Aziluth (Hebrew, Jewish) The name for the world of the Sephiroth, called the world of Emanations Olam Aziluth. It is the great and the highest prototype of the other worlds. "Atzeelooth is the Great Sacred Seal by means of which all the worlds are copied which have impressed on themselves the image on the Seal; and as this Great Seal comprehends three stages, which are three zures (prototypes) of Nephesh (the Vital Spirit or Soul), Ruach (the moral and reasoning Spirit), and the Neshamah (the Highest Soul of man), so the Sealed have also received three zures, namely Breeah, Yetzeerah, and Aseeyah, and these three zures are only one in the Seal" (Myer’s Qabbalah). The globes A, Z, of our terrestial chain are in Aziluth. (See Secret Doctrine.)

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

Haya-griva:

Haya-griva: Horse-head.The Lord took Form as Yajna, in a Brahma-yajna, above the neck, He had the Form of a Horse, He was called Haya (horse) griva (head) (BV-36).

(See also: Haya-griva , Hinduism, Hinduism Dictionary, Sanskrit Dictionary, Body Mind and Soul)

Pratyeka Buddha (Sanskrit) [from prati towards, for + eka one]

Each one for himself; exalted and in one sense holy beings who crave spiritual enlightenment for themselves alone. They "are those Bodhisattvas who strive after and often reach the Dharmakaya robe after a series of lives. Caring nothing for the woes of mankind or to help it, but only for this own bliss, they enter Nirvana and -- disappear from the sight and the hearts of men. In Northern Buddhism a 'Pratyeka Buddha' is a synonym of spiritual Selfishness"; "He, who becomes Pratyeka-Buddha, makes his obeisance but to his Self" (VS 86, 43).

They achieve nirvana automatically as it were, and leave the world in its misery behind. Though exalted, nevertheless they do not rank with the unutterable sublimity, wisdom, and pity of the Buddhas of Compassion.

"The Pratyeka Buddha is a degree which belongs exclusively to the Yogacharya school, yet it is only one of high intellectual development with no true spirituality. It is the dead-letter of the Yoga laws, in which intellect and comprehension play the greatest part, added to the strict carrying out of the rules of the inner development. It is one of the three paths to Nirvana, and the lowest, in which a Yogi -- 'without teacher and without saving others' -- by the mere force of will and technical observances, attains to a kind of nominal Buddhaship individually; doing no good to anyone, but working selfishly for his own salvation and himself alone.

The Pratyekas are respected outwardly but are despised inwardly by those of keen or spiritual appreciation. A Pratyeka is generally compared to a 'Khadga' or solitary rhinoceros and called Ekashringa Rishi, a selfish solitary Rishi (or saint)" (TG 261).

(See also: Pratyeka Buddha , Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary, Occultism, Occultism Dictionary)

Alogon (Greek) Used by Pythagoras and Plato for the irrational soul in man, divided into the thymichon and epithymichon; the rational soul was called logos. (BCW 7:229)

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

'Om Namo Bhagavate Vasudevaya':

'Om Namo Bhagavate Vasudevaya': My respects for Vasudeva, the Supreme Lord (also called dvadasaksara-mantra) (SB: C4:8-54)

(See also: 'Om Namo Bhagavate Vasudevaya' , Hinduism, Hinduism Dictionary, Sanskrit Dictionary, Body Mind and Soul)

Tulku sprul sku (Tibetan) [short for sprul pa'i sku (tul-pe-ku) from sprul pa phantom, disembodied spirit; cf Sanskrit nirmanakaya body of magical transformation]

Applied to a lama of high rank, often to the head abbot of a monastery; specifically, to those lamas who have proved their ability of remembering their office and standing in a former incarnation, e.g., by selecting articles belonging previously to themselves, describing details of a former life, surroundings, etc. The two most important tulkus in the Tibetan Buddhist hierarchy are the Tashi and Dalai Lamas. Tulku is often referred to as an incarnation but, outside of the many varieties of an incarnating or imbodying power or energy, incarnation in popular usage is the direct continuance of a previous imbodiment. These so-called living buddhas of Tibet are one kind of tulku -- the transmission of a spiritual power or energy from one Buddha-lama of a Tibetan monastery when he dies, to a child or adult successor. If the transmission is successful, the result is tulku.

Tulku is of many different kinds and very closely parallels the Hindu doctrine of avatara. Taking Jesus as an example: here was a life-long tulku, a ray from a divinity; a tulku of that divinity so far as that ray goes, a divine manifestation, and hence a true avatara in the Brahmanical sense. Again, Gautama Buddha was tulku of his own inner buddha or inner god. The average person, however, is merely overshadowed occasionally, if he really aspires, by a touch of the divine flame from within the higher parts of his own constitution, and yet even for these fugitive instants such person is tulku. But when Gautama attained buddhahood, he was relatively infilled with his own inner buddha, and therefore was that god's human tulku. That was for Siddhartha the man, nirvana; he then entered dharmakaya and this portion of him was then known of men no more: that portion of him was a man become divine.

Another kind of tulku is where a human mahatma will send a ray from himself, or a part of himself, to take imbodiment, perhaps only temporarily, perhaps almost for a lifetime, in a neophyte-messenger that this mahatma is sending out into the world to teach. The messenger in this instance acts as a transmitter of the spiritual and divine powers of the mahatma. Blavatsky was such a tulku, imbodying frequently the very life of, and hence guided by, her own teacher. While this incarnation of the teacher's higher essence lasted, she was tulku. When for one reason or another the influence or ray was withdrawn for a longer or shorter period, tulku then and there became nonexistent.

Still another aspect of the tulku doctrine is illustrated by the case of Blavatsky. Where is she now? Blavatsky has not yet again reincarnated -- she has not yet been born as a child -- but she has at certain times, and for one certain individual, with that individual's consent, organized as it were tulku for that individual. For the time being, therefore, we can say that Blavatsky has partially imbodied in that chosen individual for the purpose of special transmission. In all cases of tulku, they are incarnations or appearances. If Blavatsky, for instance, were to make tulku of a person for a month or a year, for the time being that person would be tulku, but when that particular work was done, the influence would be withdrawn and tulku would stop.

There is again another kind of avataric incarnation or tulku, a temporary physical appearance of an adept in the mayavi-rupa. Certain Tibetan lamas are known to be able to perform this feat, and thus they too have been properly called tulkus, which is the type of tulku that certain Orientalists have referred to as "an appearance."

Another type of tulku of an opposite and essentially evil character is that brought about by a hypnotist who temporarily displaces the psychological nature of his entranced subject through psychologization or even hypnosis plus mesmerism. This, however, is more often than not an act of black magic and fraught with grave dangers, both to the hypnotist and the one entranced. Every clever hypnotist actually makes a tulku of his victim in a black magic sense. When he puts an idea into the brain of his victim, that one week from now at three o'clock in the afternoon he is going to do some essentially foolish or undignified act -- for the time being that hypnotist is working a black magic tulku on that victim, and every psychologist and hypnotist knows the possibility of this fact, though the scientific explanation of the term may be strange to him. A key example of black magic tulku was what the medieval Europeans used to call werewolves. This doctrine of the tulku, however, is at heart beautiful and sublime, and hence highly reverenced by the Tibetans.

(See also: Tulku, sprul sku , Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary, Body mind and Soul)

Kaivalya:

Kaivalya ("isolation"): the state of absolute freedom from conditioned existence, as explained in ashta-anga-yoga; in the nondualistic (advaita) traditions of India, this is usually called moksha or mukti (meaning "release" from the fetters of ignorance, or avidya)

(See also: Kaivalya ,Yoga, Yoga Dictionary)

Kalahansa or Hamsa (Sanskrit). A mystic title given to Brahma (or Parabrahman); means "the swan in and out of time". Brahma (male) is called Hansa-Vahan, the vehicle of the "Swan".

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

Tirthikas (Sanskrit) [from tirtha holy place]

The holy ones; "the Brahmanical Sectarians 'beyond' the Himalayas called 'infidels' by the Buddhist in the sacred land, Tibet, and vice versa" (VS 85-6).

(See also: Tirthikas , Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary, Body mind and Soul)

Arya-Bhata (Sanskrit) The earliest Hindu algerbraist and astronomer, with the exception of Asura Maya (q.v.); the author of a work called Arya Siddhanta, a system of Astronomy.

(See also: Arya-Bhata , Theosophy, Spirituality, Body mind and Soul, Spiritual Dictionary,)

Deva: "A shining one," a god-greater or lesser in the evolutionary hierarchy; a semi-divine or celestial being with great powers, and therefore a "god." Sometimes called a demi-god.

(See also: Deva , Hinduism, Hinduism Dictionary, Sanskrit Dictionary, Body Mind and Soul)

Samhain

Sabbat held on the eve of November 1st, also called Halloween and celebrated by most people (religiously or not) on October 31. Pronounced Sow -wen

(See also: Samhain , New Age Spirituality, Body Mind and Soul)

Sabean, Sabaean, Sabian, Sabianism [from Hebrew tsaba host, army, celestial hosts]

A name given by the Shemitic peoples to those who worship the spiritual beings in the universe; and because the celestial bodies were the most evident manifestations of some classes of these spiritual beings, this religion naturally became confused with the worship of the celestial bodies themselves as the dwellings or mansions of the regents above, in, and behind the visible orbs. Hence the Sabeans were called astrolaters or star-worshipers; but it was not the physical bodies of the celestial orbs which were worshiped, but the spiritual entities, powers, or spirits which ensouled these orbs. This was one of the very archaic religions of the human race, found all over the globe in various forms; and in its origins Sabianism was undoubtedly an outpouring of occult teaching from the archaic Mysteries.

The word Sabean itself has come down to us mainly through Greek and Latin writers, but so thoroughly imbued were the ancient Hebrews with this idea of the celestial hosts or cosmic spirits that the Bible is full of references where the context even wrongly endows the celestial hosts with the properties of the Most High God, and it has been so understood by Christian theologians; forgetting, however, that manifested deities, however high, are but the manifestations of the infinite and ineffable Mystery or parabrahman, from which all the celestial hosts flow or emanate. Thus not only ancient and modern Judaism, but Christianity itself, is filled with the thought of the ancient Sabeans.

Sabeanism was unquestionably the main religious belief of the ancient Chaldeans and Assyrians, but likewise the very foundation stone of practically all the great religions of all the great peoples of the past. Upon the authority of the Jewish scholar Maimonides, scholars have considered the Sabeans as an ancient race whose principal religion was that of star-worship and closely affiliated with the Babylonians and Syrians. But the Sabeans were not a race, but those who followed and practiced the divine astrological astrolatry of the hoariest antiquity. Mohammed in the Koran mentions a sect between the Jews and Christians called Sabi una -- to whom certain privileges were granted; older Moslem theologians were agreed that the Sabeans possessed manuscripts which they regarded in the light of a revelation, and the Mandeans came under the same protection granted to the Sabeans; hence the Mandeans also came to be regarded as Sabeans. Another sect of polytheists, the Harranians (830 AD), also affiliated with the Sabeans and shielded themselves under the same privileges; they were a remnant of a Mesopotamian cult, and star-worship had a prominent place in their system.

Certain Arabian writers termed the Sabean language the science of astronomy, but what we now call astronomy was but a minor portion of ancient astrolatry; they also state that Seth or Set was the founder of Sabeanism, and that the pyramids were regarded as the place of sepulture of Seth or Agathodaimon. We see here confusion, reductions of general principles to details, and anthropomorphizations of cosmic principles. Hermes is in many senses the same as Seth, and the pyramids were consecrated to the regents of the stars, rather than to the orbs (SD 2:362).

(See also: Sabean, Sabaean, Sabian, Sabianism , Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary)

Karma

(Sanskrit "deed," "action," "ritual," "result") A central Indian term with various meanings.

1)    Any mental, verbal, or physical action or intention, especially a morally correct or textually prescribed activity.

2)    The results or consequences of actions or intentions.

3)    The Hindu principle of cause and effect, originally developed in South Asian religions, that determines one's past, current, and future existences. Everything we do produces some effect, now or later, on the physical or astral planes. Representing neither good nor evil, all actions and events cause corresponding actions and events in the past or future (including past and future lives through reincarnation).

4)    Ritual activity, particularly the ancient Indian rites propitiating a pantheon of gods as prescribed in the Vedic texts. Ritual performance might be done to meet religious obligations, such as initiation into the community, to honor one's ancestors, or to fulfill individual desires such as wealth, progeny, or immortality. The results of ritual, which are also called karma, were sometimes interpreted as "unseen" (apurva), that is, postponed or not yet noticeable in order to explain apparently delayed consequences. While all could admit that actions would eventually bear consequences, the doctrine of unseen results provoked lively debate and reconsideration of the importance of ritual.

5)    The erroneous western interpretation: That the good and bad deeds that we do adds and subtracts from our accumulated record, our karma. At the end of our life, we are rewarded or punished according to our karma by being reincarnated into either a painful or good new life.

(see Karma)

(See also: Karma , New Age Spirituality, Body Mind and Soul)

Anubhava - one of the five essential ingredients of rasa. The actions which display or reveal the spiritual emotions situated within the heart are called anubhavas.

The anubhavas are thirteen in number:

1)   nrtya (dancing) ,

2)   vilunthita (rolling on the ground) ,

3)   gita (singing) ,

4)   krosana (loud crying) ,

5)   tanu-motana (writhing of the body) ,

6)   hunkara (roaring) ,

7)   jrmbhana (yawning) ,

8)   svasa-bhua (breathing heavily) ,

9)   loka-anapeksita (giving up concern for public image) ,

10)    lalasrava (salivating) ,

11)    atta-hasa (loud laughter) ,

12)    ghurna (staggering about) , and

13)    hikka (a fit of hiccups).

(See also: Anubhava , Bhakti, Bhakti Yoga, Bhakti Dictionary, Body Mind and Soul)