Below I am going to put
the testimonies that I find about this theme.
WILLIAM JUDGE TESTIMONY
William Judge was
Blavatsky's main collaborator, and on this subject he wrote the following:
« The word “glamour” was long ago defined in old dictionaries as “witchery
or a charm on the eyes, making them see things differently from what they
really are.” This is still the meaning of the word. Not long ago, before the
strange things possible in hypnotic experiments became known to the Western
world, it seemed as if everything would be reduced to mere matter and motion by
the fiat of science.
Witchery was to fade away, be forgotten, be laughed out of sight, and
what could not be ascribed to defective training of the senses was to have its explanation
in the state of the liver, a most prosaic organ. But before science with its
speculation and ever-altering canons could enlighten the unlearned multitude,
hypnotism crept slowly and surely forward and at last began to buttress the
positions of Theosophy. Glamour stands once more a fair chance for recognition.
Indeed, H.P. Blavatsky uttered prophetic words when she said that in America
more than anywhere else this art would be practiced by selfish men for selfish
purposes, for money-getting and gratification of desire.
Hurriedly glancing over some fields of folk-lore, see what a mass of
tales bearing on glamour produced by men, gods, or elementals. In India the
gods every now and then, often the sages, appear before certain persons in
various guises by means of a glamour which causes the eye to see what is not
really there. In Ireland volumes of tales in which the person sees houses, men,
and animals where they are not; he is suddenly given the power to see under the
skin of natural things, and then perceives the field or the market-place full
of fairies, men, and women gliding in and out among the people. Anon a man or
woman is changed into the appearance of animal or bird, and only regains the
old semblance when touched with the magic rod.
This change of appearance is not a change in fact, but always a glamour
affecting the eyes of the other person. Such a mass of similar stories found
during all time and among every people cannot be due to folly nor be without a
basis. The basis is a fact and a law in man’s nature. It is glamour, the reason
for glamour, and the power to bring it about. Just because there have always
been those who, either by natural ability or training, had the power to bring
on a “witchery over the eyes,” these stories have arisen.
A writer well-known in England and America once thought he had found a
mare’s nest when he reported that Mme. Blavatsky had confessed to him that
certain phenomena he enquired of had been caused by glamour.
“Ah, glamour” he said; “thus falls this Theosophic house of cards”; and
he went away satisfied, for in truth he had been himself thoroughly glamoured.
But Theosophists should not stumble and fall violently as this gentleman did
over a word which, when enquired into, carries with it a good deal of science
relating to an important branch of occultism.
When I read in an issue of the Arena all about this confession on glamour,
I was quite ready to believe that H.P. Blavatsky did say to the learned enquirer
what he reported, but at the same time, of course, knew that she never intended
to apply her enchantment explanation to every phenomenon. She only intended to
include certain classes, — although in every occult phenomenon there is some
glamour upon some of the observers according to their individual physical
idiosyncrasies.
The classes of phenomena covered by this word are referred to in part by
Patanjali in his Yoga Aphorisms, where he says that if the luminousness natural
to object and eye is interfered with the object will disappear, whether it be
man or thing and whether it be day or night. This little aphorism covers a good
deal of ground, and confutes, if accepted, some theories of the day. It
declares, in fact, that not only is it necessary for rays of light to proceed
from the object to the eye, but also light must also proceed from the eye
towards the object. Cut off the latter and the object disappears; alter the
character of the luminousness coming from the eye, and the object is altered in
shape or color for the perceiver.
(Cid's observation: I
think that here perhaps William Judge was wrong and I am inclined to consider
that the bewitcher manages to manipulate the brain of the person so that she
sees —or does not see— what he wants. And this is also what William Judge detailed below.)
Take up now imagination in its aspects of a power to make a clear and
definite image. This is done in hypnotism and in spiritualism. If the image be
definite enough and the perceiver or subject sensitive enough, a glamour will
be produced. The person will see that which is not the normal shape or form or
corporature of the other. But this new shape is as real as the normal, for the
normal form is but that which is to last during a certain stage of human
evolution and will certainly alter as new senses and organs develop in us.
Thus far having gone, is it not easy to see that if a person can make the
definite and vivid mind-pictures spoken of, and if the minor organs can affect
and be affected, it is quite probable and possible that trained persons may
have glamoured the eyes of others so to make them see an elephant, snake, man,
tree, pot, or any other object where only is empty space, or as an alteration
of a thing or person actually there?
This is exactly what is done in experiments by the hypnotists, with this
difference, that they have to put the subject into an abnormal state, while the
other operators need no such adventitious aids. Glamour, then, has a very
important place in magic. That it was frequently used by H.P. Blavatsky there
is not the smallest doubt, just as there is no doubt that the yogi in India
puts the same power into operation.
In many cases she could have used it by making the persons present think
they saw her when she had gone into the next room, or that another person was
also present who was not in fact. The same power of glamour would permit her to
hide from sight any object in the room or in her hands. This is one of the
difficult feats of magic, and not in the slightest degree dependent on
legerdemain. Persons sometimes say this is folly even if true, but looked at in
another light it is no folly, nor are those cases in which anyone was entitled
to know all that was going on.
She exhibited these feats —seldom as it was— for the purpose of showing
those who were learning from her that the human subject is a complicated and
powerful being, not to be classed, as science so loves to do, with mere matter
and motion. All these phenomena accomplished two objects. First, to help those
who learned from her, and second, to spread abroad again in the West the belief
in man’s real power and nature.
The last was a most necessary thing to do because in the West
materialism was beginning to have too much sway and threatened to destroy
spirituality. And it was done also in pursuance of the plans of the Great Lodge
for the human race. As one of her Masters said, her phenomena puzzled skeptics
for many years. Even now we see the effects, for when such men as Stead, the
Editor of the Review of Reviews, and
Du Prel, Schiaparelli, and others take up the facts of Spiritualism
scientifically, one can perceive that another day for psychology is dawning.
This power of glamour is used more often than people think, and not
excluding members of the Theosophical Society, by the Adepts. They are often among
us from day to day appearing in a guise we do not recognize, and are dropping
ideas into men’s minds about the spiritual world and the true life of the soul,
as well as also inciting men and women to good acts. By this means they pass
unrecognized and are able to accomplish more in this doubting and transition
age than they could in any other way.
Sometimes as they pass they are recognized by those who have the right
faculty; but a subtle and powerful bond and agreement prevents their secret
from being divulged. This is something for members of the Theosophical Society
to think of, for they may be entertaining now and then angels unawares. They
may now and then be tried by their leaders when they least expect it, and the
verdict is not given out but has its effect all the same.
But glamour covers only a small part of the field of occultism. The use
of the astral body enters into nearly all of the phenomena, and in other
directions the subject of occult chemistry, absolutely unknown to the man of
the day, is of the utmost importance; if it is ever given out it will be a
surprise to science, but certainly that divulgation will not soon be to such a
selfish age. »
(The Path, May 1893, p.43-46)
BLAVATSKY'S TESTIMONY
Several people began
to accuse Blavatsky that she was putting spells on people, and that is why in
an article she replied to them:
«
Ignorance not altogether bliss
All know that there is a tacit,
often openly-expressed, belief among a few of the Fellows of the Theosophical
Society that a certain prominent Theosophist among the leaders of the Theosophical
Society psychologizes all those who happen to come within the area of that
individual’s influence.
Dozens, nay, hundreds, were, and
still are, “psychologized.” The hypnotic effect seems so strong as to virtually
transform all such “unfortunates” into irresponsible nincompoops, mere cyphers
and tools of that theosophical Circe.
This idiotic belief was originally
started by some “wise men” of the West. Unwilling to admit that the said person
had either any knowledge or powers, bent on discrediting their victim, and yet
unable to explain certain abnormal occurrences, they hit upon this happy and
logical loop-hole to get out of their difficulties.
The theory found a grateful and
fruitful soil. Henceforth, whenever any Fellows connected theosophically with
the said “psychologizer” happen to disagree in their views upon questions,
metaphysical or even purely administrative, with some other member— “on
despotism bent,” forthwith the latter comes out with the favorite solution :
“Oh, they are psychologized!”
The magic WORD springs out on the
arena of discussion like a Jack-in-a-box, and forthwith the attitude of the “rebels”
is explained and plausibly accounted for.
Of course the alleged “psychology”
has really no existence outside the imagination of those who are too vain to
allow any opposition to their all-wise and autocratic decrees on any other
ground than phenomenal —nay, magical— interference with their will. A short
analysis of the Karmic effects that would be produced by the exercise of such
powers may prove interesting to theosophists.
Even on the terrestrial, purely
physical plane, moral irresponsibility ensures impunity. Parents are answerable
for their children, tutors and guardians for their pupils and wards, and even
the Supreme Courts have admitted extenuating circumstances for criminals who
are proved to have been led to crime by a will or influences stronger than
their own.
How much more forcibly this law
of simple retributive justice must act on the psychic plane; and what, therefore,
may be the responsibility incurred by using such psychological powers, in the
face of Karma and its punitive laws, may be easily inferred. Is it not evident
that, if even human justice recognizes the impossibility of punishing an
irrational idiot, a child, a minor, etc., taking into account even hereditary
causes and bad family influences— that the divine Law of Retribution, which we
call Karma, must visit with hundredfold severity one who deprives reasonable,
thinking men of their free will and powers of ratiocination?
From the occult standpoint, the
charge is simply one of black magic, of envoutement.
Alone a Dugpa [a sorcerer], with “Avitchi” [hellish punishment] yawning at
the further end of his life cycle, could risk such a thing.
Have those so prompt to hurl the charge at the head of persons in their
way, ever understood the whole terrible meaning implied in the accusation?
We doubt it.
No occultist, no
intelligent student of the mysterious laws of the “night side of Nature,” no
one who knows anything of Karma, would ever suggest such an explanation. What
adept or even a moderately-informed chela [disciple] would ever risk an endless
future by interfering with, and therefore taking upon himself, the Karmic debit
of all those whom he would so psychologize as to make of them merely the tools
of his own sweet will!
This fact seems so evident and
palpably flagrant, that it is absurd to have to recall it to those who boast of
knowing all about Karma.
Is it not enough to bear the
burden of the knowledge that from birth to death, the least, the most
unimportant, unit of the human family exercises an influence over, and receives
in his turn, as unconsciously as he breathes, that of every other unit whom he
approaches, or who comes in contact with him ?
Each of us either adds to or
diminishes the sum total of human happiness and human misery, “not only of the
present, but of every subsequent age of humanity,” as shown so ably by Elihu Burritt,
who says:
“There is no sequestered spot in the Universe, no dark niche along the
disc of non-existence, from which he (man) can retreat from his relations to
others, where he can withdraw the influence of his existence upon the moral
destiny of the world; everywhere his presence or absence will be felt —
everywhere he will have companions who will be better or worse for his
influence. It is an old saying, and one of fearful and fathoming import, that
we are forming characters for eternity.
Forming characters!
Whose? Our own or others?
Both—and in that momentous fact lies the peril and responsibility of our
existence.
Who is sufficient for the thought?
Thousands of my fellow-beings will yearly enter eternity* with
characters differing from those they would have carried thither had I never
lived. The sunlight of that world will reveal my finger-marks in their primary
formations, and in their successive strata of thought and life.”
(* Devachan, rather; the entracte
between two incarnations.)
These are the words of a profound
thinker. And if the simple fact of our living changes the sum of human weal and
woe —in a way for which we are, owing to our ignorance, entirely irresponsible—
what must be the Karmic decree in the matter of influencing hundreds of people
by an act perpetrated and carried on for years in premeditation and the full consciousness
of what we are doing!
Verily the man or woman in the
unconscious possession of such dangerous powers had much better never be born. The
Occultist who exercises them consciously will be caught up by the whirlwind of successive
rebirths, without even an hour of rest. Woe to him, then, in that ceaseless,
dreary series of terrestrial Avitchis; in that interminable aeon of torture,
suffering, and despair, during which, like the squirrel doomed to turn the
wheel at every motion, he will launch from one life of misery into another,
only to awake each time with a fresh burden of other people’s Karma, which he
will have drawn upon himself! »
(Lucifer,
March 1889, p.8-10)
OBSERVATIONS
Personally,
I do see it as very feasible that Blavatsky possessed this ability,
since it is something that the old fakirs used, and she having
reached a much more advanced development than the fakirs; it would have been easy for her to be able to do it too.
But as William Judge pointed out, she only did it on
a few occasions and with a pedagogical purpose, since as Blavatsky
indicated in her article, she was very aware of the serious Karma that
one generates if one bewitches the minds for manipulation purposes. .
And
some individuals have used this data to argue that in reality the
phenomena that Blavatsky produced were not real, but that she put a
spell on people to make them believe that she had produced those
phenomena.
In
some cases it may have been the case, but in general I do not agree
with this conclusion because several of the objects that she
materialized are still in existence, and these are preserved by the
Adyar Theosophical Society in a piece of furniture known as "the HPB
Memorial Cabinet".
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