Quest Magazine

Tim and Lily Boyd pose with Singapore Young Theosophists.

Printed in the Summer 2015 issue of Quest magazine.
Citation: Boyd,  Tim."President,s Diary" Quest 103.3 (Summer 2015): pg. 114-115.

At the end of January my wife, daughter, and I left Adyar to return to the U.S. Along the way we stopped in Singapore. I had scheduled a visit with the TS group there. Singapore is a remarkable place. It is a country that its recently deceased founder, Lee Kwan Yew, said should not exist, not because it did not deserve to, but because geography, politics, and demographics all would seem to argue that as a nation, it is impossible.

The TS group there is a dynamic bunch of people. Not too many years ago its membership had declined to seven. Under the guidance of Sanne and Lily Chong the group today has 400-plus members. Although our meeting with the group was unscheduled and on an unusual day for them, around 100 members turned out.

From Singapore I traveled on to Krotona for the annual Partners in Theosophy program. Every year at the end of January members from around the country gather for the week-long program. This year I facilitated our exploration of the Three Objects of the Theosophical Society. Since last year I had been looking forward to cofacilitating the get-together with the Krotona School director, Maria Parisen. Over the years Maria and I have done a number of retreat-type programs together. Although our previous combined efforts have been well received by the participants, my enthusiasm for conducting it was somewhat selfish. I love working with Maria. Unfortunately, because of unforeseeable circumstances she had to withdraw at the last minute. Joy Mills, Betty Bland, Pablo Sender, and I ended up leading the group in an inspiring program.

John and Anne Kern, after John’s talk at Krotona.

In addition to the partners and mentors, each year John Kern, adviser to the trust for The Kern Foundation, also attends the full term of meetings. This year, on the Tuesday when the Ojai Valley Lodge gathered for their weekly session, they had asked John to talk about his life and experiences working for the TS. It was a packed house. John’s intimate acquaintance with the people and history of the TS made for a riveting evening. It was a view of a side of TS history that no one else could have presented. More than four decades ago John retired from his own lucrative business career to work, gratis, solely for the Theosophical organizations served by the foundation. (The MP3 of the talk can be listened to or downloaded at https://www.theosophical.org/announcements/3512).

From Krotona it was finally back to Olcott in time for our February meeting of the board of directors. As always, the members of the board came to the headquarters for the three and a half day meeting. Currently our board is composed of long-time members who hail from Louisiana, New Hampshire, Florida, Wisconsin, Colorado, and Oregon. It’s a diverse, passionate, and very efficient group. Unlike the previous board, which was 50/50 male-female, this one is primarily female. Besides me the one lone man is Dr. Doug Keene from New Hampshire. It could be viewed as an enviable position to be in.

This year the dates for the meeting coincided with Adyar Day. For more than 100 years, February 17 has been a special day for the TS. The commemoration began as a remembrance of Colonel Olcott, the first president and cofounder of the TS, on the date of his passing. In 1922 Annie Besant shifted the emphasis to serving as a memorial for all of the TS’s past leaders and as a day to remember and give support to the TS international headquarters. All around the world programs are held and donations collected for the various works going on at Adyar. For a number of years in the American Section we allowed this occasion to slip. This year I gave an impromptu slide presentation of Adyar —a view from the inside. It was not on the schedule, but still attracted about thirty people. All of the board, a number of staff, and some members of the public turned out.

Whenever I have shown images of Adyar to a group, I am fascinated at the audience’s sense of novelty and surprise at seeing the scope of the place and the work. It should not surprise me. Until I started regularly traveling to Adyar, I was the same way. It always seemed like such a mysterious place. I had no mental images to help me grasp its dimensions. Since I became international president, three of our staff members have made extended visits to Adyar and have done significant work while there. Over the years I have noticed that those members who have spent some time at the international headquarters come away with a deeper understanding and commitment to the work.

In March I was off to the San Francisco Bay area for three programs. I was mainly going because for about a year a good friend and founder of the Greenheart International organization, Emanuel Kunzelman, had been trying to coordinate the details for a public conversation between Michael Murphy, founder of California’s Esalen Institute, and me. (See more about this discussion in my “Viewpoint: A Great Idea” .) Given everyone’s hyperbusy schedule, it was difficult.

The event was a two-hour conversation moderated by Emanuel. The description advertising the event went like this: 

This historical evening will bring together Michael Murphy of ITPI (Integral Transformative Practice International) in a conversation with Tim Boyd, international president of the Theosophical Society, as they discuss how the Theosophy of today meets evolutionary theory. Join us for this lively dialogue moderated by Greenheart International president, Emanuel Kuntzelman, as we hear from these two titans of spiritual thought.

Tim Boyd converses with Michael Murphy at their discussion program.

I like it. Titanic! It was a wide-ranging exchange that seemed to bring out the best in both of us. We plan to get together in the future to flesh out our discussion of some of the subjects that came up that evening. (To hear the entire two-hour conversation go here:
https://www.itp-international.org/library/dialogue-michael-murphy-tim-boyd-and-emanuel-kuntzelman.)

We set a date for the conversation that also allowed me to schedule visits with our TS groups in San Francisco and Oakland. So next it was a meeting with the San Francisco TS group. The SFTS has been a dynamic center in the area for many years. Although as a group they are keen students of the Ageless Wisdom teachings, they have always focused on more than mere study. Application and experience have been the emphasis since the days of their famous member and guiding light Joe Miller—an entirely unique and inspired student/teacher/friend. As a young man, Joe had met Annie Besant and formed a bond with the TS. Years later he would say, “Everything I have in life I owe to the Theosophical Society.” They are a group who in quiet, behind-the-scenes ways have been a tremendous support to the TS work. We met at their building, which is right downtown, almost at the top of San Francisco’s famous Nob Hill.

Two days later it was back across the Bay Bridge for a meeting with the Oakland TS. The Oakland group has a long history. It had been almost twenty-five years since I had last visited with them. Many things have changed since then. For a time the group had become inactive, only coming back to life again in the past couple of years. Because their normal meeting place was too small, we met in a lovely hall in the Berkeley public library. Members came from Oakland and the surrounding area. Also a group of friends from Turlock, California, about 100 miles away, came for the talk. I had a meal with the group members, then we drove to the library for the talk. It was a good day, and I am expecting very good things to come out of the Oakland branch.

At the end of March, it was back to Adyar (where I am now writing this piece). I arrived in time to inaugurate and speak at the South Indian Conference. Every year around 150–170 members from some of the Indian states in the south come together (Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Karnataka). It is a three-day event that for the last several years has been hosted at Adyar. The subject for this year’s gathering was The Voice of the Silence.

Unlike the Midwest, where we have the four distinct seasons of winter, spring, summer, and fall, the Adyar area is said to have three—hot, hotter, and hottest. Right now is the hotter season, with everyday temperatures in the mid- to upper 90s. It’s surprising how quickly one adapts. Leave Wheaton, Illinois, and 50 degrees, get off an air-conditioned jet plane in Chennai, sweat profusely for two days, and voilà, you have acclimated. Give it a try.

Tim Boyd

Printed in the Summer 2015 issue of Quest magazine.
Citation: Bamford, Christopher."Blavatsky, Rudolf Steiner, and the Perennial Tradition" Quest 103.3 (Summer 2015): pg. 90-94.

By Christopher Bamford

We forget just how much the spiritual movements of the twentieth and now the twenty-first centuries owe to H.P. Blavatsky and the Theosophical Society she founded. Although not yet counted with Marx, Nietzsche, and Freud as a creator of our time, Mme. Blavatsky, no matter how wild her eccentricity or willful and capricious her natural freedom of spirit, deserves equivalent stature. Contemporary spiritual thinkers could not have accomplished what they have without her strenuous preparatory efforts. Much of what we think of as "New Age" — from Buddhism through "inner development" to channeling — was part of the original Theosophical mission.

Despite the apparent differences in their individual teachings, the capacious being of Mme. Blavatsky, deep as it is wide, lies behind most alternative spiritual teachers still read today, such as G.I. Gurdjieff, J. Krishnamurti, and Rene Schwaller de Lubicz. In fact, it is difficult to imagine anyone escaping her influence. The same is equally true of cultural figures like C.G. Jung (and the Eranos group), as well as contemporary figures like R.J. Stewart, David Spangler, or Caroline Myss. It was HPB, furthermore, who introduced world religions and world history into the theretofore parochial and tightly guarded confines of Western thought. It was she likewise who opened up the possibility of ecumenical and interreligious dialogue and laid the ground (with the philosopher G.W.F. Hegel) for a truly global theory of history as evolution of consciousness.

Above all, it was Blavatsky's stubborn, independent, open-minded exploration that broke open the hegemony of the aging secret societies and began the process of tearing the veil of the temple and making esotericism part of cultural life, in two equally important ways. She made available — for rational reflection, speculation, and contemplation — long-hidden spiritual teachings and doctrines, both Western and Eastern, about the universe and humanity's place and role within it. At the same time, she introduced and began to teach methods and practices of inner work by which any person of good intention willing to make the effort could achieve direct cognition of the realities she expounded, more theoretically, in her books. Thus, despite herself and her passionate anti-Christianity, she was, perhaps without knowing it, of Christ's party.

All that said, one might sum up her achievement by naming her the "prophet" or "mother" of what has begun to be called "post-religion spirituality." This is a tricky term, because it was not clear then, nor is it now, in fact, that the age of religions is over. To think so is perhaps only wishful thinking. It may be overly optimistic to believe that we have moved beyond religion to an age of spirituality in which each person has a personal, direct connection to the universe and the Godhead that translates into peace, compassion, justice, and mercy in social relations. It is by no means evident that the shared communal institutions, rites, and rituals that have for untold millennia transmitted revelation and tradition in the form of wisdom and knowledge are obsolete. Certainly much evil has been done in the name of the good, often with the best intentions. But we must never forget that to be human is to interpret, and any religion can turn on a new interpretation if it is radical enough. In this case — if the religions don't atrophy and fade away, but somehow manage to evolve — then the term "metareligious spirituality" would perhaps be more appropriate.

The great Austrian esotericist Rudolf Steiner — who was strongly influenced by Blavatsky — was ambiguous about this question. On the one hand, his Anthroposophy or spiritual science, like Theosophy, was whole in itself — sufficient for a complete spiritual life — and he clearly believed religions were dying (and, indeed, they seemed deader then than now). On the other hand, he was equally clear that Anthroposophy itself was not a religion — it was a "science," a way of knowing. But if one had a religion, the practice of Anthroposophy would only deepen, elucidate, and enrich it.

Whether or not the Kali Yuga, or Age of Darkness, ended in 1900, as Steiner believed, it is true that something new arose in the second half of the nineteenth century. Human beings had forgotten that beyond the countable, weighable, measurable universe lay other worlds. Spiritualism began to change all that. Suddenly the world revealed by sense perception, itself determined by the cognitive structures (ideology, prejudice) of science, became only the tip of an enormous, practically infinite, iceberg. This was obvious, but it had been obscured by three centuries of modern science. Such was the good news proclaimed at the apex of materialism: the world is essentially spiritual. We live in a spiritual world. We are spiritual beings in a universe of spiritual beings. Materiality is the illusion.

Thus the realization dawned that, if the world is spiritual, we need only awaken to this reality to begin to explore it — to develop means of researching it — and so unite, as in the most ancient times, science and religion in a new universal mysticism. This was the mission of Theosophy. What was new in Theosophy was not so much the proclamation or the insights behind it, but the democratization of the teaching: it was available to everyone.

In a sense, the reality had never been forgotten. Throughout dark ages of materialism, however, knowledge of it had remained the jealously guarded province of elitist occult and esoteric groups and secret societies. During the Romantic period, beginning at the end of the eighteenth century and lasting about forty years, an attempt had been made to bring knowledge of the spiritual nature of reality out into the open and transform society, science, and religion in its light, but materialism (and opposing forces) won the day. Spiritualism, which began in upstate New York in 1848 and was to culminate in the profound revelation of esotericism and practice of Theosophy, was the ultimately successful response of the spiritual world to this impasse.

In his essay "Swedenborg, Mediums, and the Desert Places," the Irish poet W.B. Yeats (who was also an occultist, magician, philosopher, and early Theosophist) told how he once withdrew in poor health to the west of Ireland. Here he helped his friend in the Celtic Revival, Lady Gregory, collect stories from country people. These stories contained a great deal of wisdom, as living folk traditions often do, and were filled with supernatural occurrences and miraculous powers. Listening to them, the poet felt he was beginning to live in a dream.

As "the ancient system of belief" unfolded before him, Yeats began to notice analogies between the informants' accounts and modern spiritualism. It seemed that a community of potential and practice existed between the Irish peasants and his own experiences when, as he wrote, "I climbed to the top of some house in Soho or Holloway, and, having paid my shilling, awaited, among servant girls, the wisdom of some fat old medium." As he says, "I did not go there for evidence of the kind the Society for Psychical Research would value, any more than I would seek it in Galway or Aran." His aim was simply, like that of Paracelsus, to compare beliefs. And the result? He discovered a continuity and network of kinship that reached from the ancient mystery religions through Jacob Boehme, Emanuel Swedenborg, and William Blake to the spiritualist mediums and philosophers of his own time, and included the second sight of peasant people everywhere.

Andrew Lang (1844-1912), the Scots poet, folklorist, novelist, and psychical researcher, neatly corroborated Yeats's experience by publishing, in 1893, an edition of Robert Kirk's Secret Commonwealth, subtitled Of Elves, Fauns, and Faeries. Yeats in fact owned a copy of this work and may well have been influenced by it. The Reverend Kirk, who was born in 1644, was a Scots minister and a linguist who translated the Psalms into Gaelic and other religious works into Highland dialect. He was also the seventh son of a large family — that is to say, he had "second sight." In June 1685, he was appointed to the family parish of Aberfoyle. Here he remained until his death in 1692, the same year he created the manuscript of The Secret Commonwealth, perhaps the most remarkable work of its kind ever written.

Interest in the clairvoyant capacities of the people of the Scottish Highlands had been at its height in the last twenty years of the seventeenth century. Scottish authors like Kirk, stimulated by scientific and philosophical curiosity about magic, were encouraged to put down whatever they could discover. And what was discovered was marvelous indeed. For Andrew Lang, the phenomena Kirk recounts, having lain dormant for two centuries, were evidently the stuff of contemporary spiritualism: rappings, teleportations, precipitations, poltergeists, and so forth. Lang was not alone in thinking so. W.Y. Evans-Wentz, in his Fairy Faith in Celtic Countries, concurred in this assessment. Today such fairy phenomena have been assimilated to abduction and UFO phenomena. In a sense, the more things change, the more they remain the same — "there is nothing new under the sun."

The story, however, like all good stories, is more complicated. To understand it, several strands must be unraveled — strands that are not just strings of historical connection but lineages or, more precisely, esoteric lines of filiation. Steiner's main concern was to make esotericism and the cult of symbolism, ritual, and practice that traditionally conveyed it accessible to the general public. Therefore he tried to move beyond the dualism of esoteric and exoteric. His later teaching is exemplary in this regard. At the same time, Steiner sought to ensure evolutionary continuity. At the start of his mission, therefore, he consciously and explicitly affiliated himself with those esoteric lineages and movements to whose transformation or flowering he sought to bear witness.

The history of these lineages, as Steiner never failed to emphasize, began long ago. Indeed, in a sense, it is a history without beginning, for it begins in the spiritual world. On earth, however, it passes by Atlantis through great initiates into the great mystery centers of prehistory. Thence, consciousness ever evolving, it metamorphoses into the temples, shrines, cults, and sacred sites — the mystery religions — of antiquity. And these streams, Indian, Persian, Egypto-Chaldean, flow into the great pluralistic, multicultural maelstrom of Hellenism. At which point, suddenly and bafflingly, the incarnation of Christ erupts, transforming everything forever.

The full story is too complex to be told here in any detail — perhaps to be told at all. Nevertheless, several milestones or points along the way may be usefully noted.

Whether or not acknowledged consciously or known by name, the Mystery of Golgotha — Steiner's preferred designation for the Christ event — transformed the world and human nature utterly and forever. What had been outside the world was now in it. Matter was spiritualized. Living fire or spiritual leaven filled all things again and awaited only the love-filled recognition of the sons and daughters of God to be awoken and raised in the spirit to approach the kingdom. The Logos, the divine Word-Son, dwelling within and without, made this possible.

Throughout the early Christian centuries, Greek and Latin church fathers, early Gnostics, and alchemists of the Hellenistic period strove to understand what had come to pass and to create a new culture appropriate to it. Everyone had a part to play in this process. Persia, Egypt, Greece, and Israel all played theirs. From Persia arose the sense of the human mission to cultivate the earth and transform evil. From Egypt, a dynamic and transformative cosmology in the shape of Hermetism. From Greece, philosophy (Presocratic, Platonic, and Aristotelian) and the remnants of the mysteries; and from Israel, the personal and passionate relationship with the living God.

Throughout the Middle Ages this vision encountered and then entered the human heart. True human feeling, residual clairvoyance, and the birth of new thinking came together to create a magnificent synthesis. True and embodied knowledge created a civilization. Consider the greatness of Romanesque and Gothic architecture, the growth of vernacular literatures (the Troubadour and the Grail cycles, for instance), the profound mysticism of such as St. Bernard, St. Francis, Hildegard, Gertrude of Helfta, Margaret of Porete, Hadjewich, and Meister Eckhart, and the cognitive triumph of Thomas Aquinas. These are not signs of a dark and miserable time! Nor is this all. The sacred science of alchemy, Christianized, took hold and flourished. New precursors of a future spirituality planted the seeds of our time: Cathars, Templars, and the Brethren of the Free Spirit, the Friend of God from the Highlands, to name but a few. The new message was twofold, with two meanings — the local or particular, and the cosmic or universal — in one. Exoterically, ordinary human beings came to feel that the embodied human heart, made new and united to God in knowing, could overcome evil and transform the world through love. The other side of this was that esoterically, the good news was dawning that the world was in God as God was in the world — in the least atom of matter as in the greatness of the galaxies. The world was spiritual, a heavenly host, whose name (as the Valentinian Gnostics would say) is anthropos, Christ, or the fullness of human nature. In a word, it came to be realized that matter and consciousness were two sides of a single coin: the conscious heart.

It is clear from the above that one may speak of many renaissances. The very word renaissance therefore requires specification. With the Italian Renaissance, which followed, we might say, the renaissances of the ninth and twelfth centuries, reality struck. The foretaste of paradise was over. The journey would be long, perhaps indefinitely so. Many obstacles would call for human resourcefulness before the hard work of consciousness could take hold.

The Byzantine scholar George Gemistos Plethon brought the good news to the Council of Ferrara-Florence in 1439: what had been locally intuited was a global phenomenon with an ancient lineage. Zoroaster, Hermes, Orpheus, Min (the first king of Egypt), Minos, and Numa, and even the Brahmans of India, the Magi of Media, and the priests of Dodona — these were the ancient theologians, the prisci theologi, who had all taught the same thing: that the world is full of gods whose nature is of fire. And the human task is the cotransfiguration of the earth by this fiery light of glory, the all-luminous substance that is the true nature of human beings.

Plethon also brought texts: Plato and the Neoplatonists (Plotinus, Iamblichus, Porphyry, Proclus), the Corpus Hermeticum, the Chaldean Oracles. These in turn, translated by Marsilio Ficino, were read and pored over by indigenous magi such as Paracelsus, John Dee, and Giordano Bruno. The practice of alchemy — and other occult sciences, like astrology and magic — deepened and became more widespread. The result was a call for a general reformation of all knowledge and being: a new way of knowing. At the same time, under the impact of the discoveries of Copernicus and Galileo, the first rays of modern science in the form of the search for abstract mathematical certainty, combined with a pragmatic, empirical literalism, could be sensed dawning on the horizon.

At the beginning of the seventeenth century, with Bruno dead at the stake, the battle lines were drawn. The Rosicrucian Manifestos of 1614-17 announced the last struggle. In vain. Religious conflicts and the horrors of the Thirty Years' War decided the issue: mechanistic, materialistic science would become the outer form of the new civilization. The dream of the Renaissance was over. The Rosicrucians left Europe for the East, perhaps the Baltic states, and the inner traditions of sacred science and the work of consciousness went underground, to emerge again later, like a message in a bottle, in Freemasonry and other secret societies. For a while, however, there was an attempt at some kind of collaboration. We see this, for instance, in the background to the Royal Society in England, behind whose ideas lay Rosicrucian ideals mediated by such figures as John Comenius and Samuel Hartlib. It is evident, for example, in the alchemical work of Robert Boyle, the great founder of empirical chemistry. Boyle, like Newton, worked with alchemy all his life and understood the need for a higher, clairvoyant empiricism. For this reason, indeed, Boyle consulted with the Reverend Kirk, quizzing him about Highland "second sight." Kirk also spoke to him of the "Mason Word." For Masonry too appears to have originated in Scotland, where medieval guild initiations seem to have melded with a transformed Templarism — many Templars having fled to Scotland, already a Templar stronghold, after the destruction of the order by the French king Philip the Fair between 1308 and 1314.

All these currents of inner wisdom then flowed through into the eighteenth century, carried primarily by the secret societies. Side by side, as rationalism and materialistic empiricism flourished, the study and practice of ancient initiation metamorphosed and evolved, developed and unfolded by important pioneers such as Martines de Pasqually, Swedenborg, Louis-Claude de Saint Martin, Friedrich Christian Oettinger, Karl von Eckhartshausen, Alessandro Cagliostro, and Franz Anton Mesmer. A whole history remains to be explored here.

Around the turn of the nineteenth century, a new dawn was felt, a third (or fourth) Renaissance: Romanticism. The inner side of Romanticism, from this perspective, is nothing but the transformation of the esoteric. Drawing on the rediscovery of direct experience, coupled with a renewed respect and deep reading of Hermetic texts, these poets and seers proclaimed a new mystery cult of the everyday. A new science, a new religion, a new art — all available to all — were seen to be possible again. The good news was that the world was spiritual after all. We see this in great souls like Goethe, Novalis, Blake, Coleridge. We see it in philosophers like Franz von Baader, as well as the better-known German idealists (Kant, Hegel, and Schelling). Above all we see it in those precursors of spiritualism, "lesser" figures like Jung-Stilling and Justinus Kerner, who wrote the account of the Seeress of Prevorst. For Steiner, this moment marked the earthly reflection of the great reopening of the spiritual school of the archangel Michael in heaven.

By the 1840s, this dream too was over. Materialism again seemed to have won the day. But just when humanity seemed to have reached the nadir, light — weird light — broke forth. Led by figures like Éliphas Lévi, esotericism, occultism, and magic reemerged gradually from the shadows of history to begin what would be a continuous ascent into the light of consciousness. At the same time, to the hour, the phenomenon of spiritualism erupted, shattering forever the complacency of the industrial age. With it, the "New Age" was born.

Spiritualism itself was born in 1848 in the hamlet of Hydesville in Wayne County in the "burned-over district" of western New York, so called because of the number of religious revivals (including Joseph Smith's discovery of the Book of Mormon) that had swept through it. Thence spiritualism, with its attendant and democratic culture of mediumship and the primacy of women, spread like wildfire, first across America (where, by 1850, it could count over two million adherents), and then into Britain and continental Europe. However, there was a difference between Anglo-Saxon "spiritualism" and Continental "spiritism." The Anglo-Saxon variant was concerned mostly with the "spirits of the dead," whereas spiritism, which began in France, under the aegis of Allan Kardec, and moved across into Germany and Austria, became something akin to a "religion of the spirits." (As a kind of animism, it has its major center now in Brazil.) It was furthermore resolutely reincarnationist and, though universalist and even "Druid" in its origins, it was resolutely Christian in its moral and ethical fervor. But it had no method. Mme. Blavatsky's great contribution was both to link it to the perennial and esoteric wisdom traditions of the world and to incorporate into its program a method (meditation, ritual, and astral travel) whereby one could confirm its teachings for oneself. Steiner's perhaps even greater contribution was to remove the dust of the past and Blavatsky's prejudices and to place both method and teachings squarely in the evolutionary development of human consciousness.

It is important to remember, however, that Steiner did this as a Theosophist, within Theosophy. Anthroposophy, which he taught from the beginning, began as, and was for the first ten years of his public (and private) esoteric work, explicitly his contribution to Theosophy. On Steiner's part, this was a conscious deed, a historical decision freely made out of his own understanding of the spiritual world, given as a gift to the movement and impulse that he recognized as carrying the spiritual mandate of our time. During this period (1902"“13), he created an independent body of teaching based on his own spiritual research and written and spoken out of his own experience. But he always did so within the framework and context of the Theosophical movement, whose world-historical mission he understood directly from the spiritual world.

The emergence of Anthroposophy as a separate teaching — its radical separation from Theosophy enforced and rendered irrevocable by the momentous barrier placed around Central Europe by the First World War — came only as a final and humble submission to world destiny. The earthly circumstances of this separation were, of course, many and complex. The precipitating event — whether or not the young Krishnamurti was the reincarnation of the Christ, the World Teacher; indeed, whether or not there could be a reincarnation of the Christ, which Steiner denied — was embedded within an extended, long-standing web of intricate and duplicitous personal and political struggle.

Steiner resisted the inevitable as long as he could. He had honestly placed himself at the service of Theosophy — as late as 1907 he translated Blavatsky's Key to Theosophy — but in 1913 he realized that he had no choice but to place himself at the service of an Anthroposophy no longer connected to Theosophy. It was a costly decision, both in personal and cultural evolutionary terms. I am sure, however, that he made his peace with Mme. Blavatsky and that on May 8, her death day, while no longer giving White Lotus Day lectures, he continued to acknowledge her contribution, to express his gratitude, and seek her counsel.

Christopher Bamford is editor-in-chief of Steiner Books and Lindisfarne Books and senior editor of Parabola. His works include The Voice of the Eagle: The Heart of Celtic Christianity (Lindisfarne) and An Endless Trace: The Passionate Pursuit of Wisdom in the West (Codhill Press). He is also coauthor of Green Hermeticism: Alchemy and Ecology (Lindisfarne).

This article is adapted from Mr. Bamford's introduction to Spiritualism, Mme. Blavatsky, and Theosophy: An Eyewitness View of Occult History, a collection of Rudolf Steiner's lectures published by the Anthroposophic Press (today called Steiner Books) in 2001. Reproduced with permission.

Printed in the Summer 2015 issue of Quest magazine.
Citation: Abbasova, Pyarvin."HPB in Today's Russia" Quest 103.3 (Summer 2015): pg. 112-113.

By Pyarvin Abbasova

If one tries to understand Helena Petrovna Blavatsky's role in today's world, it is important to know how she is viewed in her native country — Russia. Hated, loved, highly revered by some and humiliated by others, she never found acceptance or support in her homeland. Her sister Vera wrote that HPB "was homesick to the last days, her heart was aching for the coming future of Russia."

I can't help but wonder if she knew it would take over a hundred years for her good name to be restored, pulled out of the dirt, and cleared of all lies and superstitions, because this is exactly what is happening now. I think she knew. In fact, it might have been one of the reasons she kept on working so hard, despite all imaginable and unimaginable obstacles.

Many of our brothers and sisters know the sad history of the Theosophical movement in the U.S.S.R. Along with mainstream religion, anything spiritual or esoteric was considered to be a threat to the regime. The Theosophists in the U.S.S.R. truly went through a trial by fire. At the beginning they were under the wing of A.V. Lunacharsky, head of the department of education, who publicly pretended to be an atheist but in real life was very much devoted to occult studies and mysticism. But after 1927, massive repressions of the TS started, which led to the closing of all lodges and the incarceration of most members by 1931.

There is a beautiful novel, written by Concordia Antarova (1886--1959) and entitled Two Lives, that unfortunately has never been translated into English. The author describes the beginning of the Theosophical Society; the Masters; secret communities started by arhats in deserts and remote areas of the world; the way of life in these communities; and the path of the neophyte. The personalities of HPB, H.S. Olcott, Annie Besant, and C.W. Leadbeater, along with their interaction with Masters, are described in detail and with much love.

Antarova was a famous opera singer (contralto) and a faithful student of the celebrated theater director K.S. Stanislavsky. She worked in both the Bolshoi and Mariinsky theaters as a leading voice. Her spiritual beliefs were well-known, and the only reason she managed to escape prison was that Stalin himself was a fan of her unique voice. She was constantly watched, and Two Lives, written during World War II, was published only in 1993. Until then handwritten copies were distributed to those hungry for occult knowledge. Antarova has admitted herself that the main characters of the book — the Great Souls who have completed their evolution on the earth but who remain here to help the humanity — came in contact with her during the war and kept in touch till her last days. It was they who revealed events of the past and helped her in writing the book through clairaudience. Today this book is not only popular, it is also a gateway title for many seekers who could otherwise never find Theosophy or the work of Blavatsky.

Works of people like Antarova and Helena and Nicholas Roerich became widely available only after the communist regime fell in 1991. Without the dedication and enthusiasm of these individuals, the ideas of Helena Petrovna would remain unknown outside of a narrow circle. Although much of this work was accomplished by HPB herself, her followers have played an even bigger part: translations, commentaries, handwritten copies, underground publishing. Keep in mind not only that these efforts brought no financial gain but also put them in danger of imprisonment. Future generations are truly indebted for the early members' selfless service to Theosophical ideals.

Today there are many more possibilities for the development of the TS and spreading the words and ideas of Helena Petrovna than there were a hundred, fifty, or even twenty years ago. With the invention of the Internet and increasing numbers of English-speaking Russians, it is easier than ever to get all the information one needs from the convenience of home, and I am happy to see that many people are using these opportunities.

Since 1992, interest in the work of Blavatsky has been constantly increasing. Many books, including her collected writings, talks, and articles, have been published and can be found in every bookstore that has an esoteric or spiritual shelf. Every year new editions and commentaries are being published. I did some research and found a Russian YouTube channel with videos and movies about HPB and lectures of Russian Theosophists; many groups and online communities in the social network VK (similar to Facebook) that have thousands of followers, with information and audiobooks posted on a daily and weekly basis; and Web sites where one can download and read books and articles for free. Practically all the Web sites of the different spiritual organizations have pages about Helena Petrovna or references to her work.

An interesting difference between the U.S. and Russia is that in the U.S., it is mostly people over forty or fifty who are interested in Theosophy, but in Russia it is teenagers, students, and people in their twenties who are reading Blavatsky's work. In Siberia her name is very well-known. I have heard it mentioned in yoga studios, energy healing workshops, and even psychotherapy trainings.

Despite the rising public interest in Blavatsky, there is very little interest in the Theosophical Society, which is a paradox that is perplexing to me. It would be logical to assume that the TS would be gaining a lot of new members, but the opposite is happening. Most people who think along Theosophical lines, respect HPB, are familiar with her, and have similar views either don't know of the Society's existence or are afraid to be associated with it. The reasons for the latter can be found in the 1990s. In the newly established country, all sorts of occult and pseudo-occult groups were flourishing. A large portion of them turned out to be scams, cults, or criminal schemes. The memories of these turbulent times are still alive in the mind of the nation, so there is a lot of skepticism and very little trust in spiritual organizations.

Unfortunately, there is also resistance from the Russian Orthodox church, whose officials still openly criticize HPB and Theosophy, sometimes coming up with quite comical reasons to support their position. Most educated people with common sense and a sense of humor just laugh at these statements. On the other hand, there are also deeply religious people who are attracted to Theosophy but refrain from the spiritual search because it is against the advice of Orthodox leaders. Indeed Helena Petrovna had a difficult relationship with the Orthodox church, but so did Leo Tolstoy and Fyodor Dostoyevsky, even though their books are still respected and are part of school programs.

A lot has been done in Russia. There is still much to be done. As the country is facing another turbulent period, I hope that the work of HPB and the Theosophical Society is not going to be targeted by propaganda and political or religious persecution. We Russians have come very far, and it would be heartbreaking to see a backlash now.

All this said, I want to add that despite difficulties on the path, spiritual truth cannot stay hidden for long. It will always find a vessel to run its clear waters through. Helena Petrovna was such a vessel. Now it is time to pick up her work.

Pyarvin Abbasova, M.D., was born and raised in Siberia. She is a psychiatrist and yoga teacher and has been a member of the TS since 2009. She has been a longtime volunteer at Pumpkin Hollow Retreat Center, where she is currently a resident. Her article "Altered States of Consciousness" appeared in the Winter 2015 issue of Quest.

Printed in the Summer 2015 issue of Quest magazine.
Citation: Boyd, Tim."A Great Idea" Quest 103.3 (Summer 2015): pg. 88-89.

By Tim Boyd, President

Contemporary poet and philosopher Diane Ackerman has described humanity as "a life form that quests." In many ways this is an apt description of beings who, since appearing on the earth, have turned over rocks to discover what lies beneath, traveled beyond distant hills to find what lies on the other side, sent exploratory vehicles into space, and delved into the minutest corners of the subatomic realm. Throughout time we have been seeking, asking, and exploring.

One reason for the reappearance of the Ageless Wisdom teachings in our time was as an attempt to shift the focus of that questing. This quality of questing is recognized in the Three Objects of the Theosophical Society. It could be said that the Objects taken as a whole define a very specific quest: (1) to form a nucleus of the universal brotherhood of humanity; (2) to encourage the comparative study of religion, philosophy, and science; (3) to investigate unexplained laws of nature and the powers latent in humanity. To form, study, and investigate is the character of this particular quest.

Every quest necessarily begins with a question. Is there a shorter route to India? Where and what is the Grail? Is there life on Mars? Who am I? All of these questions have fueled intense journeys of exploration and have changed the course of our collective lives. The great Sufi mystic Rumi said, "Ask a difficult question and marvelous answers appear."

Recently I was in California for a program. It was a public conversation between Michael Murphy and me. Michael has led a remarkable life and is a brilliant man. Although he is the author of a number of books that have been influential in the field of contemporary spirituality, he is probably best-known for his role in founding California's Esalen Institute. Ever since it was started in 1962, Esalen has been a force in the Western world for developing the teachers and the conversation about human potential and peak states of human experience — what the TS would describe as the "powers latent in humanity." Most of today's prominent teachers of contemporary spirituality have made their way through Esalen's doors at one time or another.

It was a two-hour conversation that could have gone on much longer. One fascinating feature for me was that although the evening was sold out, it was an audience that did not have more than a passing familiarity with Theosophy or the Theosophical Society. As is necessarily the case for anyone exploring contemporary approaches to spirituality, many of them had come across the TS or its literature, but for a variety of reasons felt it was not enough. Some of them had been turned off from their study of Theosophy by the difficult Victorian English that was common in our early literature. Others, who had studied a little more, ran into difficulties correctly understanding the sometimes complex and challenging concepts involved.

During the question-and-answer part of the evening, a gentleman asked me a couple of probing questions. He was a man who clearly had delved into a study of the TS's history and at least some of its teachings. His first question called attention to a number of prominent people who have left the TS to pursue other approaches to the Ageless Wisdom. He pointed to Rudolf Steiner, who left to form the Anthroposophical Society, taking with him most of the German Section of the TS. He brought up the separations of J. Krishnamurti after disbanding the Order of the Star, of William Quan Judge, and others. After outlining some of the history of these highly regarded people, he asked, "For an organization that promotes unity, truth, and brotherhood, how can you explain so many schisms?" From the manner in which the question was framed, it was clear that it was not merely about TS history, but was about the credibility of the TS in advancing some of its high ideals. I got the impression that my questioner had already made up his mind.

My response to that question can be found in the Adyar Theosophist, April 2015, "The River Delta." But in brief, it was that there is no individual or organization that can fully contain the wisdom of the ages. The individuals involved in the various schisms were, like H.P. Blavatsky, subject to the influence of their personalities, but were also sincere and intuitive people who had been affected by some profound insight into the Ageless Wisdom. The fact that they developed their own vision and organizations made it possible for a broader audience to be exposed to different aspects of the wisdom teachings.

The gentleman's first query called into question the TS's credibility as an organization. His second question targeted the teachings. In his introduction to the question he pointed out that the most substantial teachings of Theosophy are credited to the Mahatmas, the Masters of Wisdom. The actual question was, "Since nobody has ever seen or spoken to these Mahatmas, isn't it stretching credulity to present these as authentic teachings?"

As someone who frequently speaks to groups of people, over the years I have found that during question-and-answer sessions often people ask leading questions — those that walk you through the person's beliefs or knowledge, eventually leading you to the answer that confirms those beliefs. These are always wonderful opportunities to "step outside of the box" and see things from a different point of view.

Although my questioner was exaggerating in saying that nobody had seen or spoken to the Mahatmas, it was not a huge departure from the facts. In the history of the TS, approximately twenty-four people received letters from the Mahatmas, and only eight actually saw them physically. Because this was an audience that had limited exposure to the teachings of the Ageless Wisdom, I began by going through a basic description of the idea and process of spiritual evolution which supports the existence of those highly evolved beings described as Mahatmas. I noted that in the normal conception of the chain of being there is a progressive unfoldment of function and consciousness from the mineral kingdom to single-celled organisms to plants, to animals, and then humans. In conventional thought, humanity is where it ends, with the next step beyond us being God, or, for the religious, angels or their equivalent. This gap in the spectrum of consciousness does not accord with the rest of the natural world. From the Theosophical point of view, the Mahatmas are the next stage in the human evolutionary process.

My answer to the questioner went something like this: whether or not someone accepts this view of spiritual evolution does not really matter. What is important is the value of the teachings. H.P. Blavatsky described Theosophy as "the accumulated wisdom of the ages, tested and verified by generations of seers." Individual testing and verification are essential.

Since the founding of the TS, many prominent people have been affected by profound insights resulting from their exposure to the wisdom tradition. These are people in every field of human endeavor whose lives have deeply influenced society. The list is long — Alfred Lord Tennyson, Thomas Edison, Kandinsky, Scriabin, Gandhi, Albert Einstein, William James, Nehru, Henry Wallace (vice-president of the U.S.), Elvis Presley, and many others. Through their lives and vision, countless people have been exposed to some of the nuances of the One Tradition that Theosophy embodies.

Then there are the countless unheralded students and practitioners of the many forms of contemporary spirituality who are unaware that their roots trace back directly to the TS. Groups like the Esalen Institute and the numerous other spiritual groups that comprise the landscape of contemporary spirituality continue to draw on those teachings. One can either believe that these teachings are inspired by Great Ones, such as the Mahatmas, or that they are simply an example of a great idea whose time has come. Given that the ideas of unity, multidimensionality, spiritual evolution, omnipresent intelligence, and self-responsibility that the TS introduced have permeated world culture, the best approach would be to judge the tree by its fruits.

HPB once commented that "the world is man living in his personal nature." The teachings of Theosophy were intended for that world. They were presented in full knowledge that they would not, could not, be fully comprehended or faithfully followed, that their meaning would necessarily be distorted, but that their reintroduction to the current of world thought was the greatest hope for an alternative to the "degrading superstition and still more degrading brutal materialism" that characterized the time.

In my conversation with Michael Murphy and the interaction with the audience, it became clear that in the year 2015, 140 years after the founding of the TS, its teachings are not yet understood or fully appreciated, but its influence is growing stronger. Though this is dimly understood by many, the fact is that its ideas and the societal influence it exerts are slowly but surely moving humanity toward a deeper experience of truth. To my optimistic eyes the process is slow, the results are imperfect, but the end is certain.