These excerpts from two articles written by H. P. Blavatsky for her magazine titled “Lucifer” (see Lucifer The Lightbringer for explanation of the origins and real meaning of that perfectly benevolent name, which was not originally a synonym for Satan) reveal the sublime profundity of her editorial policy.

As will be seen, she argues – compellingly – that what she describes here is the truly Theosophical approach to take. It will quite swiftly be realised by any readers familiar with today’s Theosophical magazines and journals that few, if any, would escape HPB’s definition of actually being a sectarian journal as opposed to a legitimately Theosophical one. As an associate of the United Lodge of Theosophists, we do not at all exclude the ULT magazines from this, though we do not wish to point fingers and name specific ones.

It is for those who are directly responsible for Theosophical magazines – ULT and otherwise – to honestly and open-mindedly assess how these magazines compare with HPB’s approach. If they do not compare at all, why is this? Does it even matter in the present day? And how could any changes of this magnitude be introduced to existing Theosophical magazines without essentially starting them over from scratch? These are merely rhetorical questions for consideration.

We expect some editors would justify their approach – “sectarian” and “dogmatic” though it be, as per HPB’s weighty remarks on this matter – by saying that “This is how _________ set up this magazine 100+ years ago, so we just continue it along the same lines (forevermore).”

It is only natural to respect and feel devotion towards one’s Theosophical forebears, especially if they have been very influential within one’s particular Theosophical circles. This is completely admirable. But sometimes we will inevitably encounter undeniable contradictions and discrepancies between their approach and methods and those of the actual Agents or Messengers or direct Representatives of the Masters (which in the ULT refers specifically to H. P. Blavatsky and William Q. Judge). The article The “Original Lines” for Theosophical Work highlights a few examples of this and thus naturally makes uncomfortable reading for some.

If we recognise that there are indeed contradictions and discrepancies in approach, perspective, and methodology, who are we going to choose to follow as our guide and example? Of course, no-one is infallible, but who will we decide to place our greatest trust in? That choice is entirely up to us.

FROM “WHAT IS TRUTH?”

“Even his [i.e. a personified expression with reference to “Lucifer” magazine] friends are beginning to find fault with him. They cannot see why it should not be a purely Theosophical magazine, in other words, why it refuses to be dogmatic and bigoted. Instead of devoting every inch of space to theosophical and occult teachings, it opens its pages “to the publication of the most grotesquely heterogeneous elements and conflicting doctrines.” This is the chief accusation, to which we answer — why not?

“Theosophy is divine knowledge, and knowledge is truth; every true fact, every sincere word are thus part and parcel of Theosophy. One who is skilled in divine alchemy, or even approximately blessed with the gift of the perception of truth, will find and extract it from an erroneous as much as from a correct statement. However small the particle of gold lost in a ton of rubbish, it is the noble metal still, and worthy of being dug out even at the price of some extra trouble. As has been said, it is often as useful to know what a thing is not, as to learn what it is.

“The average reader can hardly hope to find any fact in a sectarian publication under all its aspects, pro and con, for either one way or the other its presentation is sure to be biassed, and the scales helped to incline to that side to which its editor’s special policy is directed. A Theosophical magazine is thus, perhaps, the only publication where one may hope to find, at any rate, the unbiassed, if still only approximate truth and fact.

“Naked truth is reflected in LUCIFER under its many aspects, for no philosophical or religious views are excluded from its pages. And, as every philosophy and religion, however incomplete, unsatisfactory, and even foolish some may be occasionally, must be based on a truth and fact of some kind, the reader has thus the opportunity of comparing, analysing, and choosing from the several philosophies discussed therein. LUCIFER offers as many facets of the One universal jewel as its limited space will permit, . . .

“Surely it is that philosophy that tends to diminish, instead of adding to, the sum of human misery, which is the best.

“At all events, the choice is there, and for this purpose only have we opened our pages to every kind of contributors. Therefore do you find in them the views of a Christian clergyman who believes in his God and Christ, but rejects the wicked interpretations and the enforced dogmas of his ambitious proud Church, along with the doctrines of the Hylo-Idealist, who denies God, soul, and immortality, and believes in nought save himself. The rankest Materialists will find hospitality in our journal; aye, even those who have not scrupled to fill pages of it with sneers and personal remarks upon ourselves, and abuse of the doctrines of Theosophy, so dear to us.

“When a journal of free thought, conducted by an Atheist, inserts an article by a Mystic or Theosophist in praise of his occult views and the mystery of Parabrahmam [i.e. the Absolute, the infinite eternal Reality], and passes on it only a few casual remarks, then shall we say LUCIFER has found a rival. When a Christian periodical or missionary organ accepts an article from the pen of a free-thinker deriding belief in Adam and his rib, and passes criticism on Christianity — its editor’s faith — in meek silence, then it will have become worthy of LUCIFER, and may be said truly to have reached that degree of tolerance when it may be placed on a level with any Theosophical publication.

“But so long as none of these organs do something of the kind, they are all sectarian, bigoted, intolerant, and can never have an idea of truth and justice. They may throw innuendoes against LUCIFER and its editors, they cannot affect either. In fact, the editors of that magazine feel proud of such criticism and accusations, as they are witnesses to the absolute absence of bigotry, or arrogance of any kind in theosophy, the result of the divine beauty of the doctrines it preaches.

“For, as said, Theosophy allows a hearing and a fair chance to all. It deems no views — if sincere — entirely destitute of truth. It respects thinking men, to whatever class of thought they may belong. Ever ready to oppose ideas and views which can only create confusion without benefiting philosophy, it leaves their expounders personally to believe in whatever they please, and does justice to their ideas when they are good. [Note: It’s important to notice that HPB’s approach is not a wishy-washy “anything goes” free-for-all, as much as it may at first sound like that to some. As we just saw, her magazine – and any ideal Theosophical magazine – is still “ever ready to oppose” whatever truly needs opposing. Her “Lucifer” article titled “On Pseudo-Theosophy” is a prominent example of this. In broadly opening up a magazine, one does not lose control of it, for one still has the editorial – a feature missing from today’s ULT magazines – with which to lead the issue/edition, and overt and reliable Theosophical articles are by no means excluded from the content.] Indeed, the conclusions or deductions of a philosophic writer may be entirely opposed to our views and the teachings we expound; yet his premises and statements of facts may be quite correct, and other people may profit by the adverse philosophy, even if we ourselves reject it, believing we have something higher and still nearer to the truth.

“In any case, our profession of faith is now made plain, and all that is said in the foregoing pages both justifies and explains our editorial policy.”

FROM “TO THE READERS OF ‘LUCIFER'”

“Since our journal is entirely unsectarian, since it is neither theistic nor atheistic, Pagan nor Christian, orthodox nor heterodox, therefore, its editors discover eternal verities in the most opposite religious systems and modes of thought.

“. . . Each party would have us on its own sectarian side, recognising as truth, only that which its particular ism does. But this cannot nor shall it be. Our motto was from the first, and ever shall be:

“THERE IS NO RELIGION HIGHER THAN – TRUTH.

“Truth we search for, and, once found, we bring it forward before the world, whencesoever it comes. A large majority of our readers is fully satisfied with this our policy, and that is plainly sufficient for our purposes.

“It is evident that when toleration is not the outcome of indifference it must arise from wide-spreading charity and large-minded sympathy. Intolerance is pre-eminently the consequence of ignorance and jealousy. He who fondly believes that he has got the great ocean in his family water-jug is naturally intolerant of his neighbour, who also is pleased to imagine that he has poured the broad expanse of the sea of truth into his own particular pitcher.

“But anyone who, like the Theosophist, knows how infinite is that ocean of eternal wisdom, to be fathomed by no one man, class, or party, and realizes how little the largest vessel made by man contains in comparison to what lies dormant and still unperceived in its dark, bottomless depths, cannot help but be tolerant. For he sees that others have filled their little water-jugs at the same great reservoir in which he has dipped his own, and if the water in the various pitchers seems different to the eye, it can only be because it is discoloured by impurities that were in the vessel before the pure crystalline element – a portion of the one eternal and immutable truth – entered into it. . . .

“A portion of truth, great or small, is found in every religious and philosophical system, and . . . if we would find it, we have to search for it at the origin and source of every such system, at its roots and first growth, not in its later overgrowth of sects and dogmatism. Our object is not to destroy any religion but rather to help to filter each, thus ridding them of their respective impurities. In this we are opposed by all those who maintain, against evidence, that their particular pitcher alone contains the whole ocean. . . .

“Free discussion, temperate, candid, undefiled by personalities and animosity, is, we think, the most efficacious means of getting rid of error and bringing out the underlying truth; and this applies to publications as well as to persons. . . .

“LUCIFER feels that it would be unworthy of that designation were it not true to the profession of the broadest tolerance and catholicity, even while pointing out to its brothers and neighbours the errors which they indulge in and follow.

“While thus keeping strictly, in its editorials, and in articles by its individual editors, to the spirit and teachings of pure theosophy, it nevertheless frequently gives room to articles and letters which diverge widely from the esoteric teachings accepted by the editors, as also by the majority of theosophists. Readers, therefore, who are accustomed to find in magazines and party publications only such opinions and arguments as the editor believes to be unmistakably orthodox – from his peculiar standpoint – must not condemn any article in LUCIFER with which they are not entirely in accord, or in which expressions are used that may be offensive from a sectarian or a prudish point of view, on the ground that such are unfitted for a theosophical magazine.

“They should remember that precisely because LUCIFER is a theosophical magazine, it opens its columns to writers whose views of life and things may not only slightly differ from its own, but even be diametrically opposed to the opinion of the editors. The object of the latter [i.e. the editors of a truly Theosophical magazine] is to elicit truth, not to advance the interest of any particular ism, or to pander to any hobbies, likes or dislikes, of any class of readers. It is only snobs and prigs who, disregarding the truth or error of the idea, cavil and strain merely over the expressions and words it is couched in.

“Theosophy, if meaning anything, means truth; and truth has to deal indiscriminately and in the same spirit of impartiality with vessels of honour and of dishonour alike. . . .

“Justice demands that when the reader comes across an article in this magazine which does not immediately approve itself to his mind by chiming in with his own peculiar ideas, he should regard it as a problem to solve rather than as a mere subject of criticism. Let him endeavour to learn the lesson which only opinions differing from his own can teach him. Let him be tolerant, if not actually charitable, and postpone his judgment till he extracts from the article the truth it must contain, adding this new acquisition to his store.”

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If you found this article helpful, you may particularly like to read The “Original Lines” for Theosophical Work and What is Theosophy and Who is a Theosophist?

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