Tuesday, April 25, 2017

Through the Curtain

Dr. Shafica Karagulla (1914-1986) was a well known psychiatrist and medical doctor  with a vast research background in many countries.  Early in her professional career  she had made an in depth study of hallucinations reported by patients with temporal lobe epilepsy. In the introduction to the remarkable book Through the Curtain she writes that ”the research had led me to believe that all of man´s experiences were limited to the physical brain and the five senses”.  Karagulla had since 1930 been a close friend of Viola Petitt Neal, poet, writer and student of the Esoteric Tradition. Neal had obtained a doctorate of Philosophy (Ph.D.) from London University writing a thesis on the secret religions of the Middle East.



In 1956 Viola Petitt Neal challenged the skeptical Shafica Karagulla to read books by Helena P. Blavatsky, Alice Bailey and Edgar Cayce. ”But how was one to classify such experiences, for they were not included in my training?”, comments Karagulla. Neal further revealed to her friend that she had for many years been in contact with one of the adepts (Masters) or Planetary Guardians (Spiritual Hierachy) of our planet. Neal regularly attended what she called Night Classes by various adepts.
Karagulla is stunned by this confidential disclosure and as a researcher of the human mind ask for some verification of Neal´s experiences. As a test Karagulla is allowed to question Neal during sleep when she is attending night classes and also to tape record the sessions: ”The following morning I would try to see if she could recall the class which I had taped the night before. To my utter amazement she was able to recall the lecture which she had attended while asleep, almost verbatim, as the tape confirmed.” This research and documentation  went on secretly for twenty years and the result was published in Through the Curtain, published in 1983. After the death of Viola Petitt Neal in 1981 Shafica Karagulla was permitted to reveal the secret life of her friend. A Swedish edition of Through the Curtain, Nattlektioner, was published in 1992 by esotericist Lars Adelskogh.


Information on night classes was given by the Tibetan adept D.K. in the first volume published by Alice Bailey, Initiation Human and Solar (1922): ”Classes are held by initiates of the first and second degrees for accepted disciples and those on probation, between the hours of ten and five every night in all parts of the world… They gather in the Hall of Learning and the method is much the same as in the big Universities, - classes at certain hours, experimental work, examinations, and a gradual moving up and onward as the tests are passed.” (64-65) ”Disciples are taught in groups in the Masters´s ashram, or classroom, at night, if in incarnation.” (p. 69)

The night classes published in Through the Curtain were recorded between 1960-1980. The lessons cover a wide range of subjects but are divided into ten main headings such as extrasensory perception, science, education in the future, crystals, planetary types. The teaching presented is generally in accordance with information published by Helena Blavatsky, Alice Bailey and Henry T. Laurency. But there is some new and controversial data on extraterrestrial visitors that I have not found in other esoteric sources.

On May 11, 1962 Viola Petitt Neal is informed in a night class that ”Very definitely, there are space people who come and go on your planet.  Some of these are very constructive, as those from Mars and Venus. Some are destructive.” (p. 280) In several chapters details are given about a group of evil and destructive space people originating from Pluto: ”During the fifth sub-race (Atlantis-HB), Plutonians came en masse and invaded the planet earth… (p. 235) The Plutonian invasion was both by a type of spaceship and by simply incarnating in this human life wave on the planet… (p. 242) ”The Planet Pluto, the invader planet, eighth sphere, within our solar system, constitutes an integrated and hard core of evil… (p. 231) ”Plutonians came to the planet earth to invade and exploit and take over.” (p.233).

To my knowledge this detailed information about Pluto and Plutonians has never been mentioned in any of the classic books on esotericism. The Tibetan D.K. only says that ”The destructive power of the first ray, focussed in Pluto, brings change, darkness and death.” (Bailey, Esoteric Astrology, p. 187). In UFO contactee literature we find a few references to Pluto. In My Contact With Flying Saucers, the controversial Brazilian contactee Dino Kraspedon (Aladino Felix) is told regarding space people from Pluto that ”… they are dangerous beings, and any instances of saucers doing harm to people on Earth can be attributed to them”. (p. 191) Riley Crabb, director of Borderland Sciences Research Foundation (BSRF) 1959-1985 often in his comments on various contactee issues referred to ”the Men in Black, Plutoids from the Mafia of the Solar System”. (The Journal of Borderland Research, vol. 27, no. 3, May-June 1971 p. 5) Afficionados of the supernatural in horror fiction may also have noticed that H.P. Lovecraft in his novel The Whisperer in Darkness, published in 1931, mention non-human extraterrestrial invaders from Pluto, called Yuggoth by Lovecraft. If we accept this information the contact claims of Kelvin Rowe become dubious. As I noted in my former blog entry Rowe said one of his space contacts came from Pluto. If you are an esotericist the only way to deal with conflicting statements like these is to use discrimination and an open mind. As UFO investigator the interesting if true attitude is the best.

There is some very interesting information about Shafica Karagulla in Ingo Swann´s autobiography Remote viewing. The Real Story. An Autobiographical memoir (1996). Karagulla became sort of a spiritual mentor to Swann as described in chapter 40: ”You see, Shafia was to become one of my three major advisors regarding international affairs of the type that never get mentioned in the media, science, academe, or mentioned even by conspiracy enthusiasts… She also knew about how almost all of the world´s intelligence agencies operated – those agencies known to exist, AND those which exist but are not known or even admitted to by anyone and don´t even have names.”

Karagulla´s knowledge and advice was certainly welcome to Swann as he in 1975-1977 became involved with a secret intelligence organization described as the Axelrod incident. The story of how Swann helped this group with remote viewing is told in his book Penetration. The Question of Extraterrestrial and Human Telepathy (1998). Mr. Axelrod confirmed to Swann that his organization was aware of and were trying to deal with extraterrestrial intruders in their own way: ”Well, I guess you guys, whoever you are, have a problem, and from all I can tell, Earth in under some kind of siege. UFOs appear everywhere, are seen by thousands. Yet they are illusive, but of concern, so you are trying to fit the pieces together. And I would suppose too, that you are desperate, enough at least to try to employ psychics to help you out.
You see, Axel laughed. I don´t have to tell you anything, do I”.


Ingo Swann had, together with two intelligence operatives, observed a very unusual woman in a Hollywood supermarket. His psychic sensitivity indicated that this woman was an ET and dangerous. At a dinner later with Shafica Karagulla and Viola Petitt Neal the discussion entered the problem of ET groups infiltrating Earth. Without Swann mentioning the Axelrod incident he got these comments:
”Viola: There are a lot of THEM, you know, and many are bio-androids.
Shafica: They´re dangerous, you know, and they realize that Earth psychics are their only enenies. Be careful, Ingo, be careful”

This information can be compared with what John Keel wrote in a confidential letter to Jim and Coral Lorenzen July 18, 1967. It was during this time Keel became involved with and personally encountered the Men In Black: ”The people I am concerned with are Androids… manufactured entities controlled by a distant and unknown master.. They are not composed of living cells as we are, and do not grow old… MIB represent a very large terrestrial group who are allied with a very hostile UFO group… There are people in government who know about these things. I have their names and know what is going on… this is not a scientific or military problem… There is no need for the public to know everything”.

I do have some sympathy for the scientific, mainstream ufologists who shun away from this kind of research and data and year after year struggle on with ordinary UFO observations. Playing on the safe side so to speak. But my 40+ years involvement with the UFO enigma has made me aware of that you must dare to knock on some doors usually not even recognized by mainstream scientists and academics. That´s why I admire heretic and iconoclastic investigators like Jacques Vallee, John Keel, Riley Crabb or Ingo Swann, to name a few.

Entering the mirror world of intelligence organizations, conspiracies and esotericism is not for everyone. And once there you may wish to go back to the safe world of everyday reality. In this respect I am reminded of a fascinating quote from Norman Mailer´s famous novel An American Dream: ” I decided the only explanation is that God and the Devil are very attentive to the people at the summit. I don´t know if they stir much in the average man´s daily stew, no great sport for spooks, I would suppose… There´s nothing but magic at the top. It´s the little secret a few of us keep to ourselves, but that, my friend, is one reason it´s not very easy to get to the very top. Because you have to be ready to deal with One or the Other, and that´s too much for the average good man on his way. Sooner or later, he decides to be mediocre, and put up with the middle.” (An American Dream, The Dial Press, New York 1965, p. 246).