December 2008
How
Do You Know That What Theosophy Teaches is True?
Nearly every student of Theosophy has at one time been asked, or has asked:
“How do you know that what Theosophy teaches is true?” The motto of the
Theosophically independent student is to “test, check and verify” before
accepting a statement to be true. Can one know that their belief is valid and
sound? How does one prove that Theosophy is logical and true? If one cannot do
this, or if one is not taught how to do this, is this independent thinker
entitled to dismiss Theosophy as one more system based on unprovable
assumptions and unfounded speculations? Theosophy is a synthesis of science,
religion and philosophy. Unless one has developed their physical, psychic and
spiritual senses and faculties to the highest possible degree, Theosophy, as a
body of knowledge embracing occult laws that govern the visible and invisible
departments of Man and Nature, will be a reasoned belief. Is that sufficient so
one can say that one knows Theosophy to be true?
Philosophers are familiar with the criteria for knowledge. Unlike scientific
knowledge, which is based on direct experience, in philosophy knowledge requires
a different set of criteria. It is not enough to believe that the premises of an
argument are true, even if one believes strongly --- with deep conviction.
Knowledge, according to the standards of philosophy, is a belief that is true
and justified. There are two philosophical approaches to justify that a belief
is true, or that it meets the criteria of knowledge. One approach is empiricism
and the other is rationalism. Skepticism is the philosophical approach that one
can have no certain knowledge since there is no way to adequately justify that a
belief is true. It is useless to argue philosophically with a skeptic that
something is true because a skeptic argues back that all we can have is our
belief that it is true.
The empiricist argues that beliefs can be justified by the evidence of the
senses through personal experience. Empirical knowledge is based on the
experience of what one sees, hears, touches, tastes, smells, or can experience
through instruments which extend the range of these senses. Science extends the
realm of empirical knowledge by utilizing instruments that refine and magnify
the power of the senses, or by experiments that carefully control the conditions
of experience. The rationalist argues that beliefs can be justified on the basis
of rational evidence. Such evidence is provided by the rigorous disciplines of
logic and mathematics. Rational knowledge is based on the light of reason.
The skeptic has a point. The senses are not a reliable source for justifying
the truth of one’s belief. The world is not exactly as we perceive it to be
through the senses. Tables are not solid; rocks are not motionless; human beings
are not separate. The evidence provided by the senses - the color, smell, taste,
shape and movement of an object - is often dependent on the perceptions and
preconceptions of the mind and the relative perspective of the observer.
Physicists have demonstrated this to be a fact. The best one can do from
particular and personal observations is infer that one’s perceptions are closely
related to the actual reality of the world. One can not even draw general
conclusions or establish universal principles only from the particular facts
observed since, for most observers, the process of induction from particulars to
universals is based more on reason than on direct experience. These
generalizations called scientific theories are subject to change whenever new
facts are discovered.
Approaching the problem of knowledge from a Theosophical viewpoint,
philosophical knowledge can be acquired by combining the benefits of personal
experience and the evidence of the senses with the benefits of logical reasoning
and mathematics. The logical reasoning begins with universal propositions or
premises and proceeds according to analogy and correspondence to particulars.
In geometry, if one knows two sides of a right triangle, the third side can be
calculated even without the benefit of direct measurement. This is the famous
Pythagorean Theorem. This method can be used to know something philosophically
without the benefit of direct observation.
In this case, one side of the philosophical triangle is represented by what
anyone and everyone could observe with the senses through personal experience,
such as a drop of water falling on one’s hand. The second side of the
philosophical triangle is represented by a universal principle that anyone and
everyone could understand, such as the universality of the law of cycles.
Reasoning on the basis of this universal principle and the universal experience
of feeling a drop of water, one can conclude by analogy and correspondence that
just as the drop of water cyclically proceeds from the ocean only to return to
the ocean, the pilgrim soul periodically differentiates from the universal
oversoul and after a long series of transmigrations and reincarnations returns
to its one source. Point by point, the philosophy of Theosophy can be known by
the independent thinker to be justifiably true.
QUOTES OF INTEREST
"Love" is a mysterious word and does strange things when observed as an
element of study or philosophical research. It is said that Thomas Taylor
understood the philosophy of Plato more deeply than many, not because of his
Greek erudition but because he loved Plato. If we love the Secret Doctrine as
a close and daily friend, discarding ideas of learning or of becoming erudite
students, it too may be able to "love" us; for the Teachings speak to those who
listen and are concerned. We should come to this study, and stay for a while,
allowing the rational side of ourselves to be perplexed if need be, but
remembering that this state is not relevant, or is at least a livable condition
when it occurs in a state of friendship:
"Unto thee who findeth no fault I will now make known this most mysterious
knowledge, coupled with a realization of it, which having known thou shalt be
delivered from evil." When the one who desires to learn is not in a critical
attitude, when he has sensed in one way or another that truth lies in a certain
direction and gives all his attention to it without quarreling with terms or the
ideas put forward, his is the attitude of the true student. Universal Theosophy
Theosophy Magazine, Vol. 52, p. 113
Our search for knowledge is almost universally a looking for something
outside. We are looking for information, for instruction, in the thoughts of
other men, in the ideas of other peoples, which, in this school of Occult
Knowledge, is not knowledge at all. The only knowledge we can have is that
which we gain for ourselves, and within ourselves, as actual experience.
External facts and information can never give us any understanding whatever of
the higher, more divine parts of our nature. The Friendly Philosopher,
p.316
Knowledge is understanding, or Manas fully incarnated. There is no light, no
love in all the regions of the Universe to surpass it. Theosophy Magazine,
Vol. 40, p.159
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