Author: H P Blavatsky
Translator(s)/ Edito: Boris de Zirkoff
Publisher: Theosophical Publishing
Year: 2006
Language: English
Pages: 850
ISBN/UPC (if available): 817059507X
Description
FROM PREFACE OF VOLUME II
Were it possible, we would keep this work out of the hands of many Christians whom its perusal would not benefit, and for whom it was not written. We allude to those whose faith in their respective churches is pure and sincere, and those whose sinless lives reflect the glorious example of that Prophet of Nazareth, by whose mouth the spirit of truth spake loudly to humanity.
Such there have been at all times. History preserves the names of many as heroes, philosophers, philanthropists, martyrs, and holy men and women; but how many more have lived and died, unknown but to their intimate acquaintance, unblessed but by their humble beneficiaries! These have ennobled Christianity, but would have shed the same luster upon any other faith they might have professed -- for they were higher than their creed.
The benevolence of Peter Cooper and Elizabeth Thompson, of America, who are not orthodox Christians, is no less Christ-like than that of the Baroness Angela Burdett-Coutts, of England, who is one. And yet, in comparison with the millions who have been accounted Christians, such have always formed a small minority. They are to be found at this day, in pulpit and pew, in palace and cottage; but the increasing materialism, worldliness and hypocrisy are fast diminishing their proportionate number. Their charity, and simple, child-like faith in the infallibility of their Bible, their dogmas, and their clergy, bring into full activity all the virtues.
That are implanted in our common nature. We have personally known such God-fearing priests and clergymen, and we have always avoided debate with them, lest we might be guilty of the cruelty of hurting their feelings; nor would we rob a single layman of his blind confidence, if it alone made possible for him holy living and serene dying.
An analysis of religious beliefs in general, this volume is in particular directed against theological Christianity, the chief opponent of free thought. It contains not one word against the pure teachings of Jesus, but unsparingly denounces their debasement into pernicious ecclesiastical systems that are ruinous to man's faith in his immortality and his God, and subversive of all moral restraint.
We cast our gauntlet at the dogmatic theologians who would enslave both history and science; and especially at the Vatican, whose despotic pretensions have become hateful to the greater portion of enlightened Christendom. The clergy apart, none but the logician, the investigator, the dauntless explorer should meddle with books like this. Such delvers after truth have the courage of their opinions.
Contents
Preface
Mrs. Elizabeth Thompson and
Baroness Burdett-Coutts
Volume Second
THE "INFALLIBILITY" OF MODERN RELIGION.
CHAPTER I
THE CHURCH: WHERE IS IT?
Church statistics
Catholic "miracles" and spiritualistic "phenomena"
Christian and Pagan beliefs compared
Magic and sorcery practised by Christian clergy
Comparative theology a new science
Eastern traditions as to Alexandrian Library
Roman pontiffs imitators of the Hindu Brahm-atma
Christian dogmas derived from heathen philosophy
Doctrine of the Trinity of Pagan origin
Disputes between Gnostics and Church Fathers
Bloody records of Christianity
CHAPTER II
CHRISTIAN CRIMES AND HEATHEN VIRTUES
Sorceries of Catherine of Medicis
Occult arts practised by the clergy
Witch-burnings and auto-da-fe of little children
Lying Catholic saints
Pretensions of missionaries in India and China
Sacrilegious tricks of Catholic clergy
Paul a kabalist
Peter not the founder of Roman church
Strict lives of Pagan hierophants
High character of ancient "mysteries"
Jacolliot's account of Hindu fakirs
Christian symbolism derived from Phallic worship
Hindu doctrine of the Pitris
Brahminic spirit-communion
Dangers of untrained mediumship
CHAPTER III
DIVISIONS AMONGST THE EARLY CHRISTIANS
Resemblance between early Christianity and Buddhism
Peter never in Rome
Meanings of "Nazar" and "Nazarene"
Baptism a derived right
Is Zoroaster a generic name?
Pythagorean teachings of Jesus
The Apocalypse kabalistic
Jesus considered an adept by some Pagan philosophers and early Christians
Doctrine of permutation
The meaning of God-Incarnate
Dogmas of the Gnostics
Ideas of Marcion, the "heresiarch"
Precepts of Manu
Jehovah identical with Bacchus
CHAPTER IV
ORIENTAL COSMOGONIES AND BIBLE RECORDS
Discrepancies in the Pentateuch
Indian, Chaldean and Ophite systems compared
Who were the first Christians?
Christos and Sophia-Achamoth
Secret doctrine taught by Jesus
Jesus never claimed to be God
New Testament narratives and Hindu legends
Antiquity of the "Logos" and "Christ"
Comparative Virgin-worship
CHAPTER V
MYSTERIES OF THE KABALA
En-Soph and the Sephiroth
The primitive wisdom-religion
The book of Genesis a compilation of Old World legends
The Trinity of the Kabala
Gnostic and Nazarene systems contrasted with Hindu myths
Kabalism in the book of Ezekiel
Story of the resurrection of Jairus's daughter found in the history of Christna
Untrustworthy teachings of the early Fathers
Their persecuting spirit
CHAPTER VI
ESOTERIC DOCTRINES OF BUDDHISM PARODIED IN CHRISTIANITY
Decisions of Nicean Council, how arrived at
Murder of Hypatia
Origin of the fish-symbol of Vishnu
Kabalistic doctrine of the Cosmogony
Diagrams of Hindu and Chaldeo-Jewish systems
Ten mythical Avatars of Vishnu
Trinity of man taught by Paul
Socrates and Plato on soul and spirit
True Buddhism, what it is
CHAPTER VII
EARLY CHRISTIAN HERESIES AND SECRET SOCIETIES
Nazareans, Ophites, and modern Druzes
Etymology of IAO
"Hermetic Brothers" of Egypt
True meaning of Nirvana
The Jayna sect .
Christians and Chrestians
The Gnostics and their detractors
Buddha, Jesus, and Apollonius of Tyana
CHAPTER VIII
JESUITRY AND MASONRY
The Sohar and Rabbi Simeon
The Order of Jesuits and its relation to some of the Masonic orders
Crimes permitted to its members
Principles of Jesuitry compared with those of Pagan moralists
Trinity of man in Egyptian Book of the Dead
Freemasonry no longer esoteric
Persecution of Templars by the Church
Secret Masonic ciphers
Jehovah not the "Ineffable Name"
CHAPTER IX
THE VEDAS AND THE BIBLE
Nearly every myth based on some great truth
Whence the Christian Sabbath
Antiquity of the Vedas
Pythagorean doctrine of the potentialities of numbers
"Days" of Genesis and "Days" of Brahma
Fall of man and the Deluge in the Hindu books
Antiquity of the Mahabharata
Were the ancient Egyptians of the Aryan race?
Samuel, David, and Solomon mythical personages
Symbolism of Noah's Ark
The Patriarchs identical with zodiacal signs
All Bible legends belong to universal history
CHAPTER X
THE DEVIL-MYTH
The devil officially recognized by the Church
Satan the mainstay of sacerdotalism
Identity of Satan with the Egyptian Typhon
His relation to serpent-worship
The Book of Job and the Book of the Dead
The Hindu devil a metaphysical abstraction
Satan and the Prince of Hell in the Gospel of Nicodemus
CHAPTER XI
COMPARATIVE RESULTS OF BUDDHISM AND CHRISTIANITY
The age of philosophy produced no atheists
The legends of three Saviours
Christian doctrine of the Atonement illogical
Cause of the failure of missionaries to convert Buddhists and Brahmanists
Neither Buddha nor Jesus left written records
The grandest mysteries of religion in the Bagaved-gita
The meaning of regeneration explained in the Satapa-Brahmana
The sacrifice of blood interpreted
Demoralization of British India by Christian missionaries
The Bible less authenticated than any other sacred book
Knowledge of chemistry and physics displayed by Indian jugglers
CHAPTER XII
CONCLUSIONS AND ILLUSTRATIONS
Recapitulation of fundamental propositions
Seership of the soul and of the spirit
The phenomenon of the so-called spirit-hand
Difference between mediums and adepts
Interview of an English ambassador with a reincarnated Buddha
Flight of a lama's astral body related by Abbe Huc
Schools of magic in Buddhist lamaseries
The unknown race of Hindu Todas
Will-power of fakirs and yogis
Taming of wild beasts by fakirs
Evocation of a living spirit by a Shaman, witnessed by the writer
Sorcery by the breath of a Jesuit Father
Why the study of magic is almost impracticable in Europe
Conclusion