Pineal Gland, Conarium, or Epiphysis Cerebri A small organ in the brain with a fancied resemblance to a pine cone; technically called the epiphysis, as being an "upgrowth" from the embryonic tissues which later form part of the ventricular or hollow center of the brain, which space is continuous with the central canal of the spinal cord.

The pineal gland is described as a rounded, oblong body, about one-third of an inch long, of a deep reddish color, connected with the posterior part of the third ventricle, and intimately related to the optic thalami which physiologists find to be the organs of reception and condensation of the most sensitive and sensorial incitations from the periphery of the body.

Thus this organ is in central relation to the coordinating organs of all the senses and sensations, and to the thinking brain which perfects and coordinates ideas. Its purpose, however, remains a mystery to the medical profession. A standard anatomy says: "The ancients had a grotesque theory that the epiphysis is the favorite and peculiar abiding-place of the human soul. Modern morphologists have shown it to be the homologue of the third eye which some reptiles possess."

Blavatsky, repeating the ancient belief, says that this concealed third eye is the "seat of the highest and divinest consciousness in man -- his omniscient spiritual and all-embracing mind" (Key 121). She sketches the evolutionary history of this Deva Eye (SD 2:294 et seq) which was the only seeing organ in the beginning of the present human race, when the spiritual element in the then humanity reigned supreme over the as yet unawakened intellectual and psychic elements in the nature. Later on, as the ethereal and psychospiritual early races became self-conscious and physicalized, they used their spiritual and intellectual powers and faculties for selfish and sensual purposes. Meantime, the third eye withdrew, pari passu, into the central cavity of the developing brain. There it has remained until the present -- a symbol of that past spiritual vision which we will regain as we progress consciously along the upward arc of the evolutionary cycle. As to scientific evidence of a once active third eye of objective vision in animals, the Hatteria punctata, a lizard type found in New Zealand, is pointed out. This land, being a part well above the waters of the ancient continent Lemuria, the home of the third root-race, would be likely to retain some remnants of early types of the creatures which once existed when "the third eye was primarily, as in man, the only seeing organ" (SD 2:299).

An ancient commentary says that by the middle of the fourth root-race, the "inner vision had to be awakened and acquired by artificial stimuli, the process of which was known to the old sages" (SD 2:294). Even now, the adept, with trained will, can arouse this ordinarily quiescent organ into activity, so that he becomes illuminated throughout and by it with a vision of infinitude. It was this sublime vision which overwhelmed Arjuna when Krishna, acting as the Logos within, gave the aspiring human monad the divine eye (BG ch 11). The analogy of enlarged vision holds good, in degree, when the spiritual teacher arouses the chela's latent ability to see for himself hidden truth.

Descartes reasoned that the seat of the soul was the pineal gland which, he said, though it was tied to the brain, was yet capable of being put into a kind of swinging motion by the animal spirits that cross the cavities of the skull. He was right about the cavities being open during life, and about the organ's response in oscillations; and what the ancients called animal spirits, is otherwise expressed in theosophical literature as circulating currents of the nerve-aura of occultism.

In the adept, the third eye is aroused by aspiration and concentration of his human will upon the attainment of union of his mental with his spiritual faculties. By this conscious effort, he rises to the higher powers of will which, in its ordinary automatic and emotional phases, is usually diffused throughout the activities of the animal body and brain, by way of the main organ of will, the pituitary gland, the psychic associate of the pineal center. The x-ray may yet reveal ethereal emanations of nerve-aura in the human brain, as living evidence of the interrelation of mind and matter. Meantime, concrete examples of such interaction are found in the pineal gland, in the form of "brain sand," or (acervulus cerebri).

See also EYE OF SIVA; THIRD EYE; CYCLOPES; DEVAKSHA; TRI-LOCHANA

(See also: Pineal Gland, Conarium, Epiphysis Cerebri, Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary, Occultism, Occultism Dictionary)

Life-atom In theosophical literature, the vital ensouling power or vital entified unit in every primary or ultimate physical particle, itself a vital quasi-conscious individualized vehicle of the spiritual monad or highest consciousness-center. A life-atom is not the physical atom of science, which is but the vehicle or garment of the former, compounded of physical or physical-astral matter only. This being so, an atom decomposes when its term of expression on this plane is ended, but it reimbodies itself again, doing so by the innate force or life which its ensouling monad (life-atom) radiates. The term does not mean the ultimates or primary particles of prana (life principle or life force). Prana, itself derivative from the jiva, is as an entity quite distinct from the atoms it animates. The physical atoms belong to the lowest or grossest state of matter on our plane, while jiva essentially is an emanation or outpouring from atman or paramatman.

"Life is ever present in the atom of matter, whether organic or inorganic, conditioned or unconditioned -- a difference that the occultists do not accept. Their doctrine is that life is as much present in the inorganic as in the organic matter: when life-energy is active in the atom, that atom is organic; when dormant or latent, then the atom is inorganic" (BCW 5:111-12).

Life-atoms may indeed be called the building blocks of the universe or of any imbodied entity: for they are in very truth the vehicles of universal life. They are composite of consciousness in the core of the core of each, and they manifest spontaneously in that form of consciousness which at times is called will and at other times force or energy. They partake of spirituality and remain ever invisible: physical atoms group and form around them and their aggregation results in physical matter, the life-atoms being to them very much as higher and invisible principles.

Life-atoms may be said to belong to all planes, functioning within each of the seven principles of which the human composition is built: thus we may speak of divine life-atoms, spiritual life-atoms, intellectual, psychic, vital, astral, and physical life-atoms. During man's life those which are intimately connected with an individual are in a state of constant flux and reflex, entering and leaving in unceasing rhythms the body of their owner or host; but after death the dominant controlling factor having departed from the lower planes, each group of life-atoms proceeds to peregrinate throughout their respective natural habitats. Thus when the physical body dies, the life-atoms of the body go into the soil, into plants, or into the bodies of beasts or men -- through food or by osmosis, or in breathing creatures through the air that is inspired or expired -- they are drawn to bodies by magnetic sympathy. This transmigration of the life-atoms is the origin of the theories of the transmigration of the human soul into beasts after death.

The life-atoms belonging to the astral plane which make up the linga-sarira or model-body of men and beasts, are also liberated at death and follow along the same general lines as the physical life-atoms: they find their way into and out of other astral vehicles with which they are in magnetic sympathy. In this way they help form the astral vehicles of individuals of the three lower kingdoms as well as of the beast and human kingdoms. In similar manner peregrinate the psychic, intellectual, spiritual, and divine life-atoms. In order that the spiritual monad may proceed on its afterdeath journey, all sheaths of the spiritual consciousness must be dropped on their appropriate planes, thus finally permitting the spiritual ego to pursue its upward and inward journey unhampered by the attractions to the lower planes which these life-atoms bring about.

"The life-atoms are actually the offspring or the off-throwings of the interior principles of man's constitution. It is obvious that the life-atoms which ensoul the physical atoms in man's body are as numerous as the atoms which they ensoul; and there are almost countless hosts of them, . . . in practically incomputable numbers. Each one of these life-atoms is a learning entity, an evolving entity, a being which is living, moving, growing, never standing still -- evolving towards a sublime destiny which ultimately becomes divinity" (OG 87).

During this evolutionary journey it passes from unself-consciousness through manifold and all-various stages of experience to self-consciousness, finally merging into divinity. When this last stage is reached it is no longer an unself-conscious god-spark but a self-conscious god, one of the co-laborers and collaborators in the great work of the building of the worlds.

(See also: Life-atom, Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary, Occultism, Occultism Dictionary)

Alchemists; From Al and Chemi, fire, or the god and patriarch, Kham, also, the name of Egypt.

The Rosicrucians of the middle ages, such as Robertus de Fluctibus (Robert Fludd), Paracelsus, Thomas Vaughan (Eugenius Philalethes), Van Helmont, and others, were all alchemists, who sought for the hidden spirit in every inorganic matter.

Some people -  nay, the great majority - have accused alchemists of charlatanry and false pretending. Surely such men as Roger Bacon, Agrippa, Henry Khunrath, and the Arabian Geber (the first to introduce into Europe some of the secrets of chemistry), can hardly he treated as impostors -  least of all as fools.

Scientists who are reforming the science of physics upon the basis of the atomic theory of Democritus, as restated by John Dalton, conveniently forget that Democritus, of Abdera, was an alchemist, and that the mind that was capable of penetrating so far into the secret operations of nature in one direction must have had good reasons to study and become a Hermetic philosopher. Olaus Borrichius says that the cradle of alchemy is to be sought in the most distant times. (Isis Unveiled).

Alchemy ; in Arabic Ul-Khemi, is, as the name suggests, the chemistry of nature. Ui-Khemi or Al-Kimia, however, is only an Arabianized word, taken from the Greek chemeia, (chemeia) from cumoz -  "juice", sap extracted from a plant.

Says Dr. Wynn Westcott: "The earliest use of the actual term ‘alchemy’ is found in the works of Julius Firmicus Maternus, who lived in the days of Constantine the Great. The Imperial Library in Paris contains the oldest-extant alchemic treatise known in Europe;it was written by Zosimus the Panopolite about 400 A.D. in the Greek language, the next oldest is by Eneas Gazeus, 480 A.D."

It deals with the finer forces of nature and the various conditions in which they are found to operate. Seeking under the veil of language, more or less artificial, to convey to the uninitiated so much of the mysterium magnum as is safe in the hands of a selfish world, the alchemist postulates as his first principle the existence of a certain Universal Solvent by which all composite bodies are resolved into the homogeneous substance from which they are evolved, which substance he calls pure gold, or summa materia. This solvent, also called menstvuum universale, possesses the power of removing all the seeds of disease from the human body, of renewing youth and prolonging life. Such is the lapis philosophorum (philosopher’s stone).

Alchemy first penetrated into Europe through Geber, the great Arabian sage and philosopher, in the eighth century of our era; but it was known and practised long ages ago in China and in Egypt, numerous papyri on alchemy and other proofs of its being the favourite study of kings and priests having been exhumed and preserved under the generic name of Hermetic treatises. (See "Tabula Smaragdina"). Alchemy is studied under three distinct aspects, which admit of many different interpretations, viz.: the Cosmic, Human, and Terrestrial. These three methods were typified under the three alchemical properties - sulphur, mercury, and salt.

Different writers have stated that there are three, seven, ten, and twelve processes respectively; but they are all agreed that there is but one object in alchemy, which is to transmute gross metals into pure gold. What that gold, however, really is, very few people understand correctly. No doubt that there is such a thing in nature as transmutation of the baser metals into the nobler, or gold. But this is only one aspect of alchemy, the terrestrial or purely material, for we sense logically the same process taking place in the bowels of the earth. Yet, besides and beyond this interpretation, there is in alchemy a symbolical meaning, purely psychic and spiritual.

While the Kabbalist-Alchemist seeks for the realization of the former, the Occultist-Alchemist, spurning the gold of the mines, gives all his attention and directs his efforts only towards the transmutation of the baser quaternary into the divine upper trinity of man, which when finally blended are one. The spiritual, mental, psychic, and physical planes of human existence are in alchemy compared to the four elements, fire, air, water and earth, and are each capable of a threefold constitution, i.e., fixed, mutable and volatile.

Little or nothing is known by the word concerning the origin of this archaic branch of philosophy; but it is certain that it antedates the construction of any known Zodiac, and, as dealing with the personified forces of nature, probably also any of the mythologies of the world; nor is there any doubt that the true secret of transmutation (on the physical plane) was known in days of old, and lost before the dawn of the so-called historical period. Modern chemistry owes its best fundamental discoveries to alchemy, but regardless of the undeniable truism of the latter that there is but one element in the universe, chemistry has placed metals in the class of elements and is only now beginning to find out its gross mistake.

Even sonic Encyclopedists are now forced to confess that if most of the accounts of transmutations are fraud or delusion, "yet some of them are accompanied by testimony which renders them probable. . . By means of the galvanic battery even the alkalis have been discovered to have a metallic base.

The possibility of obtaining metal from other substances which contain the ingredients composing it, and of changing one metal into another . . . must therefore be left undecided. Nor are all alchemists to be considered impostors. Many have laboured under the conviction of obtaining their object, with indefatigable patience and purity of heart, which is earnestly recommended by sound alchemists as the principal requisite for the success of their labours."

(Pop. Encyclop.)

(See also: Alchemists, Theosophy, Spirituality, Body mind and Soul, Spiritual Dictionary, )

Sixth Root-race The root-race which will succeed the present fifth root-race, sometimes called the Aryan race in theosophical literature because the Aryan Hindus were a part of the original first subrace of the fifth root-race. Care should be taken not to confuse the sixth root-race with the sixth subrace of the fifth root-race which was stated by Blavatsky to be in process of forming in America as seeds -- the earliest pioneers, although already beginning to appear, will not be numerous for several thousand years. The preparation for the sixth root-race will take place during the sixth and seventh subraces of the fifth root-race in the Americas. When the time arrives, this future sixth root-race will be predominant on the earth, new lands will have appeared, and many of the present lands will be submerged. The surface of the globe will, in time of course, be entirely changed, and there will then be more land than water (as also was the case during the fourth root-race).

During the sixth root-race, humanity will not be gigantic in size (as were the fourth and third root-races), for spirituality will be on the ascendancy and materiality decreasing, so that at the end of the sixth root-race the development of spirituality will be parallel to what it was at the beginning of the second root-race plus, however, the added evolutionary experience gained during the preceding root-races. The characteristics of sex will gradually disappear, and humanity will be slowly once again becoming androgynous. Offspring will be born in a manner generally similar to that which prevailed during the second and early third root-race periods: toward the close of the sixth, mankind will begin to manifest the first appearances of reproduction by kriyasakti (propagation by means of will and imagination). Toward the close of the sixth root-race, humanity will be showing a steadily increasing tendency to evolve out of fleshly into more ethereal physical vehicles. These various changes are presentments of what will in the due course be established in relative perfection during the sixth round -- coming events cast their shadows before. Indeed the sixth root-race will be as compared with our own fifth far in advance, spiritually, intellectually, psychically, and even physically; and the attainment by mankind of adeptship or mahatmaship will be notably more easy than is the case at present.

With the advent of each root-race a new cosmic element comes into proportionate manifestation, and a new physical sense apparatus appears: thus humanity in the sixth root-race will develop what is meant by a sixth sense. The fifth cosmic element (often named aether or akasa-tattva) will reach a development proportionate to the evolution of mankind during the fifth root-race in this fourth round; and after the same manner, a sixth cosmic element will make its appearance during the course of human evolution during the sixth root-race. Furthermore, just as a manushya-buddha comes to lead mankind in each root-race, so will one appear during the sixth root-race of the future.

(See also: Sixth Root-race, Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary)

Agnidagdha (Sanskrit) (from agni fire + dagdha burnt from the verbal root dah to burn)

Consumed by fire; a class of pitris (fathers, ancestors) who maintained the household fires and offered oblations with fire. Those who refrained form doing so were called anagnidagdhas (not consumed by fire).

The agnidagdhas, corresponding to the lunar pitris of The Secret Doctrine, are as mysterious as the higher or arupa classes of kumaras or agnishvattas. The agnidagdhas are the vehicles of the arupa classes and, because of their grosser or more materialized essences, are able to coalesce with the forces and substances of nature on more material planes of the solar system. Known also as barhishads, they "kept up the household flame," and thus were conversant with and living with flames of the material or quasimaterial realms. Such "material" flames are the fiery or magneto-electric forces and substances of the lower worlds, which include the flame of desire and passion as well as the electric fire of the physical universe. They not only equipped man with the lower parts of his constitution, but likewise projected their chhayas (shadows or astral vehicles), thus furnishing the astral-physical vehicle of early humanity.

The anagnidagdhas are the more spiritual and intellectual classes of pitris who provided nascent humanity with its spiritual, intellectual, and higher psychic principles. Blavatsky writes: "The first or primordial Pitris, the 'Seven Sons of Fire' or of the Flame, are distinguished or divided into seven classes . . . (VP 3:14; Manu 3:199)

three of which classes are Arupa, formless, 'composed of intellectual not elementary substance,' and four are corporeal. The first are pure Agni (fire) or Sapta-jiva ('seven lives,' now become Sapta-jihva, seven-tongued, as Agni is represented with seven tongues and seven winds as the wheels of his car). As a formless, purely spiritual essence, in the first degree of evolution, they could not create that, the prototypical form of which was not in their minds, as this is the first requisite. They could only give birth to 'mind-born' beings, their 'Sons,' the second class of Pitris (or Prajapati, or Rishis, etc.), one degree more material; these, to the third -- the last of the Arupa class. It is only this last class that was enabled with the help of the Fourth principle of the Universal Soul (Aditi, Akasha) to produce beings that became objective and having a form. But when these came to existence, they were found to possess such a small proportion of the divine immortal Soul or Fire in them, that they were considered failures. . . . The three orders of Beings, the Pitri-Rishis, the Sons of Flame, had to merge and blend together their three higher principles with the Fourth (the Circle), and the Fifth (the microcosmic) principle before the necessary union could be obtained and result therefrom achieved" (BCW 6:191-3).

(See also: Agnidagdha, Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary, Occultism, Occultism Dictionary)

Devil (from Greek diabolos slanderer, adversary; cf Italian diavolo, French diable)

The Devil of the New Testament and Christian theology is an evil personality, ruling over a kingdom of evil spirits, the inveterate foe of both God and man; a fallen angel, one of the celestial host who rebelled against God and was cast out from heaven. The conception of an evil individuality is a necessary counterpart to the conception of a good personal God: evil exists, God is good and could not have made evil; therefore the devil made it, but eventually he will be overthrown, and in the meantime he fulfills God's purpose by trying and testing mankind.

The older Hebrews had no such devil; the word Satan is nearly always used in the ordinary sense of adversary. In Job, Satan is an emissary of God, one of his sons, charged with a mission to test Job. The original Hebrew God is supreme, author of both good and evil. But with the later Hebrews the idea underwent modification, and the notion of an evil deity arose, possibly from an adoption of Persian dualism acquired during the captivity. At the time the Gospels were written it is evident that the idea of a prince of darkness was very real and ever-present, though the story of the temptation of Jesus is evidently a picture of the triumph of an initiate over the forces of terrestrial nature.

In cosmic evolution, no sooner does duality in evolutionary manifestation supervene, than matter of necessity appears as the other pole or alter ego of spirit, from the dual nature of manifestation itself. It is only by the interaction of polar forces that evolution can proceed, a process everywhere mystically or theologically typified by the various wars in heaven. The same duality is present in human nature: the adversary is the lower quaternary manifesting through the terrestrial nature, which first dominates, and then eventually is dominated by, the upper triad or spirit. In many old myths, Satan under various names appears as the benefactor of mankind, e.g., Prometheus, Venus-Lucifer, and the Serpent of Genesis. Christian theology, through misunderstanding of and loss of the keys to its own sacred writings, has perverted several symbols: the Fall of the angels in one of its aspects is really the descent of the manasaputras; the Serpent of Eden was not the devil; and the sin of mankind was not sexual generation but the abuse of spiritual and intellectual as well as of psychic powers.

By some sects in early Christian times the doctrine of the Demiourgos or secondary creator prevailed, assuming a variety of forms, more of less philosophical and approximating the esoteric teachings; but the spirit of the times demanded a cruder conception. In the Middle Ages the idea of a personified devil and devils inflicting trials upon mankind become a veritable obsession: the idea has persisted up the present time in many churches.

Devils may denote various kinds of evil or partially evil entities in nature, evil because not yet sufficiently evolved to express the spiritual light within them; or entities generated from human thoughts and inhabiting the lower regions of the astral light. In the singular it may stand as a wide generalization for human selfishness and passions. Sensitives seeing these thought-impression in the astral light, may be inclined to view them as realities.

See also DRAGON; LUCIFER; SATAN; SERPENT

(See also: Devil, Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary, Occultism, Occultism Dictionary)

God (Gods) and Goddess (Goddesses) A generalizing term signifying all self-conscious entities superior to humankind, most often restricted to the three dhyani-chohanic kingdoms. The gods have differing places in nature's hierarchical scheme, running through innumerable grades of cosmic intelligences. Theosophy teaches that human beings who successfully reach the seventh round on this earth chain will pass, at the conclusion of this last round, into the kingdom superior to the human, that of the lowest dhyani-chohans.

One function of dhyani-chohans (gods or demigods of a lower type) is the watching over of all hierarchies below them, some being guardians of the human host, others guarding and protecting the less evolved kingdoms. The higher hierarchical ranges of gods or divinities in our universe "are Entities of the higher worlds in the hierarchy of Being, so immeasurably high that, to us, they must appear as Gods, and collectively -- God. . . . To the highest, we are taught, belong the seven orders of the purely divine Spirits; to the six lower ones belong hierarchies that can occasionally be seen and heard by men, and who do communicate with their progeny of the Earth; which progeny is indissoluble linked with them, each principle in man having its direct source in the nature of those great Beings, who furnish us with the respective invisible elements in us" (SD 1:133).

These beings belong to two general divisions, the arupa (formless) and the rupa (form) divinities. Those having forms should not be imagined as necessarily having human forms as in the ancient pantheons, yet rupa gods do have highly ethereal forms, some perhaps resembling the present human shape and others of quite different construction. But the arupa divinities are to our power of imagination "beings of pure intelligence and of understanding, pure essences, pure spirits, formless as we conceive form" (Fund 347).

Tradition has it that in the immemorial past, certain lower gods associated intimately with their children, humanity, on this globe; but as time went by and mankind became more immersed in material pursuits, people grew to become increasingly forgetful of their divine origin and of the presence of the shining divinities instructing and guiding their forebears, so that the gods and demigods were remembered only in mythologies and religious metaphors of the various races.

What did the ancients mean by their gods and goddesses? They were intended to represent the guiding intelligences present within or in back of all invisible secrets, as well as astral and physical manifestations of nature. During the third root-race there were beings who were

"endowed with the sacred fire from the spark of higher and then independent Beings, who were the psychic and spiritual parents of Man, as the lower Pitar Devata (the Pitris) were the progenitors of his physical body. That Third and holy Race consisted of men who, at their zenith, were described as, 'towering giants of godly strength and beauty, and the depositaries of all the mysteries of Heaven and Earth.'. . .

". . . the chief gods and heroes of the Fourth and Fifth Races, as of later antiquity, are the deified images of these men of the Third. The days of their physiological purity, and those of their so-called Fall, have equally survived in the hearts and memories of their descendants. Hence, the dual nature shown in those gods, both virtue and sin being exalted to their highest degree, in the biographies composed by posterity" (SD 2:171-2).

The primeval human deity worship degenerated during the fourth root-race (the Atlantean), the ideal at first becoming confused with the form, and the latter finally almost superseding the spirit -- thus in the relatively complete materialization of idea into form, the later Atlanteans in time began to worship themselves, what was to them the powers of nature appearing through themselves as human beings; the degeneration of the ideal proceeding so far that ultimately the worst kind of idol worship became relatively universal, except for the seed of the newer and somewhat higher mankind of the fifth root-race then beginning.

"The moderns are satisfied with worshipping the male heroes of the Fourth race, who created gods after their own sexual image, whereas the gods of primeval mankind were 'male and female,' " i.e., hermaphrodite (SD 2:135).

See also DEITY

(See also: God, Goddess, Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary, Occultism, Occultism Dictionary)

Mammals The highest class of animals produced from man, himself a mammal, in this fourth round. The evolutionary plan, as regards the passing of life-waves around the planetary chain entails that so far as the human and animal kingdoms are concerned, in the fourth round man shall appear before the mammals on globe D of the earth-chain. The other stocks of the animal kingdom were at the beginning of this round represented by their various sishtas, as in fact man himself was. In each round after the first, each one of the kingdoms or life-waves on entering a globe of the chain, does so in its regular serial order.

The man of the second and early third root-race, though distinctly belonging to the human kingdom, was different from the truly human man of today, as much in his inner psychical apparatus as in his astral-vital-physical body. This body was then much more astral or tenuous than that of today, composed of life-atoms of all kinds, seeking manifestation and finding a temporary habitat in the human body, which thus becomes their host. These atoms were continuously entering and leaving the body, just as happens in the human body today, but with this difference -- that the atoms which the human body throws off today are far more stamped with the person's own svabhava (individual, personal characteristics) than formerly, and they are in consequence strongly and continuously attracted back to their human host, who is often their source.

But in those early races the various monadic entities, which in their evolution were far inferior to the human monad, and each of which expressed itself through a life-atom, were in consequence far more free from the human dominating, almost tyrannical control, for then man had not yet acquired his present power of strongly impressing his own stamp on these life-atoms. The result was that in these early times each of these evolving monads with its life-atom vehicle on this plane could, when thrown off from the human entity, become the origin of a line of an animal stock, according to its own innate characteristics and potentialities. Thus were from time to time through the geologic ages generated the various mammalian stocks or phyla, each different according to the nature of the monad-germ thus thrown off, many of which were then able to pursue a course of evolutionary differentiation and specialization along its own particular line -- each one unfolding from within its characteristics, expressing themselves in form and shape.

Thus it is seen how man precedes the mammals in the fourth round; but this does not apply to the non-mammalian animals, which were nevertheless evolved from the human stock in more or less the same manner during the preceding third and second rounds.

Occult biology also teaches that every monad which now has unfolded itself into the human stage, did at some remote cosmic period pass through all the lower kingdoms of nature as they then existed; even as the monads now finding expression in the elemental, mineral, vegetable, and animal kingdoms are undergoing the same process of evolutionary unfolding from within outwards and therefore are on their way upwards to a state equivalent in characteristic powers to what the human now has reached.

"The mammalia, whose first traces are discovered in the marsupials of the Triassic rocks of the Secondary Period, were evolved from purely astral progenitors contemporary with the Second Race. They are thus post-Human, and, consequently, it is easy to account for the general resemblance between their embryonic stages and those of Man, who necessarily embraces in himself and epitomizes in his development the features of the group he originated" (SD 2:684; cf MIE ch 12).

(See also: Mammals, Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary)

Bhuta (Sanskrit) (from the verbal root bhu to be, become)

Has been; as an adjective become, been gone; as a noun, that which is or exists, any living being; entities that have lived and passed on. Applied specifically to "spooks, ghosts, simulacra, the reliquiae, of dead men; in other words, the astral dregs and remnants of human beings. They are the 'shades' of the ancients, the pale and ghostly phantoms living in the astral world, or the astral copies of the men that were; and the distinction between the bhuta and the kama-rupa is very slight.

"Bereft of all that pertains to the real entity, the genuine man, the bhuta is as much a corpse in the astral realms as is the decaying physical body left behind at physical death; and consequently, astral or psychical intercourse of any kind with these shells is productive only of evil. The bhutas, although belonging in the astral world, are magnetically attracted to physical localities similar in type to the remnants of impulses still inhering in them. The bhuta of a drunkard is attracted to wine-cellars and taverns; the bhuta of one who has lived a lewd life is attracted to localities sympathetic to it; the thin and tenuous bhuta of a good man is similarly attracted to less obnoxious and evil places" (OG 17-18).

Blavatsky also speaks of primitive humanity as relatively intellectually senseless bhutas or phantoms: "the word in India now means ghosts, ethereal or astral phantoms, while in esoteric teaching it means elementary substances, something made of attenuated, non-compound essence, and, specifically, the astral double of any man or animal. In this case these primitive men are the doubles of the first ethereal Dhyanis or Pitris" (SD 2:102n).

From another standpoint, bhuta applies in a general way to reproductions in a new existence of entities which "have been" in a former existence. This is the reason cosmic elements are occasionally called bhutas in their connection with the various tattvas, because the elements in any one manvantara are the derivatives or reproductions, and therefore the bhutas, of the same elements in the previous manvantara.

Bhutas are also rudimentary substances or elements. The Vendantists and Sankhyas, when speaking of the six original producers or elements of nature, called them bhutas or prakritis. These are the bases of objective nature, the vehicular or substantial side of the tattvas (the principles of nature) and therefore inseparable from them. The ancients always reckoned four elements, and sometimes five, and called them aether, fire, air, water, and earth. But esoterically there are seven: adi-bhuta (the primordial), anupapadaka-bhuta (the unevolved or parentless), akasa-bhuta (aether), taijasa-bhuta (fire), vayu-bhuta (air), apas-bhuta (water), and prithivi-bhuta (earth). These cosmic elements are not the familiar things which we know under these names, for the familiar physical substances were taken as symbols, through certain appropriate qualities which they possess, of the actual elements of cosmic being. These familiar physical substances of earth, water, air, and fire are the correspondences on earth, in a mystic sense, of the true cosmic elements.

"It is likewise the old Stoic doctrine, that the elements give birth one to another. Manifestation begins on the spiritual plane, and as the life impulses reach forth into grosser forms, into matter . . . the succeeding elements (bases, rudiments) are born, each one from the preceding one, and from all preceding ones. For instance, earth is born not merely from the element water, but likewise from fire, and air. Furthermore, the seven rounds of a planetary chain, the seven globes of a planetary chain, and the seven root-races of any globe thereof, has each its predominating correspondence with one of these seven elements" (Fund 348).

(See also: Bhuta, Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary, Occultism, Occultism Dictionary)

God (Gods) and Goddess (Goddesses) A generalizing term signifying all self-conscious entities superior to humankind, most often restricted to the three dhyani-chohanic kingdoms. The gods have differing places in nature's hierarchical scheme, running through innumerable grades of cosmic intelligences. Theosophy teaches that human beings who successfully reach the seventh round on this earth chain will pass, at the conclusion of this last round, into the kingdom superior to the human, that of the lowest dhyani-chohans.

One function of dhyani-chohans (gods or demigods of a lower type) is the watching over of all hierarchies below them, some being guardians of the human host, others guarding and protecting the less evolved kingdoms. The higher hierarchical ranges of gods or divinities in our universe "are Entities of the higher worlds in the hierarchy of Being, so immeasurably high that, to us, they must appear as Gods, and collectively -- God. . . . To the highest, we are taught, belong the seven orders of the purely divine Spirits; to the six lower ones belong hierarchies that can occasionally be seen and heard by men, and who do communicate with their progeny of the Earth; which progeny is indissoluble linked with them, each principle in man having its direct source in the nature of those great Beings, who furnish us with the respective invisible elements in us" (SD 1:133).

These beings belong to two general divisions, the arupa (formless) and the rupa (form) divinities. Those having forms should not be imagined as necessarily having human forms as in the ancient pantheons, yet rupa gods do have highly ethereal forms, some perhaps resembling the present human shape and others of quite different construction. But the arupa divinities are to our power of imagination "beings of pure intelligence and of understanding, pure essences, pure spirits, formless as we conceive form" (Fund 347).

Tradition has it that in the immemorial past, certain lower gods associated intimately with their children, humanity, on this globe; but as time went by and mankind became more immersed in material pursuits, people grew to become increasingly forgetful of their divine origin and of the presence of the shining divinities instructing and guiding their forebears, so that the gods and demigods were remembered only in mythologies and religious metaphors of the various races.

What did the ancients mean by their gods and goddesses? They were intended to represent the guiding intelligences present within or in back of all invisible secrets, as well as astral and physical manifestations of nature. During the third root-race there were beings who were

"endowed with the sacred fire from the spark of higher and then independent Beings, who were the psychic and spiritual parents of Man, as the lower Pitar Devata (the Pitris) were the progenitors of his physical body. That Third and holy Race consisted of men who, at their zenith, were described as, 'towering giants of godly strength and beauty, and the depositaries of all the mysteries of Heaven and Earth.'. . .

". . . the chief gods and heroes of the Fourth and Fifth Races, as of later antiquity, are the deified images of these men of the Third. The days of their physiological purity, and those of their so-called Fall, have equally survived in the hearts and memories of their descendants. Hence, the dual nature shown in those gods, both virtue and sin being exalted to their highest degree, in the biographies composed by posterity" (SD 2:171-2).

The primeval human deity worship degenerated during the fourth root-race (the Atlantean), the ideal at first becoming confused with the form, and the latter finally almost superseding the spirit -- thus in the relatively complete materialization of idea into form, the later Atlanteans in time began to worship themselves, what was to them the powers of nature appearing through themselves as human beings; the degeneration of the ideal proceeding so far that ultimately the worst kind of idol worship became relatively universal, except for the seed of the newer and somewhat higher mankind of the fifth root-race then beginning.

"The moderns are satisfied with worshipping the male heroes of the Fourth race, who created gods after their own sexual image, whereas the gods of primeval mankind were 'male and female,' " i.e., hermaphrodite (SD 2:135).

See also DEITY

(See also: God, Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary, Occultism, Occultism Dictionary)

Osiris. (Egypt, Egyptian). The greatest God of Egypt, the Son of Seb (Saturn), celestial fire, and of Neith, primordial matter and infinite space.

This shows him as the self-existent and self-created god, the first manifesting deity (our third Logos), identical with Ahura Mazda and other " First Causes". For as Ahura Mazda is one with, or the synthesis of, the Amshaspends, so Osiris, the collective unit, when differentiated and  personified, becomes Typhon, his brother, Isis and Nephtys his sisters, Horus his son and his other aspects. He was born at Mount Sinai, the Nyssa of the 0. T. (See- Exodus xvii. 15), and buried at Abydos, after being killed by Typhon at the early age of twenty-eight, according to the allegory.

According to Euripides he is the same as Zeus and Dionysos or Dio-Nysos "the god of Nysa", for Osiris is said by him to have been brought up in Nysa, in Arabia "the Happy". Query: how much did the latter tradition influence, or have anything in common with, the statement in the Bible, that "Moses built an altar and called the name Jehovah Nissi", or Kabbalistically - "Dio-Iao-Nyssi"? (See Isis Unveiled Vol. II. p. 165.) The four chief aspects of Osiris were - Osiris-Phtah (Light), the spiritual aspect; Osiris-Horus (Mind), the intellectual manasic aspect; Osiris-Lunus, the " Lunar" or psychic, astral aspect; Osiris-Typhon, Da?monic, or physical, material, therefore passional turbulent aspect. In these four aspects he symbolizes the dual Ego -  the divine and the human, the cosmico-spiritual and the terrestrial.

Of the many supreme gods, this Egyptian conception is the most suggestive and the grandest, as it embraces the whole range of physical and metaphysical thought. As a solar deity he had twelve minor gods under him - the twelve signs of the Zodiac. Though his name is the "Ineffable", his forty-two attributes bore each one of his names, and his seven dual aspects completed the forty-nine, or 7 X 7; the former symbolized by the fourteen members of his body, or twice seven. Thus the god is blended in man, and the man is deified into a god. He was addressed as Osiris-Eloh. Mr. Dunbar T. Heath speaks of a Phœnician inscription which, when read, yielded the following tumular inscription in honour of the mummy: "Blessed be Ta-Bai, daughter of Ta-Hapi, priest of Osiris-Eloh. She did nothing against anyone in anger. She spoke no falsehood against any one. Justified before Osiris, blessed be thou from before Osiris! Peace be to thee." And then he adds the following remarks:

"The author of this inscription ought, I suppose, to be called a heathen, as justification before Osiris is the object of his religious aspirations. We find, however, that he gives to Osiris the appellation Eloh. Eloh is the name used by the Ten Tribes of Israel for the Elohim of Two Tribes. Jehovah-Eloh (Gen. iii. 21.) in the version used by Ephraim corresponds to Jehovah Elohim in that used by Judah and ourselves. This being so, the question is sure to be asked, and ought to be humbly answered - What was the meaning meant to be conveyed by the two phrases respectively, Osiris-Eloh and Jehovah-Eloh? For my part I can imagine but one answer, viz., that Osiris was the national God of Egypt, Jehovah that of Israel, and that Eloh is equivalent to Deus, Gott or Dieu". As to his human development, he is, as the author of the Egyptian Belief has it . . . "One of the Saviours or Deliverers of Humanity . . . . As such he is born in the world. He came as a benefactor, to relieve man of trouble . . . . In his efforts to do good he encounters evil . . . and he is temporarily overcome. He is killed . . Osiris is buried. His tomb was the object of pilgrimage for thousands of years. But he did not rest in his grave. At the end of three days, or forty, he rose again and ascended to Heaven. This is the story of his Humanity" (Egypt. Belief). And Mariette Bey, speaking of the Sixth Dynasty, tells us that "the name of Osiris . . commences to be more used. The formula of Justified is met with": and adds that "it proves that this name (of the Justified or Makheru was not given to the dead only". But it also proves that the legend of Christ was found ready in almost all its details thousands of years before the Christian era, and that the Church fathers had no greater difficulty than to simply apply it to a new personage.

(See also: Osiris, Theosophy, Spirituality, Body mind and Soul, Spiritual Dictionary, )

veridical dream

Psychic experience during sleep that later becomes a real event

(See also: Veridical dream, Body Mind and Soul)

Fainting

Dreams that we remember are those that have penetrated through our ego defenses and their messages have began to come into our conscious awareness. Often, we do not have a full understanding of the meaning of a particular dream. Awareness is a long and continual process. If you remember dreams in which you are fainting, the setting of the dream and the details leading to the fainting spell are important. Fainting in your dream suggests that you are unable to consciously confront the issues or the topic that is being raised by the unconscious. In daily life, we faint when we are ill or when we are overcome by environmental forces (i.e. heat, smells, a traumatic event or a dramatic visual image). In the dream, internal forces, images or emotions that may be to powerful for us to process may have an overwhelming effect on the dream ego and fainting occurs. The fainting dream may be the first step in a process of becoming more aware of a particular area of your life. The unconscious will continue to send up messages and eventually you may be able to experience the unconscious psychic event that currently results in fainting.

Source: Dream Lover Incorporated, http://www.dreamloverinc.com

(See also: Dream Archives, Meaning of Dreams, Dream Interpretation, Dream Dictionary, Dream Dictionary - Fainting, Meaning of Dreams about Fainting, Dream Interpretation Fainting)

Demons/Devil

(Source: Myths - Dreams - Symbols)

Related pages: Dream Symbols, Dream Interpretation, Dream Symbol Demons, Dream Dictionary Demons, Meaning of dreams about Demons, Dream Interpretation Demons, Dream Analysis Demons, Dreaming of Demons

Demons, Devil, Repressed, Unconscious, Harmonious life, Balanced life, Fertility god, Horned god, Nature, Fertilizing agent, Fertilizer, Psyche, Jewish, Christian, Islamic, Judaism, Christianity, Islam, Muslim, Energy, Wisdom, Healing, Wholeness, Conversion of the devil within, Negatively charged psychic forces, Psychic forces, Conscious life, Naked women, Sexual symbol, Sexuality, Repressed sexuality, Woman's dream, Fear of sexual relations, Fear of sexuality, Fear of sex, Freud, Freudian, Mansdream, Guilt, Guilty, Erotic feelings, Erotic feelings for mother, Enhancement of the self, Self-knowledge, Unconscious, Demonic possession, Conscious ego, Conscious, Ego, Unconscious forces, Obsessive fear, Obsessive anger, Fear, Anger

For more dictionary entries, see » Become A Psychic Dictionary

Wise Old Man/Woman

(Source: Myths - Dreams - Symbols)

Related pages: Dream Symbols, Dream Interpretation, Dream Symbol Wise Old Man, Dream Dictionary Wise Old Man, Meaning of dreams about Wise Old Man, Dream Interpretation Wise Old Man, Dream Analysis Wise Old Man, Dreaming of Wise Old Man

Wise Old Man, Wise Old woman, Mansdream, Woman's dream, Old bearded man, Guru, Priest, Prophet, King, Magician, Teacher, Earth Mother, Great Goddess, Mother Church, Priestess, Prophetess, Transformation, Jung, Jungian, Mana, Mysterious power, Gods, Natural phenomena, Extraordinary human skills, Genius, Holiness, Psychic powers, Supranormal knowledge, Supernormal knowledge, Knowledge, Jungian therapist, Possessed, Domineering, Self-important, Opinionated, Authoritarian, Authoritative

For more dictionary entries, see » Become A Psychic Dictionary