Nothing answers questions like Theosophy can!:-The Key to Theosophy

The Key to Theosophy

Helena Petrovna Blavatsky

1831 -1891

_______________________

The Key to Theosophy

Helena Petrovna Blavatsky

Key to Theosophy Index

On the Mysteries of Reincarnation

Periodical Rebirths

Q. You mean, then, that we have all lived on earth before, in many past

incarnations, and shall go on so living?

A. I do. The life cycle, or rather the cycle of conscious life, begins with the

separation of the mortal animal-man into sexes, and will end with the close of

the last generation of men, in the seventh round and seventh race of mankind.

Considering we are only in the fourth round and fifth race, its duration is more

easily imagined than expressed.

Q. And we keep on incarnating in new personalities all the time?

A. Most assuredly so; because this life cycle or period of incarnation may be

best compared to human life. As each such life is composed of days of activity

separated by nights of sleep or of inaction, so, in the incarnation cycle, an

active life is followed by a Devachanic rest.

Q. And it is this succession of births that is generally defined as

reincarnation?

A. Just so. It is only through these births that the perpetual progress of the

countless millions of Egos toward final perfection and final rest (as long as

was the period of activity) can be achieved.

Q. And what is it that regulates the duration, or special qualities of these

incarnations?

A. Karma, the universal law of retributive justice.

Q. Is it an intelligent law?

A. For the Materialist, who calls the law of periodicity which regulates the

marshaling of the several bodies, and all the other laws in nature, blind forces

and mechanical laws, no doubt Karma would be a law of chance and no more. For us, no adjective or qualification could describe that which is impersonal and no entity, but a universal operative law. If you question me about the causative

intelligence in it, I must answer you I do not know. But if you ask me to define

its effects and tell you what these are in our belief, I may say that the

experience of thousands of ages has shown us that they are absolute and unerring equity, wisdom, and intelligence.For Karma in its effects is an unfailing

redresser of human injustice, and of all the failures of nature; a stern

adjuster of wrongs; a retributive law which rewards and punishes with equal

impartiality. It is, in the strictest sense, "no respecter of persons," though,

on the other hand, it can neither be propitiated, nor turned aside by prayer.

This is a belief common to Hindus and Buddhists, who both believe in Karma.

Q. In this Christian dogmas contradict both, and I doubt whether any Christian

will accept the teaching.

A. No; and Inman gave the reason for it many years ago. As he puts it, while

… the Christians will accept any nonsense, if promulgated by the Church as a

matter of faith … the Buddhists hold that nothing which is contradicted by sound reason can be a true doctrine of Buddha.

They do not believe in any pardon for their sins, except after an adequate and

just punishment for each evil deed or thought in a future incarnation, and a

proportionate compensation to the parties injured.

Q. Where is it so stated?

A. In most of their sacred works. Consider the following Theosophical tenet:

Buddhists believe that every act, word, or thought has its consequence, which

will appear sooner or later in the present or in the future state. Evil acts

will produce evil consequences, good acts will produce good consequences:

prosperity in this world, or birth in heaven (Devachan) … in the future state.

Q. Christians believe the same thing, don't they?

A. Oh, no; they believe in the pardon and the remission of all sins. They are

promised that if they only believe in the blood of Christ (an innocentvictim!),

in the blood offered by Him for the expiation of the sins of the whole of

mankind, it will atone for every mortal sin. And we believe neither in vicarious

atonement, nor in the possibility of the remission of the smallest sin by any

god, not even by a "personal Absolute" or "Infinite," if such a thing could have

any existence. What we believe in, is strict and impartial justice. Our idea of

the unknown Universal Deity, represented by Karma, is that it is a Power which

cannot fail, and can, therefore, have neither wrath nor mercy, only absolute

Equity, which leaves every cause, great or small, to work out its inevitable

effects. The saying of Jesus: "With what measure you mete it shall be measured

to you again," neither by expression nor implication points to any hope of

future mercy or salvation by proxy. This is why, recognizing as we do in our

philosophy the justice of this statement, we cannot recommend too strongly

mercy, charity, and forgiveness of mutual offenses. Resist not evil, and render

good for evil, are Buddhist precepts, and were first preached in view of the

implacability of Karmic law. For man to take the law into his own hands is

anyhow a sacrilegious presumption. Human Law may use restrictive not punitive

measures; but a man who, believing in Karma, still revenges himself and refuses

to forgive every injury, thereby rendering good for evil, is a criminal and only

hurts himself. As Karma is sure to punish the man who wronged him, by seeking to inflict an additional punishment on his enemy, he, who instead of leaving that

punishment to the great Law adds to it his own mite, only begets thereby a cause

for the future reward of his own enemy and a future punishment for himself. The

unfailing Regulator affects in each incarnation the quality of its successor;

and the sum of the merit or demerit in preceding ones determines it.

Q. Are we then to infer a man's past from his present?

A. Only so far as to believe that his present life is what it justly should be,

to atone for the sins of the past life. Of course-seers and great adepts

excepted-we cannot as average mortals know what those sins were. From our

paucity of data, it is impossible for us even to determine what an old man's

youth must have been; neither can we, for like reasons, draw final conclusions

merely from what we see in the life of some man, as to what his past life may

have been.