Secret Doctrine Study Group

SD pages 279-282

Cosmic Ideation

We hold to Hermes and his “Wisdom”—in its universal character; they—to Aristotle as against intuition and the experience of the ages, fancying that Truth is the exclusive property of the Western world. Hence the disagreement. As Hermes says, “Knowledge differs much from sense; for sense is of things that sur…[Read more]

SD i. pages 278-9
The Three Trinities

In sober truth, as just shown, every “Spirit” so-called is either a disembodied or a future man. As from the highest Archangel (Dhyan Chohan) down to the last conscious “Builder” (the inferior class of Spiritual Entities), all such are men, having lived æons ago, in other Manvantaras, on this or other…[Read more]

Studies in the Secret Doctrine: B.P. Wadia
Growth Through Self-Effort

Life is substantial as Spirit or as Matter, as the noumenal principle or as the phenomenal personality, as monads or as atoms. In pralayic non-manifestation or in manvantaric manifestation that LIFE is the “One homogeneous divine SUBSTANCE PRINCIPLE,…” (S.D. I, 273.) IT is Be…[Read more]

SD i 279-280

Whatever may be the destiny of these actual writings in a remote future, we hope to have proven so far the following facts:

(1) The Secret Doctrine teaches no Atheism, except in the Hindu sense of the word nastika, or the rejection of idols, including every anthropomorphic god. In this sense every Occultist is a Nastika.…[Read more]

SD i 277

The whole order of nature evinces a progressive march towards a higher life. There is design in the action of the seemingly blindest forces. The whole process of evolution with its endless adaptations is a proof of this. The immutable laws that weed out the weak and feeble species, to make room for the strong, and which ensure the…[Read more]

For the last two months, an intense state of continuous Bliss, Peace and Joy is being experienced by this individuated aspect of the One All. Just now reading this below: ““When Buddhi absorbs our EGO-tism (destroys it) with all its Vikaras, Avalôkitêshvara becomes manifested to us, and Nirvana, or Mukti, is reached, “Mukti” being the same as…[Read more]

SD i page 272
Sri Sankaracharya, the greatest Initiate living in the historical ages, wrote many a Bhâshya on the Upanishads. But his original treatises, as there are reasons to suppose, have not yet fallen into the hands of the Philistines, for they are too jealously preserved in his maths (monasteries, mathams). And there are still weightier…[Read more]

SD i pages 269-70

The name, “Upanishads,” is usually translated “esoteric doctrine.” These treatises form part of the Sruti or “revealed knowledge,” Revelation, in short, and are generally attached to the Brahmana portion of the Vedas,* as their third division. There are over 150 Upanishads enumerated by, and known to, Orientalists, who credit…[Read more]

SD i xlv

This accounts for the necessity under which the writer has laboured to be ever explaining the facts given from the hoariest Past by evidence gathered from the historical period. No other means was at hand, at the risk even of being once more charged with a lack of method and system. The public must be made acquainted with the…[Read more]

SD i. page xliv- xlv

The days of Constantine were the last turning-point in history, the period of the Supreme struggle that ended in the Western world throttling the old religions in favour of the new one, built on their bodies. From thence the vista into the far distant Past, beyond the “Deluge” and the Garden of Eden, began to be forcibly and…[Read more]

B.P. Wadia From the Article: The Writer of the Secret Doctrine

Truth is sacred and can therefore stand the attack, sacrilegious and severe. H. P. Blavatsky invites this searching examination. Blind believers do her a disservice when by example or precept they discourage the attitude of critical questioning. Ours the mission to examine and…[Read more]

SD i XXXVI

More than one great scholar has stated that there never was a religious founder, whether Aryan, Semitic or Turanian, who had invented a new religion, or revealed a new truth. These founders were all transmitters, not original teachers. They were the authors of new forms and interpretations, while the truths upon which the latter were…[Read more]

Very well worded Kirk,
HPB mentions somewhere (and I can’t find the ref anymore) that “Ethics is applied metaphysics”.
The misapprehension and lack of application of this statement could – apart from other considerations – lie at the basis of the failure of exoteric religions to live up to their promises as it would provide a thoroughly grounded…[Read more]

In the same article that Peter quotes (“Is Theosophy a Religion?”), Blavatsky refers to Thomas Carlyle, the 18th century Scottish philosopher, who described the western religion of his day as a kind of “working for divine wages…a prudential feeling, grounded on mere calculation, a matter of expediency and utility…whereby some smaller quantum of…[Read more]

“Theosophy is Religion” itself This is understandable as it is the source of all major religions, and governed by the Mysteries of the Zodiac as told by HPB.
However, one must remember that this does not mean the ‘Theosophical Society’, or what HPB gave to it, is religion itself. A point often overlooked by students.
Remember she only gave th…[Read more]

‘Theosophy, as already said, is the WISDOM-RELIGION.’
(The Key to Theosophy, p 13)

Theosophy, we say, is not a Religion.

Theosophy, we say, is not a Religion. Yet there are, as every one knows, certain beliefs, philosophical, religious and scientific, which have become so closely associated in recent years with the word “Th…[Read more]

“Why is it important not to call theosophy a religion?”

Perhaps the first question could be;

Why did the Maha Chohan write … ‘the Theosophical Society was chosen as the corner stone, the foundation of the future religion of humanity.’

Although that idea appears to have been scrapped by 1925 due to all the splits etc.

Why is it important not to call theosophy a religion?