Studies in Occultism; A Series of Reprints from the Writings of H. P. Blavatsky: No. 1: Practical Occultism—Occultism versus the Occult; Arts—The Blessings of Publicity — John Shaqi
Studies in Occultism; A Series of Reprints from the Writings of H. P. Blavatsky: No. 1: Practical Occultism—Occultism versus the Occult; Arts—The Blessings of PublicityBlavatsky, H. P. (Helena Petrovna)
Religion
Studies in Occultism; A Series of Reprints from the Writings of H. P. Blavatsky: No. 1: Practical Occultism—Occultism versus the Occult; Arts—The Blessings of Publicity
Blavatsky, H. P. (Helena Petrovna)
Occultism; Theosophy
In our highly civilized West, where modern languages have been formed,
and words coined, in the wake of ideas and thoughts--as happened with
every tongue--the more the latter became materialized in the cold
atmosphere of Western selfishness and its incessant chase after the
goods of this world, the less was there any need felt for the production
of new terms to express that which was tacitly regarded as obsolete and
exploded "superstition." Such words could answer only to ideas which a
cultured man was scarcely supposed to harbor in his mind. "Magic," a
synonym for jugglery; "Sorcery," an equivalent for crass ignorance; and
"Occultism," the sorry relic of crack-brained, medieval
Fire-philosophers, of the Jacob Boehmes and the St. Martins, are
expressions believed more than amply sufficient to cover the whole field
of "thimble-rigging." They are terms of contempt, and used generally
only in reference to the dross and residues of the Dark Ages and its
preceding aeons of paganism. Therefore have we no terms in the English
tongue to define and shade the difference between such abnormal powers,
or the sciences that lead to the acquisition of them, with the nicety
possible in the Eastern languages--pre-eminently the Sanskrit. What do
the words "miracle" and "enchantment" (words identical in meaning after
all, as both express the idea of producing wonderful things by _breaking
the laws of nature_ [!!] as explained by the accepted authorities)
convey to the minds of those who hear, or who pronounce them? A
Christian--_breaking_ "of the laws of nature," notwithstanding--while
believing firmly in the _miracles_, because said to have been produced
by God through Moses, will either scout the enchantments performed by
Pharoah's magicians, or attribute them to the devil. It is the latter
whom our pious enemies connect with Occultism, while their impious foes,
the infidels, laugh at Moses, Magicians, and Occultists, and would
blush to give one serious thought to such "superstitions." This, because
there is no term in existence to show the difference; no words to
express the lights and shadows and draw the line of demarcation between
the sublime and the true, the absurd and the ridiculous. The latter are
the theological interpretations which teach the "breaking of the laws of
Nature" by man, God, or devil; the former--the _scientific_ "miracles"
and enchantments of Moses and the Magicians _in accordance with natural
laws_, both having been learned in all the Wisdom of the Sanctuaries,
which were the "Royal Societies" of those days--and in true OCCULTISM.
This last word is certainly misleading, translated as it stands from the
compound word _Gupta-Vidya_, "Secret Knowledge." But the knowledge of
what? Some of the Sanskrit terms may help us.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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