Talk:The Secret Doctrine

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[edit] Einstein connection

I'm not wild about the inclusion of the Einstein link. It's possible that Einstein did keep a copy on his desk, but to me it looks like there's a good chance it's just an urban legend. I know the links should not be held to the same standards as the text, but I worry about posting links to such dubious information.

From my understanding the secret doctrine was brought up in the conversation of hitler and his mentor Dietrich Eckart and i believed he stated that he had said "follow hitler!he will dance, but it is i who have called the tune!'i have intiated him into the secret doctrine open his centres in vision and givehim the means to communicate with the Powers. So what does the phrase 'Secret Doctrine' really mean?"

[edit] RR

Paul, I think details about RR would better belong to the RR article itself. There the topic could be explained in detail, with the necessary information about the seven chains, globes,... instead of giving here some select citations confusing and bewildering the reader. I'm not against criticism, and I think that parts of the SD deserve to be criticized, but this topic should be treated in one single article. This is standard wikipedia practice: The Qu'uran article has no citations about Jihad or Slavery, because they are treated in separate articles (theoretically). --Loa 16:23, 4 December 2005 (UTC)

The article should be about the content of the book. In its previous form it consisted of nothing but unexplained gushing endorsements. There was virtually no account of the book's content at all. I think that was far more 'confusing and bewildering to the reader.' Certainly more material should be added, especially about the first half of the book, but the racial aspect is quite important to the book's content, since HPB is consistently engaging with the scientific topics of her day - the age of the earth, evolution etc. This engagement is aligned to other attacks on Judeo-Christian traditions from this period. I don't quite follow the analogy with the Qur'an. Slavery is not central to the Qur'an, jihad is marginal. Root races are central to the SD. Paul B 08:00, 5 December 2005 (UTC)

The article states:

"Blavatsky attempted to demonstrate that the discoveries of "materialist" science had been anticipated in the writings of ancient sages, and that materialism would soon be proven wrong." Is it me, or aren't these two things contradictory, or at least, it would take some fleshing out to explain this in context. Did she think the ancients were wrong in the things they anticipated, or does it mean that *some* aspects of "materialism" will be proven wrong, I suspect excepting the parts the ancients supposedly anticipated? It seems to suggest 1) the ancients were right about . . . something and 2) modern materialists are wrong about . . . something, but not the same things? DianaW (talk) 14:54, 5 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Racism

It is completely lopsided too use half the article on The Secret Doctrine for quotations about the "aryan race", a subject which takes up just a few lines in the work as a whole. --Vindheim (talk) 17:53, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Well she talks about Aryans repeatedly. However, expand the rest if you think there's too much on race. Paul B (talk) 23:06, 6 June 2008 (UTC)

Yes, I shall try to find the time to expand on the article, and to balance the misunderstood aryan stuff a bit in the process.--Vindheim (talk) 15:09, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Hypatia of Alexandria

I really do not understand what is supposed to be meant by claiming that Blavatskys work was "borrowed from Hypatia". If the intention is to claim that Blavatsky was influenced by Hypatia, it may be true, but still needs documentation (as well as rephrasing).--Vindheim (talk) 16:02, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

I don't understand. Where does it say that? As far as I know none of Hypatia's writings actually survive. Paul B (talk) 16:10, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

an anonymous editor had inserted the following (which i subsequently removed): "The work was borrowed from Hypatia of Alexandria, founder of universities in ancient Rome. Hypatia was raped and killed by Christian fanatics. Her work burned down 400 years after Caligula's reign." --Vindheim (talk) 16:51, 7 June 2008 (UTC)

Well that's just nutty nonsense. Anyway, she wasn't raped, didn't found anything in Rome, and why mention Caligula? Paul B (talk) 17:43, 7 June 2008 (UTC)