Compass Newsletter Spring 2021 No.45

Compassion
Second & Revised Edition of The Mahatma Letters to A. P. Sinnett
Online Discussions
Theosophical Newsletters

Compassion

During a period when it seemed like the world had stopped turning negatives are easily  identified and commented on. However, there are also positives that have developed during the same period, or perhaps they were always there but were obscured by too many negatives that were unhelpfully and, it seems, invisibly exaggerated. One such positive is something we don’t learn, as it’s always in every person. The feeling of empathy, which is seated in the understanding and belief in the unity of humanity. From the feeling of empathy follows the development of compassion. Empathy allows the broad approach to the oneness of all while compassion develops empathy in a particular context. The context becomes contingent on many things. Compassion, an instinct of the soul, which grows in us in proportion to its use. Compassion has become synonymous, for too many, as a sign of weakness. A position to be exploited and possibly taken advantage of. A world which engenders selfishness to an extraordinary degree, compassion seems out of place. The ruthlessness that accompanies selfishness attempts to obscure compassion. As the sentence below, from G. de Purucker, taken from The Esoteric Tradition, 3rd and Revised Edition, p.263.

…”Compassion is nature’s fundamental law”…

The project of selfishness will ultimately fail in its attempt to displace a ‘fundamental law’. It will fail in the attempt to show compassion as weakness. Compassion is a sign of strength. Each individual has the opportunity to exercise the ‘muscle’ of compassion, with discernment.

“Every sun that we discern in the midnight sky, every human creature, every dhyani-chohan whose presence we may instinctively feel, is not only an evolving and progressing entity — especially in the cases of the stars and of the gods — but is also an entity which, motivated by celestial love and wisdom divine, each one in accordance with its own karmic powers and to the extent that it may, has halted on its path or advances slowly on its path, in order to give help to the multitudes and hosts of less progressed entities trailing along behind.

Thus a star, our sun for instance, is not only an evolving god in its divine and spiritual and intellectual and psychical and astral aspects, but is also bending towards us from its celestial throne as it were, and thus appears in our own material realms helping us, giving us light, urging us upwards.” — G. de Purucker, The Four Sacred Seasons

“Each of us, in the privacy of our innermost being, may consciously choose to become a channel for the reception of light that it may flow out into the world. And once the vow to awaken is registered deep within the soul, an Ariadne thread seems to guide us, and we know that we must “accept the cosmos” — groan if we will, but work with and never against the workings of the cosmos in ourselves and in our environs … Anyone, no matter what his outer stature and religion, who is living by the inner code of doing good, being alert and sensitive to understanding the need of those near or far, is adding to the light-energies in this world. Such a one is affecting in remarkably strong and potent ways the thought-consciousness of humanity.“— Grace Knoche, Sunrise magazine, June/July 2003

And again from G. de Purucker;

“…the grandest rule of life is to foster within one’s own being undying compassion for all that is, thus bringing about the winning of selflessness which is in its turn enables the peregrinating monad ultimately to become the Self of the cosmic spirit without loss to the monad of its individuality…” — G de Purucker, Fountain-Source of Occultism, p.18.

On a local TV channel (18/3/21) there was a report on how people have had their lives affected through the periods of lockdown(s). A person talked about being a full time carer for a mother, who suffered from mental illness, a grandmother, who had suffered from, sadly, more than one stroke. The carer spoke without any feeling of hardship or resentment for her their position. When asked by the interviewer what would be the message for others in a similar position, the reply came, ‘I’m doing it to help. It’s not about myself’. She was 13 years of age, living in Cardiff, Wales expressing a maturity beyond her years which humbled those watching the programme Throughout the interview she was quiet, thoughtful and entirely without thought of any inconvenience to herself. Something was shining from within and through her. Applying herself, to the best of her abilities, in the position Life had presented her with. She understood she was missing her education, the social development of her life. She didn’t complain but thought what she was doing was correct and right.

She really struggled understanding the interest shown to her by the interviewer. More than likely she is one among many who find themselves having to deal with life’s unfolding. Indeed, there were others also interviewed, all of a similar age, all in the same type of situation. They all felt what they were doing was natural and they did the caring with the attitude of love and concern towards those they cared for.

We all have the opportunity to do the best we can, with what we have, in the position we find ourselves, to feel compassion for those who fall below the standard we may set for ourselves, for we never truly know the inner workings of another. We need not look for what we can do for others as Mr. Judge, in Letter That Have Helped Me, states, in reply to an enquirer…”You ask about the “moment of choice.” It is made up of all moments. It is not in space or time, but is the aggregation of those moments flying by us each instant…(Letter 3). Further on he states this,…”Let us then, extend help to all who come our way. This will be true progress : the veils that come over our souls fall away when we work for others. Let that be the real motive, and the quantity of work done makes no difference. (Letter 9). …”it is our duty to help all, and we must begin on those nearest to us, for to run abroad to souls we might possibly help we again forsake our present duty. It is better to die in our own duty, however mean, than try another one”… (Letter 6).

Something similar is written by Grace Knoche… ”It seems to me that every human being has within him the power to do what is required: privately and unnoticed to follow the lead of his higher self. But we have to persevere in this practice; above all, we have to trust unreservedly in the potency of our inner light to illumine our lives. If each one of us steadfastly heeds it’s guidance, in time we will become an imbodiment of compassion, understanding, knowledge and helpfulness – and yet – , paradoxically, we will have achieved the greatest boon of all, we will have become as”nothing in the eyes of the world”. In this manner will we strengthen the light-impulses that are gaining in number and momentum, and by so much fortify the compassionate labors of those who work unceasingly for all nations and for the unborn and who are, even now, readying the way for the dawn of a brighter age” — Grace Knoche, To Light a Thousand Lamps, p.170

News

We are pleased to announce a new Second & Revised Edition of The Mahatma Letters to A. P. Sinnett, transcribed and compiled by A. Trevor Barker. It is verbatim, page-for-page, with our current Second Edition, but corrects transcription errors; it also adds a chronological key, as well as a second Appendix containing:

1. First Letter of K.H. to A. O. Hume
2. View of the Chohan on the T.S.
3. Cosmological Notes (originally reproduced in Appendix II of The Letters of H. P. Blavatsky to A. P. Sinnett)
4. A. O. Hume’s Reply to K.H.’s First Letter (full text of Letter 99)
5. The Writing of The Mahatma Letters by A. Trevor Barker
6. Foreign Words and Phrases
7. Chronological Order

A PDF eBook version is now online (copy with full margins attached).

Print versions of the book should be available in the near future and will be notified when they are available.

The website for Pasadena is constantly added to with material and is recommended a visit. Visit  the site see new items and established theosophical publications.

Online Discussions

The facility to engage in online theosophical meetings is now available (on ZOOM). If you wish to engage in these discussions please merely drop an email to ts-uk@talktalk.net with as short an indication as ‘yes’ and this will be arranged.

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