem is of course whether (2) and especially (3)
> above are true or not. If they are not, then the
> theory is pure speculation. If they are, then the
> theory deserves to be taken seriously as a hypothesis.
> 
> The third strata would be the anthropological theory,
> and here it seems the ideas presented are the weakest
> in the sense of being well grounded in fact. This is
> obviously a form of "scientific creationism" in which
> Eastern and Greek myths are substituted for the Hebrew
> myth of Adam and Eve. I'd have to agree that
> "Theosophy is not about history" because this theory
> is unlikely to be found to be historically true. It
> is interesting, but highly speculative and
> contradicted by the fossil record. It seems to me
> that the value of these ideas diminishes as we proceed
> from the first stratum to the third stratum, and that
> it is in the first stratum that we are most likely to
> find the ideas of her original teachers. The third is
> probably her own concept, especially since the
> sequence of events which led her to it can be easily
> traced.
> 
> Brigitte: "There was also an Indian meditation teacher
> G.N.Chakravarti that time in London that Bertram
> Keightley and Annie Beant became students of for a
> duration of eleven years.
> 
> Yes, he was bumped from his throne by Leadbeater.
> 
> Jerry: "Dallas has the notion that by establishing his
> "self" as an outsider observer of a duality, by
> creating a third or triad, he has somehow solved the
> whole duality problem.
> 
> This is known as a meta position and is used in NLP
> for various purposes. The duality spoken of is not an
> intellectual construct.
> 
> Brigitte: "HOW COULD RELAXATION OR FOCUSING THE MIND,
> WHICH REQUIRES AN ,,1" TO FOCUS OR A FOCUSER, HAVE
> ANYTHING TO DO WITH FINDING OUT WHO YOU ARE
> 
> Don't know that mantra yoga or the other systems you
> describe do. In Zen one begins with the question,
> which can better be stated for the Westerner as "Who
> am I?" One then cultivates "the Great Doubt" as the
> Zen masters call it, by focusing on this question
> intently, then boiling it down to the single word
> "Who?", which is not used as a mantra to calm oneself
> down, but as a battering ram as it were to crash
> through built up delusions which keep us from seeing
> our True Nature. (In Japan one would ask "Mu?" which
> means "no" instead of "Who?") The relevant metaphor
> is that of a mosquito stinging an iron bull. All
> intellectual insights are rejected, and one keeps
> battering at the iron bull, using the question which
> is repeated mentally, until the moment of
> enlightenment. Yasutani roshi says it is important
> during this provcess to avoid even the slightest
> tendency toward intellectual analysis, since what we
> are aiming at here is direct experience and not
> thinking about experience. When the answer comes, it
> is not such that it can be spelled out in words on an
> email list or written in a pamphlet. So members of
> the Read Only school will be forever outside the pale.
> There are, it is true, more complex methods for
> reaching awareness of one's True Nature, but this is
> reputed to be the most effective.
> 
> Brigitte: "A new book that I just received two days
> ago exposes the role of the Catholic Church in the
> promotion of the protocols.
> 
> They may be on their way out. Yet another of their
> priests was exposed recently as a homosexual pederast,
> which means he gets jailed and the church gets sued. 
> Apparently people would rather get rich off a lawsuit
> than worship the Virgin Mary. He is just the latest
> in a long and ongoing series. A spectacular lawsuit
> in this area a few years ago led to a $100,000,000+
> judgement against the church, and they have a lot of
> priests left. The bishops are afraid to get rid of
> them because they themselves are at risk of exposure. 
> Without commenting in any way on the validity or non
> validity of their theological system, realistically,
> at $100,000,000 a priest, how long can they remain a
> profitable business? Or even a solvent one? They
> better hope the Virgin Mary is real. They may need a
> miracle to get out of this one.
> 
> Steve
> 
> 
> 
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