Case of the Masters, their Disciples and Sponsors behind the Theosophical Movement

INTRODUCTION

THIS SERIES WILL PROVIDE A BETTER UNDERSTANDING OF THE ROLE AND HISTORY about the “the Masters” that were said to be secret sponsors behind the Theosophical Movement and its operations. These circles of adepts, including their disciples and associates were said to have activities in South Asia, the Middle East, North Africa, the Americas and Europe. Here we examine the cases of K. Paul Johnson and Daniel H. Caldwell.

1. Speculations About Thakar Singh Sandhawalia: Were the Mahatmas Sikh/Sant Mat
2. Tamil Swami Ramalingam Pillai’s Prophecy
3. Was Morya the Maharajah Ranbir Singh
4. Hilarion Smerdis, Serapis Bey and the Legend of the “Brotherhood of Light” and Luxor
5. Political Operations in Cairo and War Treaty in Cyprus involving Hilarion and Ooton Liatto
6. Thakur Singh Connection and Damodar meets the Mahatmas
7. Olcott meets His Master in Lahore: K. Paul Johnson versus Olcott’s Testimony
8. Olcott’s Strained Relationship with Blavatsky and the Judge Case
9. Witnesses of Morya, Identity of Koot Hoomi and Connections to Tibet and the Panchen Lama
10. Sarat Chandra Das The Bengali Spy, Sengchen Tulku and the Maha-Chohan Connection

Of your own accord, somehow you stumbled into this complex library and perhaps confusing history of “Theosophy.” You have numerously come across the names “Morya” and “Koot Hoomi,” and the terms “Adepts,” “Mahatmas” or “Initiates.”

These individuals saw themselves as part of a very long lineage of philosophical and religious development in a cause of social and religious revolution. Take for example this letter, which states:

“There have been times when “a considerable portion of enlightened minds” were taught in our schools. Such times there were in India, Persia, Egypt, Greece, and Rome. But, as I remarked (…) the adept is the efflorescence of his age, and comparatively few ever appear in a single century. Earth is the battle-ground of moral no less than physical forces, and the boisterousness of animal passion (…) always tends to quench spirituality.”

There is a long history of the existence of such minds, reformers, heroes, students, their teachers and schools, of legends and myth of semi-history and literature. You may have been introduced to the names Koot Hoomi, Morya or St. Germain in Theosophy through copyist ideas and organizations in the last century under the “New Age (Aquarian)” movement. These differ in great detail and purpose from the Theosophy that Blavatsky introduces to the world. In the original scheme of Theosophy, these sponsors are mortals, not spirits, even though they are claimed to possess super-human and para-natural abilities.

H.P. Blavatsky’s letter of July 14, 1886 to Olcott asserts the undeniable existence of adepts before and after the Christian period, and that the early Christian Fathers admitted of a double esoteric meaning to the Testament. The real source of every Christian dogma is to be sought not in Judaism, but in the oldest Mysteries of Egypt, in India during the Vedic period, and the late Vedic period in the development of Brahmanism.

The entire story of the Crucifixion, the trials and Jesus’ descent into Hades are based on ancient rites, “all Aryan,” found exactly in the Puranas, Brahamanas, and their esoteric explanations. In a March 3, 1886 letter, Blavatsky argues that the existence of a universal secret doctrine was known to early Christian Fathers, the existence of which can be proven in the writings of ancient philosophers and classics of every age (see Celsus discourse Against the Christian Cult), and through the efforts of many adepts, initiated poets, and writers.

Blavatsky explained that she was ordered to demonstrate it by initiates that were her masters, that the public must be made acquainted with the history, and the work is to preserve the records of the existence of such a philosophy, and its tenets. Whether a Theos. Soc. had been ever founded or not, or its founders had ever existed or frauds or not, this very mission would still need enactment and its representatives.

Theosophy is not a synthesis (a cheap term) or “draws on” (a lazy definition) Neoplatonic and Eastern Philosophy like a potpourri, a buffet or incoherent mixture.

It firstly challenges the usual understanding of what constitutes and divides “West” versus “East” (or Asia) in modern minds, as opposed to the actual history (see Peter Kingsley: The Presocratic Sages who created Western Civilization).

Secondly, theosophists individually belong to their own years of research, religious traditions or schools.

The combined effort of our work is a commentary on the ancient writings, philosophers, mythologies and so on. The quality of this work may vary period to period, or generation to generation. We continuously work and improve at this.

Thirdly, the concept of mahatmas when introduced seemed to stun Westerners, whereas the concept appears quite a norm in cultures and religions outside of the U.S. and Western European cultures in its period of “modernization” in the nineteenth-century.

Furthermore, we must distinguish “New Age” and later “neo-Theosophy” influences from what the early Theosophists are explaining, or you will become confused. This is the systematic body of philosophy provided and explained by those “Adepts” or “mahatmas” to whom Helena P. Blavatsky and themselves in The Mahatma Letters asserted were mortals of flesh and blood, not: (i) “ascended masters” (a later innovation); (ii) the mere fictitious creations of H.P.B.’s multiple personalities; or (iii) attempts to conceal the identities of religious and political figures, thus far suspected during the time under a political conspiracy.

K. PAUL JOHNSON AND HIS RESEARCH

These were the hypotheses and interpretations made by historian and esotericist K. Paul Johnson in his effort to unveil the real identities of the “Theosophical Masters.” K. Paul Johnson is a former member of the Theosophical Society who joined the Church of Light in 2005 and retired from his position as head librarian at the Halifax County-South Boston Regional Library in 2008.

For many years the author has encountered numerous persons not theosophists who through some means were introduced to K. Paul Johnson’s claims identifying these masters as either fictitious inventions of H.P. Blavatsky, or fictitious inventions but based on the real historical identities of political figures. Dr. Wernekke of Germany, the Casebook of Encounters with the Theosophical Mahatmas, Ramalingam Pillai, Charles J. Ryan and famous Russian philosopher Vladimir Solovyov defended the existence of such masters in ‘H.P.B. did not invent the Tibetan Brotherhood and Chelas’. Also read Nicholas Roerich asks Lama about the Kalachakra and the Kuthumpas.

In K. Paul Johnson’s research, he argued that H.P.B.’s portrayal of Morya and Koot Hoomi was designed to mislead in order to protect the privacy of the real identities; that the personae of these masters are covers for other people. K. Paul Johnson’s historical research is important, though misleading; and the problem with his book, e.g., The Masters Revealed is that firstly “the Masters” were not revealed. Secondly, every person I have met, that have read or perused the book believes in K. Paul Johnson’s theories and suspicions as verifiable fact. They speak as if they are facts and did not consult any other counterarguments or theories as others have presented.

“The Masters Revealed” had managed to achieve mainstream fame, whereas other important works by Theosophists themselves, even exposing Neo-Theosophy are never on the library shelves to accompany K. Paul Johnson’s work. This feeds into the lazy “scholarly research” on Theosophy in general, which seems to never consult the material directly, or wrestle with the philosophy directly to understand it.

Instead, the Theosophical Movement becomes mistakenly seen as the work of a mere charlatan by many people, or as an uninterrupted continuum from the initial historical formers to post-Blavatsky and her so-called successors, where the secular concept of Masonic secret chiefs and Rosicrucian-esque adepts (either actually historical and traceable figures or clandestine and yet unidentified) morph into a completely bastardized mythical angelology for the program of New Age messianic cults and authoritarian spiritual authorities. The differences have been proven, and its dangers highlighted, yet others including certain theosophists themselves will strangely gaslight you!

I will deal with some misunderstandings in the minds of others that resulted from K. Paul Johnson’s research and gradually expand the scope on the influences underlying the Theosophical Movement.

A number of researchers like the case study of Daniel H. Caldwell demonstrated that (1) K. Paul Johnson contradicts his suspicions, and (2) the logic of his arguments was not consistent. To read K. Paul Johnson’s theories about the Theosophical masters and then adopt them as conclusive ignores this issue and other testimony when it disagrees with K. Paul Johnson’s speculations.

I have nothing against K. Paul Johnson’s work, as it is needed and the historiographical approach is valuable. However, some researchers I have read that prefer K. Paul Johnson’s theories adopt them on no criteria besides pure skepticism. This is the fraud of “scholarship” when others pretend to have solely read his book on a university library shelf and think they know everything about Theosophy.

K. Paul Johnson seemed only to believe testimonies when they agreed with his speculations; and among scholars, this subject has been considered too outré or weird to be satisfyingly solved. The issues surrounding the existence of the mahatmas have remained unsatisfactorily closed to both theosophists and scholars, but precisely since this brotherhood never wanted to be found. Yet, there is a great deal of context that refutes the belief, Blavatsky was a charlatan.

It is because it seems far-out, that K. Paul Johnson despite his theories, attempted to ground and trace her sponsors in that history as the controversial but important figures her association and travel dovetailed with, however this created problems.

THEOSOPHY AND THE COLONIAL MIND

Other researchers have tried to interpret the history of the Theosophical Movement through a racial lens believing ignorantly that (1) these masters were inventions of these Europeans through their romantic and colonial imaginings about the Orient; and (2) maintaining that the introduction of the concepts “Black and White Magic” linked to light and dark by European esotericists are rooted in racism, and were developed in the context of the justification for slavery, “an example of intentional and explicit white supremacy” (Brandy Williams, White Light, Black Magic: Racism in Esoteric Thought).

In one sense, the proponents of the “esotericists were of the colonialist mind” position are partially correct, given that the concept has been used by a certain number of esotericists to connect to their racialist doctrines and even ethno-nationalist politics. However, if Blavatsky’s contribution to the world was republican and Mazzinian, Mazzini and Blavatsky were anti-slavery, unlike many others. Her contribution, opposite the manifestation of a racist operation is rare. Yet, she has mostly been misunderstood, disrespected, dogged and classed a fraud. This narrative has solely served to prevent people from studying theosophical writings, and nothing else.

These positions hold so long as its defendant continues to assert, that the “mahatmas” are the fictitious inventions and romanticization of these Europeans, (a) despite them not all being European, but belonging to these various cultures themselves as Theosophists or associates of Theosophy; and (b) despite having hundreds of Hindus and others come to the defense of Blavatsky and Theosophy.

So, it ought to be noted, that these secret sponsors are of various nationalities and ethnicity themselves, and are not mere inventions of a “colonial imagination.” It is rather a story of real and difficult interactions and communication obstacles, both physically and culturally during the colonial periods in the context of early globalization.