Aher (Hebrew) To be after, behind, secondary, another; the plural 'aherim, especially when used in conjunction with 'elohim, means "other or strange gods," which were supposed to be merely idols. As the Hebrew scriptures themselves show, the ancient Hebrews never at any time denied the existence of the gods of other peoples, but being utterly and strongly tribalistic, their own god Jehovah was to them supreme. Their tribal god is the regent of the planet Saturn, who was their planetary hierarch, and consequently, to them, the supreme god -- the god over all other gods. Had the Jews been born as a people under the regent of some other planet, the hierarchical regent of this other planet would then have been in their opinion the supreme god.

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

Zervan Akarana (Avestan) [from zervan time (cf Pahlavi zervam, zarvan, zurvan) + arana, akrana boundary]

Also Zeruana Akerne. Boundless spirit (BCW 4:328); in Zoroastrian literature there are two different kinds of time -- boundless time, pre-existing and ever-existing -- and finite time, which lasts for 12,000 symbolic years, the period during which the two forces of Ahura-Mazda and Ahriman are engaged in their never-ending struggle. According to the Avesta, Zervan Akarana has always existed; its glory is too exalted, its light too resplendent, for human intellect to grasp and comprehend. Its first emanation is eternal light, which becomes Ahura Mazda, the Logos; from whom emanate the six Amesha Spentas, and everything that has being, existence, and form. Another translation is "duration in a circle," the circle being the symbol for the endless, the beginningless, the unknown -- hence boundless time. Zervan Akarana is thus the Mazdean equivalent of Parabrahman or 'eyn soph.

The cycle marking the time period of the world (a fixed period, in contradistinction to boundless time) was called in the Avesta, Zervan daregho-hvadata (the sovereign time of the long period), measured as twelve periods of a thousand years, but what is generally understood in the 'Avesta' system as a thousand years, means, in the esoteric doctrine, a cycle of a duration known but to the initiates and which has an allegorical sense" (IU 2:221n).

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

'Adam Qadmon (Hebrew) (from 'adam mankind + qadam to be before, precede)

Primordial man, Adam Primus; in the Qabbalah macrocosmic man in contrast to the earthly Adam, the microcosm. Often called the Heavenly Man because symbolically he is the Sephirothal Tree of Life, each of the Sephiroth having its correspondence with a part of the body, the head being Kether (Crown), and the feet standing for Malchuth (Kingdom). 'Adam Qadmon corresponds mystically to the Hindu Purusha: both are generalizing terms used to represent the cosmic Logos or hierarch of their respective hierarchies.

Blavatsky compares 'Adam Qadmon to the first manu, Svayambhuva, "the synthesis of the fourteen Manus" (TG 206); also to the Greek Prometheus and the divine Pymander of the Hermetica -- the power of the thought divine "in its most spiritual aspect" (IU 1:298).

(See also: Adam Qadmon , Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary, Occultism, Occultism Dictionary)

Zipporah tsipporah (Hebrew) A circling, revolving, hence song or singing as a circling of sound; in the Bible, one of the seven daughters of Jethro, the Midianite priest, given in marriage to Moses after the latter had assisted her at the well (Ex 2). In one interpretation, "Jethro is called the 'father-in-law' of Moses; not because Moses was really married to one of his seven daughters. Moses was an Initiate, if he ever existed, and as such an ascetic, a nazar, and could never be married. It is an allegory like everything else. Zipporah (the shining) is one of the personified Occult Sciences given by Revel-Jethro, the Midian priest Initiator, to Moses, his Egyptian pupil. The 'well' by which Moses sat down in his fight from the Pharaoh symbolizes the 'well of Knowledge' " (SD 2:466n).

Zipporah is similar to the City Sippara -- situated on the Euphrates River north of Babylon -- where the casting of the infant Sargon occurred, which is practically identical with the story of Moses, only said to have happened about 1100 years earlier. Blavatsky concludes that Ezra applied this story to that of the prophet Moses when he compiled his history in Exodus.

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

Dream Interpretation Judge

Dreaming of a judge indicates that you need to speak with care and deliberation in the created situation. If you are the judge in your dream, you need to consider your decision carefully before you act. Dealing with a judge in an official matter means that you will be soon punished for bad conduct.

Source: Dream-Land, http://www.dream-land.info

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

Nidhi (Sanskrit) A treasure; the nine divine treasures or jewels of Kuvera, the Vedic Satan, each under the guardianship of some demon -- or rather a spirit more of the nature of the Greek daimon.

These nine nidhis are popularly given as

• padma (lotus),
• mahapadma (great lotus),
• sankha (conch shell),
• makara (marine animal or fish),
• kachchhapa (tortoise),
• mukunda (kettle drum),
• ananda (joy),
• nila (a dark color or blue), and
• kharva (dwarf).

They are sometimes personified as attendants of Kuvera or of Lakshmi.

All these nidhis are the objects of special worship by the Tantrikas. They differ from the nava-nidhi, or nine treasuries or jewels of wisdom referring to a consummation of spiritual development in occult training, occult life, or mysticism generally. In theosophy the "seven jewels of wisdom" are seven of the nine nava-nidhi.

(See also: Nidhi , Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary)

Alaya-vijnana (Sanskrit) (from alaya abode, dwelling from a-li to settle upon, come close to + vijnana discernment, knowledge from vi-jna to distinguish, know, understand) Abode of discriminative knowledge; the cognizing or discerning faculty, the mental power of making distinctions, hence the higher reasoning. When used mystically as "a receptacle or treasury of knowledge or wisdom," it corresponds very closely to the Vedantic vijnanamaya-kosa, the "thought-made sheath" of the human constitution, the higher manas or reincarnating ego.

In Mahayana Buddhism, alaya-vijnana has acquired a somewhat larger and higher significance: alaya (an abode, in the sense of focus of activity), the prepositional prefix a (meaning position or limitation) with the verb li (to dissolve) signifies solution or coalescence in unity.

Used much as the term human monad is in theosophy, equivalent to the higher manas or even buddhi-manas, it therefore signifies the focus or interior organ of consciousness into which is collected at the end of each incarnation the aroma of the higher experiences during that lifetime, thus forming a kind of treasury.

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

Anaitis, Anait (Chaldean) Also Anaitia, Aneitis, Tanais, Nanaea. A goddess whose worship was widespread over large portions of the Near East; "identical with the Hindu Annapurna, one of the names of Kali -- the female aspect of Siva -- at her best" (TG 21). Identified with the Greek Artemis and Aphrodite. "Anna (the name of the Mother of the Virgin Mary) . . . is derived from the Chaldean Ana, heaven, or Astral Light, Anima Mundi; whence Anaitia, Devi-durga, the wife of Siva, is also called Annapurna, and Kanya, the Virgin; 'Uma-Kanya' being her esoteric name, and meaning the 'Virgin of light,' Astral Light in one of its multitudinous aspects" (SD 1:91-2).

(See also: Anaitis, Anait , Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary, Occultism, Occultism Dictionary)

Manticism [from Greek mantis seer from mainomai to act ecstatically under a divine impulse]

A seer, one inspired with divine ecstasy; according to Plato, one who uttered oracles while under a divine impulse, which in its lowest forms was a kind of frenzy, while a prophetes (prophet) was one who interpreted the oracles. Frenzy, now used only to denote madness or anger, meant in classic times a state of exaltation both of mind and psychical nature which enabled inner faculties of perception to come into play, whereby seership and prophetic power were attained.

Certain exhalations from the earth would often act upon the body of the seer or seeress, inducing a state of physical receptivity, as occurred in the grotto of Delphi; and Cicero speaks highly of the better side of the power thus conferred. The condition produced by Bacchic rites was similar, but in later times degenerated into mere frenzy or ravings in the modern sense of the word; and as these rites became degraded into profligacy, the meaning of the word frenzy naturally altered pari passu.

(See also: Manticism , Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary)

Akupara (Sanskrit) (from a not + kupara ocean)

Unbounded; the mythical tortoise which upholds the earth (sometimes kupara). Also the sea, whether earthly or cosmic; likewise a name for the sun (cf MB Vana-parvan, ch 199).

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

Thought In The Secret Doctrine, used in senses quite different from the ordinary: abstract absolute thought, of which mind is a concrete manifestation, or of which voice or the Logos is a manifestation. Pymander is quoted as saying that passive or unconscious mind generates active idea -- and active idea here is the same as the activity of the Logos. Thought, impressed on the astral light, exists in eternity, whether active or passive.

Kriyasakti, one of the innate human powers, is the power which thought has of expressing itself analogically in action. Thoughts are imbodied elemental energies. The human brain does not create them, it only transmits them, because the human brain is but the vehicle transmitting intellectual, mental, and emotional energy from the monadic center within, and this monadic center itself originates thought.

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

Thraetaona (Avestan) Freton (Pahlavi) Feraydun (Persian) [from Avestan thrae trice + taona potent]

The Avestan fire god possibly connected in meaning with Traitana or (Trita in the Hindu Vedas), or the son of the waters, in India generally called Apam Napat and stated to be born from the cloud through the lightning. He slew the dreadful serpent Azhi Dahaka in the four-cornered Varena (the heavens) -- Feraydun (Thraetaona) with his three sons versus Azhi Dahaka with three heads. In the Vendidad (20) he is described as the first healer. Blavatsky calls Thraetaona the Persian Michael, and equates Apam Napat with fohat.

Another meaning of Feraydun is the sphere of the fixed stars (the light spheres).

See also AZHI DAHAKA; ZOHAK

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

Positivism In general, a philosophy based on physical phenomena and ignoring underlying antecedent causes; specifically, the system of Auguste Comte (1798-1857), miscalled the Religion of Humanity. He held that all speculative thought passes through three phases -- theological, metaphysical, positive: in the first, living beings having individual free will are regarded as the cause of phenomena; in the next, unverifiable abstractions are resorted to; positivism contents itself with a general description of phenomena.

The universe is not composed of individuals with volition, but of an ordered organism -- humanity -- governed by necessary laws. The civilized community is a true organism, a great being, and should be an object of worship. In conformity with the last, Positivist churches continue to exist, with definite organization and procedure. As stated in Isis Unveiled (1:79), negativism might be a better term, since the system denies more than it affirms. Its rejection of individuals in favor of humanity certainly is a lapse into the rejected metaphysical stage of speculation, which Comte showed he had no true comprehension of.

As a philosophy, holding that knowledge is based exclusively on the methods and discoveries of physical or positive science, it labors under great disadvantages. That speculation does pass through these and other stages is evident from the history of philosophy; but that positivism represents more than a passing phase is impossible to believe. It is one of the subtle forms of materialistic European philosophy so popular -- and among certain minds still in vogue -- during the 18th and 19th centuries.

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

Aeshma-Daeva (Avestan) Eesham-Diev, Hesham-Diev (Pahlavi) (from aeshma wrath, ill wish, anger from the verbal root ish desire, passion + daevas evil spirits (originally gods); cf Sanskrit deva, Persian dievs)

The fiend of the wounding spear in the Avesta. The Aryan gods or daevas having become anthropomorphic, they were denounced by the Aryan initiates who had settled in Airya-Vaeja (Eran or Iran). Zarathustra in the Gathas refers to Kavis and Karpans, the leaders of the ancient Aryan faith, as daevas because they had polluted the abstraction of Mazdean philosophy with ritualistic ceremonies.

In Pahlavi and Pazand writing Aeshma-Daeva changed form to Heshm-Diev, from which Asmodeus, the medieval evil spirit, is derived. Aeshma is known to be Sraush's opponent.

(See also: Aeshma-Daeva , Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary, Occultism, Occultism Dictionary)

Airavata (Sanskrit) (from iravat moisture-possessing from ira drink, food)

Son of Iravati; a vast elephant produced at the churning of the ocean and appropriated by the god Indra. When seated upon Airavata, Indra blesses the earth with rain, i.e., with the water that is drawn up by Airavata from the underworld. According to the Matangalila, Airavata was born when Brahma sang over the halves of the shell from which Garuda hatched, followed by seven more male and eight female elephants.

In the Mahabharata (Adi-parvan, ch 66) Airavata guards the eastern zone. Four such "elephants" (sometimes eight, each with its sakti or feminine potency) uphold the structure of the earth. The mighty four-tusked Airavata, therefore, represents one of the lokapalas (world protectors) -- called by Buddhists maharajas (great kings) -- which are the guardians and supporters of the universe. They are also mystically connected with the lipikas, the eternal karmic scribes. In the Bhagavad-Gita (10:2, 7) Krishna, in naming his divine manifestations, says that among elephants he is Airavata.

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

Sibika or Sivika (Sanskrit) The weapon of Kuvera, the Vedic god of wealth equivalent to the Greek Pluto; made out of the parts of the divine splendor of Vishnu, a sun god, and filed off by Visvakarman, the architect of the gods.

(See also: Sibika, Sivika , Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary)

Alorus, Adi-ur (Chaldean) According to Berosus, the first king of the mythical age of Babylon, the period before the flood of Xisuthrus. Alorus reigned for a period of ten saroi or 36,000 years.

See also ALAPARUS

(See also: Alorus, Adi-ur , Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary, Occultism, Occultism Dictionary)

Anu (Sanskrit) As a noun, an atom of matter; as an adjective, atomic, fine, minute. A title of Brahma, conceived as both infinitesimal and universal, thus pointing to the pantheistic character of divinity. Hence, every anu is "a centre of potential vitality, with latent intelligence in it" (SD 1:567; cf FSO 273-5, 431). In the Bhagavad-Gita (8:9) Arjuna is enjoined to meditate on the "seer," i.e., the enlightened, omniscient One, who is "more atomic than the atom" (anor aniyamsam) and yet "the supporter of all" (cf VP 1:2, 5:1; ChU 3:14, 3-4, Katha 2:20, MU 3:1, 7).

In Jainism the soul is represented as being like an anu, atomic in size, and seated within the heart, while the jiva (life-monad) is the quickening element that pervades the whole.

Besides meaning a particle of substance, anu also means an atom of time, being equivalent to the 54,675,000th part of a muhurta (48 minutes).

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

Showbread, Shewbread The bread placed by the ancient Jews every Sabbath before Jehovah on the table made of shittim wood, which was set in the holy place on the north side of the altar of incense.

The bread itself was made of fine flour and baked into twelve cakes, as commanded by Moses: "two tenth deals shall be in one cake. And thou shalt set them in two rows, six on a row, upon the pure table before the Lord. And thou shalt put pure frankincense upon each row" (Lev 24:4-8). The bread remained on the golden table throughout the week, and was then removed to the sanctuary and eaten by the priests alone.

Philo Judaeus states that Moses instituted the showbread with twelve loaves in order to represent the twelve tribes of Israel; and that he divided the nation into twelve tribes in order to represent the twelve signs of the zodiac.

(See also: Showbread, Shewbread , Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary)

Sutra (Sanskrit) [from siv to sew]

A string, thread; the sutras are strings of rules or aphorisms written in serve form, composed in terse and symbolic language with the obvious intention of their being committed to memory. This was a favorite form among the Hindus, as among all ancient peoples, of imbodying and transmitting rules of ancient religious and philosophic thought.

There are sutras written upon almost every subject, but the sutras commonly signify those connected with the Vedas, of which there are three kinds: the Kalpa-sutras (rules of ritual); the grihya-sutras (domestic rules) treating of ordinary family rites such as marriage, birth, name-giving, etc.; and the Samayacharika-sutras which treat of customs and temporal duties. The Kalpa-sutras belong to the class of writings called Srutis (heard or revealed); while the other two types of sutras belong to the Smritis (remembered), carried traditionally from generation to generation by word of mouth.

In Buddhist writings, the Sutras are the second division of sacred works, generally known under the equivalent Pali term Suttas.

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

Advent (from Latin ad to, toward + venio to come)

Arrival; in Christianity a period of some four weeks preceding Christmas.

In pre-Christian Greece one of the great seats of initiation was Eleusis, a Greek word meaning coming or advent. All the Mystery schools of antiquity taught and dramatized doctrines dealing with that which is to come: the mysteries of death, rebirth, and initiation -- the birth or awakening of the inner Buddha or Christos in the neophyte. This was called the coming or advent of the god within.

Advent may also be used to signify the serial comings into the human sphere of a nirmanakaya who imbodies a dhyani-buddha -- a perfected human being from a preceding manvantara -- in order to enlighten the humanity of the current cycle. Such nirmanakayas work in the sphere of our earth as invisible or occasionally visible helpers of mankind.

The "second advent," referring to a second coming of Christ, was considered imminent by some early Christian sects, and is still expected by certain sects today. This echoes the archaic teaching concerning the advent of Maitreya-Buddha -- the next great Buddha to appear in the long line of Buddha-succession -- as well as the second coming of Elijah among the Jews, and the coming of the Kalki-avatara among the Hindus.

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

Ajita (Sanskrit) (from a not + the verbal root ji to conquer, triumph)

The invisible, unsurpassed; in the Vayu-Purana, the highest of twelve gods, named jayas, who were created by Brahma to aid him at the beginning of the manvantara. But because they neglected his directives, Brahma "cursed" them to be born in each succeeding manvantara until the seventh, the Vaivasvata-manvantara (cf VP 1:15; n2, p. 26). These twelve jayas are the Hindu equivalent of the twelve great gods of Greco-Roman mythology. Because of their all-permeant character, on a lower scale these divinities are identical with the manasa, the jnana-devas, the rudras, and other classes of manifested deities. In these lower manifestations of their functions, they are identical with those dhyani-chohanic groups which "refuse to incarnate," spoken of in The Secret Doctrine.

Also the name of the second of the 24 Tirthankaras or Jain teachers.

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