Mahatmas can travel in their inner or astral body, preserve full command of all their intelligence, and condense their “phantom” form into visibility or dissolve it into invisibility. But They are not accident-proof for They are living men in living bodies. Their Mayavi-Rupa is furnished by the Auric Egg. At death, Their apparitional or astral body becomes as solid and tangible as was the late physical body. – When the body of an Adept is entirely at the command of the Inner Man, – When the Spiritual Self is completely reunited with its seventh principle even during the lifetime of the personality, — When the Astral Man or Personal Self has become so purified that he has gradually assimilated all the qualities and attributes of the middle nature (Buddhi and Manas in their terrestrial aspect), Then it can be said that the material lower self substitutes itself for the spiritual Higher Self, and is thenceforth capable of living an independent life on earth. Mahatmas are able to desert their bodies, which live on from that point until the day of death of the body entirely devoid of a soul. But the influence of the Adept on the atoms, and consequently on all new physical atoms coming into the form, is such that no evil influence enters and the life led by that body is harmless and often actively good. There are two types of voluntary and conscious incarnations: those of Nirmanakayas, and those undertaken by the probationary chelas who are on trial.

List of Illustrations The Masters Foreword Acknowledgments Introduction: The Masters and the Myth Part One. Adepts Prince Pavel Dolgorukii Prince Aleksandr Golitsyn Albert Rawson Paolos Metamon Agardi Metrovitch Giuseppe Mazzini Louis Maximilien Bimstein Jamal ad-Din "al-Afghani" James Sanua Lydia Pashkov Ooton Liatto Marie, Countess of Caithness Sir Richard Burton Abdelkader Raphael Borg James Peebles Charles Sotheran Mikhail Katkov Illustrations Part Two. Mahatmas Swami Dayananda Sarasvati Shyamaji Krishnavarma Maharaja Ranbir Singh of Kashmir Thakar Singh Sandhanwalia Maharaja Holkar of Indore Bhai Gurmukh Singh Baba Khem Singh Bedi Surendranath Banerjea Dayal Singh Majithia Sumangala Unnanse Sarat Chandra Das Ugyen Gyatso Sengchen Tulku Swami Sankaracharya of Mysore Part Three. Secret Messages Suspicion on Three Continents An Urgent Warning to the Viceroy Who Inspired Hume? The Occult Imprisonment Notes Bibliography Index

World traveler and student of religions, Blavatsky was among the first to bring Eastern wisdom to the West. Her writings excited such luminaries as W.B. Yeats, James Joyce, Wassily Kandinsky, Piet Mondrian, and Gustav Mahler. Here are first-handed accounts of her colorful life by family, friends, and enemies.

The life and times of Helena Blavatsky, the controversial religious guru who cofounded the Theosophical Society and kick-started the New Age movement. Recklessly brilliant, Helena Petrovna Blavatsky scandalized her 19th century world with a controversial new religion that tried to synthesize Eastern and Western philosophies. If her contemporaries saw her as a freak, a charlatan, and a snake oil salesman, she viewed herself as a special person born for great things. She firmly believed that it was her destiny to enlighten the world. Rebelliously breaking conventions, she was the antithesis of a pious religious leader. She cursed, smoked, overate, and needed to airbrush out certain inconvenient facts, like husbands, lovers, and a child. Marion Meade digs deep into Madame Blavatsky’s life from her birth in Russia among the aristocracy to a penniless exile in Europe, across the Atlantic to New York where she became the first Russian woman naturalized as an American citizen, and finally moving on to India where she established the international headquarters of the Theosophical Society in 1882. As she chased from continent to continent, she left in her aftermath a trail of enthralled followers and the ideas of Theosophy that endure to this day. While dismissed as a female messiah, her efforts laid the groundwork for the New Age movement, which sought to reconcile Eastern traditions with Western occultism. Her teachings entered the mainstream by creating new respect for the cultures and religions of the East—for Buddhism and Hinduism—and interest in meditation, yoga, gurus, and reincarnation. Madame Blavatsky was one of a kind. Here is her richly bizarre story told with compassion, insight, and an attempt to plumb the truth behind those astonishing accomplishments.

Chronicles the life of the cofounder of the Theosophical Society, examining her legacy and the controversy surrounding her.