Will Power.

See WILL

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Wind Often used synonymously with spirit and breath, which are denoted by similar or identical words in many languages. In the New Testament (John 3:8) Jesus uses the simile of wind for spirit: "The wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, and whither it goeth: so is every one that is born of the Spirit." Another equally exact translation reads: "The Spirit breathes wither it will, and you hear its voice (or power), but know not whence it comes and whither its destination; thus is everyone who arises out of the spirit."

Wind is also used alternatively with air. The regents of the cosmic forces of north, south, east, and west -- the four Maharajas connected with karma -- have as their material agents the four corresponding winds or spirits, which mightily influence all living things.

With the Greeks, "the cave of the winds was the earth, and the winds were the winds of the spirit, the circulations of the universe figurated as winds: a cave of which the north gate was made of horn through which they ascend also, but mainly descend. And the south gate of the earth, or of the cave of the winds, was made of ivory, signifying the elephants of the south, as the horn does the tusks of the animals of the north. And out of the south gate go the hordes of men" (SOPh 321-2).

See also ANIMA; PNEUMA; SPIRITUS

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

Wine Used as an emblem of life and spirit, as in the Mysteries, where at one stage of the initiatory rites wine and bread were offered to the candidate as symbols of spirit and body, the meaning being the same as that conveyed elsewhere by fire and water, or blood and flesh. It was necessary for the aspirant to be perfected in both ways.

The rite was very early adopted from the Dionysian Mysteries by the Christian churches in the sacrament of the Eucharist where wine represents the blood of Christ, and the bread his body. Wine is also connected in the same mystical manner with the Greek god Dionysos or Bacchus, for this divinity represented the Christos or initiator, teacher, and savior of mankind; and thus wine stands for inspiration and holy enthusiasm, varying from divine inspiration and spiritual quickening all down the scale to merely phrenetic exaltation, and even when grossly degenerate, orgiastic, and drunken excitement, such as marked the degraded forms of Bacchic worship.

In the New Testament the parable of the turning of water into wine is another way of stating that exoteric or mythologic teachings were explained and illustrated so that the inner wisdom became known, the wine standing for the inner aspect. Only an adept or initiate is able to do this.

See also BREAD AND WINE; SOMA; VINE

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

Wing, Wings Often signifying flight, but more accurately the soaring power of the spirit, literally or metaphorically, as in the wings of Mercury, of Christian, Hebrew, and other angelic figures of the Mesopotamian nations, of the horse Pegasus, of the sphinxes representative of the several human powers, of the winged dragons, of the winged wheels mentioned in Ezekiel's vision of initiation, and also as descriptive of the workings of fohat. The eternal bird, the flutter of whose wings produces life, represents the dual forces proceeding from boundless space, and the emblem is equivalent to Hansa, the Hindu bird of wisdom. Similar to this is the winged globe of Egypt.

As the emblem in ancient symbolic art, representative of the soaring power of the human spirit-soul within, and from this fundamental idea the emblem has been applied to derivative symbolic ideas, such as the flight of the inner self into interior worlds during the trials of initiation, or the soaring intelligence of the initiate penetrating into the mysteries and secrets of interior worlds.

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

Winged Globe.

See GLOBE, WINGED

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Winged Wheel Used in mystic philosophy worldwide, depicted under many forms, whether as a winged wheel, globe, egg, disk, etc. The Stanzas of Dzyan state that "Fohat takes five strides, and builds a winged wheel at each corner of the square for the four holy ones." Here winged wheel is a name for the four Maharajas who are the guardians or regents of the cosmic forces of the cardinal points north, south, east, and west (SD 1:122).

More generally, the winged wheel or globe suggests cyclic time unrolling its mysterious destiny, emerging from the darkness of the mists of the past, passing through the present, and pursuing its equally mysterious but always karmic courses into the future. In a more restricted sense, it applies to the reimbodying monads, the egg, wheel, or disk representing the monad or consciousness-center, and its wings suggesting its passage through not only duration but space.

See also WHEEL

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Winter Solstice.

See SEASONS

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Wisdom.

See ATMA-VIDYA; BODHI; HOCHMAH; SOPHIA, ETC.

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

White Regarded as the source whence the seven prismatic colors diverge, it stands for the Logos of a hierarchy. Nearly all the archaic religio-philosophies state that light or white is born of darkness, the incomprehensible deeps of universal life which is darkness only to our poorly evolved sense and mind. In this sense, darkness may often be spoken of as absolute light.

As opposed to black, it mystically signifies pure and good: for example, white magician or white magic.

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

White Island Translation of the Sanskrit seta-dvipa; an island mentioned frequently in ancient Hindu Puranic accounts of the various continents or islands which have flourished and disappeared in past geologic ages, as well as those which now are or which will come into being in time.

It was an actual continental system with outlying islands lying mainly within the arctic regions, and its remains (with partial submersions and re-elevations within geologic history) are today known as Greenland, Siberia, and several other places. It is equivalent to the second continent in theosophical teaching, although there were at much later dates than this continental system a few small islands also called white.

Another dvipa mentioned in the Puranas, Saka-dvipa, has not yet come into existence and is now mainly under the floors of the oceans. It may be called the sixth continent. Both Sveta-dvipa and Saka-dvipa have been confused by some writers with the islands called Ruta and Daitya, which have both disappeared: Ruta between 800 and 900 thousand years ago, and the smaller Daitya at a much later date but still several hundred thousand years ago. Ruta and Daitya were remnants of the fourth or Atlantean continent.

Mystically, although based on geological history, Sveta-dvipa is often called part of the Eternal Land or north pole and the lands immediately surrounding it. The unvarying traditions of a large part of the Orient state that it is the only locality which escapes the fate of most other dvipas: total submersion under the waters of the oceans. All the avataras of Vishnu were said to have come originally from the White Island. It is sometimes called preeminently the home or source of white magicians, and is contrasted with Atala, often called the abode of black magicians.

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White Lotus Day May 8; commemorating H. P. Blavatsky's death in 1891.

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White Magic, White Magicians.

See MAGIC, MAGICIAN

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White Stone "To him that overcometh will I give of the hidden manna, and will give him a white stone, and in the stone a new name written, which no man knoweth saving he that receiveth it" (Rev 2:17).

In Revelation, a symbolic record of John's initiation, the white stone is the new, pure, inner psychological vehicle in the person which the spirit within him is enabled to acquire and work through when the victory in initiation has been won; and the new name signifies the new self which has thus become manifest in him.

The stone "had the word prize engraved on it, and was the symbol of that word given to the neophyte who, in his initiation, had successfully passed through all the trials in the Mysteries. It was the potent white cornelian of the mediaeval Rosicrucians, who took it from the Gnostics" (TG 369).

In exoteric rites this truth was represented by the gift of an actual stone or gem, and we hear of the alba petra (white stone) of initiation; while the Gnostic gems and their inscriptions are well known. It also calls to mind the philosopher's stone.

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

Widow's Son "A name given to the French Masons, because the Masonic ceremonies are principally based on the adventures and death of Hiram Abif, 'the widow's son,' who is supposed to have helped to build the mythical Solomon's Temple" (TG 369).

See also HIRAM ABIF

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Widblain.

See VIDBLAINN

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Wigred.

See VIGRIDSSLATTEN

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Will-born Used in The Secret Doctrine as equivalent to mind-born -- referring specifically to those beings in the early third root-race "while it was yet in its state of purity" who were created by means of will power through kriyasakti by the Sons of Wisdom.

This progeny is termed the Sons of Ad, Sons of the Fire-mist, or Sons of Will and Yoga. "It was not a Race, this progeny. It was at first a wondrous Being, called the 'Initiator,' and after him a group of semi-divine and semi-human beings. 'Set apart' in Archaic genesis for certain purposes, they are those in whom are said to have incarnated the highest Dhyanis, 'Munis and Rishis from previous Manvantaras' -- to form the nursery for future human adepts, on this earth and during the present cycle" (SD 1:207). Theosophy teaches that in future ages generation by means of will power through krisyasakti will again be the method of producing offspring.

The Puranas also refer to will-born progeny, termed chhandajas.

(See also: Will-born, Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary, Body mind and Soul)

Waters of Space Chaos, the great deep, the great cosmic Mother, the universal cosmic matrix. According to Thales and other ancient philosophers, the water of cosmic space was the first principle emanating from the spatial deeps of spirit and producing the universe through emanational evolution. Various Greek philosophers have represented aether, fire, air, or water as the primordial cosmic principle; and each of these was true, though giving only a part of the truth. These philosophies as aspects of a whole in much the same way as the several great schools of Hindu philosophy are.

Thus the waters of space are equivalent to the veil of cosmic spirit. Water in ancient cosmogonies corresponded to the Hindu prakriti or pradhana, and like the Greek Second Logos was endowed with feminine or productive characteristics. Thus the archaic Greeks in one form of their cosmogonical philosophy taught that all things, including the gods, came forth from Ocean and his wife Tethys:

"Ocean is the immeasurable space (Spirit in Chaos), which is the Deity . . .; and Tethys is not the Earth, but primordial matter in the process of formation" (SD 2:65).

"But there are two distinct aspects in universal Esotericism, Eastern and Western, in all those personations of the Female Power in nature, or nature -- the noumenal and the phenomenal. One is its purely metaphysical aspect, . . . the other terrestrial and physical, and at the same time divine from the stand-point of practical human conception and Occultism. They are all the symbols and personifications of Chaos, the 'Great Deep' or the Primordial Waters of Space, the impenetrable veil between the Incognisable and the Logos of Creation" (SD 1:431).

(See also: Waters of Space, Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary, Body mind and Soul)

We.

See VE

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

Week The period of seven days was known to the Hindus, Egyptians, Hebrews, and other ancient nations, but not used by the Greeks or Romans until the Christian Emperor Theodosius. It is not based on any exact astronomical cycle, so far as is ordinarily known, though it may be considered roughly as a subdivision of the month. It was well known to the Hebrews, and in the New Testament the word week translates the Greek Sabbator which is the Hebrew Shabbath. Though commonly Sabbath is taken to mean a seventh day after six, a more esoteric sense makes it a period of seven time units of rest after a period of seven active time units -- in other words after a septenary manvantara comes a septenary pralaya. The word is also used of other sevenfold time periods, such as a week of years or of ages; for each of the days in a week of years represents 360 solar years, and the whole week 2,520 years. The Hebrews "had a Sabbatical week, a Sabbatical year, etc., etc., and their Sabbath lasted indifferently 24 hours or 24,000 years -- in their secret calculations of the Sods. We of the present times call an age a century" (SD 2:395).

The nomenclature of the seven days of the week according to the seven sacred planets is serially uniform in the various calendars, and points to a common origin of this knowledge. It can be arrived at by dividing the day into 24 hours and assigning a planet to each hour, for instance, first counting from Saturn, then Jupiter, then Mars, Sun, Venus, Mercury, down to the Moon when, by this system of counting and pausing at every fourth, both inclusive, the first planetary hour of each day, beginning with the sunrise, will be found to be governed by the planet which is assigned to that day. The same occurs with a ten-hour day, or by counting the planets in order and giving one to each quarter of the day (cf Fund 250).

Here are the names of the days of the week in the English, ancient Anglo-Saxon, Scandinavian, Greek, and Latin systems as being sacred to their deities:

English // Anglo-Saxon // Scandinavian // Greek // Latin

Sunday // Sunnandaeg // Day of the Sun // Phoebus // Apollo

Monday // Monandaeg // Day of the Moon // Artemis // Diana

Tuesday // Tiwesdaeg // Day of Tiw // Ares // Mars

Wednesday // Wodnesdaeg // Day of Odin // Hermes // Mercurius

Thursday // Thunresdaeg // Day of Thor // Zeus // Jupiter

Friday // Frigedaeg // Day of Frigga // Aphrodite // Venus

Saturday // Saeterndaeg // Day of (?) // Kronos // Saturnus

Blavatsky writes that in the course of time the seven-headed or septenary Dragon-logos became split up into "four heptanomic parts or twenty-eight portions," which suggests the division of the week and the month, into the seven days of the week, and the 28 days of the lunar month, and the four seasons of the year. "Each lunar week has a distinct occult character in the lunar month; each day of the twenty-eight has its special characteristics; as each of the twelve constellations, whether separately or in combination with other signs, has an occult influence either for good or for evil" (SD 1:409).

The ancient Mexicans had a different system of dividing their weeks and months: their week consisted of five days, and their month of 20 days. There were likewise other weeks among other nations or peoples as, for instance, the Athenians had a week of ten days, etc.

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

Werewolf.

See LYCANTHROPY

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