THE BUILDING OF THE KOSMOS/PART 1

 

PREFACE.

 

THE four lectures printed in this volume were delivered to the delegates and members of the Theosophical Society, assembled for the Annual Convention at Adyar, Madras, on December 27th, 28th, 29th, 30th, 1893. They were intended to show the value of the teachings of H. P. Blavatsky as a guide to the obscurer meanings of the Hindu Sacred books, and so to vindicate at once the useful­ness of the Theosophical and the Hindu doctrines. They were intended also to show the identity of these doctrines, and to prove that any one who believes the Theosophical teachings must accept those of the Vedas and the Puranas on fundamental matters. That Theosophy is a fragment of the Brahma Vidya of pre-Vaidic days, that the Shruti are the best exoteric presentment of Brahma Vidya, that the Puranas were intended to give to the class excluded from the study of the Vedas the spiritual truths contained in the latter in a concrete form easy of assimilation - such were the ideas which sought expression in these lectures.

 

My acceptance of Theosophical teachings has to me, from the beginning, implied the acceptance of the Hindu Scriptures as the mine out of which the gold of Spiritual Knowledge was to be dug. As a Philosophy, Theosophy may be held intellectually apart from Hinduism as from all Religions, though reproducing on many points the Advaita Vedanta; but if any attempt be made to draw from it spiritual sustenance, if it be taught as Religion as well as Philosophy, then in the Hinduism which is its earliest and fullest exoteric presentment will the need for worship find its completest satisfaction. I do not mean that devotion may not clothe itself in various religious garbs; and that if a man have a Religion when he becomes a Theosophist, he will not naturally seek in that Religion the spiritual food he requires and will not therein find it. But if he comes into Theosophy, as I did, from Mate­rialism, then he will most probably in his devotion adopt the ancient Sanskrit forms preserved in Hinduism, with which he has become intellectually familiar in his philosophical studies. Theosophy has been to me not only intellectually but also devotionally satisfying, and devotional Theosophy finds in Hinduism its most ancient and most natural expression. The student of Brahma Vidya may thus as a Bhakta become also Hindu, recognizing that Gnyanam and Bhakti are both necessary for the evolution of the spiritual life.

 

I say these few words in explanation of my own position as Theosophist and Hindu that will be found running through these lectures, and in repu­diation of the absurd story that I have been con­verted to Hinduism since I came to India. I became a Hindu with my full and complete accept­ance of Theosophy as taught by Occultists, and there has been no change save an ever-increasing clearness of vision, an ever-expanding knowledge, and an ever-growing depth of satisfaction in the teachings embraced in 1889.

 

 

 

ANNIE BESANT.

 

Ludhiana, Feb., 1894.

 

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