Yes, the symbols of fire, stone and ice have a good load in the system of Christian symbolism. But they have - in it! - and negative comprehension. Theosophists, on the other hand, give an apparently un-Christian meaning to these symbols.

The light of Agni Yoga cannot have the same source as the Uncreated Light contemplated by the Orthodox Saints. Otherwise, the spirits would not have knocked on the Orthodox Saints at the Roerichs: "Zealots of the Church and servants of darkness, of course, will not endure the spark of Fohat." (Infinity, 391). Not all "zealots of the Church" are Saints. But all Orthodox Saints are "zealots for the Church." And so spiritualistic informers count them on a par with the "servants of darkness". This means that the "spark of Fohat" and the Holy Spirit of Christianity are antipodes. And it is unseemly for a Christian to identify the rotten light of Lucifer with the radiance of God.

And the stones for Theosophists do not at all signify the firmness of Peter's faith and not the inviolability of Christ as the support of the Church. Stone is dear to them "in the sense of a psychomagnet. Along this path, peoples can expand the sphere of communication with distant stars"[564] The Roerichs' stone is by no means a symbol of loyalty[565], but "a mysterious sacred object"[566], "the teraph of the Brotherhood is the stone of the far-off worlds... The stone contains a certain substance that helps to store vibrations with distant worlds. We keep it in a special room" (Nadnezhnoye, 134). Can such a stone be identified with Christ?

And this cobblestone-"meteorite" serves to communicate with a certain "Cosmic Magnet" located in the constellation of Orion: "The stone is a particle of the Stone that fell from Orion and is now stored in the White Brotherhood"[567] A meteorite sent from Orion fell to Earth in the Himalayas. The place of its fall became Shambhala, and through this meteorite, which fell at the beginning of the history of the earth, Orion supervises the earth's evolution and through the meteorite communicates with the "aliens" disguised as earthlings. Part of the meteorite is sent to different places on earth, where the "mahatmas" want to expand their zone of influence and produce a new "evolutionary push", it is called Cintamani. "That mysterious meteor from the Orion creation, a fragment of which is in her (E.I. Roerich – A.K.) since 1923. "The stone rests on a pillow," the Teacher reported, "which lies on a base of marble and is separated by a circle of metal. There, after the rhythm, we silently saturate the space. The vault lies deep, and the White Brotherhood converges on the galleries for a night vigil."[568] For the Roerichs themselves, this stone is associated with the "mahatmas" and is a powerful energy teraph... So the semantic associations that arise in the Roerichs when they hear about the "Stone" are completely different from those of Christians who comprehend the same word.

Ksenia Grigorievna shows a striking inattention to the mystical Orthodox tradition, which constantly warns that "fire" and "light" in visions can be signs of the most terrible danger. "Satan himself takes the form of an angel of light" (2 Corinthians 11:14). Numerous sayings of the Holy Fathers, warning that fallen spirits can appear in a fiery environment and call themselves by the holiest names, are cited in the works of St. Ignatius Brianchaninov[569]. K. Myalo too hastily identifies the fire of the Gospel with the fire of Agni Yoga. Not all fire and light mentioned in religions comes from the One Source. Otherwise, it would have to be said that the Zoroastrian fire-worshippers are related to the Orthodox hesychasts, and the priests who offered human sacrifices to their god of the Sun, i.e. to the light, were brought to their senses by the same Angels who concelebrate the Orthodox Liturgy.

I am ready to express a judgment that is very easy to verify in practice. I maintain that the rejection of Theosophy by Christians depends on the degree and spirituality of the Christians. The more experienced and prayerful monk Ksenia Myalo shows the Agni Yogi books with records of conversations with spirits, the stricter will be the judgment of this monk. Ksenia Grigorievna, would you try to verify this statement of mine?

If Myalo seriously insists that the symbols she mentioned can only be given a positive load, then what will she achieve in the end? Now, if someone says that this character has an icy heart, this can no longer be regarded as a negative characteristic: after all, Myalo proved that ice in Christian symbolism is the basis of the universe and a symbol of grace... If someone notices the fossilization of someone's soul, then this will also have to be interpreted as a positive assessment, as an indication of "cosmicness" in the light of the recommendations of the Roerich Xenia Myalo.

I reserve the right to speak about the icy cold that binds Roerich's canvases, about the petrification and inhumanity of the world of his paintings, and about the non-divinity of the fire that permeates the books of Agni Yoga. It cannot but be cold in a world in which humanity is proclaimed that it is a "great Orphan."

And therefore I am not surprised that Roerich himself, and not only his paintings, sometimes evoked a feeling of mystical horror. In any case, Baron Meyendorff had the impression that "Roerich's hair turns gray at one glance"[570].

17. NUMBERS ARE BORING, BUT FALSE

Forgive me for the banality, but there are indeed three types of lies: just lies, blatant lies, and... statistics.

So for this, the highest gradation of lies, there was a place in the pro-Roerich book. Its publishers turned to statistics, considering the preface to Mialo's book a convenient place to advertise their other products.

We read: "In an attempt to prove the anti-Christian character of Agni Yoga, Deacon Kuraev stated that in the course of reading the books of the Teaching, he "began to be struck by the absence of certain words that are key to any Christian reflection. In the entire multi-volume book of the Living Ethics, there are no such words as sin, repentance, redemption, grace, God. This means that these are texts born of non-Christian spirituality." The creative team of the publishing house "Belovodye" has recently prepared and published the last, third volume of the "Symphony of Agni Yoga", where the number of all words and concepts related to various topics, including the topic of religion, was counted. Strict numbers testify to the incorrectness (this is the mildest characteristic) of the deacon's words: the word "sin" is mentioned in 2 paragraphs, "repentance" (repentance) in 4 paragraphs, "redemption" in 12 paragraphs, "grace" in 77 paragraphs, "God" in 63 paragraphs. In addition, in 74 paragraphs of the Teaching there is the word "Creator", in 124 paragraphs the word "prayer", in 68 paragraphs – "soul", in 63 paragraphs – "Christ". In general, Christian terminology is more frequent than Hindu and Buddhist. Deacon Kuraev tried more than once to assert that the Teaching and the Roerichs often resort to lies in order to disguise their true intentions. Then what is Kuraev masking in his "non-false" passage about the absence of key Christian words in the Teaching? And there are a great many such frank "disguises" in Kuraev's writings by various authors who polemicize with him" (pp. 30-31).