101. Regarding the forthcoming presidential election of the Theosophical Society

I would prefer not to write any further comments on this matter in this journal, but to merely share what is of interest for the general theosophical cause. For it is, after all, a matter of internal Society business; and this journal is to be devoted to objective Theosophical work and administrative questions only insofar as these are related to that work.

However, under the present circumstances, I cannot fully implement this point of view. This election matter stirs up so many things, and has already caused so much discussion, that it would be badly received from many quarters if I were to remain completely silent on the subject.

The late President-Founder had the statutory right to nominate his successor. This nomination is subject to confirmation by the company. And for the nomination to be valid, two-thirds of the votes cast in the election act must be in favor of the nominated candidate. Now the late president-founder proposed Mrs. Besant. The current vice president, in accordance with the statutes, has asked the secretaries general to carry out the election in May. This will be done in the stated legal form within the German section. Thus, if nothing else had happened, no matter could be in better order than this.

Yes, certainly, if nothing else had happened. Unfortunately, however, various things have happened, and this has complicated what was once a simple matter. I will now explain what has happened. The late President Olcott did not simply announce that he was nominating Mrs. Besant as his successor, but he sent a message in the most diverse circulars to the general secretaries, which then found its way into the Theosophical press, and unfortunately not only into it, that those high individuals, who are referred to as the masters, and specifically those who have a special relationship to the Theosophical cause, appeared at his deathbed and instructed him to nominate Mrs. Besant as his successor. Not only that, but they also made an important announcement to him about Mr. Leadbeater, who recently resigned from the Society. Now, this addition to the nomination of Mrs. Besant could have been simply ignored. Because whether one believes in the authenticity of the appearance of the masters in this case or not, what business is it of the members voting in terms of the statutes, from which side Olcott was advised when he made the nomination? Whether he took counsel from masters or from any ordinary mortal is his own business. The electors are to keep to the statutes and to ask themselves only whether they consider Mrs. Besant the right person or not. But a difficulty arose immediately from the fact that Mrs. Besant made it known that she had been instructed by her master to accept the election, and that for this reason she was taking on the burden, that she was even interpreting the order of the masters as something decisive for the election. This results in a factual calamity. For Mrs. Besant enjoys the esoteric trust of many members. For them, a purely administrative matter has been made a matter of conscience by her actions. For if they were to base their feelings on the statutes, they would place themselves in opposition to the personality who must enjoy their esoteric trust. Some also said to themselves: can Mrs. Besant be elected if she confuses a mere administrative matter with an esoteric matter, such as a pronouncement of the masters, even before taking office? Is there not a danger that in the future we will receive Mahatma orders from Adyar instead of simple prestidigitations? The confusion that would ensue if that happened is unimaginable. Within our German Section, however, this danger was not great, because our work in recent years has succeeded in keeping out many of the storms that have swept through the Society. Even the Leadbeater case passed without unnecessary storm with us. There would have been time to talk about the revelations in Adyar later. That would have happened, and will happen, because anyone who, like the writer of these lines, is firmly convinced that the higher wisdom is only the expression of highly developed spiritual individuals, will never say anything in the teaching that he could not justify to these individuals; such a person will feel the necessity to speak openly at the right time about things like the revelations communicated by Adyar. But he must not choose an inopportune time for doing so.

And there is something else. If the discussions that have taken place in the Society outside Germany have led to discussions that amount to opposition to Mrs. Besant's election, the scope of these discussions has been further increased by an article written by Mrs. Besant in the March issue of The Theosophical Review on the Society's foundations. This article could be understood to contain nothing more than the following. The Theosophical Society requires its members to recognize the universal brotherhood of mankind. Anyone who recognizes that the Society has such work to do and is suited to bringing about such a brotherhood can be a member of the Society. And one should not say that a member can be expelled for actions that offend here and there, provided that they recognize the above rule of the Society. For the Theosophical Society has no moral code, and one finds among the greatest minds of humanity actions that might offend someone, depending on the circumstances of his time and country. The writer of these lines must confess that he regarded this essay as a correct, even self-evident expression of an occultist attitude, and that he assumed that other Theosophists also think so, until the April number of the Theosophical Review, in which it is said from many sides and repeated endlessly that such an attitude is the height of immorality and must undermine all good morals in society. And again and again the refrain, spoken or unspoken: can someone who preaches such immorality be president of a decent society? Now is not the time to modestly raise the question: Where is the transference of the doctrine of karma into life, which shows us that man is dependent on his karma in his present actions, but that he will depend on his thoughts in the present with regard to his future actions? As Theosophists, should we judge as people do who know nothing about karma, or should we see the actions of our fellow human beings as conditioned by their past lives? Do we still remember that thoughts are facts and that those who work for right thoughts in our ranks are laying the very foundation for overcoming what clings to people from past lives? What has Mrs. Besant done in this essay but expound an ancient occultist tenet, which is correctly expressed in the otherwise certainly disputable novel “Zanoni” with the following words: “Our opinions are the angel part of us, our deeds the earthly part.” In quieter times Mrs. Besant's essay would probably have been taken as the point that the occultist often has to emphasize in the face of popular morality. This shows that this presidential election threatens to remove the discussion from the calm, objective ground. The question of whether or not a purely administrative matter may be played out in the esoteric could easily become the question of principle as to how society should further relate to the occult. And if that should be the case, those who must maintain the occult basis of the Society cannot for a moment doubt that the choice of a personality who starts from the occult point of view is the right one, even if they believe that this personality is currently mistaken with regard to statutes and constitutions. Such an error could be remedied, but not if, for instance, the Society were to be estranged from occultism by the election of its present president. That is enough for today. We will discuss what else needs to be said about the election. Whether it will be in this journal or only among members will depend on the circumstances. It must be done.

These lines would also have been unnecessary if there had been no talk of the matter outside Germany. But readers of this journal can demand that there be not complete silence about something that is being discussed so much elsewhere.