Quest Magazine

by Monte J. Zerger

Originally printed in the Fall 2010 issue of Quest magazine. 
Citation: Zerger, Monte J.. "The Passion of Yin and Yang." Quest  98. 4 (Fall 2010): 135-138, 159.

The yin-yang principle is not, therefore, what we would ordinarily call a dualism, but rather an explicit duality expressing an implicit unity.

                                           —Alan Watts (Tao, 26)

   In his beautiful masterpiece entitled Hsin Hsin Ming ("Faith Mind"), Seng Ts'an, a Buddhist philosopher of the sixth century C.E., teaches that when we "make the slightest distinction...heaven and earth are set infinitely apart."

Often a visual representation of a concept is more helpful and enlightening than words. The two bands in the accompanying diagram were formed by cutting two identical strips from an ordinary sheet of paper. On each strip "yin" was written on one side and "yang" on the other. The cylindrical band on the left was formed by taping the ends of one strip together in an ordinary manner. The other band was created in the same way except that one end was given a half-twist before being taped to the other end. This creates what is called a Mbius band, and most of us are familiar with this shape. Yet we probably find that no matter how many times we construct one or how well we comprehend the topology involved, something mysterious still remains.

   Obviously in the case of the cylindrical band, the yin and yang remain on opposite sides. With the Mbius band, however, if you fix your eyes on the yin and visually trace a path along the band, you will find you eventually reach the yang. If you continue to trace further, you will soon return to the yin again. The yin and yang are now on the same side of the strip, for it is now one-sided.

  Suppose now we think of the Mbius band as the "original condition," as the "underlying unity" of yin and yang. If we "make the slightest distinction" by cutting the band and taping it back without the twist, we have set yin and yang distinctly apart, even if not "infinitely apart." A simple alteration in the taping has created a distinct change. In both cases we return to where we began, but only in one situation do we return after "visiting" both the yin and the yang. We have moved from the appearance of two to the underlying unity of one.

   We live by polarities, as we must. If I think I am one with the door, I will end up with a bruised head. The joys of romantic love spring from the attraction of opposites, while the horrors of war spring from the clashes of opposites. Passion seems to fuel them both. But do opposites even exist?  This may seem like a silly question when we can look around us and see opposites everywhere. But we are looking at the visible world, the world of appearance and manifestation. What about the substratum beneath the visible? What about the mysterious quantum world of physics? Is the world of opposites merely an illusion, created by Mind in order to process information? Is it all a matter of vantage point, so that, with a more encompassing view, the opposites merge? Alan Watts, the renowned interpreter of Eastern philosophies, noted that the apparent conflicts of nature are "rooted in an underlying harmony," so there is "no serious conflict, no ultimate threat to the universal order, no possibility of final annihilation or non-being because as Lao-tzu said, ‘To be and not to be arise mutually'" (Watts, The Two Hands of God, 57).

    Nondualism, and the nondualistic state, are abstractions for nearly everyone. We try talking about these things, but when we do, we find that we're only grasping at metaphoric straws. If we're lucky, we may have brief moments in which we experience nondualism. Quickly we realize we cannot adequately explain the experience, because it transcends the rational mind and defies verbal description. There is no yin and yang at that point–only the Tao. In that moment we are in that matrix from which, as Lao-tzu said, "To be and not to be arise mutually."                                                      

Paradox and Complementarity 

   Closely intertwined with the concept of opposites is that of paradox. H.P. Blavatsky comments that although the manifested universe is "pervaded by duality...the opposite poles of subject and object, spirit and matter, are but aspects of the One Unity in which they are synthesized" (Blavatsky, 1:15-16). Here she is simultaneously, and paradoxically, calling two poles both opposite and One. Isn't it in paradox that the deepest truths lay?

   When Niels Bohr, the great Danish physicist and Nobel laureate, was knighted in his country, he designed a coat of arms around the yin-yang symbol. He viewed this symbol as a striking visual representation of the principle of complementarity that he had formulated. Loosely interpreted, this principle states that it is possible for something to exhibit its nature in two different states that are apparently contradictory. The classic example of this is light, which is sometimes seen as a wave and sometimes as a stream of particles. In reality, as has been proven, light exists as both, but those two states can never be observed simultaneously. Compare this to those drawings we've all seen that seem to portray one thing (a duck, a candlestick), but if you blink your eyes, you suddenly see a different image (a rabbit, a pair of faces). Try as you may, you are never able to see both at once, and yet they are both there. 

   In view of Bohr's complementarity principle and his choice of the yin-yang symbol, it is not surprising that the following statement is attributed to him: "The opposite of a shallow truth is false, but the opposite of a deep truth is also true" (Keyes, 227). Whether or not these were his exact words is less important than that he held such a belief. The true-false polarity that is so obvious at a surface level can mysteriously dissolve into a singular truth at a deeper level. 

Nature's Quantum World 

   Richard Wilhelm, the eminent scholar of Chinese philosophy and cosmology, is best known for his seminal translation of the I Ching, one of the oldest books in civilization's library. In discussing the yin and yang, he wrote, "Among European scholars, some have turned first to sexual references for an explanation, but the characters refer to phenomena in nature" (Wilhelm, 12).

   Matter is formed from atoms, which in turn are formed from what physicists call particles. Particles are believed to be the smallest components of matter. In the 1930s physicists discovered that every particle in the universe has an antiparticle (although some particles, such as photons—light particles—include their own antiparticles).

   The bubble chamber portrayed in the accompanying photograph shows two spiral tracks, one produced by an electron (negatively charged), and one by its antiparticle, a positron (positively charged). The pair was created by a single high-energy photon (light particle) as it traveled through a magnetic field. The tracks spiral in opposite directions because their charges react in opposite ways to the magnetic field through which the photon is passing. Although the photon does not create a track, because it lacks a charge, we can detect where the "birthing" took place. The point where the two spirals touch marks the point where the photon transformed into the two oppositely charged particles. This genesis is called pair production, and physicists have compelling evidence that it occurred over and over again in the first two seconds after the Big Bang. We might say that the particle (yang) and the antiparticle (yin) arose mutually from the photon (Tao).

The most amazing part of this story is that a simple mathematical principle was at the heart of the discovery of antiparticles. In 1932 Paul Dirac, a quiet, unassuming physicist, developed an equation for which a solution was the electron, long an observed and studied particle. He was puzzled by the fact that the equation had another solution, a condition familiar to any high-school mathematics student. For a time this was ignored, but eventually Dirac boldly suggested that since mathematical equations don't "lie," the other solution must reflect a reality. He hypothesized that a particle opposite in charge to the electron must exist. Many of Dirac's fellow physicists scoffed at this idea, but eventually such a particle was discovered and named the positron. There is a beautiful parallelism here. Just as 0 is equivalent to the sum of two numbers equal in magnitude but opposite in sign (e.g. -2 and +2), likewise a particle with a 0 charge (photon) can give rise to two particles with equal magnitude, but carrying opposite charges (electron and positron).

One of the deepest mysteries of quantum mechanics is entanglement. This astounding phenomenon has been proven by experiments, and yet continues to elude explanation. Two particles can be "entangled" in the laboratory in such a way that makes them effectively two parts of the same entity. You can then separate them from each other as far as you like–the distance is irrelevant–and a change in one will be instantly reflected in the other. 

We used to think that a basic property of space is that it separates and distinguishes one object from another. But we now see that quantum mechanics radically challenges this view. Two things can be separated by an enormous amount of space and yet not have a fully independent existence....Space does not distinguish such entangled objects. Space cannot overcome their interconnection. Space, even a huge amount of space, does not weaken their quantum mechanical interdependence. (Greene, 122;  italics are the author's)  

   The parallelism exhibited by entanglement is not the result of a signal being sent, because nothing travels faster than light, the upper "speed limit" of our universe, and the response of entangled particles is instantaneous. In some as yet unexplained way, a random choice by one entangled particle is instantly echoed by its distant partner. The physicist Abner Shimony has humorously referred to entanglement as "passion at a distance" (Aczel, 252). Chinese philosophers many millennia ago might have referred to the passion of yin and yang.

Cosmos and Psyche

   Wilhelm wrote, "The psyche and the cosmos are to each other like the inner world and the outer world. Therefore man participates by nature in all cosmic events, and is inwardly as well as outwardly interwoven with them" (Wilhelm, 11).

The great Swiss psychologist Carl Jung was deeply influenced by his friendship with Wilhelm. He wrote the foreword to one of Wilhelm's books (a translation of the I Ching), a commentary on another (The Secret of the Golden Flower), and, after Wilhelm's death, delivered the principal address at his memorial service. If one were to choose a single word that most effectively exemplifies Jung's psychology, surely a leading candidate would be "polarity." Jung, whose significance and audience seem to be growing at an exponential rate, was intent on identifying and characterizing opposites, as well as on reconciling them. In this way, Theosophy and Jung share a common ground, suggested by the fact that he was born in July 1875, just four months before the Theosophical Society was created.

   In any case, we can easily see the common ground shared by Jung, who studied the psyche, and Bohr, whose work was with matter, by comparing the following statement from Jung with Bohr's remark that the opposite of a deep truth is also true. In an interview given late in his life, Jung said, as if summing up his life's work,  "Every psychological statement is also true when it is turned round to mean the opposite. That is complicated but that is Nature" (Jung, C.G. Jung Speaking, 246).

   Particularly in his later years, Jung spoke extensively of an unus mundus ("unitary world") in which psyche and matter are undifferentiated. This term was first used by medieval philosophers, who identified it with Sophia, the ancient personification of wisdom. This concept of an unus mundus was at the core of Jung's theories of synchronicity, and was regarded by his colleague Marie-Louise von Franz as "one of the most important discoveries he made" (von Franz, 159). Jung saw the unus mundus as the "Western equivalent of the fundamental principle of classical Chinese philosophy, namely the union of yang and yin in Tao" (Jung, Mysterium Coniunctionis, 464).

   Jung analyzed the dreams of the quantum physicist and Nobel laureate Wolfgang Pauli, and they corresponded extensively for several years. They even coauthored a book consisting of two essays, one from each of them. In discussing Bohr's complementarity principle, Pauli wrote, "It would be most satisfactory of all if physics and psyche could be seen as complementary aspects of the same reality" (Pauli and Jung, 210). Pauli felt so strongly about the yin and yang of physics and psyche that he would not allow his article to be translated into English unless it was published simultaneously with Jung's article on synchronicity (Laurikainen, 140).

   In his brilliant work Cosmos and Psyche, Richard Tarnas contrasts two worldviews, which he calls the primal and modern, and his sentiments echo those of Wilhelm and Jung. He laments that we have traded the holistic primal worldview, characteristic of traditional indigenous cultures, for a modern view, with its "fundamental tendency to assert and experience a radical separation between subject and object, a distinct division between the human self and the encompassing world." In this reality "the human psyche is embedded within a world psyche in which it completely participates and by which it is continuously defined" (Tarnas, 16-17). Sadly, modern humanity appears to be terminating this dialogue and overlaying it with an artificial construct of duality. Nevertheless, as Tarnas observes, "The relation of psyche and cosmos is a mysterious marriage, one that is still unfolding–at once a mutual interpenetration and a fertile tension of opposites....Our own marvelously complex nature depends upon and is embedded in the universe" (Tarnas, 491).                              

Biology and Psychology 

   Back in the '70s split-brain research created great excitement by revealing that the two hemispheres of the brain tended to divide processing tasks between them according to the nature of the task. The left hemisphere performed the analytic and verbal tasks, while the right hemisphere handled the nonverbal and spatial ones. Although this is still held to be true to some degree, later research has shown that there is extensive communication between these hemispheres through the corpus callosum, and different jobs are not so neatly parceled out. We could say the halves of the brain are two in form but one in function, evidence of an underlying unity.

   Another area in which Jung pioneered was the realm of the contrasexual. He introduced the terms anima and animus to represent the inner feminine in a man and the inner masculine in a woman respectively. These concepts are becoming increasingly common, accepted, and drawn upon in therapeutic work.  

   "Gender fluidity" seems to be increasingly visible in Western society today. This term is not to be conflated with same-sex sexual preference or transgenderism, but rather is to be seen as a continuum between the polarities of female and male. It can be viewed as the emerging desire to express outwardly the inner-dwelling yin and yang. There is ample anthropological evidence that this fluidity has been found in diverse cultures throughout time. In her book Androgyny, the Jungian analyst June Singer writes, "Androgyny may be the oldest archetype of which we have any experience. It derives from, and is second only to, the archetype of the Absolute, which is beyond the possibility of human experience and must remain forever unknowable" (Singer, 6).  

   What is the message of all this for us? Perhaps it is to function in the World of Two (because we must) but anchor in the World of One. Perhaps the most we can do is recognize, accept, and reconcile, but not attempt to dissolve, the opposites. As long as we walk the earth, yin and yang will be immanent and pervasive. But they don't have to war and wreak havoc in our lives. Our challenge is to stand midway between them, extending one hand to each and offering them a fulcrum on which to balance.

   The Taoist Chuang Tzu is often associated with his celebrated dream in which he dreamt he was a butterfly, and in the dream he didn't realize he was Chuang Tzu. However, when he awoke, he realized he was unmistakably Chuang Tzu. He was then faced with the dilemma of whether he was Chuang Tzu who had dreamt he was a butterfly, or a butterfly dreaming he was Chuang Tzu.

   At the core of being, is there truly a difference? Was there a separate butterfly and Chuang Tzu, or were they, and are they still, embedded in an underlying unity from which they arose mutually?

References 

Aczel, Amir D. Entanglement. New York: Four Walls Eight Windows, 2001.

Blavatsky, H.P. The Secret Doctrine. Two volumes. Pasadena, Calif.: Thesosophical University Press, 1988.

Greene, Brian. The Fabric of the Cosmos. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2004.

Jung, C.G. C.G. Jung Speaking. Edited by William McGuire and R.F.C. Hull. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1977.

—— Mysterium Coniunctionis. 2d ed. Translated by R.F.C. Hull. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1970.

Keyes, Ralph. The Quote Verifier. New York: St. Martin's Griffin, 2006.

Laurikainen, Kalervo V. Beyond the Atom. Berlin: Springer Verlag, 1988.

Pauli, Wolfgang, and C.G. Jung. The Interpretation of Nature and the Psyche. Translated by Priscilla Sitz and R.F.C Hull.

New York: Pantheon, 1955.

Singer, June. Androgyny. New York: Anchor Books, 1977.

Tarnas, Richard. Cosmos and Psyche. New York: Penguin, 2006.

Von Franz, Marie-Louise. Psyche and Matter. Boston: Shambhala, 1991.

Watts, Alan. Tao: The Watercourse Way. New York: Pantheon, 1975.

—— The Two Hands of God. New York: Collier, 1963.

Wilhelm, Richard. The Secret of the Golden Flower. Translated by Cary F. Baynes. Rev. ed. New York: Harcourt, Brace & World, 1962.

Monte J. Zerger is a retired mathematics professor with interests that include the perennial philosophy, Carl Jung, the esoteric sciences, and particularly number symbolism. During his teaching career he published numerous aricles in professional mathematical journals, but has also published articles and poetry in other types of journals and magazines such as Word Ways, New Realities and The Mountain Astrologer. He lives in the Rocky Mountains with his partner, Susan, a counselor educator.

 by John Algeo

Originally printed in the Fall 2010 issue of Quest magazine. 
Citation: Algeo, John. "Blavatsky and Confucius." Quest  98. 4 (Fall 2010): 130-134.

     Yang and yin, the two great cosmological principles whose combination generates the ten thousand things of nature, may be associated, respectively, with the West and the East, the proactive and receptive cultural hemispheres. They may also be associated with two great teachers: Western Helena Petrovna Blavatsky and Eastern Confucius. Yang and yin are not opposites, but complements. They merge together, each becoming the other, in the revolving diagram of the t'ai chi or absolute (). So also Blavatsky and Confucius, like West and East, interact, each articulating the same Ancient Wisdom, though with different accents. Theosophists know a lot about Blavatsky, but less about Confucius, though he greatly merits our attention.

     "Confucius" is a Latinized form for the name of the greatest Chinese philosopher and teacher, who lived for some seventy-two years (551—479 bc). The Chinese appellation from which the name "Confucius" comes is K'ung-fu-tzu or Kongfuzi (depending on the transliteration system one uses), which means "Master Kung." And a very great master he was. If we judge a teacher by the number of persons influenced by his teaching, Master Kung is arguably the greatest teacher ever to have lived on this planet. His teachings have deeply influenced the societies of China, Korea, Japan, and Vietnam for two and a half millennia and thus have guided the lives of more human beings than any other system of beliefs.

     Although recognized by H. P. Blavatsky and her teachers as one of the Elder Brothers, Master Kung has been accorded relatively little attention by Theosophists. That is unfortunate, because his teachings are wisely Theosophical. Of all the great spiritual traditions of humanity, Confucianism is the closest to Theosophy in certain respects. Many religious traditions think of this world as a place to be escaped from. But Confucianism and Theosophy think of it as a place where self-realization can be achieved. One scholar of Confucianism put it this way:

The art of Confucian spirituality might be described as discovering one's cosmological being amidst daily affairs. For the Confucian the ordinary is the locus of the extraordinary; the secular is the sacred; the transcendent is in the immanent. What distinguishes Confucian spirituality among the world's religious traditions is an all-encompassing cosmological context that grounds its world-affirming orientation for humanity. This is not a tradition that seeks liberation outside the world, but rather one that affirms the spirituality of becoming more fully human within the world. (Tucker 1)

Much the same thing could be said of Theosophical spirituality. Both Confucianism and Theosophy are world-affirming, rather than world-denying.

As for the person of Master Kung, in Isis Unveiled (2:159), Blavat­sky mentions that there are two classes among the great teach­ers. One is those holy (that is, "whole") ones who have permanently united with their spiritual selves; they include Buda­dha, Christ, and Krisha­na. The other category is those who have been so united at intervals; they include Moses, Pythagoras, Apollonius, Plotinus, Plato, Iamblichus, and Confucius.

We should not, however, think of the latter group as somehow "second class" Masters. They too are Elders, far ahead of us in evolution. Our species is now in a stage of its evolution known in Theosophical literature as the Fourth Round. Blavatsky, however, explains (Secret Doctrine 1:162) that Confucius and Plato are Fifth-Rounders because they have evolved psychically, mentally, and spiritually to the level that will be the norm of humanity in the next round after our current one—ages in the future. In making this observation, Blavat­sky was quoting one of her teach­ers, Koot Hoomi (or K.H.), who wrote: "Plato and Confucius were fifth round men and our Lord [Buddha] a sixth round man" (Mahatma Letters, chronological letter 66, 3d ed., 14).

In her earliest writing, Blavatsky was less sympathetic to Confucius than in her later works. In July 1875, before the foundation of the Theosophical Society, she wrote of his "cold, practical philosophy" (Collected Writings 1:108), and she observed that he "confined his attention solely to his own country." Even so, she recognized that he was "trying to apply his profound wisdom and philosophy to the wants of his countrymen." Her judgment of Confucius in this regard seems less sympathetic than it was later to become, perhaps because in her later years Blavatsky grew better acquainted with the teachings of Master Kung.

If we consider Confucian teachings parallel to those of Theosophy, we can understand why Blavatsky came to hold the Chinese teacher in such high regard. To be sure, "parallel to" does not mean "equivalent to" or "the same as." In any coherent system of thought, every idea in the system derives its meaning from, and is connected with, other ideas in that system. Thus no two ideas from different thought systems can ever be exactly equivalent because they have separate connections, each within its own frame of reference. But ideas from different systems can be like each other in some respects and thus be parallel. The ideas cited here from Theosophy and Confucianism are not the same ideas, but they echo each other in notable ways.

Blavatsky and Master Kung were both fundamentally concerned, not with intellectual abstractions, but with human behavior, that is, with ethics or moral action. Yet all action needs to be considered within a view of the nature of the cosmos in which we act. Blavatsky and Master Kung both relate human behavior to the larger cosmos. Here are nine ways in which their teachings are parallel.

1. Because of their shared concern for ethics, Blavatsky early commented on Master Kung's version of the Golden Rule, and referred to it repeatedly. In Isis Unveiled (2:239, 338) she noted that the Christian "Golden Rule" is paralleled in Confucius's Analects. Perhaps the clearest statement is Analects 15.24, where a disciple asks the Master whether some single word can sum up how we ought to live. The Master replied: "It is perhaps shu (= consideration of others). What you do not wish for yourself, do not impose on others." In another passage (4.15), the Master said that his teaching was simple and easy to understand. One of his disciples explained: "The doctrine of our master consists in doing what we should, and in being considerate of others." Those two principles are parallel with two concepts that H.P.B. often cited: dharma and ahims?. The first principle, "doing what we should," is living according to our dharma or duty in life. The second principle, "consideration of others" (in Chinese shu, often translated as "reciprocity"), advises us not to harm others, but to treat them as we would want them to treat us, and so is equivalent to ahims?.

2. Blavatsky found Confucius's attitude toward "spirits" (specifically, spirits of the dead) compatible with her own. She believed that most of the "spirits" contacted in séances were not what they seemed to be. In 1872 she wrote to her relatives about the belief of Spiritualists: "Their spirits are no spirits but spooks—rags, the cast off second skins of their personalities that the dead shed in the astral light as serpents shed theirs on earth." So Blavatsky quotes Confucius's words as one of "the wise conclusions of some of the greatest philosophers" (Collected Writings 2:178). She is referring to his advice to his students: "Respect the spirits and—keep them at a distance." When one of his students asked Confucius how to serve the spirits, the Master responded: "You cannot serve men yet; how can you serve the spirits?" (Analects 11.12). Confucius's reluctance to talk about otherworldly matters is much like a similar reluctance by the Buddha and the Christ.

3. One of the great themes in both Isis Unveiled and The Secret Doctrine, and indeed all of Blavatsky's writing, is that the Wisdom is ancient, not new. None of the great teachers ever put forth new ideas, but only restated ancient traditions in a form appropriate to their time and place. Blavatsky consequently looks with favor on Confucius, who also claimed to do only that. She cites the Analects (7.1), where Confucius said: "I only hand on: I cannot create new things. I believe in the ancients and therefore I love them." But just as Blavatsky restated the Ancient Wisdom for the West in the late nineteenth century, Master Kung did the same for China in the fifth century BC. As one scholar puts it, "Confucius's €˜transmission' is not simply imposing the past on the present . . . . Rather, his transmission is a dynamic process of meeting new challenges with resources accumulated in the past, which become revitalized and renewed in being made useful and relevant to the present" (Sor-hoon Tan, 71). That is also what Theosophy does—or should do.

4. Blavatsky (Secret Doctrine 1:441) calls Confucius a "great sage" and "one of the greatest sages of the ancient world," who believed in and practiced "ancient magic," that is, the divination of the I Ching or "Book of Changes," which is one of the Confucian Five Classics or central scriptures. She says that he also taught the sphericity of the Earth and the heliocentric system. In several other places in The Secret Doctrine, Blavatsky refers admiringly to Confucius, especially to those aspects of his teaching that are most like the Wisdom Tradition she was presenting in that book. For example, the I-Ching or Yijing, which Confucius certainly knew, mentions the "great Extreme" (or "Supreme Ultimate," as the Chinese term t'ai chi or taiji is also translated). It is the ground and source of everything (Secret Doctrine 1:356) and thus is the same as Blavatsky's concept of Parabrahm, the Absolute.

5. Although the Chinese are sometimes said to have no cosmogony, Blavatsky affirms that they do (Secret Doctrine 1:440-41). The "Great Extreme" is the source of "changes" (that is, all forms of cyclicity). Cyclicity, in the form of changing circumstances, is the subject of the I Ching. And change or periodicity is affirmed by the second of The Secret Doctrine's three fundamental propositions.

6. Blavatsky says that the "Great Extreme" first produces two energies, which are represented by two figures: yang, a solid line representing unity, and yin, a broken or divided line, representing duality. These two lines in turn combine to produce four "images," which are the possible combinations and orderings of the two lines. The two lines also combine in groups of three to produce eight "symbols," each consisting of three lines, in all the possible combinations of the yang and yin lines. Blavatsky says that these "wise symbols" "represent precisely the same idea" as "the Stanzas [of Dzyan] given in our text." The unfolding of duality and then of multiplicity from the Unity that underlies all existence is the great theme of The Secret Doctrine's cosmogony and also of the lines of the I Ching.

Together, these Confucian concepts of the Great Extreme and the Changes parallel the first two fundamental propositions of The Secret Doctrine: an Absolute that is the source of everything and a process of manifestation by cycles, which can be found everywhere in this world.

7. Blavatsky also says (Secret Doctrine 1:440) that Confucius did not believe in a future life, but rather in the "changes," that is, transformations or rebirths: "He denied immortality to the personality of man—as we do—not to MAN." Theosophical teachings about the afterlife and reincarnation have often been misunderstood because we tend to identify ourselves with the personality, which neither survives nor is reborn. Only the individuality or "thread-self" endures from life to life. This is the distinction Blavatsky alludes to here. Confucius did not talk about reincarnation, because that involved what happens after death, which is another subject he avoided. When one of his students asked Confucius what death is, the Master responded: "You do not understand life yet; how can you understand death?" (Analects 11.12). Confucius's concern was how to live well in this life. But, as Blavatsky points out, Confucius regards the "changes" as pervasive in the world, and reincarnation can be seen as an aspect of those changes.

While recognizing a spiritual order of existence, Master Kung emphasized life in this world. He was concerned especially with how we can live together in society peacefully and productively. He emphasized the centrality of human relationships: between parent and child, ruler and subject, husband and wife, elder and younger sibling, and friend and friend. His emphasis on human community and the family can be seen as parallel to the first Object of the Theosophical Society: "to form a nucleus of the universal brotherhood (or family) of humanity."

By the time H.P.B. wrote The Key to Theosophy, near the end of her life, Confucius had risen greatly in her estimation, precisely because of the moral strength of his teaching. In The Key, she says that Theosophical ethics "are the essence and cream of the world's ethics, gathered from the teachings of all the world's great reformers. Therefore, you will find represented therein Confucius and Zoroaster, Laotze and the Bhagavat-Gita, the precepts of Gautama Buddha and Jesus of Nazareth, of Hillel and his school, as of Pythagoras, Socrates, Plato, and their schools" (48-49). Notice that in listing "the world's great reformers" in the realm of ethics, she mentions Confucius first. And later in The Key (239), she expressed the wish that human beings "would live up to the standard of Confucius and their other sages."

     8. With respect to ethical teachings, Master Kung spoke of four categories of human beings who are distinguished by their evolutionary progress toward a realization of the great principles of life. He emphasized that all human beings are fundamentally the same, but he also recognized that by experience and evolution they develop diversely (Analects 17.2). The four human categories he recognized are these (Analects 16.9):

     (a) Those who have innate wisdom, who are the divine Sages (that is, avatars or Sixth-Rounders, like the Buddha, Christ, and Krishna). Such far advanced souls are very rare.

     (b) Those who have acquired wisdom by study and thus made themselves into exemplary humans (that is, chohans or Fifth-Rounders, like Moses, Pythagoras, Apollonius, Plotinus, Plato, and Iamblichus). Such advanced souls are the great teachers and example-setters of our species. The Chinese term for this category of person (chun tzu or junzi, etymologically "son of a ruler") originally denoted an inherited rank, a condition defined by one's birth, that is, a great or noble person. But Confucius agreed with Tennyson that "Kind hearts are more than coronets, / And a noble soul, than Norman blood." Confucius believed that those who lead should not necessarily be those who are born to power, but rather those who merit leadership by their personal achievements. Confucius was the first promoter of government by meritocracy. He was the first social democrat.

     (c) Those who are learning, despite the limitations of nature (that is, chelas, seekers, or disciples consciously treading the Path, who are advanced Fourth-Rounders). Such striving souls have recognized the need to take their own evolution in hand and work toward perfection. They are the ones who (as the Master K.H. says) "TRY."

     (d) Those who are of limited ability and have not yet learned what is most important in life. They are ordinary, common, or "little" persons (that is, the mass of humanity in the Fourth Round). They are those of us who are progressing only slowly and unconsciously because we have not yet come to a realization of the need for personal effort to improve ourselves.

     With regard to those four categories, we must be careful about where we place anyone—especially ourselves. In exercising such care, Master Kung set us an example, as he did in many other matters. As already noted, H.P.B. and the Masters clearly identified Confucius as a member of the second category, a Fifth-Rounder, who had mastered the lessons most of us are still struggling with. But Confucius himself never claimed such a status (Analects 7.33): "As to being a sage, or an exemplary human, how dare I presume to make such a claim? But as to striving tirelessly to achieve that, and also teaching others without growing weary—that can be said of me, and that is all." This is not false modesty on the part of Master Kung; it is rather his recognition of the truth of the saying in Light on the Path: "You will enter the light, but you will never touch the Flame." We never achieve fully, but only strive to do so.

     9. Tao or Dao is a very important Confucian concept. Its literal meaning is "way," and in Confucian use it is sometimes parallel to the Theosophical concept of the Path. But it is not merely the Path individuals tread; in a sense it is also parallel with the Theosophical concept of the Plan, which is the way the whole world evolves, the cosmic Path.

     For Master Kung, treading the Path is a matter of learning and of applying what one has learned. It is significant that he is known in China as the "First Teacher" and his birthday, celebrated on September 28, is known as "Teachers Day." A joyous emphasis on applied learning is expressed in the very first sentence of the Analects (1.1): "To learn something and then to practice it at the right time, is that not a pleasure?" And the last verse of the Analects (20.3) rounds off Master Kung's view of the importance of learning that leads to understanding on three levels: spiritual understanding of Heaven's plan; intellectual understanding of correct behavior; and social understanding of other human beings. "The Master said: If one does not understand the plan of Heaven, one has no way of becoming an exemplary person; if one does not understand the right way to do things (ritual), one has no way of taking a stand; if one does not understand words, one has no way of understanding people."

     Blavatsky and Confucius were two great exponents of living the Ancient Wisdom. They each spoke in the idioms of their times. Yet they also both speak timeless truths to us if we will hear them.

 References

 Blavatsky, Helena P. Collected Writings. 15 vols. Wheaton, IL: Theosophical Publishing House, 1977-91.

———. Isis Unveiled. 2 vols. Wheaton, IL: Theosophical Publishing House, 1972, first published 1877.

———. The Secret Doctrine. 3 vols. Wheaton, IL: Theosophical Publishing House, 1978-79, first published 1888.

Confucius. The Analects. There are many translations of this work; it is best to read several together so as to compare them. Quotations above often combine several.

The Mahatma Letters to A. P. Sinnett from the Mahatmas M. and K.H. Transcribed by A. T. Barker. Ed. Vicente Hao Chin, Jr. Manila: Theosophical Publishing House, 1993.  

Tan, Sor-hoon. "Three Corners for One: Tradition and Creativity in the Analects." In Confucius Now: Contemporary Encounters with the "Analects", ed. David Jones, 59-77.   Chicago: Open Court, 2008.

Tucker, Mary Evelyn. Introduction to Confucian Spirituality, vol. 1, ed. Tu Weiming and Mary Evelyn Tucker. New York: Crossroad, 2003.

John Algeo served for nine years as president of the Theosophical Society in America. He is also past international vice-president of the Theosophical Society.

VOULME 98, NUMBER 4

Blavatsky and Confucius
John Algeo

The Passion of Yin and Yang
Monte J. Zerger

The Power of Great and Small
Stephen Karcher

The Age of Synthesis
Corinne McLaughlin with Gordon Davidson

The Tao of It
S.J. "Peaceman" McGuire

Explorations: Dadaji
Alice O. Howell

From the Editor's Desk
Richard Smoley

Viewpoint: Keep Your Eyes on the Prize
Betty Bland

Betty Bland, National President 

Originally printed in the Summer 2010 issue of Quest magazine.
Citation: Bland, Betty. "The Charter of Compassion." Quest 98. 3 (Summer 2010): 86.

The collisions and clashes of cultures and belief systems have reached epic proportions. The problem partly stems from the attitude of Christian colonialists over the last 500 years, who were so convinced that theirs was the only way that they felt totally justified in subjugating the "heathen" races. In fact they used what has come to be known as the Doctrine of Discovery to validate their territorial claims all over the world. This doctrine traces its origins to a series of pronouncements by fifteenth-century popes that non-Christian lands could be "discovered" and subdued; the original inhabitants were classified as occupants without any sovereign rights to their land. Using this idea as justification, the colonialists destroyed millions of indigenous people and their cultures. This attitude has slid to the background in recent decades, but it still colors the attitudes of many people, influencing political policies and causing immense psychological harm to the point where it has boiled to overflowing in the violent events of today.

At its founding in 1875, the Theosophical Society was the first organized effort to develop appreciation for faiths beyond that of the dominant culture. The founders of the Theosophical Society, especially those inner guides—the adepts—recognized the urgent need for humankind to learn to live together and to honor one another as brothers and sisters of the spirit—all one family interdependent and partaking of one substance, one nature, and one destiny. Again and again they emphasized the importance of our First Object: "To form a nucleus of the universal brotherhood of humanity regardless of race, creed, sex, caste, or color." Their work for the formation of a strong nucleus of a compassionate brotherhood for all people was aimed at permeating and changing the culture of oppression before it was too late. This was probably the main reason that they even agreed to become as publicly visible as the forming of the Society required. The currents of conflict and violence were in motion, and they needed to do whatever possible to stem the tide.

By 1893, although some in the Western world were waking up to the presence of other faiths, Christian culture still prevailed, as exemplified by the first World's Parliament of Religions, which was held in Chicago that year. Its organizers basically viewed religions other than Christianity merely as interesting oddities, so they were quite amazed at the results. They were stunned by the popularity of the Hindu teacher Swami Vivekananda and of Annie Besant's famous oration. Reflecting a gradual shift in attitude, the second such event, held a hundred years later in 1993, was renamed the Parliament of the World's Religions in order to acknowledge that each religion has its own validity.

However, as we now so sadly recognize, humanity has not been quick enough in changing its attitudes. We have been entrenched in habitual thought and unwieldy institutions; finally the pain of abuse and disenfranchisement exploded into our consciousness with the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. Now we know that interfaith understanding is not just a nice thing to do, but is essential for the welfare and survival of all people. All over the planet different sects are attacking each other. No one is immune—Christians, Muslims, Buddhists, Hindus, Jews, and others are all the brunt of someone else's hatred.

As a continuation of the efforts to build interreligious understanding, a number of subsequent Parliament events have been held, the most recent being the Parliament for the World's Religions that David and I attended in Melbourne, Australia , in December 2009. Thousands of thinkers and religious leaders gathered to dialogue, honor the universal search for spiritual meaning, recognize the plight of indigenous people, and promote environmental sustainability as an inherent responsibility for the well-being of all. Foremost in the presenters' and participants' minds were ways to heal the rift between peoples and between people and their environment, all within the context of their religious traditions.

Notable among the presentations was the Charter of Compassion, which had been prepared by the well-known religious author Karen Armstrong in consultation with a number of Jewish, Christian, and Muslim leaders. Signatories of note include His Holiness the Dalai Lama, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, and former United Nations Human Rights High Commissioner Mary Robinson. The charter calls for the establishment of an alliance of individuals, organizations, and communities to advocate for global change. It calls for a complete change of attitude with a renewed sensitivity to all.

I urge each one who reads this piece to copy the Charter of Compassion given below and post it on your wall as a daily reminder of this global ethic of sensitivity. And I further ask that you consider promoting it in your groups, among friends, and in your spiritual communities. In doing so, we will be joining thousands of others who have been touched by this message, and little by little we can turn the tide of intolerance and move toward the Theosophical ideal of the universal brotherhood of humanity. 

Charter for Compassion 

The principle of compassion lies at the heart of all religious, ethical, and spiritual traditions, calling us always to treat all others as we wish to be treated ourselves. Compassion impels us to work tirelessly to alleviate the suffering of our fellow creatures, to dethrone ourselves from the center of our world and put another there, and to honor the inviolable sanctity of every single human being, treating everybody, without exception, with absolute justice, equity, and respect.

It is also necessary in both public and private life to refrain consistently and empathically from inflicting pain. To act or speak violently out of spite, chauvinism, or self-interest, to impoverish, exploit, or deny basic rights to anybody, and to incite hatred by denigrating others—even our enemies—is a denial of our common humanity. We acknowledge that we have failed to live compassionately and that some have even increased the sum of human misery in the name of religion.

We therefore call upon all men and women

•  To restore compassion to the center of morality and religion;
• To return to the ancient principle that any interpretation of scripture that breeds violence, hatred, or disdain is illegitimate;
•  To ensure that youth are given accurate and respectful information about other traditions, religions, and cultures;
• To encourage a positive appreciation of cultural and religious diversity;
•  To cultivate an informed empathy with the suffering of all human beings, even those regarded as enemies.

We urgently need to make compassion a clear, luminous, and dynamic force in our polarized world. Rooted in a principled determination to transcend selfishness, compassion can break down political, dogmatic, ideological, and religious boundaries. Born of our deep interdependence, compassion is essential to human relationships and to a fulfilled humanity. It is the path to enlightenment and indispensable to the creation of a just economy and peaceful global community.