The Mars And Mercury Question

(Ed.—Concerning the Planetary Chain of Worlds)

C. Jinarājadāsa

The Theosophist 1951 December p.187-190.

As is well-known, there is a contradiction between Sinnett's Esoteric Buddhism, and what H.P.B. says in The Secret Doctrine with regard to Mars and Mercury as planets of our Planetary Chain of worlds.

Sinnett asked the Mahātma K.H.:

"What other planets of those known to ordinary science, besides Mercury, belong to our system of worlds?" (Mahatma Letters, p. 148.)

The answer given is:

"Mars and four other planets of which astronomy knows yet nothing. Neither A, B, nor Y, Z, are known; nor can they be seen through physical means however perfected." (Mahatma Letters, p. 176.)

Ed. note—See the diagrams at the end of this article.

Much depends upon the interpretation of the words the question, "our system of worlds". Obviously, everybody knew that Mars is a part of our solar system. At this time Sinnett was trying to understand the Composition of "rings and rounds"; he mentions Mercury, and then inquires, " What other planets  .  .  ."

In the reply the Master says that four planets, which He terms A, B, Y, and Z cannot be seen "through physical means however perfected"; the Mahātma presumably refers to the planets which we now call A, B, F, and G

—= 188 =—

of our Planetary Chain—two being on the astral plane and two on the lower mental.

But the correctness of statements in Esoteric Buddhism on this matter is confirmed by the Mahātma K. H. who wrote to Sinnett:

"Be certain, that with a few undetectable mistakes and omissions notwithstanding, your 'Esoteric Buddhism' is the only right exposition—however incomplete—of our Occult doctrines. You have made no cardinal, fundamental mistakes; and whatever may be given to you hereafter will not clash with a single sentence in your book but on the contrary will explain away any seeming contradiction." (Mahatma Letters, p. 392.)

We have to note that the Mahātma says "You have  made no cardinal, fundamental mistakes." If Sinnett was mistaken as to Mars and Mercury belonging to our Scheme of the Rounds of evolution, surely the Mahātma would not have spoken as He did.

In 1894 Dr. Besant and Mr. Sinnett came closer together. She states in Lucifer for December 1895:

"The old Mars and Mercury discussion has been lately revived  .  .  .  I wrote an explanation which seemed satisfactory so far as the documents then in my hands were concerned. I was leaving for India when I wrote this paragraph, and Mr. Sinnett kept silence, in his generous way, during my absence; but on my return he showed me the original letter on which the statement in Esoteric Buddhism was founded, the letter partially quoted in The Secret Doctrine (i. 187); This letter was one of those received in the early days, and was not among those of which I had copies. This original letter left no doubt as to the Master's statement on the point, for it said categorically that Mars and Mercury made part of the chain of which our earth is the fourth globe  .  .  .  The facts are these: The planetary chain consists of Globes A, B, Mars, Earth, Mercury, F, and

—= 189 =—

G, and round these the great life-wave has swept three times and a half, reaching Earth for the fourth time; the mass of humanity passed from Mars to the Earth, and will pass from the Earth to Mercury. But the leading class of humanity— and here is a fact that throws some light on the opposing statements—did not share in this general evolution. It came directly to the Earth from another region at much later period of evolution, and had never been on Mars at all. Another fact, which H.P.B. evidently had in mind when writing on this question, is that Mars is also concerned in an entirely different evolution, [1] as to which nothing can be publicly said." (Lucifer, Dec. 1895, p. 271).

Mr. Sinnett's Autobiography [2] gives interesting sidelights regarding the "original letter" from the Mahātma, and his view of the contradictory teaching in The Secret Doctrine:

"I know that there had been no ambiguity in the Master's original teaching concerning Mars and Mercury and I was puzzled by a vague feeling that I was familiar with bits of the letter published in the 'Secret Doctrine'. This led me some time afterwards to hunt through-the early letters, all of which I had of course carefully preserved, and I found the letter in question, also finding to my surprise that the O. L. ['Old Lady', i.e., H.P.B.] had ventured to garble and omit parts of it so as to make it appear to sustain her view when in reality it did nothing of the kind. I refrained however from making a disturbance in the matter, assured by the Master that  .  .  .  the explanation

[1] The "inner round". The Mahatma K.H. continued in his Letter to Mr. Sinnett:

"You may feel sure that neither M. nor I have contradicted each other in our respective statements. He was speaking of the inner—I, of the outer Round. There are many things that you have not learned but may some day; nor will you be able to ever comprehend the process of the obscurations until you have mastered the mathematical progress of the inner and the outer Rounds and learned more about the specific difference between the seven." (Mahatma Letters, pp. 392-3).

[2] Deposited in the Archives of the T.S.

—= 190 =—

concerning Mars and Mercury in 'Esoteric Buddhism' was perfectly correct."

Further on in his Autobiography, Mr. Sinnett writes:

"I decided at last that I would take the original letter, which Madame Blavatsky had so strangely misused in the 'Secret Doctrine ', to a meeting of Theosophists at the Avenue Road and expose the whole affair. I actually went to the meeting with the letter in my pocket—and I did not carry out the exposure. I suppose I was influenced to refrain. I returned home and restored-the letter to the box containing all the rest."

Then he goes on to say that when at a still later date he opened the box to look again at the original letter, it was not there. His wife and a lady whom he called "Mary" helped him to go through all the contents of the box, but that particular letter could not be found.

If we suppose that while H.P.B. was writing she had noted that the highest type of individualized egos ("first class Pitris") never had any contact with Mars and Mercury, since after individualization on the Moon Chain, and after the "interplanetary Nirvana," they first appeared in the Earth Chain in the 3rd Root Race, the Lemurian, on our Globe D, [1] H.P.B. would naturally imagine that Sinnett was wrong on this matter. In a way then, Sinnett was right, and so was H.P.B., so far as these First Class Pitris, were concerned. I think we cannot say more than this, for the correctness of Sinnett's statement is supported by the Mahātma K. H.

[1] Man: Whence, How and Whither.

C. Jinarājadāsa

—=≡=—

Ed. note—These diagrams added for this article. Planets ABCDEFG were in the early literature named ABCDXYZ. Planets A & G are centered on the lower Mental Plane, Planets B & F are centered on the Astral Plane (the Emotional Plane), Planets C & E are centered on the etheric portion of the Physical Plane and Planet D is centered on the dense or lower portion of the Physical Plane.

The original of the first diagram is shown in The Secret Doctrine Vol. 1 p157.
The original of the second diagram is shown in Man: Whence, How and Whither.