Theos-Talk Archives (February 1996 Message tl00016)

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STANZA IV. - The Septenary Hierarchies

COMMENTARY.

1. LISTEN, YE SONS OF THE EARTH, TO YOUR INSTRUCTORS - THE SONS
OF THE FIRE (a). LEARN THERE IS NEITHER FIRST NOR LAST; FOR ALL
IS ONE NUMBER, ISSUED FROM NO NUMBER (b).

(a) These terms, the "Sons of the Fire," the "Sons of the
Fire-Mist," and the like, require explanation. They are
connected with a great primordial and universal mystery, and it
is not easy to make it clear. There is a passage in the
_Bhagavatgita_ (ch.  viii.) wherein Krishna, speaking
symbolically and _esoterically_, says:

"I will state the times (conditions) - at which devotees
departing (from this life) do so never to return (be reborn), or
to return (to incarnate again). The Fire, the Flame, the day,
the bright (lucky) fortnight, the six months of the Northern
solstice, departing (dying) in these, those who know the Brahman
(Yogis) go to the Brahman. Smoke, night, the dark (unlucky)
fortnight, the six months of the Southern solstice, (dying) in
these, the devotee goes to the lunar light (or mansion, the
astral light also) and returns (is reborn). These two paths,
bright and dark, are said to be eternal in this world (or great
kalpa, `Age'). By the one a man goes never to come back, by the
other he returns."

Now these names, "Fire," "Flame," "Day," the "bright fortnight,"
etc., as "Smoke," "Night," and so on, leading only to the end of
the lunar path are incomprehensible without a knowledge of
Esotericism. These are _all names of various deities_ which
preside over the Cosmo-psychic Powers. We often speak of the
Hierarchy of "Flames" (see Book II.), of the "Sons of Fire,"
etc.  Sankaracharya the greatest of the Esoteric masters of
India, says that _fire_ means a deity which presides over Time
(kala). The able translator of Bhagavatgita, Kashinath Trimbak
Telang, M.A., of Bombay, confesses he has "no clear notion of
the meaning of these verses" (p. 81, footnote). It seems quite
clear, on the contrary, to him who knows the occult doctrine.
With these verses the mystic sense of the solar and lunar
symbols are connected: the Pitris are _lunar_ deities and our
ancestors, because they _created the physical man_. The
Agnishwatha, the Kumara (the seven mystic sages), are solar
deities, though the former are Pitris also; and these are the
"fashioners of the _Inner_ Man." (see Book II.) They are: -

"The Sons of Fire" - because they are the first Beings (in the
Secret Doctrine they are called "Minds"), evolved from
Primordial Fire. "The Lord is a consuming Fire" (Deuteronomy iv.
24); "The Lord (Christos) shall be revealed with his mighty
angels in flaming fire" (2 Thessal. i. 7, 8). The Holy Ghost
descended on the Apostles like "cloven tongues of fire," (Acts
ii. v. 3); Vishnu will return on _Kalki_, the White Horse, as
the last Avatar amid fire and flames; and _Sosiosh_ will be
brought down equally on a White Horse in a "tornado of fire."
"And I saw heaven open and behold a white horse, and he that sat
upon him - is called the Word of God," (Rev. xix. 13) amid
flaming Fire.  Fire is Aether in its purest form, and hence is
not regarded as matter, but it is the unity of Aether - the
second manifested deity - in its universality. But there are two
"Fires" and a distinction is made between them in the Occult
teachings. The first, or the purely _Formless_ and _invisible_
Fire concealed in the _Central Spiritual Sun_, is spoken of as
"triple" (metaphysically); while the Fire of the manifested
Kosmos is Septenary, throughout both the Universe and our Solar
System.  "The fire or knowledge burns up all action on the plane
of illusion," says the commentary. "Therefore, those who have
acquired it and are emancipated, are called `Fires.'" Speaking
of the _seven_ senses symbolised as _Hotris,_ priests, the
Brahmana says in _Anugita_: "Thus these _seven_ (senses, smell
and taste, and colour, and sound, etc., etc.) are the causes of
emancipation;" and the commentator adds:

"It is from these seven from which the Self is to be
emancipated. `I' (am here devoid of qualities) must mean the
Self, not the Brahmana who speaks." ("_Sacred Books of the
East_," ed. by Max Muller, Vol. VIII., 278.)

(b) The expression "All is One Number, issued from No Number"
relates again to that universal and philosophical tenet just
explained in Stanza III. (Comm. 4). That which is absolute is of
course No Number; but in its later significance it has an
application in Space as in Time. It means that not only every
increment of time is part of a larger increment, up to the most
indefinitely prolonged duration conceivable by the human
intellect, but also that no manifested thing can be thought of
except as part of a larger whole: the total aggregate being the
One manifested Universe that issues from the unmanifested or
Absolute - called Non-Being or "No-Number," to distinguish it
from BEING or "the One Number."

STANZA IV. - Continued.

(2) LEARN WHAT WE, WHO DESCEND FROM THE PRIMORDIAL SEVEN, WE,
WHO ARE BORN FROM THE PRIMORDIAL FLAME, HAVE LEARNED FROM OUR
FATHERS (a).

(a) This is explained in Book II., and this name, "Primordi- al
Flame," corroborates what is said in the first paragraph of the
preceding commentary on Stanza IV.

The distinction between the "Primordial" and the subsequent
seven Builders is this: The former are the Ray and direct
emanation of the first "Sacred Four," the _Tetraktis_, that is,
the eternally Self-Existent One (Eternal _in Essence_ note well,
not in manifestation, and distinct from the universal ONE).
Latent, during Pralaya, and active, during Manvantara, the
"Primordial" proceed from "Father-Mother" (Spirit-Hyle, or
_Ilus_; whereas the other manifested Quaternary and the Seven
proceed from the Mother alone. It is the latter who is the
immaculate Virgin-Mother, who is overshadowed, not impregnated,
by the Universal MYSTERY - when she emerges from her state of
Laya or undifferentiated condition. In reality, they are, of
course, all one; but their aspects on the various planes of
being are different. (See Part II., "Theogony of the Creative
Gods.")

The first "Primordial" are the highest Beings on the Scale of
Existence. They are the Archangels of Christianity, those who
refuse - as Michael did in the latter system, and as did the
eldest "Mind-born sons" of Brahma (Veddhas) - to create or
rather to multiply.

STANZA IV. - Continued.

3. FROM THE EFFULGENCY OF LIGHT - THE RAY OF THE EVER- DARKNESS
- SPRUNG IN SPACE THE RE-AWAKENED ENERGIES _(Dhyan Chohans)_:
THE ONE FROM THE EGG, THE SIX AND THE FIVE (a); THEN THE THREE,
THE ONE, THE FOUR, THE ONE, THE FIVE - THE TWICE SEVEN, THE SUM
TOTAL (b). AND THESE ARE: THE ESSENCES, THE FLAMES, THE
ELEMENTS, THE BUILDERS, THE NUMBERS, THE ARUPA _(formless)_, THE
RUPA _(with bodies)_, AND THE FORCE OR DIVINE MAN - THE SUM
TOTAL. AND FROM THE DIVINE MAN EMANATED THE FORMS, THE SPARKS,
THE SACRED ANIMALS, AND THE MESSENGERS OF THE SACRED FATHERS
_(the Pitris)_ WITHIN THE HOLY FOUR. - {The 4, represent- ed in
the Occult numerals by the Tetraktis, the Sacred or Perfect
Square, is a Sacred Number with the mystics of every nation and
race. It has one and the same significance in Brahmanism,
Buddhism, the Kabala and in the Egyptian, Chaldean and other
numerical systems.}

(a) This relates to the sacred Science of the Numerals: so
sacred, indeed, and so important in the study of Occultism that
the subject can hardly be skimmed, even in such a large work as
the present. It is on the Hierarchies and correct numbers of
these Beings invisible (to us) except upon very rare occasions,
that the mystery of the whole Universe is built. The _Kumaras_,
for instance, are called the "Four" though in reality seven in
number, because Sanaka, Sananda, Sanatana and Sanat-Kumara are
the chief Vaidhatra (their patronymic name), as they spring from
the "four-fold mystery." To make the whole clearer we have to
turn for our illustrations to tenets more familiar to some of
our readers, namely, the Brahminical.

According to Manu, Hiranyagarbha is Brahma _the first male_
formed by the undiscernible Causeless CAUSE in a "Golden Egg
resplendent as the Sun," as states the Hindu Classical Dictio-
nary. "Hiranyagarbha" - means the golden, or rather the "Efful-
gent Womb" or Egg. The meaning tallies awkwardly with the
epithet of "male." Surely the esoteric meaning of the sentence
is clear enough. In the Rig Veda it is said: - "THAT, the one
Lord of all beings - the one animating principle of gods and
man," arose, in the beginning, in the Golden Womb, Hiranyagarbha
- which is the Mundane Egg or sphere of our Universe. That Being
is surely androgynous, and the allegory of Brahma separating
into two and recreating in one of his halves (the female Vach)
himself as Viraj, is a proof of it.

"The One from the Egg, the Six and the Five," give the number
1065, the value of the first-born (later on the male and female
Brahma-Prajapati), who answers to the numbers 7, and 14, and 21
respectively. The Prajapati are, like the Sephiroth, only seven,
including the synthetic Sephira of the triad from which they
spring. Thus from Hiranyagarbha or Prajapati, the _triune_
(primeval Vedic Trimurti, Agni, Vayu, and Surya), emanate the
other seven, or again ten, if we separate the first three which
exist in one, and one in three, all, moreover, being
comprehended within that one "supreme" Parama, called Guhya or
"secret," and Sarvatma, the "Super-Soul." "The seven Lords of
Being lie concealed in Sarvatma like thoughts in one brain." So
are the Sephiroth. It is either seven when counting from the
upper Triad headed by Kether, or ten - exoterically. In the
Mahabharata the Prajapati are 21 in number, or ten, six, and
five (1065), thrice seven. - (In the Kabala the same numbers are
a value of Jehovah, viz., 1065, since the numerical values of
the three letters which compose his name - Jod, Vau and twice He
- are respectively 10, 6 and 5; or again thrice seven, 21. "Ten
is the Mother of the Soul, for Life and Light are therein
united," says Hermes. "For number one is born of the Spirit and
the number ten from matter (chaos, feminine); the unity has made
the ten, the ten the unity" _(Book of the Keys_). "By the means
of the Temura, the anagrammatical method of the Kabala, and the
knowledge of 1065 (21), a universal science may be obtained
regarding Kosmos and its mysteries" (Rabbi Yogel). The Rabbis
regard the numbers 10, 6, and 5 as the most sacred of all.}

(b) "The Three, the One, the Four, the One, the Five" (in their
totality - twice seven) represent 31415 - the numerical
hierarchy of the Dhyan-Chohans of various orders, and of the
inner or circumscribed world. - {The reader may be told that an
American Kabalist has now discovered the same number for the
Elohim. It came to the Jews from Chaldaea. See "Hebrew
Metrology" in the Masonic Review, July, 1885, McMillan Lodge,
No. 141.} - When placed on the boundary of the great circle of
"Pass not" (see Stanza V.), called also the Dhyanipasa, the
"rope of the Angels," the "rope" that hedges off the phenomenal
from the noumenal Kosmos, (not falling within the range of our
present objective consciousness); this number, when not enlarged
by permutation and expansion, is ever 31415 anagrammatically and
Kabalistically, being both the number of the circle and the
mystic Svastica, the twice seven once more; for whatever way the
two sets of figures are counted, when added separately, one
figure after another, whether crossways, from right or from
left, they will always yield fourteen. Mathematically they
represent the well-known calculation, namely, that the ratio of
the diameter to the circumference of a circle is as 1 to 3.1415,
or the value of the _pi_, as this ratio is called - the symbol
being always used in mathematical formulae to express it. This
set of figures must have the same meaning, since the 1 :
314,159, and then again 1 : 3 : 1,415,927 are worked out in the
secret calculations to express the various cycles and ages of
the "first born," or 311,040,000,000,000 with fractions, and
yield the same 13,415 by a process we are not concerned with at
present. And it may be shown that Mr. Ralston Skinner, author of
_The Source of Measures_, reads the Hebrew word Alhim in the
same number values, by omitting, as said, the ciphers and by
permutation - 13,514: since Aleph (a) is 1: Lamed (l) is 3 (or
30); Heh (h) is 5; Yod (i) 1 for 10; and Mem (m) is 4 (40), and
anagrammatically - 31,415 as explained by him.

Thus, while in the metaphysical world, the circle with the one
central Point in it has no number, and is called Anupadaka
(parentless and numberless) - viz., it can fall under no
calculation, - in the manifested world the mundane Egg or Circle
is circumscribed within the groups called the Line, the
Triangle, the Pentacle, the second Line and the Cube (or 13514);
and when the Point having generated a Line, thus becomes a
diameter which stands for the androgynous Logos, then the
figures become 31415, or a triangle, a line, a cube, the second
line, and a pentacle.  "When the Son separates from the Mother
he becomes the Father," the diameter standing for Nature, or the
feminine principle.  Therefore it is said: "In the world of
being, the one Point fructifies the Line - the Virgin Matrix of
Kosmos (the egg-shaped zero) - and the immaculate Mother gives
birth to the form that combines all forms." Prajapati is called
the first procreating male, and "his Mother's husband." - {We
find the same expression in Egypt. Mout signifies, for one
thing, "Mother," and shows the character assigned to her in the
triad of that country. She was no less the mother than the wife
of Ammon, one of the principle titles of the god being "the
husband of his mother." The goddess Mout, or Mut, is addressed
as "our lady," the "queen of Heaven" and of "the Earth," thus
"sharing these titles with the other mother goddesses, Isis,
Hathor, etc." (Maspero).} - This gives the key-note to all the
later divine sons from immaculate mothers. It is greatly
corroborated by the significant fact that Anna (the name of the
Mother of the Virgin Mary) now represented by the Roman Catholic
church as having given birth to her daughter in an immaculate
way ("Mary conceived without sin"), is derived from the Chaldean
Ana, heaven, or Astral Light, Anima Mundi; whence Anaitia,
Devi-durga, the wife of Siva, is also called Annapurna, and
Kanya, the Virgin; "Uma-Kanya" being her esoteric name, and
meaning the "Virgin of light," Astral Light in one of its
multitudinous aspects.

(c) The Devas, Pitris, Rishis; the Suras and the Asuras; the
Daityas and Adityas; the Danavas ana Gandharvas, etc., etc.,
have all their synonyms in our Secret Doctrine, as well as in
the Kabala and the Hebrew Angelology; but it is useless to give
their ancient names, as it would only create confusion. Many of
these may be also found now, even in the Christian hierarchy of
divine and celestial powers. All those Thrones and Dominions,
Virtues and Principalities, Cherubs, Seraphs and demons, the
various denizens of the Sidereal World, are the modern copies of
archaic prototypes. The very symbolism in their names, when
transliterat- ed and arranged in Greek and Latin, are sufficient
to show it, as will be proved in several cases further on.

The "Sacred Animals" are found in the Bible as well as in the
Kabala, and they have their meaning (a very profound one, too)
on the page of the origins of Life. In the Sepher Jezirah it is
stated that "God engraved in the Holy Four the throne of his
glory, the Ophanim (Wheels or the World-Spheres), the Seraphim,
- (This is the literal translation from the IXth and Xth
Sections: "Ten numbers without what? One: the spirit of the
living God - who liveth in eternities! Voice and Spirit and
Word, and this is the Holy Spirit. Two: Spirit out of Spirit. He
designed and hewed therewith twenty-two letters of foundation,
three Mothers and seven double and Twelve single, and one spirit
out of them. Three: Water out of spirit; he designed and hewed
with them the barren and the void, mud and earth. He designed
them as a flowerbed, hewed them as a wall, covered them as a
paving. Four: Fire out of water. He designed and hewed therewith
the throne of glory and the wheels, and the seraphim and the
holy animals and the ministering angels, and of the three He
founded his dwelling, as it is said, He makes his angels spirits
and his servants fiery flames!" Which words "founded his
dwelling" show clearly that in the Kabala, as in India, the
Deity was considered as the Universe, and was not, in his
origin, the extra-cosmic God he is now.} - the Sacred Animals,
and the ministering angels, and from these three (the Air,
Water, and Fire or Ether) he formed his habitation." Thus was
the world made "through three Seraphim - Sepher, Saphar, and
Sipur," or "through Number, Numbers, and Numbered." With the
astronomical key these "Sacred Animals" become the signs of the
Zodiac.

STANZA IV. - Continued.

4. THIS WAS THE ARMY OF THE VOICE - THE DIVINE SEPTENARY.  THE
SPARKS OF THE SEVEN ARE SUBJECT TO, AND THE SERVANTS OF, THE
FIRST, SECOND, THIRD, FOURTH, FIFTH, SIXTH, AND THE SEVENTH OF
THE SEVEN (a). THESE _("sparks")_ ARE CALLED SPHERES, TRIANGLES,
CUBES, LINES, AND MODELLERS; FOR THUS STANDS THE ETERNAL NIDANA
- THE OI-HA-HOU _(the permutation of Oeaohoo)_ (b). - {The
literal signification of the word is, among the Eastern
Occultists of the North, a circular wind, whirlwind; but in this
instance, it is a term to denote the ceaseless and eternal
Cosmic Motion; or rather the Force that moves it, which Force is
tacitly accepted as the Deity but never named. It is the eternal
_Karana_, the ever-acting Cause.} -

(a) This Sloka gives again a brief analysis of the Hierar- chies
of the Dhyan Chohans, called Devas (gods) in India, or the
conscious intelligent powers in Nature. To this Hierarchy
correspond the actual types into which humanity may be divided;
for humanity, as a whole, is in reality a materialized though as
yet imperfect expression thereof. The "army of the Voice" is a
term closely connected with the mystery of Sound and Speech, as
an effect and corollary of the cause - Divine Thought. As
beautifully expressed by P. Christian, the learned author of
"The History of Magic" and of "L'Homme Rouge des Tuileries," the
word spoken by, as well as the name of, every individual largely
determine his future fate. Why? Because -

- "When our Soul (mind) creates or evokes a thought, the
representative sign of that thought is self-engraved upon the
astral fluid, which is the receptacle and, so to say, the mirror
of all the manifestations of being.

"The sign expresses the thing: the thing is the (hidden or
occult) virtue of the sign.

"To pronounce a word is to evoke a thought, and make it present:
the magnetic potency of the human speech is the commencement of
every manifestation in the Occult World. To utter a Name is not
only to define a Being (an Entity), but to place it under and
condemn it through the emission of the Word (Verbum), to the
influence of one or more Occult potencies.  Things are, for
every one of us, that which it (the Word) makes them while
naming them. The Word (Verbum) or the speech of every man is,
quite unconsciously to himself, a BLESSING or a CURSE; this is
why our present ignorance about the properties or attributes of
the IDEA as well as about the attributes and properties of
MATTER, is often fatal to us.

"Yes, names (and words) are either BENEFICENT or MALEFICENT;
they are, in a certain sense, either venomous or health-giving,
according to the hidden influences attached by Supreme Wisdom to
their elements, that is to say, to the LETTERS which compose
them, and the NUMBERS correlative to these letters."

This is strictly true as an esoteric teaching accepted by all
the Eastern Schools of Occultism. In the Sanskrit, as also in
the Hebrew and all other alphabets, every letter has its occult
meaning and its rationale; it is a cause and an effect of a
preceding cause and a combination of these very often produces
the most magical effect. The vowels, especially, contain the
most occult and formidable potencies. The Mantras (esoterically,
magical rather than religious) are chanted by the Brahmins and
so are the Vedas and other Scriptures.

The "Army of the Voice," is the prototype of the "Host of the
Logos," or the "WORD" of the Sepher Jezirah, called in the
Secret Doctrine "the One Number issued from No-Number" - the One
Eternal Principle. The esoteric theogony begins with the One,
manifested, therefore not eternal in its presence and being, if
eternal in its essence; the number of the numbers and numbered -
the latter proceeding from the Voice, the feminine Vach,
Satarupa "of the hundred forms," or Nature. It is from this
number 10, or creative nature, the Mother (the occult cypher, or
"nought," ever procreating and multiplying in union with the
Unit "1," one, or the Spirit of Life), that the whole Universe
proceeded.

In the _Anugita_ a conversation is given (ch. vi., 15) between a
Brahmana and his wife, on the origin of Speech and its occult
properties. - {_Anugita_ forms part of the Asvamedha Parvan of
the "Mahabharata." The translator of the Bhagavatgita, edited by
Max Muller, regards it as a continuation of the Bhagavatgita.
Its original is one of the oldest Upanishads.}

The wife asks how Speech came into existence, and which was
prior to the other, Speech or Mind. The Brahmana tells her that
the Apana _(inspirational breath)_ becoming lord, changes that
intelligence, which does not understand Speech or Words, into
the state of Apana, and thus opens the mind. Thereupon he tells
her a story, a dialogue between Speech and Mind.

"Both went to the Self of Being (i.e., to the individual Higher
Self, as Nilakantha thinks, to Prajapati, according to the
commentator Arjuna Misra), and asked him to destroy their doubts
and decide which of them preceded and was superior to the other.
To this the lord said: `Mind is superior.' But Speech answered
the Self of Being, by saying: `I verily yield (you) your
desires,' meaning that by speech he acquired what he desired.
Thereupon again, the Self told her that there are two minds, the
`movable' and the `immovable.' `The immovable is with me,' he
said, `the movable is in your dominion' (i.e. of Speech) on the
plane of matter. To that you are superior. But inasmuch, O
beautiful one, as you came personally to speak to me (in the way
you did, i.e. proudly), therefore, O, Sarasvati! you shall never
speak after (hard) exhalation."

"The goddess Speech" (Sarasvati, a later form or aspect of Vach,
the goddess also of secret learning or Esoteric Wisdom),

"verily, dwelt always between the Prana and the Apana. But O
noble one! going with the Apana wind (vital air), though
impelled, without the Prana (expirational breath), she ran up to
Prajapati (Brahma), saying, `Be pleased, O venerable sir!' Then
the Prana appeared again, nourishing Speech. And, therefore,
Speech never speaks after (hard or inspirational) exhalation. It
is always noisy or noiseless. Of these two, the noiseless is the
superior to the noisy (Speech). - The (speech) which is produced
in the body by means of the Prana, and which then goes (is
trans- formed) into Apana, and then becoming assimilated with
the Udana (physical organs of Speech) - then finally dwells in
the Samana (`at the navel in the form of sound, as the material
cause of all words,' says Arjuna Misra). So Speech formerly
spoke. Hence the mind is distinguished by reason of its being
immovable, and the Goddess (Speech) by reason of her being
movable."

This allegory is at the root of the Occult law, which prescribes
silence upon the knowledge of certain secret and invisible
things perceptible only to the spiritual mind (the 6th sense),
and which cannot be expressed by "noisy" or uttered speech. This
chapter of _Anugita_ explains, says Arjuna Misra, Pranayama, or
regulation of the breath in Yoga practices. This mode, however,
without the previous acquisition of, or at least full
understanding of the two higher senses, of which there are
seven, as will be shown, pertains rather to the lower Yoga. The
_Hatha_ so called was and still is discountenanced by the
Arhats.  It is injurious to the health and alone can never
develop into Raj Yoga. This story is quoted to show how
inseparably connected are, in the metaphysics of old,
intelligent beings, or rather "Intelligences," with every sense
or function whether physical or mental. The Occult claim that
there are seven senses in man, as in nature, as there are seven
states of consciousness, is corroborated in the same work,
chapter vii., on Pratyahara (the restraint and regulation of the
senses, Pranayama being that of the "vital winds" or breath).
The Brahmana speaks in it "of the institution of the seven
sacrificial Priests (Hotris)." He says:

"The nose and the eyes, and the tongue, and the skin and the ear
as the fifth (or smell, sight, taste, touch and hearing), mind
and understanding are the seven sacrificial priests separately
stationed"; and which "dwelling in a minute space (still) do not
perceive each other" on this sensuous plane, none of them except
mind. For mind says: "The nose smells not without me, the eye
does not take in colour, etc., etc. I am the eternal chief among
all elements (i.e., senses). Without me, the senses never shine,
like an empty dwelling, or like fires the flames of which are
extinct. Without me, all beings, like fuel half dried and half
moist, fail to apprehend qualities or objects even with the
senses exerting themselves." - {This shows the modern
metaphysicians, added to all past and present Hegels, Berkeleys,
Schopenhauers, Hartmanns, Herbert Spencers, and even the modern
Hylo-Idealists to boot, no better than the pale copyists of
hoary antiquity.}

This, of course, with regard only to _mind on the sensuous
plane._ Spiritual mind (the upper portion or aspect of the
_impersonal_ MANAS) takes no cognisance of the senses in
physical man. How well the ancients were acquainted with the
correlation of forces and all the recently discovered phenomena
of mental and physical faculties and functions, with many more
mysteries also - may be found in reading chapters vii. and viii.
of this (in philosophy and mystic learning) priceless work. See
the quarrel of the senses about their respective superiority and
their taking the Brahman, the lord of all creatures, for their
arbiter.

"You are all greatest and not greatest," or superior to objects,
as A. Misra says, none being independent of the other.  "You are
all possessed of one another's qualities. All are greatest in
their own spheres and all support one another. There is one
unmoving (life-wind or breath, the `_Yoga inhalation_,' so
called, which is the breath of the _One_ or Higher SELF). That
is the (or my) own Self, accumulated in numerous (forms)."

This Breath, Voice, Self or "Wind" _(pneuma?)_ is the Synthesis
of the Seven Senses, _noumenally_ all minor deities and
esoterically - the _septenary_ and the "Army of the VOICE."

(b) Next we see Cosmic matter scattering and forming itself into
elements; grouped into the mystic four within the fifth element
- Ether, the lining of Akasa, the Anima Mundi or Mother of
Kosmos. "Dots, Lines, Triangles, Cubes, Circles" and finally
"Spheres" - why or how? Because, says the Commentary, such is
the first law of Nature, and because Nature geometrizes
universally in all her manifestations. There is an inherent law
- not only in the primordial, but also in the manifested matter
of our phenomenal plane - by which Nature correlates her
geometrical forms, and later, also, her compound elements; and
in which there is no place for accident or chance. It is a
fundamental law in Occultism, that there is no rest or cessation
of motion in Nature. - {It is the knowledge of this law that
permits and helps the Arhat to perform his _Siddhis_, or various
phenomena, such as disintegration of matter, the transport of
objects from one place to another.} - That which seems rest is
only the change of one form into another; the change of
substance going hand in hand with that of form - as we are
taught in Occult physics, which thus seem to have anticipated
the discovery of the "Conservation of matter" by a considerable
time. Says the ancient Commentary - {These are ancient
Commentaries attached with modern Glossaries to the Stanzas, as
the Commentaries in their symbolical language are usually as
difficult to understand as the Stanzas them- selves.} - to
Stanza IV.: -

_"The Mother is the fiery Fish of Life. She scatters her spawn
and the Breath (Motion) heats and quickens it. The grains (of
spawn) are soon attracted to each other and form the curds in
the Ocean (of Space). The larger lumps coalesce and receive new
spawn - in fiery dots, triangles and cubes, which ripen, and at
the appointed time some of the lumps detach themselves and
assume spheroidal form, a process which they effect only when
not interfered with by the others. After which, law No. * * *
comes into operation. Motion (the Breath) becomes the whirlwind
and sets them into rotation." - {In a polemical scientific work,
"The Modern Genesis," the author, the Rev. W. B. Slaughter,
criticising the position assumed by the astronomers, asks:

"It is to be regretted that the advocates of this (nebular)
theory have not entered more largely into the discussion of it
(the beginning of rotation). No one condescends to give us the
rationale of it. How does the process of cooling and contracting
the mass impart to it a rotatory motion?"

The question is amply treated in the Addendum. It is not
materialistic science that can ever solve it. "Motion is eternal
in the unmanifested, and periodical in the manifest," says an
Occult teaching. It is "when heat caused by the descent of FLAME
into primordial matter causes its particles to move, which
motion becomes Whirlwind." A drop of liquid assumes a spheroidal
form owing to its atoms moving around themselves in their
ultimate, unresolvable, and noumenal essence; unresolvable for
physical science, at any rate.}_

STANZA IV. - Continued.

5. - WHICH IS: - "DARKNESS," THE BOUNDLESS OR THE NO-NUMBER,
ADI-NIDANA SVABHAVAT: THE [diag: circle] _(for x, unknown
quantity)_:

I.THE ADI-SANAT, THE NUMBER, FOR HE IS ONE (a).

II.THE VOICE OF THE WORD, SVABHAVAT, THE NUMBERS, FOR HE IS ONE
AND NINE. - {Which makes ten, or the perfect number applied to
the "Creator," the name given to the totality of the Creators
blended by the Monotheists into One, as the "Elohim," Adam Kadmon
or Sephira - the Crown-  are the androgyne synthesis of the 10
Sephiroth, who stand for the symbol of the manifested Universe
in the popularised Kabala. The esoteric Kabalists, however,
following the Eastern Occultists, divide the upper Sephirothal
triangle from the rest (or Sephira, Chochmah and Binah), which
leaves seven Sephiroth. As for Svabhavat, the Orientalists
explain the term as meaning the Universal plastic matter diffused
through Space, with, perhaps, half an eye to the Ether of
Science. But the Occultists identify it with "FATHER-MOTHER" on
the mystic plane. (Vide supra.)}

III.THE "FORMLESS SQUARE." _(Arupa.)_ (b).
     AND THESE THREE ENCLOSED WITHIN THE [diag: circle] _(bound-
less circle)_, ARE THE SACRED FOUR, AND THE TEN ARE THE ARUPA
_(subjective, formless)_ UNIVERSE (c); THEN COME THE "SONS," THE
SEVEN FIGHTERS, THE ONE, THE EIGHT LEFT OUT, AND HIS BREATH WHICH
IS THE LIGHT-MAKER _(Bhaskara)_ (d).

(a) "Adi-Sanat," translated literally is the First or "primeval"
ancient, which name identifies the Kabalistic "Ancient of Days"
and the "Holy Aged" (Sephira and Adam Kadmon) with Brahma the
Creator, called also _Sanat_ among his other names and titles.

Svabhavat is the mystic Essence, the plastic root of physical
Nature - "Numbers" when manifested; the Number, in its Unity of
Substance, on the highest plane. The name is of Buddhist use and
a synonym for the four-fold Anima Mundi, the Kabalistic
"Archetypal World," from whence proceed the "Creative,
Formative, and the Material Worlds"; the Scintillae or Sparks, -
the various other worlds contained in the last three. The Worlds
are all subject to Rulers or Regents - Rishis and Pitris with
the Hindus, Angels with the Jews and Christians, Gods, with the
Ancients in general.

(b) [diag: circle]: This means that the "Boundless Circle"
(Zero) becomes a figure or number, only when one of the nine
figures precedes it, and thus manifests its value and potency,
the Word or Logos in union with VOICE and Spirit - {"In union
with the Spirit and the Voice," referring to the Abstract
Thought and concrete Voice, or the manifestation thereof, the
effect of the Cause. Adam Kadmon or Tetragrammaton is the Logos
in the Kabala; therefore this triad answers in the latter to the
highest triangle of Kether, Chochmah and Binah, the last a
female potency and at the same time the male Jehovah, as
partaking of the nature of Chochmah, or the male Wisdom.} - (the
expression and source of Consciousness) standing for the nine
figures and thus forming, with the Cypher, the Decade which
contains in itself all the Universe. The triad forms within the
circle the Tetraktis or Sacred Four, the Square within the
Circle being the most potent of all the magical figures.

(c) The "One Rejected" is the Sun of our system. The exoteric
version may be found in the oldest Sanskrit Scriptures.  In the
Rig Veda, Aditi, "The Boundless" or infinite Space, translated
by Mr. Max Muller, "the visible infinite, visible by the naked
eye (!!); the endless expanse beyond the Earth, beyond the
clouds, beyond the sky," is the equivalent of "Mother-Space"
coeval with "Darkness." She is very properly called "The Mother
of the Gods," DEVA-MATRI, as it is from her Cosmic matrix that
all the heavenly bodies of our system were born - Sun and
Planets. Thus she is described, allegorically, in this wise:

"Eight Sons were born from the body of Aditi; she approached the
gods with seven, but cast away the eighth, Marttanda," our sun.
The seven sons called the Aditya are, cosmically or
astronomical- ly, the seven planets; and the Sun being excluded
from their number shows plainly that the Hindus may have known,
and in fact knew of a seventh planet, without calling it Uranus.
- {The Secret Doctrine teaches that the Sun is a central Star
and not a planet. Yet the Ancients knew of and worshipped seven
great gods, excluding the Sun and Earth. Which was that "Mystery
God" they set apart? Of course not Uranus, discovered only by
Herschel in 1781. But could it not be known by another name?
Says the author of "Maconnerie Occulte":

"Occult Sciences having discovered through astronomical
calculations that the number of the planets must be seven, the
ancients were led to introduce the Sun into the scale of the
celestial harmonies, and make him occupy the vacant place. Thus,
every time they perceived an influence that pertained to none of
the six planets known, they attributed it to the Sun. The error
only seems important, but was not so in practical results, if
the ancient astrologers replaced Uranus by the Sun, which is a
central Star relatively motionless, turning only on its axis and
regulating time and measure; and which cannot be turned aside
from its true functions. - The nomenclature of the days of the
week is thus faulty. "The Sun-Day ought to be Uranus-day (Urani
dies, Urandi)," adds the learned writer, Ragon.} - But esoteri-
cally and theologically, so to say, the Adityas are, in their
primitive most ancient meanings, the eight, and the twelve great
gods of the Hindu Pantheon. "The Seven allow the mortals to see
their dwellings, but show themselves only to the Arhats," says
an old proverb, "their dwellings" standing here for planets. The
ancient Commentary gives an allegory and explains it: -

_"Eight houses were built by Mother. Eight houses for her Eight
Divine sons; four large and four small ones. Eight brilliant
suns, according to their age and merits. Bal-ilu (Marrtanda) was
not satisfied, though his house was the largest.  He began (to
work) as the huge elephants do. He breathed (drew in) into his
stomach the vital airs of his brothers. He sought to devour
them. The larger four were far away; far, on the margin of their
kingdom. - {Planetary System.} - They were not robbed
(affected), and laughed. Do your worst, Sir, you cannot reach
us, they said. But the smaller wept. They complained to the
Mother.  She exiled Bal-i-lu to the centre of her Kingdom, from
whence he could not move. (Since then) he (only) watches and
threatens. He pursues them, turning slowly around himself, they
turning swiftly from him, and he following from afar the
direction in which his brothers move on the path that encircles
their houses. - {"The Sun rotates on his axis always in the same
direction in which the planets revolve in their respective
orbits," astronomy teaches us.} - From that day he feeds on the
sweat of the Mother's body.  He fills himself with her breath
and refuse. Therefore, she rejected him."_

Thus the "rejected Son" being our Sun, evidently, as shown
above, the "Sun-Sons" refer not only to our planets but to the
heavenly bodies in general. Himself only a reflection of the
Central Spiritual Sun, _Surya_ is the prototype of all those
bodies that evolved after him. In the Vedas he is called _Loka-
Chakshuh_, "the Eye of the World" (our planetary world), and he
is one of the three chief deities. He is called indifferently
the Son of _Dyaus_ and of _Aditi_, because no distinction is
made with reference to, or scope allowed for, the esoteric
meaning.  Thus he is depicted as drawn by seven horses, and by
one horse with seven heads; the former referring to his seven
planets, the latter to their one common origin from the One
Cosmic Element.  This "One Element" is called figuratively
"FIRE." The Vedas (Aitareya-Brahmana of Haug also; p. i.) teach
"that the fire verily is all the deities." (Narada in Anugita).

The meaning of the allegory is plain, for we have both the Dzyan
Commentary and modern science to explain it, though the two
differ in more than one particular. The Occult Doctrine rejects
the hypothesis born out of the Nebular Theory, that the (seven)
great planets have evolved from the Sun's central mass, not of
this our visible Sun, at any rate. The first condensation of
Cosmic matter of course took place about a central nucleus, its
parent Sun; but our sun, it is taught, merely detached itself
earlier than all the others, as the rotating mass contracted,
and is their elder, bigger brother therefore, not their father.
The eight Adityas, "the gods," are all formed from the eternal
substance (Cometary matter - {This Essence of Cometary matter,
Occult Science teaches, is totally different from any of the
chemical or physical characteristics with which modern science
is acquainted. It is homogeneous in its primitive form beyond
the Solar Systems, and differentiates entirely once it crosses
the boundaries of our Earth's region, vitiated by the
atmospheres of the planets and the already compound matter of
the interplanetary stuff, heterogeneous only in our manifested
world.} - the Mother) or the "World-Stuff" which is both the
fifth and the sixth COSMIC Principle, the Upadhi or basis of the
Universal Soul, just as in man, the Microcosm, Manas - {Manas -
the Mind-Principle, or the human Soul.} - is the Upadhi of
Buddhi.- {Buddhi - the divine Soul.}

(d) There is a whole poem on the pregenetic battles fought by
the growing planets before the final formation of Kosmos, thus
accounting for the seemingly disturbed position of the systems
of several planets, the plane of the satellites of some (of
Neptune and Uranus, for instance, of which the ancients knew
nothing, it is said) being tilted over, thus giving them an
appearance of retrograde motion. These planets are called the
warriors, the Architects, and are accepted by the Roman Church
as the leaders of the heavenly Hosts, thus showing the same
traditions. Having evolved from Cosmic Space, and before the
final formation of the primaries and the annulation of the
planetary nebula, the Sun, we are taught, drew into the depths
of its mass all the Cosmic vitality he could, threatening to
engulf his weaker "brothers" before the law of attraction and
repulsion was finally adjusted; after which he began feeding on
"The Mother's refuse and sweat"; in other words, on those
portions of Ether (the "breath of the Universal Soul") of the
existence and constitution of which science is as yet absolutely
ignorant. A theory of this kind having been propounded by Sir
William Grove (see "_Correlation of the Physical Forces_", 1843,
p. 81; and "_Address to the British Association_, 1866"), who
theorized that the systems "are gradually changing by
atmospheric additions or subtractions, or by accretions and
diminutions arising from nebular substances" - and again that
"the Sun may condense gaseous matter as it travels in Space and
so heat may be produced" - the archaic teaching seems scientific
enough, even in this age. - {Very similar ideas in Mr. W.
Mattieu Williams' "The Fuel of the Sun;" in Dr. C. William
Siemens' "On the Conservation of Solar Energy" (Nature, XXV., p.
440-444, March 9, 1882); and also in Dr. P. Martin Duncan's
"Address of the President of the Geological Society," London,
May, 1877.} - Mr.  W. Mattieu Williams suggested that the
diffused matter or Ether which is the recipient of the heat
radiations of the Universe is thereby drawn into the depths of
the solar mass. Expelling thence the previously condensed and
thermally exhausted Ether, it becomes compressed and gives up
its heat, to be in turn itself driven out in a rarified and
cooled state, to absorb a fresh supply of heat, which he
supposes to be in this way taken up by the Ether, and again
concentrated and redistributed by the Suns of the Universe. -
{See "Comparative Geology," by Alexander Winchell, LL.D., p.
56.}

This is about as close an approximation to the Occult teachings
as Science ever imagined; for Occultism explains it by "the dead
breath" given back by Marttanda and his feeding on the "sweat
and refuse" of "Mother Space." What could affect Neptune, -
{When we speak of Neptune it is not as an Occultist but as a
European. The true Eastern Occultist will maintain that, whereas
there are many yet undiscovered planets in our system, Neptune
does not belong to it, his apparent connection with our sun and
the influence of the latter upon Neptune notwithstanding. This
connection is _mayavic_, imaginary, they say.} - Saturn and
Jupiter, but little, would have killed such comparatively small
"Houses" as Mercury, Venus and Mars. As Uranus was not known
before the end of the eighteenth century, the name of the fourth
planet mentioned in the allegory must remain to us, so far, a
mystery.

The "Breath" of all the "seven" is said to be Bhaskara
(light-making), because they (the planets) were all comets and
suns in their origin. They evolve into Manvantaric life from
primaeval Chaos (now the noumenon of irresolvable nebulae) by
aggregation and accumulation of the primary differentiations of
the eternal matter, according to the beautiful expression in the
Commentary, "Thus the Sons of Light clothed themselves in the
fabric of Darkness." They are called allegorically "the Heavenly
Snails," on account of their (to us) formless INTELLIGENCES
inhabiting unseen their starry and planetary homes, and, so to
speak, carrying them as the snails do along with themselves in
their revolution. The doctrine of a common origin for all the
heavenly bodies and planets, was, as we see, inculcated by the
Archaic astronomers, before Kepler, Newton, Leibnitz, Kant,
Herschel and Laplace. Heat (the Breath), attraction and
repulsion - the three great factors of Motion - are the
conditions under which all the members of all this primitive
family are born, developed, and die, to be reborn after a "Night
of Brahma," during which eternal matter relapses periodically
into its primary undifferentiated state. The most attenuated
gases can give no idea of its nature to the modern physicist.
Centres of Forces at first, the invisible sparks of primordial
atoms differentiate into molecules, and become Suns - passing
gradually into objectivity - gaseous, radiant, cosmic, the one
"Whirlwind" (or motion) finally giving the impulse to the form,
and the initial motion, regulated and sustained by the
never-resting Breaths - the Dhyan Chohans.

STANZA IV. - Continued.

6. - THEN THE SECOND SEVEN, WHO ARE THE LIPIKA, PRODUCED BY THE
THREE (_Word, Voice, and Spirit_). THE REJECTED SON IS ONE, THE
"SON-SONS" ARE COUNTLESS.

The _Lipi-ka_, from the word _lipi_, "writing," means literally
the "Scribes." - {These are the four "Immortals" which are
mentioned in _Atharva Veda_ as the "Watchers" or Guardians of
the four quarters of the sky (see ch. lxxvi., 1-4, et seq.).} -
Mystically, these Divine Beings are connected with Karma, the
Law of Retribution, for they are the Recorders or Annalists who
impress on the (to us) invisible tablets of the Astral Light,
"the great picture-gallery of eternity" - a faithful record of
every act, and even thought, of man, of all that was, is, or
ever will be, in the phenomenal Universe. As said in "_Isis_",
this divine and unseen canvas is the BOOK OF LIFE. As it is the
Lipika who project into objectivity from the passive Universal
Mind the ideal plan of the universe, upon which the "Builders"
reconstruct the Kosmos after every Pralaya, it is they who stand
parallel to the Seven Angels of the Presence, whom the
Christians recognise in the Seven "Planetary Spirits" or the
"Spirits of the Stars;" for thus it is they who are the direct
amanuenses of the Eternal Ideation - or, as called by Plato, the
"Divine Thought." The Eternal Record is no fantastic dream, for
we meet with the same records in the world of gross matter. "A
shadow never falls upon a wall without leaving thereupon a
permanent trace which might be made visible by resorting to
proper processes," says Dr.  Draper. " - The portraits of our
friends or landscapeviews may be hidden on the sensitive surface
from the eye, but they are ready to make their appearance as
soon as proper developers are resorted to. A spectre is
concealed on a silver or a glassy surface, until, by our
necromancy, we make it come forth into the visible world. Upon
the walls of our most private apartments, where we think the eye
of intrusion is altogether shut out, and our retirement can
never be profaned, there exist the vestiges of all our acts,
silhouettes of whatever we have done." - {"Conflict between
Religion and Science." - Draper, pp. 132 and 133.} - Drs. Jevons
and Babbage believe that every thought, displacing the particles
of the brain and setting them in motion, scatters them
throughout the Universe, and they think that "each particle of
existing matter must be a register of all that has happened."
(Principles of Science, Vol. II. p. 455.) Thus the ancient
doctrine has begun to acquire rights of citizenship in the
speculations of the scientific world.

The forty "Assessors" who stand in the region of _Amenti_ as the
accusers of the Soul before _Osiris_, belong to the same class
of deities as the Lipika, and might stand paralleled, were not
the Egyptian gods so little understood in their esoteric
meaning.  The Hindu _Chitra-Gupta_ who reads out the account of
every Soul's life from his register, called Agra-Sandhani; the
"Assessors" who read theirs from the heart of the defunct, which
becomes an open book before (whether) Yama, Minos, Osiris, or
Karma - are all so many copies of, and variants from the Lipika,
and their Astral Records. Nevertheless, the Lipi-ka are not
deities connected with Death, but with Life Eternal.

Connected as the Lipika are with the destiny of every man and
the birth of every child, whose life is already traced in the
Astral Light - not fatalistically, but only because the future,
like the PAST, is ever alive in the PRESENT - they may also be
said to exercise an influence on the Science of Horoscopy. We
must admit the truth of the latter whether we will or not. For,
as observed by one of the modern adepts of Astrology, "Now that
photography has revealed to us the chemical influence of the
Sidereal system, by fixing on the sensitized plate of the
apparatus milliards of stars and planets that had hitherto
baffled the efforts of the most powerful telescopes to discover
them, it becomes easier to understand how our solar system can,
at the birth of a child, influence his brain - virgin of any
impression - in a definite manner and according to the presence
on the zenith of such or another zodiacal constellation." - {Les
Mysteres de l'Horoscope, p. XI.}

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Ancient Wisdom for a New Age