Technologies That Hide From Humanity Are Found In Ancient Civilizations! l Helena Petrovna Blavatsky
don't forget to subscribe afterwards the wisest and most spiritual books from the greatest authors await you every day and now buckle up sit back and we'll begin Helena petrovna blavatsky from the caves and jungles of Hindustan and Bombay late in the evening of the 16th of February 1879 after a rough Voyage which lasted 32 days joyful exclamations were heard everywhere on Deck have you seen the lighthouse there it is at last the Bombay lighthouse cards books music everything was forgotten everyone rushed on Deck the moon had not risen as yet and in spite of the starry Tropical Sky it was quite dark the stars were so bright that at first it seemed hardly possible to distinguish far away amongst them a small fiery Point lit by Earthly hands the Stars wink to this like so many huge eyes in the black sky on one side of which Shone the Southern Cross at last we distinguished the lighthouse on the distant Horizon it was nothing but a tiny fiery Point diving in the phosphorescent waves the tired Travelers greeted it warmly the rejoicing was General what a glorious day break followed this dark night the sea no longer tossed our ship under the skilled guidance of the pilot who had just arrived and whose bronze form was so sharply defined against a pale Sky our steamer Breathing heavily with its broken Machinery slipped over the quiet transparent Waters of the Indian Ocean straight to the harbor we were only four miles from Bombay and to us who had trembled with cold only a few weeks ago in the Bay of Biscay which has been so glorified by many poets and so heartily cursed by all Sailors our surroundings simply seemed a magical dream after the tropical Knights of the Red Sea in the scorching hot days that it tortured us since Aidan we people of the distant North now experienced something strange and unwanted as if the Very Fresh soft air had cast its spell over us there was not a cloud in the sky thickly strewn with dying Stars even the Moonlight which till then had covered the sky with its silvery Garb was gradually Vanishing and the brighter grew the rosiness of dawn over the small island that lay before us in the East the paler in the west grew the scattered rays of the Moon that sprinkled with bright flakes of light the dark wake our ship left behind her as if the glory of the West was bidding goodbye to us while the light of the East welcomed the newcomers from far off lands brighter and Bluer grew the sky swiftly absorbing the remaining pale Stars one after the other and we felt something touching in the sweet dignity with which the queen of night resigned her rights to the powerful usurper at last descending lower and lower she disappeared completely and suddenly almost without interval between Darkness and Light the red hot Globe emerging on the opposite side from under the cape lent his golden chin on the lower rocks of the island and seemed to stop for a while as if examining us then with one powerful effort the torch of day Rose High Over the Sea and gloriously proceeded on its path including in one Mighty fiery embraced the Blue Waters of the bay the shore and the islands with their rocks and coconut forests his golden Rays fell upon a crowd of parses his rightful worshipers who stood on Shore raising their arms towards the mighty eye of ormist the site was so impressive that everyone on Deck became silent for a moment even a red-nosed old sailor who was busy quite close to us over the cable stopped working and clearing his throat nodded at the Sun moving slowly and cautiously along the Charming but treacherous Bay we had plenty of time to admire the picture around us on the right was a group Gara Puri translated means the town of caves according to the orientalists and the town of purification according to the native Sanskrit Scholars this Temple cut out by an unknown hand in the very heart of a rock resembling porphyry is it true apple of discord amongst the archaeologists of whom nun can is yet fix even approximately its antiquity elephanta raises High its Rocky brow all overgrown with secular Cactus and right under it at the foot of the rock are hollowed out the chief temple in the two lateral ones like the serpent of our Russian fairy tales it seems to be opening its Fierce black mouth to swallow the daring mortal who comes to take possession of the secret mystery of Titan its two remaining teeth dark with time are formed by two huge pillars T the entrance sustaining the palate of the monster how many generations of Hindus how many races have knelt in the dust before the tremurti your threefold deity Oella Fanta how many centuries were spent by weak men in digging out in your stone bosom this town of temples and carving your gigantic idols who can say many years have elapsed since I saw you last ancient mysterious Temple and still the same Restless thoughts the same recurrent questions vex me snow as they did then and still remain unanswered in a few days we shall see each other again once more I shall gaze upon your Stern image upon your three huge Granite faces and shall feel as hopeless as ever of piercing the mystery of your being this secret fell into safe hands three centuries before ours it is not in vain that the old Portuguese historian Don Diego de Cuda boasts that the big Square Stone fastened over the arch of the Pagoda with a distinct inscription having been torn out and sent as a present to the kingdom Juan III disappeared mysteriously in the course of time and adds further close to this big Pagoda there stood another and farther on even a third one the most wonderful of all in Beauty incredible size and richness of material all those pagodas and caves have been built by the kings of Kanata the most important of whom was bonuser and these buildings of Satan are Portuguese soldiers attacked with such vehemence that in a few years one stone was not left upon another and worst of all they left no inscriptions that might have given a clue to so much thanks to the fanaticism of Portuguese Soldiers the chronology of the Indian cave temples must remain forever an enigma to the archaeological World beginning with the brahmans who say elephanta is 374 000 years old and ending with Ferguson who tries to prove that it was carved only in the 12th century of our era whenever One turns one's eyes to history there is nothing to be found but hypotheses in darkness and yet garipuri is mentioned in the Epic Mahabharata which was written according to Colebrook and Wilson a good while before the reign of Cyrus in another ancient legend it is said that the Temple of tremurdi was built on elephanta by the sons of pandu who took part in the war between the dynasties of the Sun and the Moon and belonging to the latter were expelled at the end of the war the rajputs who are the descendants of the first still sing of this Victory but even in their popular songs there is nothing positive centuries have passed and will pass and the ancient secret will die in the Rocky bosom of the cave still unrecorded on the left side of the bay exactly opposite elephanta and as if in contrast with all its Antiquity and greatness spreads the Malabar Hill the residents of the modern Europeans and Rich natives their brightly painted Bungalows are bathed in The Greenery of Banyan Indian fig and various other trees and the tall and straight trunks of coconut palms cover with The Fringe of their leaves the whole ridge of the hilly headland there on the southwestern end of the rock you see the almost transparent lace-like government house surrounded on three sides by the ocean this is the coolest and the most comfortable part of Bombay fan by three different sea breezes the island of Bombay designated by the natives mambai received its name from The Goddess Mamba in Marathi mahima or Amba mama and Amma according to the dialect a word meaning literally the great mother hardly 100 years ago on the side of the modern Esplanade there stood a temple consecrated to Mamba Devi with great difficulty and expense They carried it nearer to the shore close to the fort and erected it in front of balashwara the lord of the innocent one of the names of the god Shiva Bombay is part of a considerable group of islands the most remarkable of which are salsetta joined to Bombay by a mole elephanta so named by the Portuguese because of a huge Rock Cut in the shape of an elephant 35 feet long and trombe whose lovely Rock Rises 900 feet above the surface of the sea Bombay looks on the maps like an enormous crayfish and is at the head of the rest of the islands spreading far out into the sea its two claws Bombay Island stands like a Sleepless Guardian watching over his younger brothers between it and the continent there is a narrow arm of a river which gets gradually broader and then again narrower deeply indenting the sides of both Shores and so forming a Haven that has no equal in the world it was not without reason that the Portuguese expelled in the course of time by the English used to call it Buona Bahia and a fit of tourist exultation some Travelers have compared it to the Bay of Naples but as a matter of fact the one is as much like the other is a lazaroni is like a Coulee the whole resemblance between the former consists in the fact that there is water in both in Bombay as well as in its harbor everything is original and does not in the least remind one of southern Europe look at those coasting vessels and Native boats both are built in the likeness of the seabird sat a kind of Kingfisher one in motion these boats are the personification of Grace with their long prows and rounded poops they look as if they were gliding backwards and one might mistake for wings the strangely shaped long Latin sails their narrow angles fastened upwards to a yard filling these two wings with the wind and careening so is almost to touch the surface of the water these boats will fly along with astonishing swiftness unlike our European boats they do not cut the waves but Glide over them like a seagull the surroundings of the bay transported us to some Fairy Land of the Arabian Nights The Ridge of the western ghats cut through here and thereby some separate Hills almost as high as themselves stretched all along the Eastern Shore from the base to their fantastic Rocky Tops they are all overgrown with impenetrable forests and jungles inhabited by wild animals every Rock has been enriched by the popular imagination with an independent Legend all over the slope of the mountain are scattered the pagodas mosques and temples of numberless sects here and there the hot rays of the sun strike upon an old fortress once Dreadful and inaccessible now half ruined and covered with prickly Cactus at every steps a memorial of sanctity hear a deep the Hara a cave cell of a Buddhist big shoes Saint they're a rock protected by the symbol of Shiva further on a China Temple or a holy tank all covered with sejin filled with water once blessed by a brahmana and able to purify every sin all indispensable attribute of all pagodas all the surroundings are covered with symbols of gods and goddesses each of the 330 millions of deities of the Hindu Pantheon has its representative in something consecrated to it a stone a flower a tree or a bird on the west side of the Malabar Hill peeps through the trees valakisvara the Temple of the Lord of sand the long stream of Hindus moves towards this celebrated Temple men and women shining with rings on their fingers and toes with bracelets from their wrists up to their elbows clad and bright turbans and snow white Muslims with foreheads freshly painted with red yellow and white holy sectarian signs the legend says that Rama spent here a night on his way from ayodhya UD to Lanka silon to fetch his wife Sita who had been stolen by the wicked King ravana Rama's brother lakshman whose Duty it was to send him daily in new lingam from banners was late in doing so one evening losing patience Rama erected for himself a lingam of sand when at last the symbol arrived from banners it was put in a temple and the lingam erected by Rama was left on the shore there it stayed during long centuries but at the arrival of the Portuguese the Lord of sand felt so disgusted with the faringi foreigners that he jumped into the sea never to return a little farther on there is a Charming tank called vanaturtha or the point of the arrow here Rama the much worshiped hero of the Hindus felt thirsty and not finding any water shot an arrow and immediately there was created a pond its Crystal Waters were surrounded by a high wall steps were built leading down to it and a circle of white marbled dwellings was filled with guja twice born brahmanas India is the land of Legends and of mysterious nooks and corners there is not a ruin not a monument not a Thicket that has no story attached to it yet however they may be entangled in the cobweb of popular imagination which becomes thicker with every generation it is difficult to point out a single one that is not founded on fact with patience and still more with the help of the Learned brahmanas you can always get at the truth when once you have secured their trust and friendship the same road leads to the Temple of the Parsi fire worshipers at its altar Burns an unquenchable fire which daily consumes hundred weights of sandalwood and aromatic herbs lit 300 years ago the sacred fire has never been extinguished notwithstanding many disorders sectarian discords and even Wars the parsies are very proud of this Temple of zaratushta as they call zorster compared with the Hindu pagodas look like brightly painted Easter eggs generally they are consecrated to Hanuman the monkey god and the faithful Ally of Rama or to the elephant-headed Ganesha the god of the occult wisdom or to one of the devis you meet with these temples in every street before each there is a row of piples Ficus religiosa centuries-old which no Temple can dispense with because these trees are the Abode of the Elementals in the sinful Souls all this is entangled mixed and Scattered appearing to one's eyes like a picture in a dream 30 centuries have left their traces here the innate laziness and the strong conservative Tendencies of the Hindus even before the European Invasion preserved all kinds of monuments from the ruinous Vengeance of the Fanatics whether those memorials were Buddhist or belonged to some other unpopular sect the Hindus are not naturally given to senseless vandalism anaphronologist would vainly look for a bump of destructiveness on their skulls if you meet with Antiquities that having been spared by time are nowadays either destroyed or disfigured it is not they who are to blame but either musselmans or the Portuguese under the guidance of the Jesuits at last we were anchored and in a moment were besieged ourselves as well as our luggage by numbers of naked skeleton like Hindus parses Moguls and various other tribes all this crowd emerged as if From the Bottom of the Sea and began to shout to chatter and to yell as only the tribes of Asia can to get rid of this Babel confusion of tongues as soon as possible we took refuge in the first bunder boat and made for the shore want the first star so to speak the County Council of the Town whose Duty it is to clean the streets and to kill one of them is not only forbidden by the police but would be very dangerous by killing one you would Rouse the Vengeance of every Hindu who is always ready to offer his own life in exchange for a crows The Souls of the sinful forefathers transmigrate into crows and to kill one is to interfere with the law of Karma and to expose the poor ancestor to something still worse such is the firm belief not only of Hindus but of parses even the most enlightened amongst them the strange behavior of the Indian crows explains to a certain extent the Superstition the vultures are in a way the gravediggers of the parsies and are under the personal protection of the Farber Dania the angel of death who soars over the Tower of Silence watching the occupations of The Feathered workmen the deafening call of the crows strikes every newcomer is uncanny but after a while is explained very simply every tree of the numerous coconut forests round Bombay is provided with a hollow pumpkin the sap of the tree drops into it and after fermenting becomes a most intoxicating beverage known in Bombay under the name of Tati the naked toddy Wallace generally half-cast Portuguese modestly adorned with a single Coral necklace fetch this beverage twice a day climbing the 150 feet high trunks like squirrels the crows mostly build their nests on the tops of the coconut palms and drink incessantly out of the open pumpkins the result of this is The Chronic intoxication of the birds as soon as we went out in the garden of our new habitation flocks of crows came down heavily from every tree the noise they make whilst jumping about everywhere is indescribable there seemed to be something positively human in the positions of the slyly bent heads of the drunken birds and a fiendish light Shone in their eyes while they were examining us from foot to head we occupied three small Bungalows lost like nests in the garden their roofs literally smothered in roses blossoming on bushes 20 feet high and their Windows covered only with muslin instead of the usual Pains of glass the Bungalows were situated in the native part of the town so that we were transported all at once into the real India we were living in India unlike English people who are only surrounded by India at a certain distance we were enabled to study her character and Customs her religion superstitions and rights to learn her Legends in fact to live among Hindus everything in India this land of the elephant and the poisonous Cobra of the tiger and the unsuccessful English missionary his original and strange everything seems unusual unexpected and striking even to one who has traveled in Turkey Egypt Damascus and Palestine in these tropical regions the conditions of nature are so various that all the forms of the animal and vegetable kingdoms must radically differ from what we are used to in Europe look for instance at those women on their way to a well through a garden which is private and at the same time open to anyone because somebody's cows are grazing in it to whom does it not happen to meet with women to see cows and admire a garden doubtless these are among the commonest of all things but a single attentive glands will suffice to show you the difference that exists between the same objects in Europe and in India nowhere more than in India does a human being feel his weakness and insignificance the Majesty of the tropical growth is such that our highest trees would look dwarfed compared with banions and especially with Palms a European cow mistaking at First Sight her Indian sister for a calf would deny the existence of any kinship between them as neither the mouse-colored wool nor the straight goat-like horns nor the humpback of the ladder would permit her to make such an error as do the women each of them would make any artist feel enthusiastic about the gracefulness of her movements in drapery but still no pink and white Stout Anna ivanovna would condescend to greeter such as shame God forgive me the woman is entirely naked this opinion of the modern Russian woman is nothing but the echo of what was said in 1470 by a distinguished Russian traveler the sinful slave of God athanasius Son of Nikita from DVR as he Styles himself he describes India as follows this is the land of India its people are naked never cover their heads and wear their hair braided women have babies every year men and women are black their prince wears a veil round his head and wraps another Veil round his legs the nobleman wear a veil on one shoulder and the noble women on the shoulders and round the loins but everyone is barefooted the women walk about with their hair spread and their breasts naked the children boys and girls never cover their shame until they are seven years old this description is quite correct but athanasia's Nikita's son is right only concerning the lowest and poorest classes these really do walk about covered only with a veil which often is so poor that in fact it is nothing but a rag but still even the poorest woman is clad in a piece of muslin at least 10 yards long one end serves as a sort of short Petticoat and the other covers the head and shoulders when out in the street though the faces are always uncovered the hair is erected into a kind of Greek chignon the legs up to the knees the arms and the waist are never covered there is not a single respectable woman who would consent to put on a pair of shoes shoes are the attribute and the prerogative of disreputable women when some time ago the wife of The Madras Governor thought of passing a law that should induce native women to cover their breasts the place was actually threatened with a revolution a kind of jacket is worn only by dancing girls the government recognized that it would be unreasonable to irritate women who very often are more dangerous than their husbands and brothers and the custom based on the law of Manu and Sanctified by three thousand years as observance remained unchanged for more than two years before we left America we were in constant correspondence with a certain learned Brahman whose glory is great at present 1879 all over India we came to India to study under his guidance the ancient country of areas The Vedas and their difficult language his name is Dan and Sarah's Wadi Swami Swami is the name of the Learned anchorites who are initiated into many Mysteries unattainable by Common Mortals they are monks who never marry but are quite different from other mendican brotherhoods the so-called sinyasi and Hassan this Pandit is considered the greatest sanskritist of Modern India and is an absolute Enigma to everyone it is only five years since he appeared on the arena of great reforms but till then he lived entirely secluded in the jungle like the ancient gymnosophists mentioned by the Greek and Latin authors at this time he was studying the chief philosophical systems of the aryavarta and the Occult meaning of The Vedas with the help of Mystics and anchorites all Hindus believed that on the badranath mountains 22 000 feet above the level of the sea there exists spacious caves inhabited now for many Thousand Years by these ancurites badrinath is situated in the north of Hindustan on the River Michigan and is celebrated for its Temple of Vishnu right in the heart of the town inside the temple there are hot Mineral Springs visited yearly by about 50 000 pilgrims who come to be purified by them from the first day of his appearance Dayan in Saraswati produced an immense impression and got the surname of the Luther of India wandering from one town to another today in the South tomorrow in the north and transporting himself from one end of the country to another with Incredible quickness he thundering against idol worship the great orator fights with all his might against caste infant marriages and superstitions chastising all the evils grafted on India by centuries of cast history and false interpretation of The Vedas he blames for them the brahmanas who as he openly says before masses of people are alone guilty of the humiliation of their country once great and independent now fallen and enslaved and yet Great Britain has in him not an enemy but rather an ally he says openly if you expel the English then no later than tomorrow you and I and everyone who Rises against idol worship will have our throats cut like mere sheep the musselmans are stronger than the idol worshipers but these last are stronger than we the Pandit held many a warm dispute with the brahmans those treacherous enemies of the people and has almost always been Victorious and Benner's secret assassins were hired to slay him but the attempt did not succeed in a small town of Bengal where he treated fetishism with more than his usual severity some fanatic threw on his naked feet a huge cobra there are two snakes deified by the brahmana mythology the one which surrounds the neck of Shiva on his idols is called basuki the other ananta forms the couch of Vishnu so the worshiper of Shiva feeling sure that his Cobra trained purposely for the mysteries of a shivate pagoda would at once make an end of the offender's life triumphantly exclaimed let the God basuki himself show which of us is Right Diane and jerked off the Cobra twirling round his leg and with a single vigorous movement crushed the reptile's head let him do so he quietly ascended your God has been too slow it is I Who Have Decided the dispute now go added he addressing the crowd and tell everyone how easily perished the false gods thanks to his excellent knowledge of Sanskrit the panda does a great service not only to the masses clearing their ignorance about the monotheism of The Vedas but to science too showing who exactly are the brahmanas the only cast in India which during centuries had the right to study Sanskrit literature and comment on The Vedas and which used this right so long before the time of such orientalists as bernouf Colebrook and Max Muller there have been an India many reformers who tried to prove the pure monotheism of The Vedic doctrines there have even been founders of new religions who denied the revelations of these scriptures for instance the Raja Ram mohin Roy and after him Babu keshab chunder sen both Calcutta bengalese but neither of them had much success they did nothing but add new denominations to the numberless sex existing in India Bram Mohan Roy died in England having done next to nothing and keshab chundersen having founded the community of brahmo samage which professes a religion extracted from the depths of the babu's own imagination became a Mystic of the most pronounced type and now is only a berry from the same field as we say in Russia as the spiritualists by whom he is considered to be a medium and a calcuttas would emberg he spends his time in a dirty tank singing praises to chaitanya Quran Buddha and his own person proclaiming himself their prophet and performs a mystical dance dressed in woman's attire which on his part is an attention to a woman goddess whom the Baboo calls his mother father and eldest brother in short all the attempts to re-establish the pure primitive monotheism of Aryan India have been a failure they always got wrecked upon the Double Rock of brahmanism and of prejudices centuries old but low hair appears unexpectedly the panda dayanand none even of the most beloved of his disciples knows who he is and whence he comes he openly confesses before the crowds that the name under which he is known is not his but was given to him at the yogi initiation the mystical School of yogis was established by Pat and jolly the founder of one of the six philosophical systems of ancient India it is supposed that the neoplatonists of the second and third alexandrian schools were the followers of Indian yogis more especially was their theology brought from India by Pythagoras according to the tradition there still exists in India hundreds of yogis who follow the system of patanjali and assert that they are in communion with Brahma nevertheless most of them are do-nothings mendicans by profession and great frauds thanks to the insatiable longing of the natives for miracles the real yogis avoid appearing in public and spend their lives in secluded retirement and studies except when as in dayanan's case they come forth in time of need to Aid their country however it is perfectly certain that India never saw a more learned Sanskrit scholar a deeper metaphysician a more wonderful orator and a more Fearless denunciator of every evil than dayanand since the time of Sankara the celebrated founder of the vedanta philosophy the most metaphysical of Indian systems in fact the crown of pantheistic teaching then dayanan's personal appearance is striking he is immensely tall his complexion is pale rather European than Indian his eyes are large and bright and his grayish hair is long the yogis and dikshatas initiated never cut either their hair or beard his voice is clear and Loud well calculated to give expression to every shade of deep feeling ranging from a sweet childish caressing whisper to thundering wrath against the evil doings and falsehoods of the priests bald is taken together produces an Indescribable effect on the impressionable Hindu wherever day Anand appears crowds prostrate themselves in the dust over his Footprints but unlike Babu keshab chundersen he does not teach a new religion does not invent new dogmas he only asks them to renew their half-forgotten Sanskrit studies and having compared the doctrines of their forefathers with what they have become in the hands of brahmanas to return to the pure conceptions of deity taught by the Primitive riches and I they did you and they nearer the Patriarchs who first gave The Vedas to humanity he does not even claim the davitas are a Heavenly Revelation but simply teaches that every word in these scriptures belongs to the highest inspiration possible to the Earthly man an inspiration that is repeated in the history of humanity and when necessary may happen to Any Nation during his five years of work Swami dayanand made about 2 million proselytes chiefly amongst the higher castes judging by appearances they are all ready to sacrifice to him their lives and souls and even their Earthly possessions which are often more precious to them than their lives but Day end is a real Yogi he never touches money and despises pecanary affairs he contends himself with a few handfuls of rice per day one is inclined to think that this wonderful Hindu Bears a Charmed Life so careless is he of rousing the worst human passions which are so dangerous in India a marble statue could not be less moved by the Raging Wrath of the crowd we saw him once at work he sent away all his faithful followers and forbade them either to watch over him or to defend him and stood alone before the infuriated crowd facing calmly the monster ready to spring upon him and tear him to pieces here a short explanation is necessary a few years ago a society of well-informed energetic people was formed in New York a certain sharp-witted Savant surname the melissociate-day malcontence do spiritism the founders of this club were people who believing in the phenomena of spiritualism as much as in the possibility of every other phenomenon in nature still denied the theory of the spirits they considered that the modern Psychology was a science still in the first stages of its development in total ignorance of the nature of the psychic man and denying as do many other Sciences all that cannot be explained according to its own particular theories from the first days of its existence some of the most learned Americans joined the society which became known as the theosophical society its members differed on many points much as do the members of any other Society geographical or archaeological which fights for years over the sources of the Nile or the hieroglyphs of Egypt but everyone is unanimously agreed that as long as there is water in the Nile its sources must exist somewhere so much about the phenomena of spiritualism and mesmerism these phenomena were still awaiting their champ allian but the Rosetta Stone was to be searched for neither in Europe nor in America but in the far away countries where they still believe in magic where wonders are performed daily by the native priesthood and where the cold materialism of science has never yet reached in one word in the east the Council of the society knew that the Llama Buddhists for instance though not believing in God and denying the personal immortality of the Soul are yet celebrated for their phenomena and that mesmerism was known and daily practiced in China from time immemorial under the name of Gina in India they fear and hate the very name of the spirits whom the spiritualists venerate so deeply yet many and ignorant fog ear can perform Miracles calculated to turn upside down all the Notions of a scientist and to be the despair of the most celebrated of European prestidigitors many members of the society have visited India many were born there and have themselves witnessed the sorceries of the brahmanas the founders of the club well aware of the depth of modern ignorance in regard to the spiritual man we're most anxious that qvir's method of comparative Anatomy should acquire rights of citizenship among metaphysicians and so progress from regions physical to region psychological on its own inductive and deductive Foundation otherwise they thought psychology will be unable to move forward a single step and may even obstruct every other branch of Natural History instances have not been wanting a physiology poaching on The Preserves of purely metaphysical and Abstract knowledge all the time feigning to ignore the latter absolutely and seeking to class psychology with the Positive Sciences having first bounded to a bed of progress where it refuses to yield its secret to its clumsy tormentors in a short time the theosophical society counted its members not by hundreds but by thousands all the malcontents of American spiritualism and there were at that time 12 million spiritualists in America joined the society collateral branches were formed in London Corfu Australia Spain Cuba California Etc everywhere experiments were being performed and the conviction that it is not Spirits alone who are the causes of the phenomena was becoming General in course of time branches of the society were in India and in so on the Buddhist and brahmanical members became more numerous than the Europeans a league was formed and to the name of the society was added the subtitle the Brotherhood of humanity after an active correspondence between the area's samaj founded by Swami dayanand and the theosophical society an amalgamation was arranged between the two bodies then the chief Council of the New York branch decided upon sending a special delegation to India for the purpose of studying on the spot the ancient language of The Vedas and the manuscripts and the wonders of yajism on the 17th of December 1878 the delegation compost of two secretaries and two members of the Council of the theosophical society started from New York to pause for a while in London and then to proceed to Bombay where it landed in February 1879. it may easily be conceived that under these circumstances the members of the delegation were better able to study the country and to make fruitful researches than might otherwise have been the case today they are looked upon as brothers and aided by the most influential natives of India they count among the members of their society pandits of benners in Calcutta and Buddhist Priests of the salon baharas amongst others the Learned suming Gala mentioned by minnieth in the description of his visit to Adam's Peak and llamas of thibet Burma travancer and elsewhere the members of the delegation are admitted to sanctuaries where as yet no European has set his foot consequently they may hope to render many services to humanity and Science in spite of the ill will which the representatives of positive science bear to them as soon as the delegation landed a telegram was dispatched today Anand as everyone was anxious to make his personal acquaintance in reply he said that he was obliged to go immediately to hard War where hundreds of thousands of pilgrims were expected to assemble but he insisted on our remaining behind since cholera was certain to Break Out Among the devotees he appointed a certain spot at the foot of the Himalayas in the jab where we were to meet in a month's time alas all this was written some time ago since then Swami dayanon's countenance has changed completely toward us he is now an enemy of the theosophical society and its two Founders Colonel olkit and the author of these letters it appeared that on entering into an offensive and defensive alliance with the society Diana nourished a hope that all its members Christians brahmanas and Buddhists would acknowledge his Supremacy and become members of the area samage needless to say this was impossible the theosophical society rests on the principle of complete non-interference with the religious beliefs of its members Toleration is its basis and its aims are purely philosophical this did not suit dayanand he wanted all the members either to become his disciples or to be expelled from the society it was quite clear that neither the president nor the council could Ascend to such a claim Englishmen and Americans whether they were Christians or free thinkers Buddhists and especially brahmanas revolted against dayanand and unanimously demanded that the league should be broken however all this happened later at the time of which I speak we were friends and allies of the Swami and we learned with deep interest that the hard War Mella which he was to visit takes place every 12 years and is a kind of religious Fair which attracts representatives from all the numerous sects of India learn dissertations are read by the disputants in defense of their peculiar doctrines and the debates are held in public this year the hard War Gathering was exceptionally numerous the sinisis the mendicant monks of India of alone numbered 35 000 and the cholera foreseen by the Swami actually broke out as we were not yet to start for the appointed meeting we had plenty of spare time before us so we proceeded to examine Bombay the Tower of Silence on the heights of the Malabar Hill is the last Abode of all the sons of zorster it is in fact a Parsi Cemetery here they're dead rich and poor men women and children are all laid in a row and in a few minutes nothing remains of them but bare skeletons a dismal impression is made upon a foreigner by these towers where absolute Silence has rained for centuries this kind of building is very common in every place where parses live and die in Bombay of six towers the largest was built 250 years ago and the least but a short time since with few exceptions they are round or Square in shape from 20 to 40 feet high without roof window or door but with a single iron gate opening towards the east and so small that it is quite covered by a few bushes the first corpse brought to a new tower dacma must be the body of the innocent child of a mobder priest no one not even the chief Watcher is allowed to approach within a distance of 30 Paces of these towers of all living human beings NASA Sailors corpse carriers alone enter and leave the Tower of Silence the life these men lead is simply wretched no European Executioner's position is worse they live quite apart from the rest of the world in whose eyes they are the most abject of beings being forbidden to enter the markets they must get their food as they can they are born Mary and die perfect strangers to all accept their own class passing through the streets only to fetch the dead and carry them to the tower even to be near one of them is a degradation entering the Tower with a corpse covered whatever may have been its Rancor position with old white Rags they undress it and place it in silence on one of the three rows presently to be described then still preserving the same silence they come out shut the gate and burn the rags amongst the fire worshipers Death is divested of all his majesty and is a mere object of disgust as soon as the last hour of a sick person seems to approach everyone leaves the chamber of death as much to avoid impeding the departure of the soul from the body as to shun the risk of polluting the living by contact with the Dead the mobile loan stays with the dying man for a while and having whispered into his ear the Zenda Vesta precepts Hashem vohu and yato ahiveri leaves the room while the patient is still alive then a dog is Broad and made to look straight into his face this ceremony is called saws did the dog stare a dog is the only living creature that the drugs nasu the evil one fears and that is able to prevent him from taking possession of the body it must be strictly observed that no one's Shadow lies between the dying man and the dog otherwise the whole strength of the dog's gaze will be lost and the demon will profit by the occasion the body remains on the spot where life left it until the NASA Sailors appear their arms hidden to the shoulders under old bags to take it away having deposited it in an iron coffin the same forever when they carry it to the dacma if anyone who has once been carried thither should happen to regain Consciousness the NASA Sailors are bound to kill him for such a person who has been polluted by one touch of the dead bodies in the dacma has thereby lost all right to return to the living by doing so he would contaminate the whole community as some such cases have occurred the parses are trying to get a new law passed that would allow the miserable x-corpses to live again amongst their friends and that would compel the NASA Sailors to leave the only gate of the dacma unlocked so that they might find a way of retreat open to them it is very curious but it is said that the vultures which devour without hesitation the corpses will never touch those who are only apparently dead but Fly Away uttering loud shrieks after a last prayer at the Gate of the dacma pronounced from afar by the mode and repeated in chorus by the NASA Sailors the dog ceremony is repeated in Bombay there is a dog trained for this purpose at the entrance to the Tower finally the body is taken inside and placed on one or other of the rows according to its sex and age we have twice been present at the ceremonies of dying and once of burial if I may be permitted to use such an incongruous term in this respect the parsies are much more tolerant than the Hindus who are offended by the mere Presence at their religious rights of an European and barangi a chief official of the tower invited us to his house to be present at the burial of some rich woman so we witnessed all that was going on at a distance of about 40 Paces sitting quietly on our obliging hosts veranda while the dog was staring into the dead woman's face we were gazing as intently but with much more disgust at the huge flock of vultures above the dacma that kept entering the tower and flying out again with pieces of human flesh in their beaks these birds that build their nests in thousands round the Tower of Silence have been purposely imported from Persia Indian vultures proved to be too weak and not sufficiently bloodthirsty to perform the process of stripping the bones with the dispatch prescribed by zorster we were told that the entire operation of denuding the bones occupies no more than a few minutes as soon as the ceremony was over we were led into another building where a model of the dacma was to be seen we could now very easily imagine what was to take place presently inside the tower in the center there is a deep waterless well covered with a grading like the opening into a drain around it are three broad circles gradually sloping downwards in each of the Markov and like receptacles for the bodies there are 365 such places the first and smallest row is destined for children the second for women and the third for men this three-fold circle is symbolical of three Cardinals a Roastery in virtues pure thoughts kind words and good actions thanks to the vultures the bones are laid bare in less than an hour and in two or three weeks The Tropical Sun scorches them into such a state of fragility that the slightest breath of wind is enough to reduce them to powder and to carry them down into the pit no smell is Left Behind no source of plagues and epidemics I do not know that this way may not be preferable to Cremation which leads in the air about the gatophane but disagreeable odor the ghat is a place by the sea or River Shore where Hindus burn their dead instead of feeding the old slavonic deity mother wet Earth was carrion parsi's gift to our nasty pure dust our Masti means literally fostering cow and zorister teaches that the cultivation of land is the noblest of all occupations in the eyes of God accordingly the worship of Earth is so sacred among the parses that they take all possible precautions against polluting the fostering cow that gives them a hundred golden grains for every single grain in the season of The Monsoon went during four months the rain pours incessantly down and washes into the well everything that is left by the vultures the water absorbed by the Earth is filtered for the bottom of the well the walls of which are built of granite is to this end covered with sand and charcoal the site of the pinharapala is less lugubrious and much more amusing the pinharapola is the Bombay hospital for decrepit animals but a similar institution exists in every town where China's dwell being one of the most ancient this is also one of the most interesting of the sects of India it is much older than Buddhism which took its rise about 543 to 477 BC join his boast that Buddhism is nothing more than a mere heresy of Jainism Gautama the founder of Buddhism having been a disciple and follower of one of the ginaguras the Customs rights and philosophical conceptions of China's place the midway between the brahmanas and the Buddhists in view of their social Arrangements they more closely resemble the former but in their religion they inclined towards the latter their caste divisions their total abstinence from flesh and their non-worship of the relics of the Saints are as strictly observed as the similar tenets of the brahmanas but like Buddhists they deny the Hindu gods in the authority of The Vedas and adore their own 24 tirthinkaras or genus who belong to the host of the blissful their priests like the Buddhists never marry they live an isolated baharas and choose their successors from amongst the members of any social class according to them prakrit is the only sacred language and is used in their sacred literature as well as in so on jinas and Buddhists have the same traditional chronology they do not eat after Sunset and carefully dust any place before sitting down upon it that they may not crush even the tiniest of insects both systems or rather both schools of philosophy teach the theory of Eternal indestructible atoms following the ancient atomistic School of Kanata they assert that the Universe never had a beginning and never will have an end the world and everything and it is but an illusion Amaya say the vedantists the Buddhists and the Giants but whereas the followers of sankaracharya preach parabrom a deity devoid of will understanding and action because it is absolute understanding mind and will Anna schwar emanating from it the China's and the Buddhists believe in no creator of the universe but teach only the existence of swabhawadi of plastic infinite self-created principle in nature still they firmly believe as do all Indian sects in the transmigration of souls Their Fear lest by killing an animal or an insect they may perchance destroy the life of an ancestor develops their love and care for every living creature to an almost incredible extent Island not only is there a hospital for invalid animals in every town and Village but their priests always wear a muslin muzzle I trust they will pardon the disrespectful expression in order to avoid destroying even the smallest animal Kill by inadvertence in the act of breathing the same fear impels them to drink only filtered water there are a few millions of Chinas in Gujarat Bombay konkan and some other places the Bombay pinharapala occupies a whole quarter of the town and is separated into yards meadows and gardens with ponds cages for beasts of prey and enclosures for Tame animals this institution would have served very well for a model of Noah's Ark in the first yard however we saw no animals but instead a few hundred human skeletons old men women and children they were the remaining natives of the so-called famine districts who had crowded into Bombay to beg their bread thus while a few yards off the official vets were busily bandaging the broken legs of jackals pouring ointments on the backs of mangy dogs and fitting crutches to lame storks human beings were dying at their very elbows of starvation happily for the famine stricken there were at that time fewer hungry animals than usual and so they were fed on what remained from the meals of the brute pensioners no doubt many of these wretched sufferers would have consented to transmigrate instantly into the bodies of any of the animals who were ending so snugly their Earthly careers but even the pinhara holla roses are not without thorns the grand minivorous subjects of course could not wish for anything better but I doubt very much whether the beasts of prey such as Tigers hyenas and wolves are content with the rules in the forcibly prescribed diets themselves turn with disgust even from eggs and fish and in consequence all the animals of which they have the care must turn vegetarians we were present when an old Tiger wounded by an English bullet was fed having stifted a kind of rice soup which was offered to him he lashed his tail snarled showing his yellow teeth and with a weak Roar turned away from the food what a look he cast a scance upon his keeper who was meekly trying to persuade him to taste his nice dinner Only the Strong bars of the cage saved the Gina from a vigorous protest on the part of this veteran of the forest the hyena with a bleeding head and an ear half torn off began by sitting in the trough filled with the Spartan sauce and then without any further ceremony upset it as if to show its utter contempt for the mess the Wolves and the dogs raised such disconsolate howls that they attracted the attention of two Inseparable friends an old elephant with a wooden leg and a sore eye docks the veritable caster and Pollux of this institution in accordance with his Noble nature the first thought of the elephant concerned his friend he wound his trunk round the neck of the ox in token of protection and both moan dismally parrots storks pigeons flamingos the whole feathered tribe reveled in their breakfast monkeys were the first to answer the Keeper's invitation and greatly enjoyed themselves further on we were shown a holy man who was feeding insects with his own blood he lay with his eyes shut and the scorching rays of the sun striking full upon his naked body he was literally covered with flies mosquitoes ants and bugs all these are our brothers mildly observed the keeper pointing to the hundreds of animals and insects how can you Europeans kill and even devour them what would you do I asked if this snake were about to bite you is it possible you would not kill it if you had time not for all the world I should cautiously catch it and then I should carry it to some deserted place outside the town and there set it free nevertheless suppose it bit you then I should recite a mantrum and if that produced no good result I should be fair to consider it as the finger of fate and quietly leave this body for another these were the words of a man who was educated to a certain extent and very well read when we pointed out that no gift of nature is aimless and that the human teeth are all devouring he answered by quoting whole chapters of Darwin's theory of natural selection and Origin of Species it is not true argued he that the first men were born with canine teeth it was only in course of time with the degradation of humanity only when the appetite for flesh food began to develop that the Jaws changed their first shape under the influence of new Necessities I could not help asking myself who lost science bought lc4 the same evening in elphinstones theater there was given a special performance in honor of the American Mission as we are styled here native actors represented in Gujarati the ancient fairy drama cedarama that has been adapted from the ramayana the celebrated epic Bible Mickey this drama is compost of 14 acts and no end of Tableau in addition to transformation scenes all the female parts as usual were acted by young boys and the actors according to the historical and National Customs were barefooted and half-naked still the richness of the costumes the stage adornments and Transformations were truly wonderful for instance even on the stages of large Metropolitan theaters it would have been difficult to give a better representation of the army of Rama's allies who are nothing more than troops of monkeys under the leadership of hanum and the soldier Statesman dramatist poet God who is so celebrated in history that of India SVP the oldest and best of all Sanskrit dramas Hannah and natak is ascribed to this talented forefather of ours alas gone is the Glorious time when proud of our white skin which after all may be nothing more than the result of a fading under the influences of our northern sky we look down upon Hindus and other [ __ ] with a feeling of contempt well suited to our own magnificence no doubt Sir William Jones soft heartache when translating from the Sanskrit such humiliating sentences is the following Hanuman is said to be the forefather of the Europeans Rama being a hero and a demi-god was well entitled to unite all the Bachelors of his useful monkey Army to the daughters of the Lanka Salon Giants the rakshasas and to present these dravidian Beauties with the Dowry of all Western lands after the most pompous marriage ceremonies the monkey Soldiers made a bridge with the help of their own tales and safely landed with their spouses in Europe where they lived very happily and had a numerous progeny this progeny are we Europeans dravidian Wards found in some European languages in Basque for instance greatly Rejoice the hearts of the brahmanas who would gladly promote the philologists to the rank of demi-gods for this important discovery which confirms so gloriously their ancient legend but it was Darwin who crowned the edifice of proof with the authority of Western education and Western Scientific literature the Indians became still more convinced that we are the veritable descendants of Hanuman and that if one only took the trouble to examine carefully our Tales might easily be discovered our narrow breaches and long skirts only add to the evidence however uncomplementary the idea may be to us still if you consider seriously what are we to say when science in the person of Darwin concedes this hypothesis to the wisdom of ancient areas we must perform submit and really it is better to have for a forefather Hanuman the poet the hero the god than any other monkey even though it be a tailless one see the Rama belongs to the category of mythological dramas something like the tragedies of echelus listening to this production of the remotest Antiquity The Spectators are carried back to the times when the gods descending upon Earth took an active part in the everyday life of Mortals nothing reminds one of the modern drama though the exterior Arrangement is the same from the sublime to the ridiculous there is but a step and vice versa the goat chosen for a sacrifice to Backus presented the world tragedy Greek script here the death bleedings and buddings of the quadruple offering of antiquity have been Polished by the hands of time and of civilization and as a result of this process we get the dying Whisper of Rachel in the part of Adrian look of her and the fearfully realistic kicking of the modern croissant in the poisoning scene of the Sphinx but whereas the descendants of the mysticals gladly receive whether captive or free all the changes and improvements considered as such by modern taste thinking them to be a corrected and enlarged edition of The Genius of echelus Hindus happily for archaeologists and lovers of antiquity have never moved a step since the times of our much-honored forefather Hanuman we awaited the performance of cedarama with the liveliest curiosity except ourselves in the building of the theater everything was strictly indigenous and nothing reminded us of the West there was not the trace of an orchestra music was only to be heard from the stage or from behind it at last a curtain Rose the silence which had been very remarkable before the performance considering the huge crowd of Spectators of both sexes now became absolute Rama is one of the incarnations of Vishnu and as most of the audience were worshipers of Vishnu for them the spectacle was not a mere theatrical performance but a religious mystery representing the life and achievements of their favorite and most venerated gods the prologue was laid in the epoch before creation began it may safely be said that no dramatist would dare to choose an earlier one or rather before the last manifestation of the universe all the philosophical sects of India except musselmans agree that the Universe has always existed but the Hindus divide the periodical appearances and vanishings into days and nights of Brahma the knights or withdrawals of the objective Universe are called prolias and the days or epics of new Awakening into life and light are called mandentaras yugas or centuries of the Gods these periods are also called respectively the embryo things and out breathings of Brahma when pralaya comes to an end Brahma awakens and with this Awakening the universe that rested in deity in other words that was reabsorbed in its subjective Essence emanates from the Divine principle and becomes visible the gods who died at the same time as the universe begin slowly to return to life the invisible alone the infinite the lifeless the one who is the unconditioned original life itself SARS surrounded by shoreless chaos its holy presence is not visible it shows itself only in the periodical pulsation of chaos represented by a dark mass of water
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