Re: Freda Bedi Cont'd (#2)
Posted: Sat Mar 07, 2020 11:28 pm
The Mothers' Research Group
by The Theosophical Society in America, The Theosophical Publishing House, Chennai. India
by The Theosophical Society in America, The Theosophical Publishing House, Chennai. India
Freda was concerned that the Indian authorities simply didn't understand the tradition of incarnate lamas, and their critical place in Tibetan society and spiritual practice. Little was done to identify these young lamas, some little more than infants. 'Nobody knew quite what to do with them,' Freda lamented to Olive Shapley. 'In the lamas we have inherited a tradition that dates back to the seventh century -- spiritual richness we can only as yet partially realise,' she wrote to friends. 'I am sure the whole world will ultimately be enriched.'There are perhaps 200 high 'incarnate' lamas in the country now headed by His Holiness [the Dalai Lama] (including 40-60 child or adolescent incarnations: many of them young people of extraordinary intelligence and physical beauty) ... dedicated monks and lamas of a high standard of learning and spirituality number perhaps 2,500; in addition we have junior and simpler country monks, over 1,500 of whom have volunteered for roadwork. We all pray ultimately we may be able to settle the bulk of the refugees in big land settlements.32
Nehru had taken a diplomatic risk by hosting the Dalai Lama and tens of thousands of those who followed in his wake. But there was a limit to the amount of official support and funding that could be expected for the refugees' welfare, with the most urgent and unmet need being the upkeep and education of the young lamas.
Freda was entirely comfortable soliciting money and support from the rich and well connected. She had also established links with Buddhist and similar groups in London and elsewhere. Within weeks of returning to Delhi from the camps, she sought to turn her extensive network to the Tibetans' advantage. In mid-August 1960, she wrote a long letter to Muriel Lewis, a California-based Theosophist with whom she had corresponded for several years. Muriel ran the Mothers' Research Group principally for American and Western Theosophists, a network which had an interest both in eastern religions and in parenting issues.I should like to feel that the 'Mothers' Group' was in touch with all I do (Freda wrote). Do you think it would be possible for some of your members to 'Adopt' in a small way -- write to, send parcels to -- these junior lamas? Friendships, even by post, could mean a great deal. We could work out a little scheme, if you are interested. The language barrier is there, but we can overcome it, with the help of friends.
Freda's family had, she recounted, already taken a young lama under their wing.Last year my son [Kabir] 'adopted' one small lama of 12, sent him a parcel of woollen (yellow)clothes, sweets and picture books, soap and cotton cloth. This time when I went to Buxa, Jayong gave me such an excited and dazzling smile. He was brimming over with joy at seeing me again! It is very quiet away from your own country and relations for a small lama with a LOT TO LEARN. It was of course most touching to see the 'Mother-Love' in the faces of the tutor-lamas and servant lamas who look after the young ones. They are very tender with them.
Freda's letter was included in Muriel's research group newsletter and subsequently reprinted by the Buddhist Society in London. This was the founding act of the Tibetan Friendship Group, which quickly established a presence in eight western countries and was the conduit by which modest private funds were raised for the refugees.34 It outlasted Freda and ... it helped give prominence to the Tibet issue as well as the well-being of the Tibetan diaspora.
-- The Lives of Freda: The Political, Spiritual and Personal Journeys of Freda Bedi, by Andrew Whitehead
Chapter 1: The Influence and Work of the World Mother
Christianity, Hinduism (see note) and other great World Faiths all teach that there exists a Being here on our earth Who embodies in perfection all the highest attributes of the Feminine Aspect of both the creative Deity and the human race, including human motherhood. She, the all-compassionate One, gazes with infinite tenderness and concern upon life on earth. What must She see? A frankly ruthless and nakedly cynical violation and desecration by man -- chiefly, though not entirely, by the male -- of everything holy and beautiful for which She stands. She must see everywhere throughout the world irreverence, abuse and cruelty -- the continual infliction of unnecessary suffering by man upon man, and by man upon the animal kingdom
If it were not that She must also know that this epoch is a phase out of which there will grow a nobler, a fairer, a kinder and a more gentle civilization, surely Her heart would be unbearably torn by what She must see. If we add that in Her divine love She voluntarily remains near to humanity, that She is not only an outside observer, not only a great Spirit removed from us, not only an ascetic Adept who long again attained to a spiritual mountain top, but that in a mysterious way She is actually present within our hearts, and especially within the hearts of every woman and child, what an almost unbearable experience such nearness to mankind would be!
I am myself profoundly convinced that such a Being exists and that, beyond human understanding. She is the perfected embodiment of all that is highest and noblest in womanhood. Her heart, I believe, is filled with love and compassion for us all and, while She does see our sins, She does not condemn us. Rather does She draw nearer to enfold us in Her arms of love, even whilst we transgress.
St. Catherine of Sienna, when for a time she had lost contact with her Lord and in her own eyes had fallen deeply, asked, "Lord, where wast Thou amidst all that failure?" In what is called the mystic locution, when the devotee communes with God and hears His voice, the Lord answered, "Daughter, I was there with thee in thy heart." So She, the Mother of the World, is here with us in our hearts, as well as brooding maternally over all humanity, especially now when a new racial birth is occurring, the racial Christ-consciousness being "born". (See Theosophy Answers Some Problems of Life -- also by Geoffrey Hodson)
Let us now look at our world and see some of the problems with which we -- and so the World Mother, since She is one with us -- are confronted.
In the world of today we observe a great reliance on force and cunning. "Let him take who has the power and let him keep who can" is the general philosophy, particularly under totalitarian regimes. I am aware of the existence of the United Nations and its wonderful subsidiary agencies, but it must be confessed that, by some people, honour, morality and goodwill have come to be regarded only as useful means to a selfish ends. In the ultimate, all right still tends to be founded on power.
Then consider the greatest casualty of the Second World War -- loyalty. When the Spanish Commander outside Madrid said he could easily conquer the Capital City because he had four columns outside and a fifth column within, the world pounced on the phrase like a writer who had been seeking a word. "Fifth Column" has since come to connote the great corroding influence in the world today. Other times have had their traitors but never before have such large numbers of people been willing to band themselves together in disloyalty to bring about the downfall of the system within which they live and are nourished, and to act secretly and subversively even while under the protection of the National they seek to destroy. "Fifth Column" "Fifth Column" is now a fear-inspiring phrase, a tocsin of calamity, if ever there was one; for how can we build a brave new world unless we have loyalty?
The world She loves and serves is also deeply sullied by organized crime and vice, such as drug peddling, even to children and adolescents, prostitution, white slavery- horrible to contemplate when thinking of the World Mother and ideal womanhood. Other evils deeply affecting the progress, happiness and health of mankind, particularly the birth of a new and nobler race of man, with which process the World Mother may also be presumed to be concerned, consist of monopolies, cartels, price fixing, corruption in public, professional and business life, soil exploitation and timber denudation. All these bring gain to the few but result in poverty, and in some parts of the world in famine, to the many.
Other serious evils must be known to Her. The colossal consumption of alcohol, for example, takes more lives than war, ruins homes, degrades men and women, brings immeasurable sorrow and loss everywhere, but very great gain to a few who do not hesitate to foster the evil in order to acquire that gain. Then think of the wholly unnecessary and brutal annual slaughter of hundreds of millions of animals for food which also brings immense profit to the few, ugliness to civilization, ill-health to millions, agonized suffering to food animals and degradation to the slaughterman.
All these wickednesses are voluntary and quite deliberate. The infliction of the greatest possible disaster to one's fellow-men and to animals in order to bring gain for oneself is deliberately chosen by all too many people as a most desired way of life and means of making money.
Such are some of the plainly discernible phenomena of the particular phase of evolution through which mankind is now passing. In consequence, most people go on living their everyday life half-frightened, half indifferent, not daring to think into the future and, as Thoreau said, "in quiet desperation". So we, the people of the world see -- as She, the World Mother, must also see -- the ghastly, tragic comedy that is being performed on the international, national, political and economic stages, where the fate of mankind is being largely decided and individuals find themselves relatively helpless. No wonder disillusionment, bitterness and cynicism characterize the thinking and the outlook of youth and adult alike.
Hence the deep significance of those Movements which focus attention on certain aspects of this problem, particularly those concerning the birth of a new and higher Race of men and the life and work of woman in the world. There are all too few of such Movements on earth, born our of tenderness and compassion for humanity, out of a spiritual vision and a recognition of the existence of a Feminine Principle in God, in all Nature and in man.
If I may here introduce a personal note, I well remember how the vision of the veritable existence of the World Mother first dawned upon me many years ago. I think I was privileged to see Her, however faintly, not only as an ideal, or even as One in the succession of Personifications of the Mother Aspect of Deity, but also as a wondrous living Being, the Exquisite Jewel in the Hierarchy of Earth's Adepts, the World Mother for this epoch, the Star of the Sea, as She is severally named.
Some thirty years ago it fell to my lot to try and collaborate with certain physicians in London in a search for the root cause of disease. Our thoughts were constantly led back to prenatal life where it seemed that the seeds of disease, the tendency to disease, latent disease, first appear. In consequence, it was decided that I should attempt clairvoyant (clairvoyance, an extension produced by self-training and used in full waking consciousness, of the normal range of visual response, now known as Extra-Sensory Perception or ESP) investigations (see "The Miracle of Birth, also the description of Plates 29 and 30, and Chapter IV of The Kingdom of the Gods by Geoffrey Hodson). Two of the doctors owned a large Maternity Hospital, and so ample opportunity for observation was provided. In certain cases, investigations were made day by day and week by week into the prenatal development of the new mental, emotional, etheric and physical bodies of the reincarnating Egos. In certain cases the studies were followed right through to the birth itself. Some of the principles of human incarnation were observed and support gained for the view that susceptibility to disease can be observed in the human embryo.
Gradually, as the time of delivery came near, a sheen of beautiful pure blue began to unveil and tinge the auras of both the mother-to-be and the devas (Sanskrit word) meaning "shining ones", the Angelic Hosts) responsible for part of the work of building the new bodies. As the last weeks went by, this blue deepened in the auras of the devas, who began to assume Madonna-like forms. This culminated in the appearance at the time of birth of the Mother of the World as a veritable Presence, presiding over the "miracle" of human motherhood and childbirth.
As a result of these experiences, I feel that I came to know at least that She Exists and a little of what may be seen in Her eyes and in her Heart -- a divinely tender, maternal solicitude for all mankind. I learned, I think, that motherhood should ideally be as conscious as possible, though never at the cost of undue pain: for certain expansions of consciousness can then be experienced which can effect, can exhalt, the consciousness of the mother and through her that of the whole Race.
Infancy: Mothers' Occult Digest, Volume 4, Number 4, Summer 1951, by Muriel Lewis
How may She be truly envisaged? Whilst the beautiful Madonna blue is probably universal, the form in which She presents Herself is apparently adapted to those who see Her. Possibly their own minds shape the vision of Her into a familiar form. As those of us who were then studying prenatal life were all Christians, She in Her compassion may have deliberately adopted the Madonna form so that we might recognize her.
A Chinese lady once invited me to her home and showed me her beautiful garden. Amongst the trees were statues of Kwan Yin, Goddess of Wisdom and Compassion, the Feminine Logos of Chinese Buddhism. My hostess said to me, "I have had thirteen children and on more than one occasion Kwan Yin Herself saved my life. When the pangs of birth became unendurable and I would die, I saw Her there beside my bed. She stretched out Her hand towards me and immediately the pain was eased and the lost poise and steadiness restored, not once, but many times."
Thus I have come to believe, even to know, that there is such a wondrous and glorious Being on our Earth as the World Mother, that She is very near to human mothers during pregnancy and at the time of birth. I have also learned that She ever seeks human agents and human helpers who will serve in Her name and endeavour to live in Her presence. Whilst women especially represent Her, She also needs men of honour to be her knights, ever ready to fight for the weak and the exploited and to guard with knightly loyalty all women and children, as true knights should. Unhappily, men tend to forget the ideals of chivalry, save those who are still knightly in their nature.
A great Mahatma once wrote: "Not till woman bursts the bonds of her sexual slavery, to which she has ever been subjected, will the world obtain an inkling of what she really is and of her proper place in the economy of Nature." (See The Paradoxes of the Highest Science, by Eliphas Levi, page 171)
On one other memorable occasion an Angel Teacher opened my consciousness into some realisation of the present holder of the Office of World Mother, who is Mary, the mother of Jesus. She also attained perfection and chose that one of the seven roads open to the Adept which leads out of the human into the Angelic Kingdom of Nature. The Angel showed me that "She labours ever for the cause of human motherhood, and even now is bending all Her mighty strength and calling her Angel Court to labour for the upliftment of womanhood throughout the world. Through Her angel messengers, She Herself is present at every human birth, unseen and unknown, it is true, but if men would but open their eyes She would be revealed.
"She sends this message through the Brotherhood to men:-
"In the Name of Him whom long ago I bore, I come to your aid. I have taken every woman into my heart, to hold there a part of her that through it I may help her in her time of need.
"Uplift the women of your race till all are seen as queens, and to such queens let every man be as a king, that each may honour each, seeing the other's royalty. Let every home, however small, become a court, every son a knight, every child a page. Let all treat all with chivalry, honouring in each their royal parentage, their kingly birth; for there is royal blood in every man; all are the children of the KING."
"All nations have recognized, honoured and worshipped this Maternal Principle in Nature. All their exoteric religions have personified it as a Goddess, an Archangel Mother of universes, races, nations and men. These personifications of the World Mother are amongst the very noblest concepts of the human mind, which in creating, reverencing and serving them reaches its highest degrees of idealism, devotion and religious self-expression. Such reverence, such devotion and such worship as are offered to World Mothers are therefore worthy of the deepest respect and, gross superstition apart -- ever to be resisted -- may usefully be encouraged. For through human devotion, human beings may be reached from on high. Through human aspiration, higher love and supplication, man is susceptible to both his own Spiritual Self and the influence of the Adept Ministrants of mankind. The Madonna ideal, for example, has been and still is of incalculable value in consoling, purifying and ennobling humanity. Through it, a realisation of the Mother-Love of God has been brought within reach of millions of suffering and aspiring people. The concepts of Kwan Yin, Isis, Ishtar, Parvati and other Goddesses are similarly founded upon the existence, nature and function of the same great Being. Perhaps, because I am a Christian and the cases I was examining were also Christian, the Madonna-like forms here pictured presented themselves to my mind.
"The planetary World Mother is conceived in certain schools of occult philosophy as a highly evolved, Archangel Representative and Embodiment on earth of the Feminine Aspect of the Deity. She is also thought of as an Adept Official in the Inner Government of the World, in whom all the highest qualities of womanhood and motherhood shine forth in their fullest perfection." (See Kingdom of the Gods pages 242-243 )
Such are some of the thoughts and the ideals which have awakened in me since I passed through those experiences of many years ago, followed as they have been by others. Is it not worthwhile to be associated with such an ideal and with such a work as Hers? I feel strongly urged to appeal to those similarly moved, that they will participate and contribute to the best of their ability that this, Her Work, shall not only live on and prosper, but that it shall enter on a great era of activity in Her Name, which is the Name of Compassion, Wisdom and Universal Love.
-- The Spiritual Significance of Motherhood, by Geoffrey Hodson