Esoteric history

Life And Teachings of the Masters of the Far East

By David Tame, March 2023.

A Facebook friend of mine posted a quote from Volume 2 of these books [1] just hours ago, to which I gave quite a lengthy comment, and I now see the comment has been deleted (without any PM to myself). I think my comment is worth preserving.

I am very aware that, when it comes to people like Baird Spalding and his books, people find it very hard to face the truth that what he wrote was not genuine. So, evidently, my comment has been ‘censored’. Similarly, just for example, one comes across the same incapability to face the truth with believers in the books of Carlos Castaneda [2], who also definitely was long ago, in 1976, proven to have written his books as works of fiction [3]. I believed in the Castaneda books too for three or four years.

I’m a person who simply believes that real truths must be preserved, no matter how they may spoil one’s view of reality. We must adjust ourselves to Truth, not try to make Truth adjust to our conception of it. As the motto of Theosophy has it, “There is no Religion higher than Truth”[4].

My deleted or censored comment on Spalding and his “Life and Teachings” books, therefore, since I did take the trouble to write it, is as follows:

I myself am a lifelong believer in such genuine Masters. But in order for the truly genuine accounts and Their teachings to retain repute, I’ve always felt that we must ‘fess up when anything else is not quite what they seem: for the very sake of the reputation of wholly genuine books.

There is a deep mystery behind Spalding which may never be solved. The brief Wikipedia article the photo is taken from is evidently written by a ‘true believer’, and to be historically factual would need a lot of rewriting [5].

He had definitely never been to India before 1935, and he was not old enough to have been on any journey to India in “1894”. As his friend David Bruton states in his biography, Spalding advanced his age by two years upon every birthday to try to make it appear that he was old enough to have made such a journey [6]. He’d long planned to write Volume 1, though he had never himself been to the East. He wrote the first volume, and upon its unexpected success, the publisher asked him to write a second and then a third volume by virtue of the fact that, in the publisher’s eyes, they made more money for him than the rest of De Vorss’ books put together. If asked almost any question at all, Bruton tells how Spalding seemingly impulsively never replied truthfully, even about innocuous daily things.

As another means of making money, publisher DeVorss arranged for Spalding to be the guide for a party of spiritual tourists, who paid for the journey, to take them to India in 1935, yes, but soon after arrival it started becoming clear that Spalding had no knowledge or experience of India at all. (Anyone who does know India can tell that from the books, imho.) The travelling companions had frankly expected to meet at least one Master, but Spalding kept making poor excuses.

Genuine British mystic, Dr Paul Brunton, writes of how he came across Spalding and his disgruntled party. Mystic Paul Brunton (not to be confused with friend and biographer David Bruton) was India-experienced, and saw through him. so Spalding finally admitted to him that his India travelogues “dealt with visits made in his astral body, not in his physical body, as readers were led to believe”. There was a showdown with his traveling companions, upon which Spalding basically ran away, turning up weeks later at the docks, penniless, to get back to the USA. One of the fellow-travelers paid for his passage back.

A great deal more along these lines can be read about Spalding, and I would advise the researcher to read his one biography, Baird T. Spalding As I Knew Him by his genuine friend, David Bruton. It’s full of mysteries and puzzles, and a good read by itself. I do find that ‘true believers’ find all this hard to accept, yet they need to read further such as in Bruton’s book. Bruton is no critic, and not trying to debunk, simply to tell the real truth. By the time Volume 1 of “Life and Teachings” came out in 1924, there were plenty of esoteric/occult sources from which the gist of such a tale could have been concocted, particularly Theosophy, but many other sources too.

However, one major part of the mystery is that since Spalding was never in India before 1935, and was too young to have been there in 1894, nevertheless his books are certainly packed with spiritual truths, even if the actual events are fictitious. His books have inspired generations of readers nonetheless, doing great good, and therein lies their undoubted value. (By the way, publisher DeVorss must surely have swindled him, since he died with only $15 to his name, apparently.)

I like a portion of David Bruton’s introduction to his biography, in which he says, in as many words (my copy isn’t to hand), “No matter the reality or not, or the real nature of his stories, it cannot be taken from Baird that he did indeed inspire many thousands of people, for which he should be remembered.”

I am writing this post on a very coincidental day, because just today I received the latest edition of the books (!), which simply contains Volumes 1 to 3, later volumes being poor efforts of the publisher to just keep making more money and of little value. The first three volumes are now newly published as one book, with the new title, The Journey (2021), still by the same publishing house, but the initial publisher himself, DeVorss passed on in 1953. They have been honest enough now, today, to give this brand-new book a 14-page Introduction by Mitch Horowitz, academic of American occultism, who comes clean on the real life-story of Spalding [7].

I would just say, take Spalding’s works as ever one wishes, but the 1894 journey never took place. The supposed backing establishment confirms that. If one wishes, one can think of his accounts as being overshadowed by some spiritual force, or, in any case, at the very least by his own spiritual knowledge, and perhaps by even more. It is certainly not my wish to pop any balloons, but Truth Above All must be our guide.

So if anyone really wants to follow-up on this, you can start with David Bruton’s 1954 biography, and the recent 2021 14-page introduction to the latest edition.

Sources

[1]. Spalding, Baird T. 1924-1997. Life And Teachings of the Masters of the Far East. Vols. 1-6. Los Angeles: DeVorss & Company.

[2]. Wiki entry: Carlos Castaneda.

[3]. De Mille, Richard. 1976. Castaneda’s Journey: The Power and the Allegory. Santa Barbara, CA: Capra Press.

[4]. Blavatsky, H. P. 1889 (1920). The Key to Theosophy: An Exposition on the Ethics, Science, and Philosophy of Theosophy. Los Angeles, CA: The United Lodge of Theosophists.

[5]. Wiki entry: Baird T. Spalding.

[6]. Bruton, David. 1954. Baird T. Spalding As I Knew Him. Los Angeles: DeVorss & Company.

[7]. Spalding, Baird T. 2020. The Journey: Life And Teachings of the Masters of the Far East. Reprint in one volume of Life And Teachings of the Masters of the Far East, vols. 1-3. With introduction by Mitch Horowitz. Los Angeles: DeVorss & Company. (Amazon, where you can read the Horowitz intro)

Modernity Between the Rise and Fall of the Cartesian Cogito

Introduction.

In this blog I will compress into a short story my proposed periodization of Modernity, bookended by the Renaissance and Post-modernity. My idiosyncratic idea is to place the start of modernity in 1620 and its end in 1926.

The Start of Modernity in 1620

The choice of 1620 has two reasons. First, it was the winter of that year that Descartes had his most sustained meditations on his own intellectual traditions and authorities, all of which he deemed contradictory and not well-founded. He had the time and opportunity to do so because he was part of a Catholic army besieging Prague in 1620 in the context of the 30-year war (1618-1648) fought between Catholic and Protestant powers. So, reason one for 1620 is the moment Descartes hits upon, or constitutes, the experience of ‘Cogito ergo sum’ and its substantive mind-matter dichotomy.

The Esotericist Renaissance

Reason two has to do with what specific event triggered that war and what mythic-intellectual movement there and then found its demise. And here I will have to digress on what came before Modernity to which it was a partial reaction, and that is the astonishing Renaissance, but then in its mythic and philosophical aspects and not its usual humanist and artistic ones.

For starters, two sets of manuscripts, which came to the west around the 1470s, had a profound influence on the intellectual start of the Renaissance: 1) many of the Platonic dialogues coming from the Islamic east by way of Constantinople and 2) the so-called Corpus Hermeticum (CH), a collection of manuscripts in Greek many people thought were written at least before 1,000 BCE by an ancient and wise magus by the name of Hermes Trismegistus or Thrice Great Hermes. Both the terms hermeticism and hermeneutics are derived from the name of this mythic character.

These manuscripts contained a lot of magical, Gnostic and other pagan, pre-Christian ideas. The translation of the CH into Latin by the humanist and Platonist Marsilio Ficino got right of way before Plato. The first volume, titled Pimander, was published in 1471. Apparently intellectuals then were more interested in magical, esoteric, occult ideas and practices than the more sober, transcendental thoughts of Plato.

Ideas like ‘As above, so below’ (i.e. a sympathetic parallel between the microcosm of man and the macrocosm of the universe), the harmony of the cosmos, alchemy (the transmutation of lead into gold and the soul into divinity), astrology, and hidden sources of wisdom in Egypt and the east, were part and parcel of this ‘stream’, now named by academia Western Esotericism. Throughout the 15th and 16th century these ideas were very influential, but later historians did not give them much attention and so that aspect of the Renaissance became more or less forgotten. But in the early 17th century there were even some German principalities where these ideas were not only common but were half openly promoted by its rulers. One had as its capital Heidelberg in the Palatinate, the other was Prague in Bohemia.

Side Story

Now, one more step back before going forward, there existed something like the position of Holy Roman Emperor, which position was not Roman but Catholic, usually not that holy, and without an empire. It was a tradition since 9th century Emperor Charlemagne (Charles the Great) to have someone in that position, which became increasingly devoid of real power and territory, but was still something the Catholics and Protestants respected. And the person for that position was democratically chosen by his peers, i.e. a small quorum of other kings, princes and aristocrats.

Till 1612 it was Rudolf II of Bohemia, a Catholic, who held the title and he was an avid ‘western esotericist’ with his town Prague a free-haven for alchemists to set up their smokey laboratories and astrologers to cast their predictions. Catholics and Protestants alike did not necessarily look favorably on such practices. When the Bohemian nobles came together to choose the next king of their realm they chose Prince Frederick V of the Palatinate, who was Protestant and had strong esotericist sympathies. He accepted and moved to Prague in November 1620. With this crown came also the right to vote for the next Holy Roman Emperor, who might this time be a Protestant as the Protestants had gained with Frederick a majority in that electoral college.

Long story short, the whole of Catholic Christendom was verbally opposed to that prospect, but to no avail, and Frederick was crowned King of Bohemia. The Catholics then marched on Prague and beat Frederick at the Battle of the White Mountain, an early win in the 30 year war in which almost the whole of Europe was involved, including Descartes on the side of the Catholics. Frederick lost both Bohemia and the Palatinate and fled to The Netherlands. With him went the last instance of the Occult Renaissance in political power.

Preliminary Summary

So, it was at the siege of the stronghold of the last and losing ‘western esotericist’ Prince Frederick that Descartes had his profound ideas, which were more or less instrumental in challenging all this esotericism as unscientific and merely mythic. And a few decades later a Frenchman, Causabon, proved that the Corpus Hermeticum was composed in the 3rd century CE, so there went its authority as something wise and ancient.

And I just read Hegel to the same effect:

The discovery of the laws of nature enabled men to contend against the monstrous superstitions of the time, as also against all notions of mighty alien powers which magic alone could conquer. (Philosophy of History, Dover edition, p. 440)

Under the clear and precise eye of rationalism and science the esoteric tradition went underground. Therefore Frederick’s loss in 1620 was the second reason to have Modernity start in that year and a good reason to mark it off as the end of the Renaissance. I always thought this to be quite neat, but never wrote it down.

One last speculation is the question wether Descartes and Frederick might have met in the Netherlands in the 1620s and what conversation they might have had. A subject of possible agreement could have been the role of the pineal gland.

The End of Modernity in 1926

The reason to place modernity’s end at 1926 has to do with the thorough critique published that year of Descartes’ philosophy in Heidegger’s Being and Time. Basically his critique was that the Cartesian notion of both subject and object as separate substances was premised on the mistaken idea to interpret, or project onto, subject and object the ontological category of substantiality in the sense that both have the reified nature of being something ‘thing-ly’ present-at-hand (Vorhanden).

Being and Time itself can also be construed as the beginning of post-modernity given its impact on the major thinkers of that movement. Of course before Heidegger there were Darwin, Nietzsche and Freud deeply challenging Modernity’s concept of a rational and progressing humanity, but Darwin and Freud were very rational and scientific in their aims and Nietzsche was still in the 1920s a bit marginal. It is only after the collective traumatic shock of WWII that Post-modernism gains traction.

And Modernity did not go unchallenged in its 300 year reign. Romanticism, German Idealism and intellectual developments in the latter half of the 19th century posed serious challenges to it. And the tradition of Western Esotericism had many small comebacks in the persons of Emanuel Swedenborg, Jacob Boehme and Anton Mesmer, and in the movements of American spiritualism with its off-shot the so-called occult revival in the US and Europe after 1875.

Madame Blavatsky and her Theosophy had a clear and important role in this movement, reviving many esotericist ideas from the Renaissance, combining it with eastern ideas, and her own prolific fantasies and stage magic.

Though it is interesting to also look for remnants of esotericism in Descartes’ or Hegel’s ideas, one of the more surprising and underreported developments in the history of philosophy was how Kant had reacted to the voluminous writings of Swedenborg, a mining engineer and a seer creating vivid descriptions of the many mansions of heaven. Kant might have believed these writings initially, but reacted later strongly against them, influencing his epistemology regarding phenomena and noumena and implicitly declaring Swedenborgian claims beyond the pale of experienceability and conceptualization.

And Romanticism might also have had adherents dabbling in western esotericism. Hegel comes to mind, but I do not have access to sources to deepen that. What is clear is that Romanticism’s predilection for traditions and history, and resistance to cold rationality, would not put a principled opposition to appropriate Western Esotericist memes like bygone golden ages, hidden ancient wisdoms, eastern sages, and other enchanted narratives.

Conclusion

Taking all the above in, I propose the following demarcations between the Middle Ages, the Renaissance, Modernity and Post-Modernity:

I) 1471. End of the Middle Ages and start of the Renaissance with the publication of the Pimander.

II) 1620. End of the Renaissance and beginning of Modernity with the defeat of Frederick of the Palatinate in Bohemia where Descartes had its breakthrough meditations.

III) 1926. End of Modernity and beginning of Post-Modernity with Heidegger’s critique of Descartes in the publication of Being and Time.

Of course this periodization can be easily contested as it reflects personal preferences, it still has an internal logic I find compelling and fun to play around with.

Bibracte: Last Center of Celtic Occultism?

The other day I visited David Reigle’s excellent web site of the Eastern Tradition Research Institute and found again his paper on “The Centennial Cycle.” In this paper he discusses the origin of the policy by the Brotherhood of Mahatmas of enlightening the “western barbarians” on a centennial basis. Here I read that the very last of the Druid mystery schools in Europe was according to H.P.B. at Bibracte in Burgundy, France.

Drawing of Bibracte as it might have looked like 100 B.C.E.

Bibracte was the capital of the Celtic tribe the Aedui and around 50 B.C.E. Caesar conquered this important Celtic settlement during his Gallic campaigns. During the reign of Augustus its inhabitants left the place for the newly founded Augustodonum (Augustus-city, now Autun) 14 miles east and nobody else replaced them, leaving the site pristine for archeologists to uncover 1900 years later.

Apparently after this loss the Brotherhood instituted its policy of sending every last quarter of a century somebody to instruct the West in the Wisdom-Religion, with H.P.B. being the one for the 19th century cycle.

H.P.B., in her posthumously published article “The Last of the Mysteries in Europe” quotes with apparent approval J.M. Ragon, a 19th century author on Masonic lore, from his Orthodoxie Maçonnique:…

Bibractis, the mother of sciences, the soul of the early nations [in Europe], a town equally famous for its sacred college of Druids, its civilisation, its schools, in which 40,000 students were taught philosophy, literature, grammar, jurisprudence, medicine, astrology, occult sciences, architecture, etc. Rival of Thebes, of Memphis, of Athens and of Rome, it possessed an amphitheater for gladiators, surrounded with colossal statues and accommodating 100,000 spectators, a capitol, temples of Janus, Pluto, Proserpine, Jupiter, Apollo, Minerva, Cybele, Venus and Anubis, and in the midst of these sumptuous edifices the Naumachy, with its vast basin, an incredible construction, a gigantic work wherein floated boats and galleys devoted to naval games; then a Champ de Mars, an aqueduct, fountains, public baths; finally fortifications and walls, the construction of which dated from the heroic ages.

She then stated:

Such was the last city in Gaul wherein died for Europe the secrets of the Initiations of the Great Mysteries, the Mysteries of Nature, and of her forgotten Occult truths.

I did this search because in a class at Olcott, the headquarters of The Theosophical Society in America (Adyar), we were looking into possible candidates of the 1975-2000 cycle and we discussed criteria for evaluating the candidates. Reigle in his paper develops a position in favor of the Dalai Lama and the Tibetan Buddhist diaspora as the 20th century effort of the Mahatmas.

Peculiar coincidence is that I visited Bibracte many times in my life as my aunt bought in the 1970s an old farmhouse in the hamlet Les Jours at the foot of Mont Beuvray on which top Bibracte used to be and the farm is the closest inhabited structure to the site!

I knew that the leader of the Gauls, Vercingetorix, had camped there and that Caesar had stayed there as well for a winter after defeating the Gauls and, while there, wrote his book on the Gallic campaigns, Commentarii de Bello Gallico.

But I had no idea that this place on top of the hill, now known as Mont Beuvray, next to my aunt’s farmhouse, also was a Celtic center of occult learning–the last one of its kind in Europe—and that its loss lead many centuries later to the founding of the Theosophical Society. At least according to H.P.B. It is now a prime archaeological site with a very nice museum displaying their finds and reconstructions of Celtic life.

Reconstruction of the area of Mount Beuvray (1st century B.C.E.)

One memorable summer in the 1980s I spend in Les Jours with my aunt and grandfather, who was a Mason, while reading and discussing Yates’ academic study The Rosicrucian Enlightenment and Michael Baigent’s pseudo-historical Holy Blood, Holy Grail and through these books getting a feel for the “hidden tradition” of western esotericism. I would have gone to Les Jours again and join my family in August 2009 to celebrate my own half-centennial, but this plan fell through. I intended to do some research there and see what claims by H.P.B. and Ragon can be verified against the archaeological record. From what I read Ragon’s claims made about Bibracte are quite erroneous or, in H.P.B.’s words, “utterly incorrect”, as she qualified another of his claims. Bibracte was a fortified hill-town and none of the grand structures, which Ragon writes about, were ever erected there. It looks like, and he is not the only one, that he confused Bibracte with the nearby town of Autun, which does have a big Roman amphitheater, though it ‘only’ seats 17.000, and has a temple dedicated to Janus. Many historians and archaeologists in Ragon’s days thought that the correct location of Bibracte was to be found in Autun. But this was only a hypothesis. The other candidates were Beaune and Mont Beuvray. Only the excavations by the French archaeologist Jacques Gabriel Bulliot in the late 19th century confirmed the location to have been on Mont Beuvray.

The problem here is that Autun did not exist before Caesar’s time as it was founded in Augustus’ reign replacing Bibracte as the capital of the Aedui about 20 kilometers (12 miles) east. The other problem is that Ragon ascribes to the Celts feats of architecture and pastimes which are distinctly Roman and were quite out of reach for the more simple Celts.

It looks like H.P.B. was a little careless in taking over wholesale these claims by Ragon about Bibracte, even while she was aware of Ragon’s shortcomings as a historian as she warned her readers that “[h]owever learned and erudite, some of the chronological mistakes of that author are very great.” What has to be done is to sort out in more detail all the claims and think through the possible implications of the findings, especially addressing the question whether H.P.B. was unto something, but was incorrect in certain details, or if she was constructing her own mythic historiography by selectively appropriating Ragon’s Masonic (mis-)construals of history. One way or another the gap of cognitive dissonance between the Blavatskyan, emic, esoteric perception of history and the etic, scientific perception of history has to be bridged.

Govert Schuller
Wheaton, July, 2009

Krishnamurti: An Esoteric View of His Teachings

by Govert Schuller

One is opposed to nothing more severely
than to errors recently laid aside
—Goethe

A question which might interest many Theosophists is what Blavatsky and the Masters might have thought about the teachings of Krishnamurti. Although Blavatsky died before Krishnamurti was born, she fortunately left some writings which are helpful in determining on what points her teachings agree and disagree with those of Krishnamurti. The focus will be on their differences because some disagreements pertain directly to the foundations of Krishnamurti’s teachings.(1)

For example, Blavatsky stresses that one cannot pass over even one step on the path to higher consciousness (2), yet Krishnamurti summarily rejects not only a path of graduated levels in attaining truth (3), but also the very existence of a higher self to unite with.(4) Furthermore, Blavatsky makes it clear that a Guru plays an essential part in one’s mastery of higher consciousness (5), while Krishnamurti repudiates the role of a spiritual teacher.(6)

The differences even take a dramatic turn when it becomes clear that Blavatsky seriously warns about the kind of philosophy Krishnamurti teaches. She writes that certain doctrines in exoteric Vedantism–which are very similar to Krishnamurti’s teachings–might have the effect of disconnecting the soul or the personal self from its higher source, the higher self.(7) This in turn might cause the ‘second death’ of the soul, which is like an implosion of consciousness into nothingness (8) as opposed to the ‘second birth’ of the soul when she expands into divinity by first uniting with the higher self and ultimately with the divine self. These differences are not just philosophical and void of spiritual relevance. From an esoteric point of view they are of great significance.

Aside from the serious and grave warnings inferred from Blavatsky’s writings, the Masters themselves made some specific comments on Krishnamurti’s teachings. Lord Maitreya, for example, pointed out that Krishnamurti made a mistake in assuming that anyone could reach his level of consciousness immediately.(9) An English Master indicated that Krishnamurti is teaching an erroneous version of Advaita Vedanta (10), confirming indeed what was gleaned from Blavatsky. Furthermore, this Master warned for some serious dangers in Krishnamurti’s teachings, notably his rejection of an esoteric system of spiritual evaluation and his invitation to intense meditation without occult protection.(11) According to this Master, engaging in Krishnamurti’s brand of Advaitism might lead to hypocrisy and self-delusion.(12) Krishnamurti’s former Guru, Kuthumi, likewise expressed a stern warning about the consequences of his philosophy.(13) Finally, Geoffrey Hodson, a prominent Theosophist and clairvoyant pupil of the Masters, accuses Krishnamurti of circular reasoning (14) and intellectual arrogance.(15) Again, it has to be stressed that these errors are not just a matter of intellectual interest without spiritual consequences. The very health, even survival, of one’s spiritual being is involved here.

Regarding the feasibility of Krishnamurti’s suggestion of a profound fundamental transformation of the human consciousness, it has to be pointed out that Krishnamurti did not arrive at that level of consciousness by way of his own proposed instantaneous‘non- method.’(16) He arrived there solely by treading first the path of initiation under a Master (17)–going almost to its final conclusion–then stepped aside, and denounced the whole method.(18) Furthermore, Vimala Thakar, the only one who executed his kind of transformation in a credible way (19)–and as such could prove its feasability–did not arrive there by his proposed ‘non-method’ either. Instead, she transformed because Krishnamurti acted as Guru to her. She first gradually acquired an experimental understanding of his erroneous brand of Advaita Vedantism and then Krishnamurti, while laying hands on her for healing an auditory ailment, initiated her into his rebellious state of consciousness.(20) To quote Blavatsky, applying Krishnamurti’s ‘non-method’ is “like destroying a bridge over an impassable chasm; The traveler can never reach the goal on the other shore.”(21)

The foregoing does not imply that there are no truthful and salutary insights to be found in Krishnamurti’s teachings. He exhorts people to think for themselves (22) and to change in a fundamental way (23); he skillfully diagnoses certain dangers of the human ego or synthetic self (24); and he invokes with compassion a sense of urgency about the dangerous situation mankind is in.(25) But these pearls have to be found in a sea of errors. If the foundations of his teachings are erroneous then also its superstructure. A well-grounded Theosophical conception of human nature and a mastery of the “abstruse difficulties of Indian metaphysics”(26) are indispensable to catch these pearls. Even then, one might easily trip over the pearls and land in the mire of Krishnamurti’s misconceptions. Due to the deceptive, even mesmerizing properties of Krishnamurti’s teachings–notwithstanding the apparent awakening and helpful qualities they have–one might not even be aware of it.

In the same way that Krishnamurti’s teachings can have a temporary beneficial effect upon certain individuals, a civilization based on his teachings might be successful in its first stages of growth.(27) But, in the end, if not propped up or saved by esoteric corrections and guidance, it will falter, break down and disintegrate. It will never have the chance to develop into a Golden Age, because it rejects the Wisdom Religion.(28) Parallel to this notion is the idea that an individual will find the opposite of enlightenment if he rejects the age-old path of graded initiations

Endnotes

At the same time it is an undeniable fact that Theosophy and Krishnamurti have much in common. So much even that some Theosophists consider Krishnamurti’s teachings a modern expression of the ageless Wisdom Religion. In many respects both are also very close to Vedantism, especially the monist (Advaita) version. The likeness between Krishnamurti’s teachings and Vedantism, albeit Blavatsky’s understanding of it, will become hopefully clearer in endnotes 5 and 7, in which Blavatsky contrasts esoteric and exoteric interpretations of Vedanta. The esoteric interpretation is Theosophical and the exoteric interpretation is similar to Krishnamurti’s position. Endnote 10 contains the explicit remarks of a Master arguing that Krishnamurti is indeed teaching Advaita Vedanta. About the likeness between Theosophy and Advaita Vedanta, Blavatsky states that “in the Esoteric philosophy [i.e. Theosophy], which reconciles all these systems… the nearest exponent… is the Vedanta as expounded by the Advaita Vedantists.” H.P.Blavatsky, The Secret Doctrine (Los Angeles: The Theosophy Company, 1964), Vol. I, p. 55. For more of Blavatsky on Advaita see H.J. Spierenberg, The Vedanta Commentaries of H.P.Blavatsky (San Diego: Point Loma Publications, 1992), pp. 4-5. ↩
“No single rung of the ladder leading to knowledge can be skipped. No personality [personal self or soul] can ever reach or bring itself into communication with Atmâ [divine self], except through Buddhi-Manas [higher self]…” H.P. Blavatsky, The Esoteric Writings of Helena Petrovna Blavatsky: A Synthesis of Science, Philosophy and Religion (Wheaton IL: Theosophical Publishing House, 1980), p. 414. ↩
“This idea of a gradual process, this idea of gradual psychological evolution of man is very gratifying… . This gradual concept, which psychologically is generally called evolution, seems to me utterly false.” J. Krishnamurti, The Collected Works of J. Krishnamurti (Dubuque, IA: Kendall/Hunt, 1992), Vol. XVII, p. 67. ↩
“Most of us do not want to know what we are. We invent the higher self, the supreme self, the atma, and all the innumerable ideas, to escape from the reality of what we are–the actual everyday, every-minute reality of what we are. And we do not know what we are from day by day, and on that we impose something which thought has bred as the atma, which tradition has handed over as the higher self.” J. Krishnamurti, The Collected Works of J. Krishnamurti (Dubuque, IA: Kendall/Hunt, 1992), Vol. XIII, p. 151. ↩
Blavatsky wrote: “There is a great difference between an Avatara and a Jivanmukti: one, as already stated, is an illusive appearance, Karma-less, and having never before incarnated; the other, the Jivanmukta, is one who obtains Nirvana by his individual merits. To this expression again an uncompromising, philosophical Vedantin would object. He might say that as the condition of the Avatara and the Jivanmukta are one and the same state, no amount of personal merit, in howsoever many incarnations, can lead its possessor to Nirvana. Nirvana, he would say is actionless; how then can any action lead to it? It is neither a result nor a cause, but an ever-present, eternal Is, as Nagasena defined it. Hence it can have no relation to, or concern with, action, merit, or demerit, since these are subject to Karma. All this is very true, but still to our mind there is an important difference between the two. An Avatara is; a Jivanmukta becomes one. If the state of the two is identical, not so are the causes which lead to it. An Avatara is a descent of a God into an illusive form; a Jivanmukta, who may have passed through numberless incarnations and may have accumulated merit in them, certainly does not become a Nirvani because of that merit, but only because of the Karma generated by it, which leads and guides him in the direction of the Guru who will initiate him into the mystery of Nirvana and who alone can help him reach his abode.” H.P.Blavatsky, The Secret Doctrine (Adyar, India: Theosophical Publishing House, 1938) Adyar Edition, Vol. V, p. 352. Or: Idem., Collected Writings (Wheaton IL: Theosophical Publishing House, 1985) Vol. XIV, p. 374. Or: Idem., The Esoteric Writings, pp. 293-294. ↩
“I have told you frankly that Masters are unessential, that the idea of Masters is nothing more than a toy to the man who really seeks truth.” J. Krishnamurti, The Collected Works of J. Krishnamurti (Dubuque IA: Kendall/Hunt, 1991), Vol. I, p. 173. Krishnamurti himself wrote: “The core of Krishnamurti’s teaching is contained in the statement he made in 1929 when he said: ‘Truth is a pathless land.’ Man cannot come to it through any organization, through any creed, through any dogma, priest or ritual, not through any philosophic knowledge or psychological technique. He has to find it through the mirror of relationship, through the understanding of the contents of his mind, through observation and not through intellectual analysis or introspective dissection.” J. Krishnamurti, The Core of Krishnamurti’s Teaching (Ojai CA: Krishnamurti Foundation of America, n.d.). ↩
Blavatsky wrote: “In order not to confuse the mind of the western student with the abstruse difficulties of Indian metaphysics, let him view the lower manas, or mind, as the personal ego [personal self] during the waking state, and as Antahkarana only during those moments when it aspires towards its higher Ego [higher self], and thus becomes the medium of communication between the two. It is for this reason called the ‘Path.’… Seeing that the faculty and function of Antahkarana is as necessary as the medium of the ear for hearing, or that of the eye for seeing; then so long as the feeling of ahamkâra, that is, of the personal “I” or selfishness [the synthetic self], is not entirely crushed out in man, and the lower mind not entirely merged into and become one with the higher Buddhi-Manas [higher self], it stands to reason that to destroy Atahkarana is like destroying a bridge over an impassable chasm; The traveler can never reach the goal on the other shore. And there lies the difference between the exoteric and the esoteric teaching. The former makes the Vedânta state that so long as mind (the lower) clings through Antahkarana to Spirit (Buddha-Manas) [higher self] it is impossible for it to acquire true Spiritual Wisdom, Jnyâna, and that this can only be attained by seeking to come en rapport with the Universal Soul (Atmâ) [the divine self]; that, in fact, it is by ignoring the higher Mind [higher self] altogether that one reaches Râja Yoga. We say it is not so. No single rung of the ladder leading to knowledge can be skipped. No personality can ever reach or bring itself into communication with Atmâ, except through Buddhi-Manas; to try to become a Jivanmukta or a Mahâtmâ, before one has become an adept or even a Naljor (a sinless man) is like trying to reach to Ceylon from India without crossing the sea. Therefore we are told that if we destroy Antahkarana before the personal [personal self] is absolutely under the control of the impersonal Ego [the higher self], we risk to lose the latter and be severed for ever from it, unless indeed we hasten to re-establish the communication by a supreme and final effort. It is only when we are indissolubly linked with the essence of the divine Mind [higher self] that we have to destroy Antahkarana.” H.P.Blavatsky, The Esoteric Writings, pp. 413-414. Krishnamurti’s teaching neatly corresponds to the exoteric position as presented here by Blavatsky, for he proposes to access directly the impersonal universal creative intelligence (Atma) by tossing out aspiration (Antahkarana) and denying the existence of the higher self (Buddhi-Manas). ↩
Blavatsky warns: “Be it far from me the suspicion that any of the esoteric students have reached to any considerable point down the plane of spiritual descent. All the same I warn you to avoid taking the first step. You may not reach the bottom in this life or the next, but you may now generate causes which will insure you spiritual destruction in your third, fourth, fifth, or even some subsequent birth… Finally, keep ever in mind the consciousness that though you see no Master by your bedside, nor hear one audible whisper in the silence of the still night, yet the Holy Power is about you, the Holy Light is shining into your hour of spiritual need and aspirations, and it will be no fault of the MASTERS, or of their humble mouthpiece and servant, if through perversity or moral feebleness some of you cut yourselves off from these higher potencies, and step upon the declivity that leads to Avitchi [state of soulless-ness].” H.P.Blavatsky, The Esoteric Writings, p. 418. ↩
Lord Maitreya: “Thus although Krishnamurti was right to emphasize the necessity for independent thought, he was wrong in assuming that everyone else, regardless of past Karma and present limitations, could instantly reach that point which he himself had only reached through lives of effort, and by the aid of those Cosmic Forces apportioned to him solely for his office as Herald of the New Age.” Lord Maitreya in David Anrias, Through the Eyes of the Masters: Meditations and Portraits (London: Routledge, 1932), p. 67. [Full text of Maitreya’s message on Krishnamurti at alpheus.org/html/source_materials/scott_anrias/maitreya_da.html] Any of the Masters quoted in these endnotes I believe to be genuine members of the Great White Brotherhood. ↩
‘Sir Thomas,’ an English Master said: “Also instead of giving forth the new Teaching so badly needed, he [Krishnamurti] escaped from the responsibilities of his office as prophet and teacher by reverting to a past incarnation, and an ancient philosophy of his own race [Advaita Vedantism] with which you are familiar, but which is useless for the Western World in the present cycle. But those to whom he speaks think they are receiving a new message, and as such it carries undue weight. The message he should have delivered, he has failed to deliver–or only partly delivered. Nothing about Art–no plans for the new sub-race–educational schemes dropped–and in place of all this: Advaita, a philosophy for chelas, and one of the most easily misunderstood paths to liberation… He who attempts to teach Advaita, and omits all Sanscrit terms, courts failure. Sanscrit words engender an occult vibration which is lost when translated. Western words not suitable to describe subjective states of consciousness, because their associations are mainly mundane… Another flaw in this pseudo-Advaita which Krishnamurti is giving out, is that he addresses the personality, the physical plane man [personal self], as if he were the Monad [divine self] or at least the Ego [higher self]. Of course the Monad, the Divine Spark, is the Absolute Existence-Knowledge-Bliss, and hence eternally free, but that doesn’t mean that the personality down here, immersed in endless- seeming Karmic difficulties, can share its consciousness, or even that of the Ego- -the link between the personality and the Monad.” ‘Sir Thomas,’ an English Master, in: His Pupil [Cyril Scott], The Initiate in the Dark Cycle (London: Routledge, 1932), pp. 136-139. [Full text of relevant chapter at alpheus.org/html/source_materials/krishnamurti/truth_about_k.html] ↩
‘Sir Thomas’ again: “Well did my Brother Koot Hoomi say that Krishnamurti had destroyed all the many stairways to God, while his own remains incomplete. Also being incomplete it may lead to dangers unforeseen by those who attempt to climb it. Danger Number One: Krishnamurti’s casting aside of time-honoured definitions and classifications leaves aspirant without true scale of values. Danger Number Two: climbing his particular staircase necessitates constant meditation, which in its turn necessitates constant protection from Guru–and Guru not allowed by Krishnamurti. Of course a moderate degree may be practiced in safety without a Guru, but long-continued meditation leads to states of consciousness and excursions on to other planes where the Master’s guidance is absolutely indispensable.” ‘Sir Thomas,’ in His Pupil, p. 138. ↩
“Krishnamurti’s Advaitism, which is not to be confounded with the recognized form of that philosophy, will, I fear, lead his followers nowhere except perhaps to hypocrisy and self-delusion.” ‘Sir Thomas,’ in: His Pupil, p. 139. ↩
Kuthumi dictated in 1975: “Today Krishnamurti, denounced by the Brotherhood, denounces the true teachers and the path of initiation, proclaiming that the individual needs only himself and that this is the only God there is. Leading thousands of youth in the direction of sophisticated disobedience to the God within [divine self], to Christ the inner mentor [higher self], and to the masters of the Brotherhood, this fallen one has been the instrument of a philosophy that is not and does not in any way represent the true teachings of the Great White Brotherhood.” [Relevant Paragraphs at alpheus.org/html/source_materials/krishnamurti/kh_on_k.html] Kuthumi, “An Exposé of False Teachings,” Pearls of Wisdom, Vol. XIX, no.5, p. 29. Copyright © 1976, Summit University Press, P.O. Box 5000, Corwin Springs, Montana 59030-5000. (406) 848-9891. Web site: http://www.tsl.org. ↩
Hodson wrote: “Here are his words [Krishnamurti’s] on the subject: ‘When we understand profoundly the significance of our existence, of the process of ignorance and action, we will see what we call purpose has no significance. The mere search for the purpose of life covers up, detracts from the comprehension of oneself.’ That quotation is a perfect example of the closed circle of thought outside of which I for one find myself to be shut when endeavouring to comprehend these teachings… He seems to put the very goal itself as the first step towards its attainment.” Geoffrey Hodson, Krishnamurti and the Search for Light (Sydney: St.Alban Press, n.d.), pp. 12-13. [Full text at alpheus.org/html/source_materials/theosophy/hodson1.html] ↩
“In him, singleness of purpose has developed into intolerance. Unique individuality has become a fetish, worship of which produces narrow-mindedness and causes him to display distinct signs of intellectual arrogance. He alone is right. Everyone else, from the Lord Buddha down to the latest teacher of the Law, is wrong, criminally wrong.” Ibid. p. 8. ↩
Theosophist John Algeo correctly observes that Krishnamurti is “teaching ends without means.” John Algeo, review of Krishnamurti–Love and Freedom by Peter Michel in Quest Vol. 8, no. 3 (Autumn 1995), p. 86. ↩
See Mary Lutyens, Krishnamurti: The Years of Awakening (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1975), for the story of Krishnamurti’s initiations and spiritual development. See Charles W. Leadbeater, The Masters and the Path (Adyar, India: Theosophical Publishing House, 1925) for a Theosophical understanding of the initiatory process. ↩
“The Arhat initiation is the one in which the Master withdraws all guidance from his pupil, who may have to negotiate the most difficult problems without being allowed to ask any questions. He has to rely entirely on his own judgment, and if he makes mistakes, must bear the consequences. And so what did Krishnamurti do? Like the proverbial manservant who knows he is about to be given notice, he gave notice first. In other words, he cut himself adrift from the White Lodge, and repudiated all of us. And unfortunately he induced others far below him in spiritual evolution to do likewise.” ‘Sir Thomas,’ in: His Pupil, p. 139. ↩
“I wish I could describe how I witnessed the ego [the synthetic self] being torn to pieces and being thrown to the winds… . The center of thinking dissolved into nothingness.” Vimala Thakar, On an Eternal Voyage (Ahmedabad, India: The New Order Book Co., 1969), pp. 46-47. ↩
Vimala Thakar thought, and I think correctly, that her transformation had something to do with the healing-sessions with Krishnamurti. She wrote: “I have told you [Krishnamurti] about the invasion of a new awareness, irresistible and uncontrollable. I have told you how it has swept away everything. Now–this has something to do with the healing.” Thakar, p. 43. Krishnamurti on the contrary was quite sure that the two phenomena were not related. Apparently, when she published her autobiography against Krishnamurti’s wishes, he ended their friendship and later his biographers gave her the silent treatment. [This last statement is not fair, because it is not true. Pupul Jayakar did deal with the Krishnamurti-Vimala Thakar relationship in a 2- page segment in her 1986 Krishnamurti biography. She did not mention the end of their relationship though. See: Pupul Jayakar, Krishnamurti: A Biography (San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1986), pp. 204-206. (Added March 2004)] ↩
See endnote 7. ↩
“If with all its power and superiority, one cannot think for oneself, there can be no peace in the world.” J.Krishnamurti, The First and Last Freedom (New York: Harper & Brothers, 1954), p. 64. For this Krishnamurti received some compliments from the Masters: “He did good work in teaching people to use their own brain.” ‘Sir Thomas,’ in: His Pupil, p. 139. And: “Krishnamurti was right to emphasize the necessity for independent thought.” Lord Maitreya in: David Anrias, p. 67. ↩
“One sees that there must be change in oneself–the more sensitive, the more alert and intelligent one is, the more one is aware that there must be a deep, abiding, living change.” J.Krishnamurti, The Awakening of Intelligence (New York: Harper & Row, 1973), p. 43. ↩
“But when the mind seeks a timeless state which will go into action in order to destroy the [synthetic] self, is that not another form of experience which is strengthening the ‘me’[synthetic self]?… So, having projected this state of continuance in a timeless state as a spiritual entity, you have an experience; and such an experience only strengthens the self.” From chapter IX, “What is the Self,” in The First and Last Freedom, pp. 76-82. It is hard to find quotes by Krishnamurti, uncontaminated by his basic errors. In the previous quote, for example, Krishnamurti does not differentiate between aspirations of the soul, which are wholesome (see endnote 7 about the Antahkarana), and ambitions of the mind, which might be destructive depending on who or what principle directs the mind. This line of thought makes him throw out the baby (the soul) together with the bathwater (the synthetic self). ↩
“We have learned now the power of propaganda and that is one of the greatest calamities that can happen: to use ideas as a means to transform man… Man is not important–systems, ideas, have become important. Man no longer has any significance. We can destroy millions of men as long as we produce a result and the result is justified by ideas… When the intellect has the upper hand in human life, it brings about an unprecedented crisis.” From “On the Present Crisis,” in The First and Last Freedom, pp. 145-146. ↩
See endnote 7. ↩
The whole Krishnamurti phenomenon might be one of world-historical significance. We might be observing the birth of a completely new, though flawed, religion and civilization based on Krishnamurti’s teachings, with its geographical center in India and its outposts in the West. For some interesting ideas about the rise and fall of civilizations see Arnold J. Toynbee, A Study of History (London: Oxford University Press, 1946). ↩
H.P. Blavatsky had high hopes for the Judeo-Christian and Indic civilizations to transform themselves into a “heaven” in the 21st century with the aid of the Theosophical Society, led by a prophesied “torch-bearer of Truth,” expected in the last quarter of the 20th century. See her Conclusion, “The Future of the Theosophical Society,” in The Key to Theosophy (Pasadena CA: Theosophical University Press, 1995), pp. 304-307. Annie Besant defended her involvement with Krishnamurti by referring explicitly to Blavatsky’s view about the future mission of the Theosophical Society and the “torch-bearer of Truth.” She clearly believed Krishnamurti to be the vehicle for that expected teacher. She wrote in 1912 that the only difference between herself and Blavatsky regarding the coming of “the next great Teacher” was that “she put that event perhaps half a century later than I do. Which of us is right only time can show.” Annie Besant, “Freedom of Opinion in the T.S.,” letter to The Vâhan 21\8 (March 1912), p. 153. With the 20th century now drawing to a close; the world in a state of unparalleled crisis, the Theosophical Society only a minor agent of change and no sign of a “torch-bearer of Truth” connected with it, it behooves Theosophists to contemplate the texts quoted in this pamphlet and consider an alternative perception of the esoteric history of the 20th century. My own proposal is contained in a pamphlet, “The Masters and Their Emissaries: From H.P.B. to Guru Ma and Beyond,” in which is stated that the teachings of the Masters, which were originally planned to be given through Krishnamurti, were given through Guy and Edna Ballard in the 30s and 40s, through Geraldine Innocente in the 50s, through Mark and Elizabeth Prophet in the 50s till the 90s, and through Monroe and Carolyn Shearer from 1995 on. For an overview of a wide variety of other Theosophical views of Krishnamurti see “Krishnamurti and the World Teacher Project: Some Theosophical Perceptions.” ↩