Quest Magazine

Printed in the  Fall 2021  issue of Quest magazine. 
Citation: Hebert, Barbara, "From the Editor’s Desk" Quest 108:4, pg 8-9

Barbara Hebert
National President

Some individuals may see the theme of this issue and think it is about the great teachers, the holy ones whom many believe stand behind the Theosophical Society and its formation. Many of us perceive that at least two of these beings, the Mahatma Morya and the Mahatma Koot Hoomi, are responsible for bringing the Theosophical Society into being, with the aid of H.P. Blavatsky, Henry Steel Olcott, and others.

Those of us who believe that these great ones established the Theosophical Society are forever grateful. Personally, I have no doubt that they continue to stand behind this organization as its members share the Ageless Wisdom in countless ways.

There are other ways of thinking and talking about teachers, however, and the articles in this issue, including this Viewpoint, share some of these ways.

The word teach is typically defined as causing another to know something. A teacher, then, is someone or something that causes another to know. Closely associated, of course, is the definition of learn, which is typically defined as gaining knowledge or awareness. However, when we look at the etymology of the word learn, it takes on a deeper meaning, especially for those of us who are attempting to walk the spiritual path. From the website etymonline (https://www.etymonline.com/word/learn), we read that the word comes from the following: 

Old English leornian “to get knowledge, be cultivated; study, read, think about,” from Proto-Germanic *lisnojanan (cognates: Old Frisian lernia, Middle Dutch leeren, Dutch leren, Old High German lernen, German lernen “to learn,” Gothic lais “I know”), with a base sense of “to follow or find the track,” from PIE root *lois- “furrow, track.” It is related to German Gleis “track,” and to Old English læst “sole of the foot.”

Læst, by the way, survives in modern English as last: the word for the model of the foot on which shoes are shaped.

Therefore, if we look to its origin, we find that the word learn stems from a sense of walking to find or follow the path, using the soles of our feet.

This is exactly what we are doing: walking to find or follow the path. Our learning is based upon following the path, one step at a time. If our purpose on this physical plane of existence is to become fully human through learning and growing, through the expansion of our consciousness, then, if we are open to it, everything and everyone is our teacher, and we can learn from everything and everyone. We learn so that we may find or follow the track to become fully human, to move forward in our spiritual evolutionary process.

A teacher is anyone or anything that helps us to know or become aware of something, especially about finding and following a path that has been chosen. If one has chosen to become a welder, the path may be knowledge of the process of welding. The same is true for someone who has chosen a path to become an accountant and has gained knowledge of accounting.

Many of us, in addition to our mundane career paths, have chosen a spiritual path. We focus on increasing our knowledge and awareness about spirituality and spiritual evolution for all beings. 

How many people do you know who go through their lives rarely learning from the circumstances that surround them and from the people with whom they come into contact? Often these individuals look externally for solutions to problems and difficulties. They blame the world, their jobs, their families, or any number of other things for what is wrong in their lives. Sadly, these individuals don’t even seem to realize that there is a track to find, much less follow.

This track is the spiritual path, and it compels us to learn. Once we become aware of it, we can never lose that awareness. We may ignore it or pretend that it is unimportant, but the knowledge never leaves us. Once we know that there is a spiritual path to follow, we can’t unknow it. At some point on our journey, whether in this lifetime or a future one, it manifests as “divine discontent.” It will niggle at our consciousness until we finally pay attention to it.

I’m reminded of the fairy tale about the princess and the pea. Written by Hans Christian Andersen, it is a Danish fairy tale about a prince who wanted to marry a princess. It was important that she be a “real” princess, and he had great difficulty determining who could qualify.

Then, one dark stormy night, a young woman came to the town gate and knocked on it. Wet and bedraggled, she insisted she was a princess. The queen, questioning whether this was true, set about creating a test to determine if the girl was truly a princess by heaping twenty mattresses and twenty pillows upon a bed. Under these, the queen placed one raw pea. The young woman slept on this bed and in the morning was questioned about her night’s sleep. She reported that she hadn’t slept at all and that she was bruised from something hard that had been in her bed.

The young woman’s words proved that she was indeed a real princess to the satisfaction of the queen and the prince. They believed that only a real princess could be so sensitive and delicate. So the prince and princess were married and lived happily ever after, and the pea was kept in a special cabinet.

While there are many morals to this story, the one that jumps out at me is that regardless of how many soft things were placed between the princess and the pea, she knew there was something there—something deep within that she could not ignore. She was unable to sleep, remaining awake through the night.

We are all aware of the idea that many people are asleep to the reality of the spiritual self, believing that the temporary physical self is the only reality. Andersen’s fairy tale points out that we cannot remain asleep when there is something deep within that pushes us toward awakening.

Everything and everyone we encounter gives us the opportunity of learning, of following the path we have chosen. As we go about our daily lives, we encounter people and situations that can be our teachers if we open ourselves to this possibility. The “pea” may take the form of a difficult family member or coworker or long lines in the grocery store. As we respond or react to them, we can use the opportunity to learn more about ourselves, to increase our self-awareness. The more we learn about ourselves, the more likely we are to move forward on the spiritual path. 

We can ask ourselves questions such as: Why am I so frustrated with this long line? What is going on inside of me? What is it about this person that pushes my buttons? What is this button, and how can I get rid of it?

Self-observation and self-awareness are key to walking the spiritual path. Difficult though they are, especially when they have to do with being honest with ourselves, they are an essential component of becoming fully human. Lifetimes upon lifetimes, it requires vigilance and determination to remain open to any situation or individual that can help us learn more about ourselves.

I firmly believe there are great teachers “out there,” who may inspire and motivate us to continue walking this difficult path. Yet the most important teachers seem to be the ones that are placed in our lives every single day: the situations and fellow human beings who provide us with the learning that is essential on our spiritual journey. May we have gratitude for all that teaches us and propels us on our way.

Printed in the  Fall 2021  issue of Quest magazine. 
Citation: Smoley, Richard, "From the Editor’s Desk" Quest 108:4, pg 2

From the Editor’s Desk

Many people claim to have spiritual teachers whom they barely knew and who barely knew them. The teacher might have thousands, even tens of thousands of disciples, so it has always been hard to understand how any one of them (outside the innermost circle) can claim that individual as any kind of preceptor.

It’s not my business to say who is whose teacher, or under what circumstances that name applies. But I would find it difficult to go to a weekend workshop—even, say, a Tibetan Buddhist empowerment—and claim the instructor was my teacher afterward. Even if one has attended many such workshops by the same person.

This observation forms the core of this issue. Three articles—by Lucy Oliver, Joscelyn Godwin, and the Members’ Forum by Ed Abdill—show another aspect of the spiritual teacher in our time: an individual, who may or may not be in any known lineage, who attracts a few dozen students with whom he or she works on a long-term basis. To me, this setup has far more potential for promoting long-term development than practically any other in this age.

The teachers in question were not gurus as such: they did not demand devotion and, in the case of Lucy Oliver’s Glyn, whom I knew myself, actively repudiated it. (For my portrait of Glyn, see “From the Editor's Desk Spring 2015,” Quest, spring 2015.) Nevertheless, they conveyed a certain knowledge and power that enabled their students to advance in a way that very few spiritual programs have.

In a Theosophical context, as Ed Abdill points out, Dora Kunz, the late president of the TSA, fulfilled this role for many, and her pupils that I know seem to think that no one since has managed to replace her.

We are talking about living human teachers here, and there may be many other kinds. Certain people say that they have had instructions from masters on the inner planes. This certainly seems possible, even likely, to me, but it is very difficult to claim any kind of authority on that basis. If you have any such experiences, I would imagine that the most prudent approach would simply be to keep your mouth shut about them. Nothing is easier than to sound crazy by prattling on about your contacts on the inner planes.

True masters, in my experience, make no such claims, even about themselves. I have been told, and I believe, one thing about masterhood, adeptship, and so on: if you claim to be it, you’re not it. Running around talking about yourself as a Master (with a capital M, of course) is itself a disqualification.

Hence genuine teachers are extremely evasive, not only about claiming such titles, but even allowing them to be applied. Even the Dalai Lama has said more than once that he is just “a simple monk.”

This presents a dilemma for the would-be student. How do you know who is genuine and who isn’t? Many of the highest teachers make themselves difficult to recognize, even affecting gruff or slovenly behavior in order to put off those who can’t see past appearances.

But then that is the first initiation. You have to have enough discernment to see past appearances—of any sort. On the flip side, demonstrating what used to be disingenuously called “crazy wisdom,” is hardly a reliable sign either.

A peculiar verse in the Gospels reads, “And they were astonished at his doctrine: for he taught them as one that had authority, and not as the scribes” (Mark 1:22). There is an obvious meaning here: the difference between genuine spiritual authority, as shown by Christ, and the mere chapter-and-verse knowledge of the scribes.

But there is another, more oblique lesson to be learned from this verse. The people had to have something in themselves that could distinguish genuine authority from pettifogging.

Unfortunately, there is no ultimately reliable touchstone. Even a sincere, ethical individual may really have nothing more inside than platitudes. Consequently, you have no guarantee that you will not be fooled. I would go further and say, if you can be fooled, you will be.

These are the risks we all run. You can never really tell the depth of another’s integrity. You can only maintain your own.

This puts me in mind of a peculiar theory of mine, which I cannot claim to be anything more than speculation. After their downfall at the hands of church and king, the medieval Knights Templar were accused of secretly worshipping a god called Baphomet. Historians have not known what to make of this claim. The Templars, the guardians of Christendom, worshipping some grotesque unknown god? Was it just slander cooked up by the priests?

Here is my suggestion. The Templars did have a god called Baphomet, which they used in their initiations. It was a ridiculous joke god invented for the purpose of the ritual. At one point the candidate was given the ultimate test: he was told that the secret of the Templars was they worshipped Baphomet. To become fully initiated into the order, the candidate was given the choice: he had to renounce Christ and worship Baphomet. But this was merely a test. If the candidate yielded and bowed down before Baphomet, he failed. If he refused to reject Christ, even on the threat of death, he passed.

You never know in advance what form the test is going to take.

Richard Smoley

Printed in the  Fall 2021  issue of Quest magazine. 
Citation: Macrae, Janet, "Angel of the Pines" Quest 108:4, pg 34-37

By Janet Macrae

It was three o’clock in the afternoon on February 17, 2012.  I was inside the barn with my two horses: Baton Rouge, a dark brown Australian Thoroughbred with no white markings, and Poco, a chestnut American quarter horse with a white blaze on his face.

We were waiting for the saddle fitter. He was very late, and I was starting to get irritated. Should I just cancel the appointment and go home? I picked up the cell phone, but then thought twice and put it down. No, I would have to wait. The saddles were due to be repadded, and I did not want the horses’ backs to grow sore. To pass the time, I decided to take them out to the back field to graze. I put the halter on Poco, the younger horse, and led him from the stall into the hallway.

In view of the circumstances, and my frame of mind, what happened next was quite extraordinary:

The walls and ceiling of the barn somehow faded from my sight. Up in the sky, above the fields, I saw a slender, golden energy form radiating thin strands of white and golden light. It seemed to have a face (although I could not discern any features), above which was a rounded golden arch resembling a halo. I’m not sure to what extent I was using my physical eyes. It resembled, or felt, like a dream image. But I was in my waking state, and this being seemed very much in the real world.

Almost immediately, a feeling of recognition came over me. I knew what this was! It was a great Angel of the Pine Trees. I had seen an illustration in an old book that looked exactly like this . . . no, not exactly . . . I tried to focus more clearly . . . This angel had an indentation in the middle, like a waist, while the angel in the book did not.

 I stood motionless, staring, for perhaps ten seconds. The angel did not move, and there was no message or other communication of which I was aware. Then it was gone. The walls and ceiling of the barn came back into view, and I felt my hand on Poco, who was waiting patiently.

Why had this occurred? I could think of nothing that might have brought this about. There was little time to ponder, however, because the saddle fitter finally arrived. When he finished, it was still daylight, so I took the horses out to the back field, as I had planned. This was a large, unenclosed area where the grass was relatively undisturbed and, even in February, fairly lush. Coming out here was one of the high points of the horses’ day. I held Poco on the lead rope, but this past year I had been letting Baton Rouge, the older one, wander freely. He never strayed far. The three of us were like a small herd, enjoying each other’s company and the peacefulness of the landscape.

I usually tried to make this back field time a meditative experience. On that particular afternoon, however, my mind was not at all quiet: it was filled with thoughts of angels. I was trying to remember some of the things that Dora Kunz, the codeveloper of the Therapeutic Touch healing method, had taught about them. She had been able to see them since her childhood, and sometimes (not too often) she would give some descriptions to those of us who studied with her.

Dora emphasized that angels, or “intelligences,” as she referred to them, do not have physical bodies: they comprise a separate evolutionary line inhabiting the higher dimensions of this earth. There are many different types, she told us, but they are all aspects of the universal order; they help to balance the forces of nature. Some types are involved with humanity, but generally in an impersonal way. Indeed, this was one of the big differences Dora found between humans and angels. As humans, we tend to take things personally; angels do not. There are angels who preside over cities and towns, helping to balance positive and negative energies. Others are associated with hospitals, sending supportive energy to the ill and to those who care for them. Dora said that if we try to quiet our minds and attune to them, we can receive some help.

Working under the supervision of the angels are many varieties of nature spirits. These are smaller, less intelligent entities whose energies are of a denser quality, closer to that of the physical earth. Because of this relative density, they are more often seen by human beings: they are the fairies, gnomes, sea sprites, and elves that appear in the world’s folklore. I wondered why I had suddenly seen an angel and not one of these entities that appear to be more accessible.

I stood there in the grass, remembering Dora’s voice, until a chilly wind suddenly arose that penetrated my jacket. “Come on, boys, we’re going in.” I led Poco toward the barn, and Baton followed us closely. He did not see well out of one eye and would get a little fearful at dusk. Inside the barn, the staff was distributing hay and preparing the evening meal. The horses were content, and I was free to go home.

It was a short beautiful drive from western New Jersey across the Delaware River to eastern Pennsylvania. I entered the house and immediately took out a book that I had bought almost forty years ago: The Kingdom of the Gods by Geoffrey Hodson, a gifted clairvoyant from New Zealand. He had made extensive observations of many types of angels during the 1920s and had engaged an artist to paint some of them following his descriptions. I found these illustrations to be so beautiful and interesting that I returned to them many times over the years, and even showed the pictures of the healing angels in some of my nursing classes.

	The Angel of the Pines, from Geoffrey Hodson’s Kingdom of the Gods.

I first opened to plate 6: “A Lord of the Pines.” This was definitely the type of angel that I had seen. But Hodson’s lens was much more focused than mine, because he showed, in greater detail, the specific lines of energy radiating from the angel’s denser form. Indeed, these lines actually resembled the foliage of pine trees. Hodson explained that angels take on, to some degree, the characteristics of their physical region. In the illustrations, the Pine Angel is slender and graceful, like many pine trees; the Mountain Angels are broad and massive; the Angel of the Sea is curved and wavelike. It is easy to understand why they have been depicted in paintings and other art forms as beautiful people with wings. The denser core of these beings does have a humanlike appearance: the radiating bands of energy give the impression of wings, and the fact that they live in the higher dimensions reinforces the idea of flight.

I spent the evening looking over sections of the book, and the next day I described what I had seen to a few people at the farm. They listened with interest and asked to see the book. Word spread, and soon everybody knew about it. And then, happily for me, some corroboration came within a few weeks.

David, the owner of the farm, is a surgeon who likes to relax by taking long walks in the woods. He told me that he saw “a Great Being in the sky over the fields. It was like a Christmas tree. All lit up!”

We were sure that we had seen the same Great Being. David’s beloved dog had recently died, and I wondered if the Angel had reached out to him because of that. Both Dora Kunz and Geoffrey Hodson say that major transitions such as birth and death are attended by angelic forces. But why did the Pine Angel reach out to me? Although I did not realize it at the time, and might not have been willing to accept it, the consciousness of the angel was embracing my horse Baton Rouge.

Baton had been abused by a former owner but had made great progress in healing with the help of therapists using several modalities over the years: chiropractic, massage therapy, acupressure, and Therapeutic Touch. He showed great interest in the healing methods, giving his full attention during each session. “He’s exceptional,” said the chiropractor. “He tries to figure out what I’m doing and work along with me.” I always felt that Baton was more than a horse. Someone once remarked that he seemed to be a human being in a horse’s body.

Baton was twenty-eight years old, and he finally seemed at peace with his life. The status of his physical health, however, was worrisome to me. He suffered from arthritis, allergies, and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease. On the afternoon of June 5, almost four months after the sighting of the angel, he had a severe respiratory attack. Our vet came and gave him some potent intravenous medications. “This should take care of it,” he said. “Baton should be better in the morning.” As he was leaving, he gave me an oral bronchodilator to use when necessary. I watched Baton carefully, and he continued to improve as the hours passed. Sheila, David’s wife, who is a physician, told me she would keep an eye on him, so I returned home in the early evening.

I ate a quick dinner and then sat at my desk thinking over the events of the day. Baton had had many episodes of respiratory difficulty before, but this attack was much more severe, and it frightened me. I was also worried about the coming summer heat, which takes a toll on all the animals, particularly the older ones. At some point, a thought of the angel crossed my mind. Should I ask him to help Baton? Geoffrey Hodson’s book contains illustrations of beautiful healing angels that preside over hospitals, sending supportive energy to the ill. This angel was not of that type, but he might be able to help in some way.

Dora Kunz, using her clairvoyant ability, observed that angels are attracted to altruistic feelings. She used to suggest that nurses and other caregivers try to attune to them in their work. But she had an admonition: angels, by their very nature, are not able to grant personal favors. The universe is orderly, she would remind us, and angels work as agents of the laws of nature. They exist in the higher realms, where the experience of time is more expansive. Thus they can see into the future and get a sense of the destiny of the living beings around them. Angels can and will help, but they cannot work against destiny.

With this in mind, my inner sense told me to proceed: make a request, but be nonattached to the outcome and accept whatever happens. So I visualized the angel and made the intent to connect. Then I pictured Baton and asked the angel to help him in any way that would be appropriate. I did not expect a direct response, but hoped there would be an improvement in Baton’s condition. What happened next was a complete surprise and one of the most profound gifts I have ever received.

In just a few seconds, I felt a generalized sense of pressure, as though some type of energy were gently impinging on my subtle field. Then it felt as though part of my subtle energy field on the right side became synchronized with the new frequency, and it was this synchronization, or partial synchronization, that allowed me to experience the angel’s presence. I am not sure that any amount of spiritual reading or meditation could have prepared me for this. I had never felt such a majestic presence, so completely above our human personality dynamics, and yet so profoundly courteous to me at this level.

“I acknowledge your request.” This was not so much an audible voice in my inner ear as an idea impressed from without on my mind. I sat with my eyes closed, barely breathing. Across my inner visual field came a sequence of moving images: I saw Baton surrounded by little earth-tone figures. They stood about as high as his knees. Were they plants? No, they looked like plants, but they were moving around. Then I saw that they had stubby legs and odd-looking faces. They were nature spirits! I watched them perform some kind of dance around Baton. An inner circle suddenly formed, so now Baton had two circles of nature spirits dancing around him. At one point they seemed to be covering his body with leaves. Baton seemed to be completely comfortable with these little beings and what they were doing.

The vision faded, and I sat at my desk for a long time. At first I was too stunned to move or even to think. Then I felt compelled to write down what had happened. This was a glimpse into another dimension and, like dreams that are not recorded, it could slip back into the depths of my unconscious. And so I wrote, hoping the words would anchor this experience in my waking mind. I wondered if the great angel sent some energy or life force through the nature spirits, directing them to perform a healing ritual dance. It was my hope that the angel’s energy would help Baton regain his strength. Many horses are now living well into their thirties, I reasoned, and with all the supportive therapies available, Baton could be among them. But at that moment, the angel could see what I, in my physical consciousness, could not: that my hope, my personal wish, was not his destiny.

 And so it happened, very quickly. On the morning of August 13, two months after the dance of the nature spirits, I was preparing a late breakfast when the phone rang. It was Sheila. “Baton doesn’t look good at all,” she said. “I think he’s critical.”  Our vet was away, so I immediately called the nearby equine clinic. Then I ran out the door. It was brutally hot, as it had been all week, and now Baton was in respiratory distress.

Gemma, a young vet, quickly arrived. She medicated Baton, and he soon started to breathe more easily. However, Sheila detected an irregular pulse and asked Gemma to do a scan of his chest. She agreed, and we were all shocked as the picture emerged: his heart was so enlarged that it was impinging on his lung.

“This doesn’t look good,” said Gemma. “You can bring him into the clinic for a cardiology workup, but I doubt, in this condition, that we could give him any more than a week.”

I stood there trying to think clearly. The clinic is excellent, but I felt Baton would not want this option. If he stayed here, however, how much discomfort might he endure? Even if he managed to survive more than a week, he still faced the rest of the summer heat and the early fall allergens. Hard as this was, I knew I had to let him go. Gemma accepted my decision and said she would make the call for his body to be picked up for cremation. She then went to her truck to prepare the injections, and we led Baton out to the back field.

There was an unusual, profound stillness in the air. Everything seemed to have stopped. Most of the horses had been brought inside because of the heat. The instructors were on vacation, so there were no lessons, and the custodian had the day off, so all the machinery was quiet. In the distance I saw a woman leading her horse out to graze in the front yard. In the back field there were four of us with Baton: Gemma and her assistant, me, and Sheila, who had stayed with us all morning. Soon, when it was all over, there was only me, kneeling there on the grass beside him.

I covered Baton’s body with a sheet and waited there in the stillness and the heat, periodically taking refuge in the shade of the barn. I felt for Poco and tried to comfort him. After a while, maybe an hour, I heard the sound of a motor and saw an unfamiliar square truck making its way up the driveway. A sympathetic man got out of the truck and asked me to sign something. He also suggested that I leave. “You don’t want to see him hoisted onto the truck,” he said. So I went back into the barn and waited with Poco until the sound of the truck faded away.

Then Carolyn appeared, the woman who had been grazing her horse in the front yard. I did not know her well, because she had only recently started boarding her show horse here. Someone told me that she lived on her own farm nearby.

“I’m really sorry about this,” she said. And then, after a moment, she added: “Did you see all the eagles?”

 “No.”

“About ten or twelve of them came when your horse died. They flew over him in a big circle and then flew away. I’ve never seen so many—maybe a pair or two—but nothing like this.”

I wished that I had seen the eagles, but I was not looking up at the sky. I was looking down at my loss. Even in my shocked state, however, I felt a sense of mystery and gratitude. How fortunate that she had been there, at that moment, able to see what I had not. A circle of eagles. I thought about the circle of the nature spirits, and I wondered if the eagles also had been sent by the Angel of the Pines.

It was only later that my friend Geri, who lives with her family on a nearby farm, told me that she too had seen the eagles. Around noon on that hot August day, she was standing in one of her fields with a friend.

“There were several of them in a circle,” she said. “They were flying so low that I could see some individual feathers. And they were flying in your direction, towards you and Baton. I had never seen anything like that, and I remember I said to Maryanne, ‘Oh my God, what kind of a sign is this!’”

It was a sign, to me, of successful completion. Birds symbolize the human spirit and its flight to a higher dimension. Eagles, in particular, indicate strength, victory, and the release from bondage. And the circle, in all cultures, means wholeness, fulfillment, and the completion of a cycle. The circle of eagles told me, therefore, that Baton had accomplished his life’s purpose. He had been hurt and, with Poco and me at his side, had walked a long path of healing. His earthly life was fulfilled, and he was open to a higher level of existence.

Sources

Hodson, Geoffrey. The Kingdom of the Gods. Madras, India: Theosophical Publishing House, 1952.

Kunz, Dora, and Dolores Krieger. The Spiritual Dimension of Therapeutic Touch. Rochester, Vt.: Bear and Co., 2004.

Kunz, Dora van Gelder. The Real World of Fairies. Wheaton: Quest Books, 1977.

———. “Devic Consciousness,” Quest 97 (fall 2009), 152–53.

Van Gelder, Kirsten, and Frank Chesley. A Most Unusual Life: Dora Van Gelder Kunz, Clairvoyant, Theosophist, Healer. Wheaton: Quest, 2015.

Janet Macrae taught holistic nursing at New York University for many years. She is the author of Therapeutic Touch: A Practical Guide (Knopf, 1987). This article contains excerpts from her e-book On the Road to the Spirit: A Journey with a Horse, available through Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and SmashWords, 2014.

Printed in the  Fall 2021  issue of Quest magazine. 
Citation: Bowen, Robert, "Blavatsky on How to Study Theosophy" Quest 108:4, pg 29-33 

By Robert Bowen 

As the introduction below suggests, these notes have been reprinted often in Theosophical venues, including Theosophy Wiki.

This version was published by the Theosophical Publishing House in 1960. According to TSA archivist Janet Kerschner, “H.S.,” the author of the introduction, was almost certainly Henry Smith, then president of the TSA.

Robert Bowen was born in County Kerry, Ireland, in 1815 and educated in Jesuit schools. He served in the Royal Navy: the signature at the end says he was a commander, but a search of Royal Navy records turns up no Robert Bowen during that period. It has been suggested that he was actually a purser—a naval officer, in any event. He joined the TS in the early 1880s after meeting Anna Kingsford and became a personal pupil of HPB’s in 1889. He died in 1908.

Bowen’s son, Patrick, was born when his father was seventy. He spent a great deal of time in Africa, and was initiated into certain African esoteric groups. In 1969, he published a paper entitled “The Ancient Wisdom in Africa” in Studies in Comparative Religion. The article closely correlates esoteric African and Theosophical doctrines.

Theosophical scholar Michael Gomes considers the evidence for the authenticity of this material “inconclusive.” In an article in the December 2013 issue of The Theosophist, he writes: 

Aside from no one else ever seeing Bowen’s notes [apart from Patrick], there are a number of other difficulties with this material. So far no Robert Bowen has been found in membership records of the time. Most Lodge meetings were only open to members or associate members. The dates given for his association with HPB do not match with what we know of her life at the time.

In a letter in the Archives at Adyar, dated 6 March 1891, Countess Wachtmeister writes: “The Thursday evenings are continued, though HPB is seldom present; in fact, we rarely see her now. She shuts herself up for days together.”

While on 19 April 1891, the date Bowen concludes his meetings with Blavatsky, the Countess writes: “HPB is certainly growing more and more feeble, and she feels that to be able to do any work at all she must be quite alone, so as to enable her to concentrate her energies.”

So there appears to be some discrepancy.

—Ed.  

Introduction

These notes of teachings given by H.P. Blavatsky towards the close of her life have already appeared in print at various times in a number of journals. They were made by Robert Bowen, an elderly naval man who joined Mme. Blavatsky’s circle and questioned her persistently about what attitude a student ought to take towards The Secret Doctrine. He made careful notes of the answers she gave him and subsequently read them over to her to make sure that he had not mistaken her meaning. The notes were later brought to light by Bowen’s son, the late Captain P.G.B. Bowen, who was at the time a member of the Theosophical Society in Dublin, and they were first printed in the January-March 1932 issue of Theosophy in Ireland, just over forty years after they were written. Painstaking enquiries that have since been made in Dublin have failed to bring to light any other similar material from the same source.

Much of the value of the Bowen notes lies in the fact that they contain principles that can be applied not only to the study of The Secret Doctrine but to all Theosophical studies. Repeatedly they assert that any descriptive Theosophy is not to be taken as a necessarily correct picture of the universe. It is rather a secondary pattern, which is brought into being in the course of an experience of a Truth which is beyond words, beyond description and beyond relative values. Such a Theosophy is intended not to portray Truth but to lead towards it.

It will be seen that, by these standards, the value and authority of any descriptive Theosophy are not necessarily to be judged according to whether that Theosophy agrees accurately with scientific facts or principles or with the descriptive Theosophy propounded by some other person. The value of any exposition of Theosophy must lie in the depth of experience to which it can lead the student who is strong enough and daring enough to pass beyond its form or pattern to its occult or hidden reality.

Another piece of advice repeated through the notes is that, for its fuller understanding, any Theosophical teaching ought to be brought into a universal setting. As an aid to this, Mme. Blavatsky strongly recommended that the student should try to gain a deep appreciation of the three fundamental propositions, which are to be found in the proem of The Secret Doctrine.

H.S.

The Secret Doctrine and Its Study

HPB was specially interesting upon the matter of The Secret Doctrine during the past week. I had better try to sort it all out and get it safely down on paper while it is fresh in my mind. As she said herself, it may be useful to someone thirty or forty years hence.

First of all then, The Secret Doctrine is only quite a small fragment of the Esoteric Doctrine known to the higher members of the Occult Brotherhoods. It contains, she says, just as much as can be received by the World during this coming century. This raised a question—which she explained in the following way:

“The World” means Man living in the Personal Nature. This “World” will find in the two volumes of the S.D. all its utmost comprehension can grasp, but no more. But this was not to say that the Disciple who is not living in “The World” cannot find any more in the book than the “World” finds. Every form, no matter how crude, contains the image of its “creator” concealed within it. So likewise does an author’s work, no matter how obscure, contain the concealed image of the author’s knowledge. From this saying I take it that the S.D. must contain all that H.P.B. knows herself, and a great deal more than that, seeing that much of it comes from men whose knowledge is immensely wider than hers. Furthermore, she implies unmistakably that another may well find knowledge in it which she does not possess herself. It is a stimulating thought to consider that it is possible that I myself may find in H.P.B.’s words knowledge of which she herself is unconscious. She dwelt on this idea a good deal. X said afterwards: “H.P.B. must be losing her grip,” meaning, I suppose, confidence in her own knowledge. But Y and Z and myself also, see her meaning better, I think. She is telling us without a doubt not to anchor ourselves to her as the final authority, nor to anyone else, but to depend altogether upon our own widening perceptions.

(Later note on above: I was right. I put it to her direct and she nodded and smiled. It is worth something to get her approving smile! — [signed] Robert Bowen.)

At last we have managed to get H.P.B. to put us right on the matter of the study of the S.D. Let me get it down while it is all fresh in mind.

Reading the S.D. page by page as one reads any other book (she says) will only end in confusion. The first thing to do, even if it takes years, is to get some grasp of the “Three Fundamental Principles,” given in the Proem. Follow that up by study of the Recapitulation—the numbered items in the Summing Up to Vol. I (Part I). Then take the Preliminary Notes (Vol. II) and the Conclusion (Vol. II).

H.P.B. seems pretty definite about the importance of the teaching (in the Conclusion) relating to the times of coming of the Races and Sub-Races [see sidebar]. She put it more plainly than usual that there is really no such thing as a future “coming” of races. “There is neither Coming nor Passing, but eternal Becoming,” she says. The Fourth Root Race is still alive. So are the Third and Second and First—that is, their manifestations on our present plane of substance are present. I know what she means, I think, but it is beyond me to get it down in words. So likewise the Sixth Sub-Race is here, and the Sixth Root Race, and the Seventh, and even people of the coming Rounds. After all that’s understandable.

Disciples and Brothers and Adepts can’t be people of the every day Fifth Sub-Race, for the race is a state of evolution.

But she leaves no question but that, as far as humanity at large goes, we are hundreds of years (in time and space) from even the Sixth Sub-Race. I thought H.P.B. showed a peculiar anxiety in her insistence on this point. She hinted at “dangers and delusions” coming through ideas that the New Race had dawned definitely on the World. According to her the duration of a Sub-Race for humanity at large coincides with that of the Sidereal Year (the circle of the earth’s axis—about 25,000 years). That puts the new race a long way off.

We have had a remarkable session on the study of the S.D. during the past three weeks. I must sort out my notes and get the results safely down before I lose them.

She talked a good deal more about the “Fundamental Principle.” She says: If one imagines that one is going to get a satisfactory picture of the constitution of the Universe from the S.D. one will get only confusion from its study. It is not meant to give any such final verdict on existence, but to Lead Towards the Truth. She repeated this latter expression many times.

It is worse than useless going to those whom we imagine to be advanced students (she said) and asking them to give us an “interpretation” of the S.D. They cannot do it. If they try, all they give are cut and dried exoteric renderings which do not remotely resemble the Truth. To accept such interpretation means anchoring ourselves to fixed ideas, whereas Truth lies beyond any ideas we can formulate or express. Exoteric interpretations are all very well, and she does not condemn them so long as they are taken as pointers for beginners, and are not accepted by them as anything more. Many persons who are in, or who will in the future be in the T.S. are of course potentially incapable of any advance beyond the range of a common exoteric conception. But there are, and will be others, and for them she sets out the following and true way of approach to the S.D.

Come to the S.D. (she says) without any hope of getting the final Truth of existence from it, or with any idea other than seeing how far it may lead Towards the Truth. See in study a means of exercising and developing the mind never touched by other studies. Observe the following rules:

No matter what one may study in the S.D. let the mind hold fast, as the basis of its ideation, to the following ideas:

(a) The Fundamental Unity of All Existence. This unity is a thing altogether different from the common notion of unity—as when we say that a nation or an army is united; or that this planet is united to that by lines of magnetic force or the like. The teaching is not that. It is that existence is One Thing, not any collection of things linked together. Fundamentally there is One Being. The Being has two aspects, positive and negative. The positive is Spirit, or Consciousness. The negative is Substance, the subject of consciousness. This Being is the Absolute in its primary manifestation. Being absolute there is nothing outside it. It is All-Being. It is indivisible, else it would not be absolute. If a portion could be separated, that remaining could not be absolute, because there would at once arise the question of Comparison between it and the separated part. Comparison is incompatible with any idea of absoluteness. Therefore it is clear that this fundamental One Existence, or Absolute Being, must be the Reality in every form there is.

I said that though this was clear to me I did not think that many in the Lodges would grasp it. “Theosophy,” she said, “is for those who can think, or for those who can drive themselves to think, not mental sluggards.” H.P.B. has grown very mild of late. “Dumskulls” used to be her name for the average student.

The Atom, the Man, the God (she says) are each separately, as well as all collectively, Absolute Being in their last analysis, that is their Real Individuality. It is this idea which must be held always in the background of the mind to form the basis for every conception that arises from study of the S.D. The moment one lets it go (and it is most easy to do so when engaged in any of the many intricate aspects of the Esoteric Philosophy), the idea of Separation supervenes, and the study loses its value.

(b) The second idea to hold fast to is that There Is No Dead Matter. Every last atom is alive. It cannot be otherwise since every atom is itself fundamentally Absolute Being. Therefore there is no such thing as “spaces” of Ether, or Akasha, or call it what you like, in which angels and elementals disport themselves like trout in water. That’s a common idea. The true idea shows every atom of substance no matter of what plane to be in itself a Life.

(c) The third basic idea to be held is that Man is the Microcosm. As he is so, then all the Hierarchies of the Heavens exist within him. But in truth there is neither Macrocosm nor Microcosm but One Existence. Great and small are such only as viewed by a limited consciousness.

(d) Fourth and last basic idea to be held is that expressed in the Great Hermetic Axiom. It really sums up and synthesizes all the others.

As is the Inner, so is the Outer; as is the Great, so is the Small; as it is above, so it is below: there is but One Life and Law; and he that worketh it is One. Nothing is Inner, nothing is Outer; nothing is Great, nothing is Small; nothing is High, nothing is Low, in the Divine Economy.

No matter what one takes as study in the S.D. one must correlate it with those basic ideas.

I suggest that this is a kind of mental exercise which must be exceedingly fatiguing. H.P.B. smiled and nodded. One must not be a fool (she said) and drive oneself into the madhouse by attempting too much at first. The brain is the instrument of waking consciousness and every conscious mental picture formed means change and destruction of the atoms of the brain. Ordinary intellectual activity moves on well beaten paths in the brain, and does not compel sudden adjustments and destructions in its substance. But this new kind of mental effort calls for something very different—the carving out of “new brain paths,” the ranking in different order of the little brain lives. If forced injudiciously it may do serious physical harm to the brain.

This mode of thinking (she says) is what the Indians call Jnana Yoga. As one progresses in Jnana Yoga, one finds conceptions arising which, though one is conscious of them, one cannot express nor yet formulate into any sort of mental picture. As time goes on these conceptions will form into mental pictures.

This is a time to be on guard and refuse to be deluded with the idea that the new found and wonderful picture must represent reality. It does not. As one works on, one finds the once admired picture growing dull and unsatisfying, and finally fading out or being thrown away. This is another danger point, because for the moment one is left in a void without any conception to support one, and one may be tempted to revive the cast-off picture for want of a better to cling to. The true student will, however, work on unconcerned, and presently further formless gleams come, which again in time give rise to a larger and more beautiful picture than the last. But the learner will now know that no picture will ever represent the Truth. This last splendid picture will grow dull and fade like the others. And so the process goes on, until at last the mind and its pictures are transcended and the learner enters and dwells in the World of No Form, but of which all forms are narrowed reflections.

The True Student of The Secret Doctrine is a Jnana Yogi, and this Path of Yoga is the True Path for the Western student. It is to provide him with sign posts on that Path that The Secret Doctrine has been written.

(Later note: I have read over this rendering of her teaching to H.P.B. asking if I have got her aright. She called me a silly Dumskull to imagine anything can ever be put into words aright. But she smiled and nodded as well, and said I had really got it better than anyone else ever did, and better than she could do it herself.)

I wonder why I am getting all this. It should be passed to the world, but I am too old ever to do it. I feel such a child to H.P.B., yet I am twenty years older than her in actual years.

She has changed much since I met her two years ago. It is marvellous how she holds up in the face of dire illness. If one knew nothing and believed nothing, H.P.B. would convince one that she is something away and beyond body and brain. I feel, especially during these last meetings since she has become so helpless bodily, that we are getting teachings from another and higher sphere. We seem to feel and Know what she says rather than hear it with our bodily ears. X said much the same thing last night.

(Signed) Robert Bowen,

CMDR, R[oyal] N[avy]

19th April, 1891

The Three Fundamental Propositions

From the Proem of The Secret Doctrine

(a) An Omnipresent, Eternal, Boundless and Immutable Principle, on which all speculation is impossible, since it transcends the power of human conception and could only be dwarfed by any human expression or similitude. It is beyond the range and reach of thought—in the words of Māndūkya Upanishad, “unthinkable and unspeakable.” [Verse 7.]

To render these ideas clearer to the general reader, let him set out with the postulate that there is one Absolute Reality which antecedes all manifested, conditioned being. This Infinite and Eternal Cause—dimly formulated in the “Unconscious” and “Unknowable” of current European philosophy—is the rootless root of “all that was, is, or ever shall be.” It is of course devoid of all attributes and is essentially without any relation to manifested, finite Being. It is “Be-ness” rather than Being (in Sanskrit, Sat), and is beyond all thought or speculation.

This “Be-ness” is symbolized in the Secret Doctrine under two aspects. On the one hand, absolute abstract Space, representing bare subjectivity, the one thing which no human mind can either exclude from any conception, or conceive of by itself. On the other, absolute Abstract Motion representing Unconditioned Consciousness. Even our Western thinkers have shown that Consciousness is inconceivable to us apart from change, and motion best symbolizes change, its essential characteristic. This latter aspect of the one Reality, is also symbolized by the term “The Great Breath,” a symbol sufficiently graphic to need no further elucidation. Thus, then, the first fundamental axiom of the Secret Doctrine is this metaphysical One Absolute—Be-ness—symbolized by finite intelligence as the theological Trinity . . .

(b) The eternity of the Universe in toto as a boundless plane; periodically “the playground of numberless Universes incessantly manifesting and disappearing,” called the “manifesting stars,” and the “sparks of Eternity.” “The Eternity of the Pilgrim” is like a wink of the Eye of Self-Existence (Book of Dzyan). “The appearance and disappearance of Worlds is like a regular tidal ebb, flux and reflux.”

This second assertion of the Secret Doctrine is the absolute universality of that law of periodicity, of flux and reflux, ebb and flow, which physical science has observed and recorded in all departments of nature. An alternation such as that of Day and Night, Life and Death, Sleeping and Waking, is a fact so common, so perfectly universal and without exception, that it is easy to comprehend that in it we see one of the absolutely fundamental Laws of the Universe . . .

(c) The fundamental identity of all Souls with the Universal Over-Soul, the latter being itself an aspect of the Unknown Root; and the obligatory pilgrimage for every Soul—a spark of the former—through the Cycle of Incarnation (or “Necessity”) in accordance with Cyclic and Karmic Law, during the whole term. In other words, no purely spiritual Buddhi (divine Soul) can have an independent (conscious) existence before the spark which issued from the pure Essence of the Universal Sixth Principle—or the over-soul—has (a) passed through every elemental form of the phenomenal world of that Manvantara, and (b) acquired individuality, first by natural impulse, and then by self-induced and self-devised efforts (checked by its Karma), thus ascending through all the degrees of intelligence, from the lowest to the highest Manas, from mineral and plant, up to the holiest archangel (Dhyāni-Buddha). The pivotal doctrine of the Esoteric Philosophy admits no privileges or special gifts in man, save those won by his own Ego through personal effort and merit throughout a long series of metempsychoses and reincarnations.

From The Secret Doctrine (Wheaton: Quest, 1993), vol. 1, pp. 14–17.

Root Races

In Theosophical literature, the term Root Race has a specialized meaning. In this context, the word race connotes something quite distinct from the standard dictionary definition. The popular definition of race involves minor physical and cultural variations within the human species.

In Theosophical literature, however, it refers to something altogether different. Specifically, the term Root Race, or race, refers to major developmental phases that occur over time within human consciousness. The first Root Race is said to be that stage at which the most basic level of perception was developed. During the second stage, the ability for active expression was evolved. This was followed by the third stage, characterized by the development of emotion. In the fourth Root Race, the analytical powers of the mind begin to appear. We are now said to be in the Fifth Root Race—the evolutionary phase in which the mind develops its synthesizing powers.

These stages, which are successive, are great evolutionary changes spanning eons of time. All of humanity is said to pass through each of the successive Root Races—with each individual soul incarnating many times at every stage of development.

This item on the Root Races was published with the 1960 TPH version of Bowen’s notes. It was based on the following sources:

The Peopling of the Earth by Geoffrey Barborka and Theosophy: An Introductory Study Course by John Algeo.