Alfred Trevor Barker was a famous theosophist in the theosophical world because he transcribed the letters that Messrs. Alfred Sinnett and Allan Hume received from the masters Kuthumi and Morya, and published those letters in the book known as "The Mahatma Letters".
And regarding spiritualism, in the introduction of this book he wrote the following (and in purple I added my comments).
--oOo--
There has been a noticeable tendency also for sections of the Society to drift towards what Master K.H. calls "that most insane and fatal of superstitions — Spiritualism." (Letter No. 49)
In another letter he says:
"A psychic Society is being founded . . . , it will grow and develop and expand and finally the Theos. Soc. of London will be swamped in it, and lose first its influence then — its name — until Theosophy in its very name becomes a thing of the Past."
It is regrettable that these words are as true to-day, as when they were written.
The, whole question is thrashed out from every point of view in these letters, so that no misunderstanding is possible to the mind of the impartial student.
The mischief lies, then as now, in the misunderstanding of the real nature of spiritualistic phenomena.
The mistake that spiritists make
Those who adhere to the methods of Spiritualism claim that communication can be established with the souls and spirits of the departed by means of properly qualified mediums.
That communication of a kind between the living and the dead can be made, is accepted as a demonstrable fact in these letters, and is not challenged in any way. But communication with what?
Here lies the crux of the whole matter.
Master K.H. states not once, but over and over again, that communication with the souls and spirits of the dead is an impossibility.
(In reality Kuthumi said that most humans enter a deep sleep after dying, and that is why there are very few cases where spiritists communicate with dead humans, and the vast majority of cases are with deceitful astral entities that impersonate the souls of deceased people.)
At death, consciousness which pertains to the seventh, sixth, and fifth principles of man, (and in these are included the soul, and spirit and all that makes man human) withdraws into an unconscious gestation period which precedes re-birth in the Deva Chan or heaven-world.
It leaves behind it, the physical corpse, the etheric counterpart or double, and lastly the emotional and mental shell which is the correspondence in subtler matter of the physical body, and which may be termed the vehicle of consciousness on its own plane, just as the physical body is the vehicle of consciousness in the physical world.
It must be understood clearly however, that each of these empty shells has a certain illusory awareness or consciousness of its own, which is the collective consciousness of the aggregation of atoms and molecules of which they are composed, and quite distinct from the consciousness of the individual, or real entity, which informed them in life. The physical body has a similar consciousness which is purely animal and instinctive in nature.
At death the consciousness of even the shell leaves it for a time, and does not return to it until the withdrawal of 5th, 6th, and 7th principles is complete. Not until after that is accomplished, does a certain awareness of existence return to the empty shells.
The Elementarys
It is these disintegrating [astral] corpses which can be temporarily galvanized into activity by the efforts of a medium; these can and do communicate, but only as it were from memory of what has been, and not from consciousness of present facts.
This is the reason for the often stupid, meaningless, unspiritual messages from the other side of death which so disgust the seeker for real knowledge.
Exceptions
The brief analysis given above, is the rule for all humanity, with the exception of the victims of accident and suicide on the one hand, and on the other those rare individuals (only the trained occultist knows how rare they are) who have won for themselves immortality.
(They have not yet achieved immortality but are already able to stay awake in the astral plane.)
Don't be fooled by spiritualism
Those students of "occultism" who believe themselves guided, by disincarnate entities ranging in degree from departed Theosophists to "Adepts who have relinquished the use of physical bodies on earth," (Esoteric Buddhism, p. 133. Eighth Edition) by means of the methods of mediums, ouija boards and their equivalent, will do well to consider their position in the light of these letters.
Communication with departed Theosophists (i.e. the real entities) as already shown is an impossibility, for alas! they cannot be included among those who have achieved immortality, the exceptions to the general rule governing humanity being so very few; and with regard to the guidance of disembodied "Adept Spirits" it may be asked, how those who have not deserved individual instruction from Adepts in the flesh, can possibly expect to receive direct help from Their superiors — the Planetary Spirits, the Dhyan Chohanic Host?
It cannot be too strongly emphasized that in thus externalizing the source from which he seeks inspiration, the student sacrifices all possibility of the grand realities of spiritual attainment and direct knowledge.
Blavatsky wrote:
"The ever unknowable and incognizable Karana alone, the Causeless Cause of all causes, should have its shrine and altar on the holy and untrodden ground of our heart — invisible, intangible, unmentioned, save through the 'still small voice' of our spiritual consciousness.
Those who worship before it, ought to do so in the silence and the sanctified solitude of their Souls, making their Spirit the sole mediator between them and The Universal Spirit, their good actions their only priests, and their sinful intentions the only visible and objective sacrificial victims to the 'Presence'."
(Secret Doctrine I, p.280)
You should study the teaching methods of the masters instead.
The importance of the correct understanding of the doctrines relating to post mortem conditions, may be judged by the significant phrase of Master K.H. "that he who holds the keys to the Secrets of Death is possessed of the Keys of Life."
The dual meaning and application of the theosophical doctrines relating to Death would seem to have been missed — passed by. The entrance to the Mysteries has ever been through the Gate of Death; and as in the Egyptian "Book of The Dead" — under the symbolism of the passage of the Soul from life through Death to Devachan, lies hid the precious teaching which rightly understood will bring to rebirth the aspirant who has passed through the agonies of Death in Life.
Th
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