Dissolution Dictionary

dissolution: Dissolving or breaking up into parts. An alternative term for destruction. See: absorption, mahapralaya, Nataraja.

(See also: Dissolution , Hinduism, Body Mind and Soul)

Dissolution. See PRALAYA

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

Elemental Dissolution. See PRAKRITIKA PRALAYA

(See also: Elemental Dissolution , Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary, Occultism, Occultism Dictionary)

universal dissolution: The final stage in the recurring cosmic cycles of creation in which all manifestation is reabsorbed into God.

See: mahapralaya.

(See also: Universal dissolution , Hinduism, Body Mind and Soul)

A Theosophical definition of Death :

Death

Death occurs when a general break-up of the constitution of man takes place; nor is this break-up a matter of sudden occurrence, with the exceptions of course of such cases as mortal accidents or suicides. Death is always preceded, varying in each individual case, by a certain time spent in the withdrawal of the monadic individuality from an incarnation, and this withdrawal of course takes place coincidently with a decay of the seven-principle being which man is in physical incarnation. This decay precedes physical dissolution, and is a preparation of and by the consciousness-center for the forthcoming existence in the invisible realms. This withdrawal actually is a preparation for the life to come in invisible realms, and as the septenary entity on this earth so decays, it may truly be said to be approaching rebirth in the next sphere.

Death occurs, physically speaking, with the cessation of activity of the pulsating heart. There is the last beat, and this is followed by immediate, instantaneous unconsciousness, for nature is very merciful in these things. But death is not yet complete, for the brain is the last organ of the physical body really to die, and for some time after the heart has ceased beating, the brain and its memory still remain active and, although unconsciously so, the human ego for this short length of time, passes in review every event of the preceding life. This great or small panoramic picture of the past is purely automatic, so to say; yet the soul-consciousness of the reincarnating ego watches this wonderful review incident by incident, a review which includes the entire course of thought and action of the life just closed. The entity is, for the time being, entirely unconscious of everything else except this. Temporarily it lives in the past, and memory dislodges from the akasic record, so to speak, event after event, to the smallest detail: passes them all in review, and in regular order from the beginning to the end, and thus sees all its past life as an all-inclusive panorama of picture succeeding picture.

There are very definite ethical and psychological reasons inhering in this process, for this process forms a reconstruction of both the good and the evil done in the past life, and imprints this strongly as a record on the fabric of the spiritual memory of the passing being. Then the mortal and material portions sink into oblivion, while the reincarnating ego carries the best and noblest parts of these memories into the devachan or heaven-world of postmortem rest and recuperation. Thus comes the end called death; and unconsciousness, complete and undisturbed, succeeds, until there occurs what the ancients called the second death.

The lower triad (prana, linga-sarira, sthula-sarira) is now definitely cast off, and the remaining quaternary is free. The physical body of the lower triad follows the course of natural decay, and its various hosts of life-atoms proceed whither their natural attractions draw them. The linga-sarira or model-body remains in the astral realms, and finally fades out. The life-atoms of the prana, or electrical field, fly instantly back at the moment of physical dissolution to the natural pranic reservoirs of the planet.

This leaves man, therefore, no longer a heptad or septenary entity, but a quaternary consisting of the upper duad (atma-buddhi) and the intermediate duad (manas-kama). The second death then takes place.

Death and the adjective dead are mere words by which the human mind seeks to express thoughts which it gathers from a more or less consistent observation of the phenomena of the material world. Death is dissolution of a component entity or thing. The dead, therefore, are merely dissolving bodies  - entities which have reached their term on this our physical plane. Dissolution is common to all things, because all physical things are composite: they are not absolute things. They are born; they grow; they reach maturity; they enjoy, as the expression runs, a certain term of life in the full bloom of their powers; then they "die." That is the ordinary way of expressing what men call death; and the corresponding adjective is dead, when we say that such things or entities are dead.

Do you find death per se anywhere? No. You find nothing but action; you find nothing but movement; you find nothing but change. Nothing stands still or is annihilated. What is called death itself shouts forth to us the fact of movement and change. Absolute inertia is unknown in nature or in the human mind; it does not exist.

See also: Death , Mysticism, Body Mind and Soul

cosmic cycle: One of the infinitely recurring periods of the universe, comprising its creation, preservation and dissolution. These cycles are measured in periods of progressive ages, called yugas. Satya (or Krita), Treta, Dvapara and Kali are the names of these four divisions, and they repeat themselves in that order, with the Satya Yuga being the longest and the Kali Yuga the shortest. The comparison is often made of these ages with the cycles of the day: Satya Yuga being morning until noon, the period of greatest light or enlightenment, Treta Yuga afternoon, Dvapara evening, and Kali Yuga the darkest part of the night. Four yugas equal one mahayuga.

Theories vary, but by traditional astronomical calculation, a mahayuga equals 4,320,000 solar years (or 12,000 "divine years;" one divine year is 360 solar years) -  with the

• Satya Yuga lasting 1,728,000 years,
• Treta Yuga 1,296,000 years,
• Dvapara Yuga 864,000 years, and
• Kali Yuga 432,000 years.

Mankind is now experiencing the Kali Yuga, which began at midnight, February 18, 3102 bce (year one on the Hindu calendar [see Hindu Timeline]) and will end in approximately 427,000 years. (By another reckoning, one mahayuga equals approximately two million solar years.) A dissolution called laya occurs at the end of each mahayuga, when the physical world is destroyed by flood and fire. Each destructive period is followed by the succession of creation (srishti), evolution or preservation (sthiti) and dissolution (laya).

A summary of the periods in the cosmic cycles:

• 1 mahayuga = 4,320,000 years (four yugas)
• 71 mahayugas = 1 manvantara or manu (we are in the 28th mahayuga)
• 14 manvantaras = 1 kalpa or day of Brahma (we are in the 7th manvantara)
• 2 kalpas = 1 ahoratra or day and night of Brahma 360 ahoratras = 1 year of Brahma
• 100 Brahma years = 309,173,760,000,000 years (one "lifetime" of Brahma, or the universe).

We are in Brahma Year 51 of the current cycle. At the end of every kalpa or day of Brahma a greater dissolution, called pralaya (or kalpanta, "end of an eon"), occurs when both the physical and subtle worlds are absorbed into the causal world, where souls rest until the next kalpa begins. This state of withdrawal or "night of Brahma," continues for the length of an entire kalpa until creation again issues forth.

After 36,000 of these dissolutions and creations there is a total, universal annihilation, mahapralaya, when all three worlds, all time, form and space, are withdrawn into God Siva. After a period of total withdrawal a new universe or lifespan of Brahma begins. This entire cycle repeats infinitely. This view of cosmic time is recorded in the Puranas and the Dharma Shastras.

See: mahapralaya.

(See also: Cosmic cycle , Hinduism, Body Mind and Soul)

Seasons The seasons are at least in part due to the inclination of the earth's axis, and wholly according to this explanation in modern astronomy. If there were no inclination -- if the ecliptic coincided with the equator, and the earth's axis with the poles of the equator -- there would be no seasons.

In satya yuga there were no changes of season, but an eternal spring which lasted as long as the lack of polar inclination endured, but which came to an end when the third root-race fell into "sin" -- the two events coinciding. The earth's axis when without inclination is at right angles with the plane of the ecliptic. The titans or kabiri are described in The Secret Doctrine as the generators and regulators of the seasons, thus showing that they take their part with the karmic lipikas in the cosmic history of the globe. Spring, summer, autumn, and winter correspond with other quaternaries, such as the four points of the compass and the four elements; and also represent a cycle of changes from birth to dissolution and rebirth.

In theosophical literature the earth's axis is said to undergo a secular movement of inclination with interims of pausings and smaller changes, or what may be called librations; and this secular movement is on the whole continuous, so that in course of long ages the axis of the earth becomes inverted, and consequently the poles are reversed; continuing their movement, they finally return to the position of right angularity with the plane of the ecliptic. Enormous changes must take place during this cycle upon the earth, not only as regards seasons, but likewise as regards geological and marine convulsions and cataclysms -- evidences of which are apparent not only in the geological record, but in many otherwise unexplained and perhaps unexplainable botanical and zoological migrations. What is at one time land becomes sea, and vice versa.

See also EQUINOX; SOLSTICE

(See also: Seasons , Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary)

Immortality That which is not subject to death, deathlessness. Death is the dissolution of a compound entity, where the compound itself ceases to exist, though its elements do not perish. Nor does the ensouling entity perish because of the dissolution of its physical, astral, or other vehicle. Hence in a restricted sense certain elements can be said to be immortal, relative to the compound they form.

Theosophy teaches the constant rebirths of the identic spiritual-intellectual individuality throughout the manvantara; and that, even after union into paranirvana, the individuality, precisely because it is then on its own higher plane or sphere of life, is not lost and will reemerge at a new manvantara to pursue its own particular cycle. This eternal monad, the spiritual-intellectual individuality, is the real and truly immortal essence of the person; and within this supreme cycle of immortality are a series of less immortalities, each representing the life cycle of one of the imbodiments of the monad. Death therefore of necessity becomes a recurrent process, precisely like birth or rebirth, and of many degrees, and simply means the dissolution of some group of lower sheaths enclosing the individual in imbodiment.

Viewing the question from the consciousness aspect, death means the exchange of one mode of consciousness for others. We cannot say offhand that we are either mortal or immortal, since we contain various elements of both kinds. The essence of the individuality is unconditionally immortal, its sheaths or bodies are mortal in various and relative degrees.

Immortality is conditional for the human soul: if it aspires to its inner god and allies itself therewith, the human soul becomes immortal because it is at one with its spiritual parent, the upper triad or monad. But if the personal or human soul refuse to recognize its spiritual essence and allies itself with increasing fullness with the complex compound of the lower human nature, it loses its chance of immortality and becomes but a psychological mortal compound itself.

The Buddha's statement that "nothing composite endures and consequently that as man is a composite entity there is in him no immortal and unchanging 'soul,' is the key. The 'soul' of man is changing from instant to instant -- learning, growing, expanding, evolving -- so that at no two consecutive seconds of time or of experience is it the same. Therefore it is not immortal. For immortality means enduring continually as you are. If you evolve you change, and therefore you cannot be immortal in the part which evolves, because you are growing into something greater" (FSO 385). In this sense, portions of an entity may endure for long periods of time, and thus be called immortal; but they are not immortal in the sense of continuing to exist unchanged or in a state identical to what they are now.

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

pralaya: (Sanskrit) "Dissolution, reabsorption; destruction; death."

A synonym for samhara, one of the five functions of Siva. Also names the partial destruction or reabsorption of the cosmos at the end of each eon or kalpa. There are three kinds of periods of dissolution:

1)    laya, at the end of a mahayuga, when the physical world is destroyed;

2)    pralaya, at the end of a kalpa, when both the physical and subtle worlds are destroyed; and

3)    mahapralaya at the end of a mahakalpa, when all three worlds (physical, subtle and causal) are absorbed into Siva.

See: cosmic cycle, mahapralaya.

(See also: Pralaya , Hinduism, Body Mind and Soul)

Dream Dictionary including the meaning of dreams about: Dagger, Dahlia, Dairy, Daisy, Damask Rose, Damson, Dance, Dancing Master, Dandelion, Danger, Dark, Dates, Daughter, Daughter-in-law, David, Day, Daybreak, Dead, Death, Debt, December, Deck, Decorate, Deed, Deer, Delay,

Dream Dictionary Index including links to 10.000 dream interpretations: Dream Dictionary Index

For more dream interpretation, see: Meaning of Dreams or Dream Dictionary

For articles about dreams, see: Dreams

tattva: (Sanskrit) "That-ness" or "essential nature." Tattvas are the primary principles, elements, states or categories of existence, the building blocks of the universe. Lord Siva constantly creates, sustains the form of and absorbs back into Himself His creations. Rishis describe this emanational process as the unfoldment of tattvas, stages or evolutes of manifestation, descending from subtle to gross. At mahapralaya, cosmic dissolution, they enfold into their respective sources, with only the first two tattvas surviving the great dissolution.

The first and subtlest form - the pure consciousness and source of all other evolutes of manifestation - is called Siva tattva, or Parashakti-nada. But beyond Siva tattva lies Parasiva - the utterly transcendent, Absolute Reality, called attava. That is Siva's first perfection.

The Sankhya system discusses 25 tattvas. Saivism recognizes these same 25 plus 11 beyond them, making 36 tattvas in all. These are divided into three groups:

1)    First are the five shuddha tattvas (shuddha = pure). These constitute the realm of shuddha maya.

2)    Next are the seven shuddha-ashuddha tattvas(shuddha-ashuddha = pure-impure). These constitute the realm of shuddhashuddha maya.

3)    3The third group comprises the 24 ashuddha tattvas (ashuddha = impure). These constitute the realm of ashuddha maya.

See: atattva, antahkarana, guna, kosha,

(See also: Tattva , Hinduism, Body Mind and Soul)

death: Death is a rich concept for which there are many words in Sanskrit, such as: mahaprasthana, "great departure;" samadhimarana, dying consciously while in the state of meditation; mahasamadhi, "great merger, or absorption," naming the departure of an enlightened soul.

Hindus know death to be the soul's detaching itself from the physical body and continuing on in the subtle body (sukshma sharira) with the same desires, aspirations and occupations as when it lived in a physical body. Now the person exists in the in-between world, the subtle plane, or Antarloka, with loved ones who have previously died, and is visited by earthly associates during their sleep.

Hindus do not fear death, for they know it to be one of the most glorious and exalted experiences, rich in spiritual potential. Other terms for death include panchatvam (death as dissolution of the five elements), mrityu (natural death), prayopavesha (self-willed death by fasting), marana (unnatural death, e.g., by murder).

See: reincarnation, suicide, videhamukti.

(See also: Death , Hinduism, Body Mind and Soul)

Kundalini Dictionary

Dictionary over terms related to kundalini and kundalini awakening. Please note that words in grey like " Kundalini " are links to archives with related articles.

dosha: (Sanskrit) "Bodily humor; individual constitution."

Three bodily humors, which according to ayurveda regulate the body, govern its proper functioning and determine its unique constitution. These are

• vata, the air humor;
• pitta, the fire humor; and
• kapha, the water humor.

Vata has its seat in the intestinal area, pitta in the stomach, and kapha in the lung area. They govern the creation, preservation and dissolution of bodily tissue. Vata humor is metabolic, nerve energy. Pitta is the catabolic, fire energy. Kapha is the anabolic, nutritive energy.

The three doshas (tridosha) also give rise to the various emotions and correspond to the three gunas, "qualities:" sattva (quiescence- vata), rajas (activity- pitta) and tamas (inertia- kapha).

See: ayurveda, kapha, pitta, vata.

(See also: Dosha , Hinduism, Body Mind and Soul)

Pralaya (Sanskrit) [from pra away + the verbal root li to dissolve]

Dissolving away, death, dissolution, as when one pours water upon a cube of salt or sugar: the cube of salt or sugar vanishes in the water, dissolves, and changes its form. So during a pralaya, matter crumbles or vanishes away into something else which is yet in it, surrounds it, and interpenetrates it. Pralaya is often defined as the state of latency or rest between two manvantaras of great life cycles. During pralaya, everything differentiated, every unit, disappears from the phenomenal universe and is transferred into the noumenal essence which periodically throughout eternity gives birth to all the phenomena of nature. Pralaya is dissolution of the visible into the invisible, the heterogeneous into the homogeneous, relatively or absolutely -- the objective universe returns into its one primal and eternally productive Cause, to reappear at the following cosmic dawn. To our finite minds, pralaya is like a state of nonbeing -- and so it is for all existences and beings on the lower material planes.

A mahapralaya (great pralaya) is an absolute pralaya of a solar system or kosmos; a minor pralaya is a partial dissolution of some part of the solar system or cosmos, such as a planetary chain or a globe. After an absolute pralaya, when the preexisting manifested material consists of but one element, and breath "is everywhere," the creation process acts from without inwardly; but after a minor pralaya, which involves the destruction of the corporeal vehicles of things, the inner vital essences remaining untouched, the celestial bodies begin at the first flutter of manvantara their resurrection to manifested cosmic life from within outwardly.

A pralaya is not the same as an obscuration, because an obscuration means the passage of a life-wave from a globe or equivalent celestial body to a globe on another plane. During such an obscuration the globe thus abandoned by the life-wave remains in statu quo -- in a refrigerated condition, so to say -- awaiting the influx of the succeeding life-wave. In the case of obscuration the vehicle remains dormant; yet this does not signify that the body is without movement, vital or psychic, of any kind. A person, for instance, when asleep is in obscuration, and it is obvious that his physical body is still alive and active after the manner of sleeping organisms.

"It is not the physical organisms that remain in statu quo, least of all their psychical principles, during the great Cosmic or even Solar pralayas, but only their Akasic or astral 'photographs.' But during the minor pralayas, once over-taken by 'Night,' the planets remain intact, though dead, as a huge animal, caught and embedded in the polar ice, remains the same for ages" (SD 1:18n).

Theosophy divides the pralayas into several kinds: the paurusha pralaya (dissolution or death of an individual person); the atyantika pralaya (nirvana of a jivanmukta); the obscuration or individual pralaya of each globe, as a life-wave passes on to the next globe; the round-obscurations or minor pralayas of the planetary chain after each round; the bhaumika pralaya (planetary pralaya) which occurs when the seven rounds of our earth-chain are completed, also called the naimittika pralaya (dissolution during the Night of Brahma); the saurya pralaya (solar pralaya) when the whole solar system is at an end; the universal mahapralaya or Brahma pralaya, usually called the prakritika pralaya or dissolution of the cosmos at the close of an Age or Life of Brahma; and the nitya pralaya or constant, incessant evolutionary changes that take place throughout the universe and therefore affect all its parts.

"When the great period of the universal kosmic pralaya occurs, and the universe is indrawn (following the Oriental metaphor) into the bosom of Parabrahman, what then happens? The spiritual entities then enter into their paranirvana, which means exactly for them what is meant for us when we speak of the death of the human being. They are drawn by their spiritual gravitational attractions into still higher hierarchies of being, into still higher spiritual realms, therein still higher rising and growing and learning and living; while the lower elements of the kosmos, the body of the universe (even as does our physical body when the change called death comes . . .), follow their own particular gravitational attractions: the physical body to dust; the vital breath to the vital breath of the kosmos; dust to dust, breath to breath. So with the other kosmic principles, as with man's principles at his decease: the kama of our nature to the universal reservoir of the kamic organism; our manas into its dhyan-chohanic rest; our monads into their own higher life. Then when the clock of eternity points once again for the kosmos to the hour of 'coming forth into light' -- which is 'death' for the spiritual being, as death for us is life for the inner man -- when the manvantara of material life comes around again (the period of spiritual death for the kosmos is the material life of manifestation), then in the distant abysms of space and time the kosmic life-centers are aroused into activity once more . . ." (Fund 183).

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

Sri Rudram: (Sanskrit) "Hymn to the wielder of awesom powers." Preeminent Vedic hymn to Lord Siva as the God of dissolution, chanted daily in Siva temples throughout India. It is in this long prayer, located in the middle of the Yajur Veda, Taittiriya Samhita, the Þrst of the three Vedas, that the Saivite mantra Namah Sivaya rst appears.

(See also: Sri Rudram , Hinduism, Body Mind and Soul)

Alaya (Sanskrit) (from a not + laya dissolution from the verbal root li to dissolve)

Nondissolution; the indissoluble; used in Buddhism for the universal soul or higher portions of anima mundi, the source of all beings and things. Mystically identical with akasa in the latter's highest elements and with mahabuddhi; also with mulaprakriti as root-producer or root-nature (OG 5).

With Mahayana Buddhists alaya is both the universal soul and the spiritual self of an advanced sage. Aryasamgha taught that "he who is strong in the Yoga can introduce at will his Alaya by means of meditation into the true Nature of Existence" (cf SD 1:49-51; also FSO 98n).

The Secret Doctrine (1:49) mentions Alaya in the Yogachara system, most probably referring to alaya-vijnana, but adds that with the "Esoteric 'Buddhists' . . . 'Alaya' has a double and even a triple meaning."

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

A dictionary Of Siddha Yoga Terminology. From Abhanga to Yogini.

Please note that all words in grey, like "enlightenment" or "kundalini" are hyperlinked to archives further explaining the term. At the corresponding archive you will also find articles related to the term.

Qelippoth (Hebrew) Shells, rinds, the outer covering or body of any entity. Because beings in the lowest world of the Qabbalah are considered shells infilled with a certain proportion of degenerate spiritual powers and functions, these beings are often called demons.

In the Qabbalah, the lowest of the four worlds, `olam `asiyyah, is therefore likewise called `olam qelippoth, in that all the beings pertaining to this sphere need the use of a vehicle, termed a rind or shell, which though subject to formation, birth, change, and dissolution as a form, is not so as to its essential life-atoms -- except as these life-atoms themselves undergo rebirth and change, but not dissolution as do the shells.

Just as in the superior `olams there are the analogic divisions into the ten Sephiroth, likewise in this lowest sphere there are ten degrees, each growing denser and darker in its descent farther from the Sephirothic ray. The first two degrees of this descending scale are considered as absence of visible form -- termed in Genesis Tohu Bohu. The third degree is termed the abode of darkness (the darkness which covered the face of the earth of Genesis). Then follow, in descent, the seven infernal halls Sheba` Heichaloth, or hells in which are distributed the various princes of darkness and entities undergoing purgation -- the prince of the whole region being Sama'el (the angel of "venom" or death).

"note what we read in the Zohar (ii. 43a): 'For the service of the Angelic World, the Holy . . . made Samael and his legions, i.e., the world of action, who are as it were the clouds to be used (by the higher or upper Spirits, our Egos) to ride upon in their descent to the earth, and serve, as it were, for their horses.' This, in conjunction with the fact that Q'lippoth contains the matter of which stars, planets, and even men are made, shows that Samael with his legions is simply chaotic, turbulent matter, which is used in its finer state by spirits to robe themselves in. For speaking of the 'vesture' or form (rupa) of the incarnating Egos, it is said in the Occult Catechism that they, the Manasaputras or Sons of Wisdom, use for the consolidation of their forms, in order to descend into lower spheres, the dregs of Swabhavat, or that plastic matter which is throughout Space, in other words, primordial ilus. And these dregs are what the Egyptians have called Typhon and modern Europeans Satan, Samael, etc., etc. Deus est Demon inversus -- the Demon is the lining of God" (TG 269).

Thus Qelippoth has a dual meaning: first and less customary, the unorganized matter of space out of which spiritual beings build their bodies in order to manifest on this physical plane; second and more customary, is the physical bodies themselves as thus built, containing the vital and other characteristics of living beings. The word corresponds to the rupa-worlds -- the imbodied beings of this world or sphere.

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

Mahasaurya Manvantara and Pralaya [from Sanskrit maha great + saurya solar]

The life period or period of manifestation of the solar system, or its death and dissolution.

See also MANVANTARA; PRALAYA {FSO}

(See also: Mahasaurya Manvantara, Pralaya , Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary)