THEOSOPHY AND CHRISTIANITY.
In one of the weekly papers published in New York there recently appeared the following question:
Is the doctrine of reincarnation, as taught by Theosophy, contrary to the Christian faith?
The position taken in answer to the question in the paper referred to was (1) that this doctrine is contrary to the Christian faith, and then follows the statement (2) that Theosophy teaches that the soul at death passes from the body into some other body — that of man, beast or insect: also (3) that Theosophy involves a denial of the creative act, and is consequently in its last analysis, pantheism.
We may very properly consider these statements in this column as it is evident from the above that there are some who do not understand the theosophical philosophy in regard to these questions and as students it is well to know the objections they make.
(1) What is meant by the Christian faith?
We need not quibble in regard to this. It will be generally conceded that the true Christian faith must be founded on the teachings and words of Jesus. Let us take this view then and turn to the record of Christ's teachings. In St. Matthew XVII. 10, the disciples ask Jesus "Why then say the Scribes that Elias must first come? And Jesus answered and said unto them, Elias truly shall first come, and restore all things. But I say unto you, that Elias is come already, and they knew him not, but have done unto him whatsoever they listed. . . . Then the disciples understood that he spake unto them of John the Baptist."
Here is given not only an assent to the doctrine of reincarnation but an instance of it stated by Christ himself. There is also an indirect reference to it in the following when the disciples asked him: "Who did sin, this man or his parents that he was born blind? (St. John IX, 2) — the question being meaningless apart from the fact of reincarnation. Then again the injunction of Christ "Be ye perfect, even as your Father in Heaven is perfect," or according to the revised version, his promise. "Ye shall be perfect, even as your Father which is in Heaven is perfect," (St. Matthew V, 48), is in whichever way we read it a mockery apart from reincarnation. Perfection must be perfection on all planes of being, on this plane as well as on other planes. That we are not yet perfect on this plane and in the lessons and experiences of earth life cannot be denied and in order to learn these lessons and gain these experiences, and thus gradually attain to perfection we must return here where alone such can be learned and gained.
The doctrine of reincarnation is not contrary to the teachings of Christ but in perfect accord and harmony therewith. Christ's teaching that "with what measure ye mete it shall be measured to you again," (St. Matthew VII, 2), and St. Paul's that "whatsoever a man soweth. that shall he also reap" (Galatians VI, 7), both of which statements are expressions of the universal law known in theosophical literature as the law of Karma, fail utterly of their meaning apart from reincarnation.
(2) The first part of this statement is a very crude one of the doctrine of reincarnation, but most certainly the soul having once inhabited the human form does not return on the pathway of evolution and enter into the lower kingdoms of animal and insect. Having once passed through one kingdom and entered another, the door is shut behind, the soul goes ever forward, it cannot go back. Metempshychosis or transmigration of souls in the sense of the soul's return to lower forms is not upheld, but the contrary is distinctly shown, in Theosophy.
(3) If by creation is meant the making of something out of nothing, then most certainly this view of creation is not held by Theosophists. Ex nihilo nihil fit is a proposition, the truth of which cannot be gainsaid. Theosophy is pantheistic in the sense in which the teachings of St. Paul are pantheistic. When speaking of the Deity, he says: "In whom we live and move and have our being," and in the sense of the true meaning of "omnipresence," and of Goethe's description of Nature, "At the roaring loom of time I ply, and weave for God the garment them seest him by."
Nature is not God; stones, trees, flowers, animals, even men, planets, suns, are not God; but all are expressions, manifestations, "garments" of the divine, all are in essence divine and all in their evolution are ever becoming, to use Plato's idea, more perfect as expressions, as manifestations, showing ever more clearly the divinity which is at the root of their being. Again let me ask is this contrary to Christianity, or rather let us say, the teachings of Christ — what other meaning can be given to: "perfect as your father in heaven is perfect"? How is this possible unless man in essence is already perfect, and remember that "the kingdom of heaven is within you" and the only place where God can be found is within.
Christ, Buddha, Lao-Tse, and all the great teachers and saviours of humanity have taught Theosophy. There is but one Truth and all the great religious are but expressions of it as the colors of the spectrum are expressions of the one White Light. Students of Theosophy, i. e. of Divine Wisdom, are searchers after the Truth and recognize these teachings which we call Theosophy in the teachings of all the Sages of the past and of all time.
THE LOWER NATURE
In connection with the subject of "The Human Elemental" treated of in last issue an answer by William Q. Judge published in the Theosophical Forum, April, 1892, is interesting and instructive. The question was as follows: —
Is it possible that our lower nature is composed of groups of elementary beings (sub human) which under the higher tutelage can he welded into a force for good, rather than a something evil that has to be east off?
The editor of the Forum replied dissenting from the view presented in the question and Mr. Judge's reply refers also in part to the editor's position as will be seen.
W. Q. J. — The editor is right in saying the lower nature cannot be cast off, but must be subjugated. We might as well say we can annihilate universal mind as to say we can "cast off" anything that is a part of nature and going to make us what we are. The lower nature must be discovered in all its ramifications and carefully subdued, as thus it is transformed and not cast off. But I cannot agree with him in respect to "sub-human elementals" composing us and which he calls "fanciful." They are not fanciful, even though the questioner views them in the wrong light and the editor in no light at all. If there is any point strongly made in occultism it is that we are a compound of lives, that every part of us is so made, and hence it follows that our lower nature is made of these lives. There is no vacuum in the universe void of a life. But while this is so, these lives, in so far as they go to make up man, are not to be considered as separate beings from himself whom he can "educate," as inferred in the question, from a position as man which is apart from them. They exist in him, and as he lives and thinks so he impresses on them his thoughts and acts, and as they are leaving him every moment of time it follows that a stream of these lives of many grades and sorts is continually being projected from him into space and forming his own karma. For they are unintelligent and only act in their own way, just as water acts when it runs down hill. If we regard them as beings that we are educating we will fall into superstition, but if, on the other hand, we say they do not exist and have no place in us, as the editor infers, we will never come to right knowledge of the universe as it is.
They are matter, in fact, and a certain quantity of it comes into the charge, so to say, of every man, and every one is therefore responsible for the impressions he gives to the atoms that make him up, and if he does not live aright he will have to suffer the consequences sooner or later. For these very elementals are the means whereby karma operates, for without them — considering atoms as points of sensitiveness — there would be a break and no way for karma to have effect. If they do not exist, then there is no way to make the connection between matter and mind and thought and circumstance.
The conflict between the higher and the lower can be made easy only by the old rule "to look on all parts of the universe as containing spiritual beings, the same in kind and only differing from each other in degree."
How to conquer this lower nature is a problem that perplexes many and has been the cause of much anxiety and worrying. What a struggle, what a conflict! How can it be ended and peace attained? I think we are too prone to spend time and energy in thinking about it and in straining and making desperate efforts to reach the much desired result. The contemplation of the awful struggle — as we style it — excites self-pity, self-commiseration, which are really forms of egotism. Then perhaps by a supreme effort the lower nature is stilled for a time and we think it dead and that we have completely risen above it: perhaps we are proud of this achievement and congratulate ourselves on our victory, but — in a little while we fall again, it may be lower than ever before. Why is this?
It is well known that a drunkard who realizing the evil of his condition suddenly reforms and cuts himself loose from a habit of many years is in the great majority of cases liable to return to his old habit. The case is exactly parallel to that of a man who has climbed a mountain and unaccustomed to the height and the purer atmosphere becomes dizzy if he looks down. The drunkard or the one who is endeavoring to conquer his lower nature, if he looks back with horror at his former condition or if he congratulates himself on his conquest, by that very attitude makes possible, nay almost certain, his downfall again.
It is not by one gigantic effort that this conquest can be attained, but by the slow, steady and constant effort, and by being content to take one step at a time. It is not by dwelling on the evil that we have escaped from, nor on the evil which still oppresses us but by constant aspiration and the never relaxing endeavor to do the good, that we may rise to higher things. The secret of overcoming is to be positive in our attitude, not to say I will not follow this evil thing, but that I will follow this good thing. If we follow the good, the evil will cease to find room or to have part in our lives.