A Theosophical definition of Initiates :

Initiates

Those who have passed at least one initiation and therefore those who understand the mystery-teachings and who are ready to receive them at some future time in even larger measure. Please note the distinction between initiant and initiate. An initiant is one who is beginning or preparing for an initiation. An initiate is one who has successfully passed at least one initiation. It is obvious therefore that an initiate is always an initiant when he prepares for a still higher initiation.

The mystery-teachings were held as the most sacred treasure or possession that men could transmit to their descendants who were worthy postulants. The revelation of these mystery-doctrines under the seal of initiation, and under proper conditions to worthy depositaries, worked marvelous changes in the lives of those who underwent successfully the initiatory trials. It made men different from what they were before they received this spiritual and intellectual revelation. The facts are found in all the old religions and philosophies, if these are studied honestly. Initiation was always spoken of under the metaphor or figure of speech of "a new birth," a "birth into truth," for it was a spiritual and intellectual rebirth of the powers of the human spirit-soul, and could be called in all truth a birth of the soul into a loftier and nobler self-consciousness. When this happened, such men were called "initiates" or the reborn. In India, such reborn men were anciently called dvija, a Sanskrit word meaning "twice-born." In Egypt such initiates or reborn men were called "Sons of the Sun." In other countries they were called by other names.

See also: Initiates , Mysticism, Body Mind and Soul

Gospels Usually, the four accepted or canonical gospels of the New Testament, being the three synoptic gospels -- Matthew, Mark, Luke -- and the Gospel according to John. They are an authorized and approved selection from a far larger number of Gospels, extant, partially extant, and lost, attributed to various disciples and apostles, claiming to give accounts of the life and teachings of Jesus Christ and his apostles.

The key to an understanding of the nature of the four Gospels lies in a consideration of the process which the functions and teachings of some of the Mystery schools of Asia Minor became gradually transformed into the formal religious system known as Christianity. The Gospels must have originated as extracts from the Mystery-dramas enacted in those schools. The mystical-human birth of Jesus, his trials or tests, his teachings, crucifixion, resurrection, etc., are clearly a form of the world-old and universal Mystery-drama of initiation of a human neophyte re-enacted in those ceremonies.

The Gospels' present form is the result of many copyings, recensions, omissions, additions, and alterations. They are, in fact, symbolic narratives made around the personality and individuality of a real character which thus has become a Mystery-figure; and contain also many teachings properly to be attributed to him, belonging to the general class of logia, or wise sayings of teachers, paralleled in the other world sacred scriptures. Jesus, as represented, is not historical; but there was an actual teacher, doubtless bearing the name Yeshua`, Latinized as Jesus, who lived about a century earlier than the commonly accepted beginning of the Christian era.

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

Laomedon (Greek) The legendary founder and king of Troy; son of Ilus and Eurydice, and father of Priam. Zeus compelled Apollo and Poseidon to assist Laomedon in building Troy. This story represents the founding of a Mystery school, although the veiled language used hides the real meaning (SD 2:795).

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

Senzar The name given to the ancient mystery-language unknown to modern philologists, that was known to all initiates of the inhabited and civilized world; the secret sacerdotal language or mystery-speech of the adepts of whatever class belonging to or owing allegiance to the chief esoteric brotherhood, "still used and studied unto this day in the secret communities of the Eastern adepts, and called by them -- according to the locality -- Zend-zar and Brahma or Deva-Bashya" (BCW 4:518n).

In this language, besides its common use as a universal means of intercommunication, were written the secret works preserving the history of the archaic continents and races, as well as prophecies of the future. It was used in the secret commentaries and stanzas forming the basis for The Secret Doctrine, wherein they are called the Stanzas of Dzyan or the Book of Dzyan.

"Tradition says, that it was taken down in Senzar, the secret sacerdotal tongue, from the words of the Divine Beings, who dictated it to the sons of Light, in Central Asia, at the very beginning of the 5th (our) race; for there was a time when its language (the Sen-zar) was known to the Initiates of every nation, when the forefathers of the Toltec understood it as easily as the inhabitants of lost Atlantis, who inherited it, in their turn, from the sages of the 3rd Race, the Manushis, who learnt it direct from the Devas of the 2nd and 1st Races" (SD 1:xliii).

As to the mode of writing this mystery-speech, "The sacerdotal language (Senzar), besides an alphabet of its own, may be rendered in several modes of writing in cypher characters, which partake more of the nature of ideographs than of syllables" (VS vii).

(See also: Senzar , Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary)

WICCA

(Old English wicca, "male witch",  wicce,  "female witch", and wiccan,  "witchcraft"):

an Initiatory, Oathbound, Pagan Mystery religion celebrating the Mysteries contained in the Legend of the Descent of the Goddess and in the Charge of the Goddess, in which every Initiate is consecrated as a Priest or Priestess as well as a Witch;there is also a different, although related, religious movement calling itself "Wicca" - one that sprang from, and is loosely based upon the Mystery Religion, but that is more exoteric and oriented toward worship and devotion and public celebration, rather than toward a specific initiatory path, magickal practice, and spiritual discipline; this religious movement has been aptly described as "Wicca-based Paganism".

(See also: WICCA , Pagan Organisations, Paganism, Pagan Dictionary, Wicca,)

Rabbis (Hebrew, Jewish). Originally teachers of the Secret Mysteries, the Qabbalah; later, every Levite of the priestly caste became a teacher and a Rabbin. (See the series of Kabbalistic Rabbis by w.w.w.)

1 Rabbi Abulafia of Saragossa born in 1240, formed a school of Kabbalah named after him; his chief works were The Seven Paths of the Law and The Epistle to Rabbi Solomon.

2 Rabbi Akiba. Author of a famous Kabbalistic work, the "Alphabet of R.A.", which treats every letter as a symbol of an idea and an emblem of some sentiment; the Book of Enoch was originally a portion of this work, which appeared at the close of the eighth century. It was not purely a Kabbalistic treatise.

3 Rabbi Azariel ben Menachem (A.D. 1160). The author of the Commentary on the Ten

Sephiroth, which is the oldest purely Kabbalistic work extant, setting aside the Sepher Yetzirah, which although older, is not concerned with the Kabbalistic Sephiroth. He was the pupil of Isaac the Blind, who is the reputed father of the European Kabbalah, and he was the teacher of the equally famous R. Moses Nachmanides.

4 Rabbi Moses Botarel (1480). Author of a famous commentary on the Sepher Yetzirah; he taught that by ascetic life and the use of invocations, a man’s dreams might be made prophetic.

5 Rabbi Chajim Vital (1600) ( The great exponent of the Kabbalah as taught R. Isaac Loria: author of one of the most famous works, Otz Chiim, or Tree of Life; from this Knorr von Rosenroth has taken the Book on the Rashith ha Gilgalim, revolutions of souls, or scheme of reincarnations.

6 Rabbi Ibn Gebirol. A famous Hebrew Rabbi, author of the hymn Kether Malchuth, or Royal Diadem, which appeared about 1050; it is a beautiful poem, embodying the cosmic doctrines of Aristotle, and it even now forms part of the Jewish special service for the evening preceding the great annual Day of Atonement (See Ginsburg and Sachs on the Religious Poetry of the Spanish Jews). This author is also known as Avicebron.

7 Rabbi Gikatilla. A distinguished Kabbalist who flourished about 1300: he wrote the famous books, The Garden of Nuts, The Gate to the Vowel Points, The mystery of the shining Metal, and The Gates of Righteousness. He laid especial stress on the use of Gematria, Notaricon and Temura.

8 Rabbi Isaac the Blind of Posquiero. The first who publicly taught in Europe, about A.D. 1200, the Theosophic doctrines of the Kabbalah.

9 Rabbi Loria (also written Luria, and also named Ari from his initials). Founded a school of the Kabbalah circa 1560. He did not write any works, but his disciples treasured up his teachings, and R. Chajim Vital published them.

10 Rabbi Moses Cordovero (A.D.1550). The author of several Kabbalistic works of a wide reputation, viz., A Sweet Light, The Book of Retirement, and The Garden of Pomegranates; this latter can be read in Latin in Knorr von Rosenroth’s Kabbalah Denudata, entitled Tractatus de Animo, ex libro Pardes Rimmonim. Cordovero is notable for an adherence to the strictly metaphysical part, ignoring the wonder-working branch which Rabbi Sabbatai Zevi practised, and almost perished in the pursuit of.

11 Rabbi Moses de Leon (circa 1290 A,D.). The editor and first publisher of the Zohar, or "Splendour", the most famous of all the Kabbalistic volumes, and almost the only one of which any large part has been translated into English. This Zohar is asserted to be in the main the production of the still more famous Rabbi Simon ben Jochai, who lived in the reign of the Emperor Titus.

12 Rabbi Moses Maimonides (died 1304). A famous Hebrew Rabbi and author, who condemned the use of charms and amulets, and objected to the Kabbalistic use of the divine names.

13 Rabbi Sabbatai Zevi (born 1641). A very famous Kabbalist, who passing beyond the dogma became of great reputation as a thaumaturgist, working wonders by the divine names. Later in life he claimed Messiahship and fell into the hands of the Sultan Mohammed IV. of Turkey, and would have been murdered, but saved his life by adopting the Mohammedan religion. (See Jost on Judaism and its Sects.)

14 Rabbi Simon ben Jochai (circa A.D. 70-80). It is round this name that cluster the mystery and poetry of the origin of the Kabbalah as a gift of the deity to mankind.

Tradition has it that the Kabbalah was a divine theosophy first taught by God to a company of angels, and that some glimpses of its perfection were conferred upon Adam; that the wisdom passed from him unto Noah; thence to Abraham, from whom the Egyptians of his era learned a portion of the doctrine. Moses derived a partial initiation from the land of his birth, and this was perfected by direct communications with the deity. From Moses it passed to the seventy elders of the Jewish nation, and from them the theosophic scheme was handed from generation to generation; David and Solomon especially became masters of this concealed doctrine. No attempt, the legends tell us, was made to commit the sacred knowledge to writing until the time of the destruction of the second Temple by Titus, when Rabbi Simon ben Jochai, escaping from the besieged Jerusalem, concealed himself in a cave, where he remained for twelve years. Here he, a Kabbalist already, was further instructed by the prophet Elias. Here Simon taught his disciples, and his chief pupils, Rabbi Eliezer and Rabbi Abba, committed to writing those teachings which in later ages became known as the Zohar, and were certainly published afresh in Spain by Rabbi Moses de Leon, about 1280. A fierce contest has raged for centuries between the learned Rabbis of Europe around the origin of the legend, and it seems quite hopeless to expect ever to arrive at an accurate decision as to what portion of the Zohar, if any, is as old as Simon ben Jochai. (See "Zohar".)

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

Siphra' Di-tseni`utha' (Chaldean) "Their counting or telling of the concealed mysteries," the Book of Secrets or Mysteries; one of the principal books of the Zohar (Light); the secrets or mysteries dealt with are those relating to cosmogony and to the inhabitants of those worlds, thus forming the basis of the Hebrew Qabbalah. The work opens with the statement: "The book of the concealed mystery is the book of the equilibrium of balance," and proceeds to expound this thesis in Qabbalistic terminology.

Blavatsky calls it "the most ancient Hebrew document on occult learning" (SD 1:xlii), although the language used is largely Chaldean, and states that it was compiled from the very ancient Book of Dzyan through the archaic Chaldean Qabbalah.

(See also: Siphra' Di-tseni`utha' , Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary)

Rune: A character of the Germanic/Scandinavian alphabet.

The original meaning of the word "rune" in most of the Germanic languages is secret or mystery, In Freya Aswynn's Northern Mysteries & Magick, "rune" is used to denote any sign or "letter."

(See also: Rune , Magic, Shamanism, Paganism, Wicca)

Egyptian:

1. Dreaming of living in ancient Egypt might actually be a past-life memory. Be sure to write the dream down immediately upon awakening, as an issue from that past life could be coming to the surface of your unconscious mind. Something in the dream probably relates to a concern in the present, and the dream may be giving you important insights.

2. Egypt is a land of mystery, and therefore if you dream of Egypt or things Egyptian there is probably some mystery in your life that you'd like to have resolved. Look to other symbols in the dream to discern what it is and what you should do about it.

3. Egypt is a land where a lot of secrets are being dug out of the ground. What secrets are you hiding? Or are others around you keeping things from you that you really need to know? If the other symbols in the dream support this idea, honest communication with those involved is definitely called for.

Source: Astrocenter, http://astrocenter.astrology.msn.com/msn/DreamDictionary.aspx

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

EARTH -

1. the nest of humanity. (Dante)

2. third planet from the Sun, generally represented in world mythology as a feminine being of high consciousness, through a masculine being in Egyptian tradition.

3. Grandmother or Mother of all beings (Sioux and other traditional Peoples)

4. Gaia (the Greek Goddess of the Earth), a living self regulating organism.

5. planet for our training our playground in preparation for the next life in the vibrational world. (Michio Kushi).

6. the primary scientist, the primary educator, healer and technologist, the primary manifestation of the ultimate mystery of things. (Thomas Berry) (NAD)

(See also: EARTH , Wiccan Pagan, Paganism, Pagan Dictionary)

Zagreus, Zagreus-Dionysos (Greek) Dionysos was an earlier name for Bacchus. The mythos concerning Zagreus belongs to the cycle of teachings of the Orphic Mysteries rather than to mythology, so no references occur in the writings for the people, such as Homer and Hesiod. The references that have come down to our day occur principally in the manuscripts of the ancient Greek dramatists, poets, and in other ancient fragments.

As cosmic evolution was taught in the Orphic Mysteries by allegory, so was the evolution of the individual soul or microcosm, centering in the mythos of Zagreus, later Zagreus-Dionysos, the Greek savior, which the Greek Dionysian Mysteries sought to unfold in dramatic and veiled or symbolic literary form. "Dionysos is one with Osiris, with Krishna, and with Buddha (the heavenly wise), and with the coming (tenth) Avatar, the glorified Spiritual Christos . . ." (SD 2:420).

Zagreus has three distinct meanings: 1) the mighty hunter (the pilgrim-soul, hunting for the truth, its aeonic pilgrimage back to divinity); 2) he that takes many captives (the Lord of the Dead); and 3) the restorer or regenerator (King of the Reborn or initiates). Zagreus (later Bacchus or Iacchos) is the divine Son, the third of the Orphic Trinity, the other two being Zeus the Demiurge or divine All-father, and Demeter-Kore, the earth goddess in her twofold aspect as the divine Mother and the mortal maid.

The mythos relates that Zagreus, a favored son of Zeus, aroused the wrath of Hera, who plotted his destruction. First she released the dethroned titans from Tartaros to slay the newborn babe. They induced the child to give up the scepter and apple for the false toys which they held before him: a thyrsos or Bacchic wand (symbol of matter and rebirth into material life), a giddy spinning top, and a mirror (maya or illusion). As the child was gazing at himself in the mirror, they seized him, tore his body into seven or fourteen pieces (as in the Egyptian Mystery tale of Osiris); boiled and roasted and then devoured them. Discovered in this enormity by Zeus, the titans were blasted with his thunderbolt and from their ashes sprang the human race.

The titans with their false gifts symbolize the pursuing energies of the personal, material life, which enchain and delude the soul. They are earth powers which lead the soul from the path by the lure of things of sense. The dismembered body is first boiled in water -- symbol of the astral world; then roasted, "as gold is tried by fire," symbol of suffering and purification and the reascent of the victorious soul to bliss.

Apollo or the Muses, at the command of Zeus, gathered the scattered fragments and interred them near the Omphalos (navel of the earth) at Delphi. The coffin was inscribed: "Here lies dead, the body of Dionysos, son of Semele," as the Zagreus myth was known only to those initiated into the Orphic Mysteries; and the Semele myth was popularly known. The exoteric myth represents the divine Son as the son of Zeus by the mortal maid Semele, Demeter-Kore in the guise of a mortal woman, to whom the still beating heart of Zagreus was entrusted when he was slain, that she might become its mother-guardian.

Hera, however, poisoned the mind of Semele with suspicion when the new-forming body of Zagreus within her reached the seventh month of gestation, and Semele impelled Zeus to reveal himself to her in his true form, whereupon the mortal body of Semele was destroyed by the divine fire. The holy babe was saved from death by Zeus, who sewed the child up in his own thigh until "the life that formerly was Zagreus, was reborn as Dionysos," the risen Savior, at Easter (the spring equinox), while as Zagreus he had been born at Semele's death at the winter solstice. Here we

See the myth's solar significance.

The nymphs of Mount Nysa reared him safely in a cave, and when he reached manhood, Hera forced him to wander over the earth. He overcame all opposition and was successful in establishing Mystery schools wherever he went. After his triumph in the world of men, Dionysos descended into the underworld and led forth his mother, now rechristened as Semele-Thyone (Semele the Inspired), to take her place among the Olympian divinities as the divine mother and radiant queen, and later, with Dionysos, to ascend to heaven.

Zagreus as Dionysos is known as the god of many names, most of which refer to his twofold character as the suffering mortal Zagreus, and the immortal or reborn god-man. Many titles also refer to him as the mystic savior. He is the All-potent, the Permanent, the Life-blood of the World, the majesty in the forest, in fruit, in the hum of the bee, in the flowing of the stream, etc., the earth in its changes -- the list runs on indefinitely, and is strikingly similar to the passage in which Krishna, the Hindu avatara, instructs Arjuna how he shall know him completely: "I am the taste in water, the light in the sun and moon," etc. (BG ch 7).

The philosophers, dramatists, and historians who held the Dionysian mythos to be purely allegorical and symbolic take in the great names of antiquity, including Plato, Pythagoras, all the Neoplatonists, the greatest historians, and a few of the early Christian Fathers, notably Clement of Alexandria; Eusebius, Tertullian, Justin, and Augustine, also write of it.

The exoteric literature of Orphism is scanty, while the esoteric teachings were never committed to writing. Outside of the Orphic Tablets and Orphic Hymns, no original material has been discovered to date. Scholars judging from the Homeric Hymn to Demeter, have held that the Eleusinian Mystery-drama was based solely on the story of Persephone; but later researches indicate that, under the influence of Epimenides and Onomakritos, both deep students of Orphism, the Orphic Mystery tale of Zagreus-Dionysos was incorporated in the Eleusian ritual, the divine son Iacchos becoming thus identified with the Orphic god-man, Zagreus-Dionysos.

Cosmically this highly esoteric story refers to the cosmic Logos building the universe and becoming thereby not only its inspiriting and invigorating soul, but likewise the divinity guiding manifestation from Chaos to complete fullness of evolutionary grandeur; and in the case of mankind, the legend refers to the origin, peregrinations, and destiny of the human monad, itself a spiritual consciousness-center, from unself-consciousness as a god-spark, through the wanderings of destiny until becoming a fully self-conscious god. The key to the symbolism of Zagreus-Dionysos is given by Plato in the Cratylus: "The Spirit within us is the true image of Dionysos. He therefore who acts erroneously in regard to It . . . sins against Dionysos Himself," i.e., the inner god, the divinity in man. The legend thus contains not only past cosmic as well as human history, but contains as a prophecy what will come to pass in the distant future.

(See also: Zagreus, Zagreus-Dionysos , Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary, Body mind and Soul)

Yeheedah (Hebrew, Jewish). Lit., "Individuality "; esoterically, the highest individuality or Atma-Buddhi-Manas, when united in one.

This doctrine is in the Chaldean Book of Numbers, which teaches a septenary division of human "principles", so-called, as does the Kabalah in the Zohar, according to the Book of Solomon (iii.,Io4a so as translated in I. Myer’s Qabbalah). At the time of the conception, the Holy "sends a d’yook-nah, or the phantom of a shadow image" like the face of a man. it is designed and sculptured in the divine tzelem, i.e., the shadow image of the Elohim. " Elohim created man in his (their) tzelem " or image, says Genesis (i. 27). It is the tzelem that awaits the child and receives it at the moment of its conception, and this tzelem is our linga sharira. "

The Rua’h forms with the Nephesh the actual personality of the man ", and also his individuality, or, as expressed by the Kabbalist, the combination of the two is called, if he (man) deserves it, Yeheedah. This combination is that which the Theosophist calls the dual Manas, the Higher and the Lower Ego, united to Atma-Buddhi and become one. For as explained in the Zohar (i., 205b, 206a, Brody Ed.): "Neshamah, soul (Buddhi), comprises three degrees, and therefore she has three names, like the mystery above: that is, Nephesh, Rua’h, Neshamah ", or the Lower Manas, the Higher Ego, and Buddhi, the Divine Soul. "It is also to be noted that the Neshamah has three divisions;" says Myer’s Qabbalah, "the highest is the Ye-hee-dah " - or Atma-Buddhi-Manas, the latter once more as a unit; "the middle principle is Hay-yak " - or Buddhi and the dual Manas; "and the last and third, the Neshamah, properly speaking " - or Soul in general. "They manifest themselves in Ma’hshabah, thought, Tzelem, phantom of the image, Zurath, prototypes (mayavic forms, or rupas), and the D'yooknah, shadow of the phantom image.

The D’mooth, likeness or similitude (physical body), is a lower manifestation" (p. 392). Here then, we find the faithful echo of Esoteric science in the Zohar and other Kabbalistic works, a perfect Esoteric septenary division. Every Theosophist who has studied the doctrine sketched out first in Mr. Sinnett’s Occult World and Esoteric Buddhism, and later in the Theosophist, Lucifer, and other writings, will recognise them in the Zohar. Compare for instance what is taught in Theosophical works about the pre- and post-mortem states of the three higher and the four lower human principles, with the following from the Zohar: " Because all these three are one knot like the above, in the mystery of Nephesh, Rua’h, Neshamah, they are all one, and bound in one. Nephesh (Kama-Manas) has no light from her own substance; and it is for this reason that she is associated with the mystery of guff, the body, to procure enjoyment and food and everything which it needs.

Rua’h (the Spirit) is that which rides on that Nephesh (the lower soul) and rules over her and lights (supplies) her with everything she needs [ with the light of reason], and the Nephesh is the throne [ of that Ru’ah. Neshamah (Divine Soul) goes over to that Rua’h, and she rules over that Rua’h and lights to him with that Light of Life, and that Rua’h depends on the Neshamah and receives light from her, which illuminates him. . . When the ‘upper’ Neshamah ascends (after the death of the body), she goes to . . . the Ancient of the Ancient, the Hidden of all the Hidden, to receive Eternity. The Rua’h does not

[ go to Gan Eden [ because he is [ up with] Nephesh the Rua’h goes up to Eden, but not so high as the soul, and Nephesh [ animal principle, lower soul] remains in the grave below [ Kamaloka]

(Zohar, ii., 142a, Cremona Ed., ii., fol. 63b col. 252). It would be difficult not to recognise in the above our Atma (or the "upper" Neshamah), Buddhi (Neshamah),. Manas (Rua’h), and Kama-Manas (Nephesh) or the lower animal soul; the first of which goes after the death of man to join its integral whole, the second and the third proceeding to Devachan, and the last, or the Kamarupa, "remaining in its grave", called other wise the Kamaloka or Hades.

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

Chréstos (Ancient Greek) The early Gnostic form of Christ. It was used in the fifth century B.C. by Eschylus, Herodotus, and others. The Manteumata pythochresta, or the "oracles delivered by a Pythian god" "through a pythoness, are mentioned by the former (Choeph.901). Chréstian is not only "the seat of an oracle", but an offering to, or for, the oracle.

Chréstés is one who explains oracles, "a prophet and soothsayer", and Chrésterios one who serves an oracle or a god. The earliest Christian writer, Justin Martyr, in his first Apology calls his co-religionists Chréstians. It is only through ignorance that men call themselves Christians instead of Chréstians," says Lactantius (lib. iv., cap. vii.). The terms Christ and Christians, spelt originally Chrést and Chréstians, were borrowed from the Temple vocabulary of the Pagans. Chréstos meant in that vocabulary a disciple on probation, a candidate for hierophantship.

When he had attained to this through initiation, long trials, and suffering, and had been ‘‘anointed’’ (i.e., "rubbed with oil", as were Initiates and even idols of the gods, as the last touch of ritualistic observance), his name was changed into Christos, the "purified", in esoteric or mystery language. In mystic symbology, indeed, Christés, or Christos, meant that the "Way", the Path, was already trodden and the goal reached ; when the fruits of the arduous labour, uniting the personality of evanescent clay with the indestructible INDIVIDUALITY, transformed it thereby into the immortal EGO.

"At the end of the Way stands the Chréstes", the Purifier, and the union once accomplished, the Chrestos, the "man of sorrow", became Christos himself. Paul, the Initiate, knew this, and meant this precisely, when he is made to say, in bad translation: ‘‘I travail in birth again until Christ be formed in you" (Gal. iv.19), the true rendering of which is . . . ‘‘until ye form the Christos within yourselves" But the profane who knew only that Chréstés was in some way connected with priest and prophet, and knew nothing about the hidden meaning of Christos, insisted, as did Lactantius and Justin Martyr, on being called Chréstians instead of Christians. Every good individual, therefore, may find Christ in his "inner man" as Paul expresses it (Ephes. iii. 16,17), whether he be Jew, Mussulman, Hindu, or Christian.

Kenneth Mackenzie seemed to think that the word Chréstos was a synonym of Soter, "an appellation assigned to deities, great kings and heroes," indicating ‘‘Saviour,’’ - and he was right. For, as he adds:"It has been applied redundantly to Jesus Christ, whose name Jesus or Joshua bears the same interpretation. The name Jesus, in fact, is rather a title of honour than a name - the true name of the Soter of Christianity being Emmanuel, or God with us (Matt.i, 23.).Great divinities among all nations, who are represented as expiatory or self-sacrificing, have been designated by the same title.’’ (R. M. Cyclop.) The Asklepios (or Esculapius) of the Greeks had the title of Soter.

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

A dictionary of Parapsycology. Please note that words in grey are hyperlinked to a corresponding archive with articles related to that particular topic.

Dolphin

Dolphins represent friendliness, communal living, rescue, communication, and affection. They are water dwelling mammals and in our dreams they represent our willingness and ability to navigate through emotions. They represent positive messages from our unconscious minds. Dolphins could also represent a positive connection between our consciousness and to those parts of the psyche that is a mystery and largely unconscious.

See also: Meaning of Dreams about Water, Whale

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

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

Jesus (Latin of Greek Iesous from Hebrew Yeshua` contraction of Yehoshua` a proper name meaning savior or helper, or that which is spacious or widespread)

Indubitably a historical character, whose life as narrated in the Gospels is pure allegory, a story of the initiation chamber. There is a story current from medieval times among the Jews, mentioned in the Sepher Toledoth Yeshua` (Book of the Generations of Jesus), to the effect that the Jesus of the Gospels was a Jehoshua ben Panthera, a Jewish adept living about 100 BC. Jesus illustrates the typical sequence in occult history: 1) the coming of a leader or teacher to a people needing to be led and taught; 2) his passing, followed by the adoration, even worship, of his followers; 3) the gradual transformation of historic facts into more or less embroidered legends or mythological tales, which in time cluster so thickly about his memory that his identity as a person, and even his name, are lost; 4) the myth, allegory, or legend; and 5) the efforts of other, later teachers to explain, interpret, and reinstate this earlier teacher, now a purely mythic figure or else materialized and misunderstood.

The Christian Gospels appear to have originated in mystery-dramas, beautiful and often sublime in their inner significances, in which were depicted the experiences of the neophyte and adept in his union with the Logos, and hence such unified individual was called a Logos incarnate as a man, the Logos itself being variously named as Christos or Dionysos, and to have been by stages adapted and given a semi-historical guise, as has happened in other instances besides the Christian mythos. Christ therefore, or the Christos, is not a particular man or an especial incarnation of divinity, but a generic term for the divine as incarnated in all human beings, although Jesus was undoubtedly the name of this great Jewish initiate-avatara as an individual. Hence this universal allegory in its Christian version has a true historical peg to hang from; for there did appear, sometime before the Christian era, a special cyclic messenger who was due to come on the change of the ecliptic point from one sign of the celestial zodiac to another, from the sign of Aries to Pisces. In theosophical literature, Jesus is considered to be an avatara, the messenger for the European Messianic or Piscean cycle. As such, Jesus represented a ray sent from the Wondrous Being or spiritual hierarch of the earth into the soul of a pure human being, while the racial buddha, Gautama Buddha, supplied the intermediate or psychological nature in this act of white magic.

"But it is probable that the theosophic effort which Jesus attempted to initiate did not endure for fifty years after his death. Almost immediately after his passing, his disciples, all half-instructed, and in some cases almost illiterate, men . . . foisted upon the world of their time the forms and beliefs of early Christianity; and had there been nothing but these, that religious system had not lived another fifty years. But what happened? During the oncoming of the dark cycle after Jesus (which began as before said about the time of Pythagoras), the last few rays from the setting sun of the ancient light shone feebly in the minds of certain of these Christian Fathers, Clement of Alexandria for one, and Origen of Alexandria for another, and in one or two more like these, who had been initiated at least in the lowest of some of the then degenerate pagan Mysteries; and these men entered into the Christian Church and introduced some poor modicum of that light, . . . which they still cherished; and these rays they derived mainly from the Neo-pythagorean and the Neoplatonic system" (Fund 486-7).

The Hebrew name Jah or Jehovah became identified in the mind of Christians with the name of Jesus, although Jesus never was in any wise identical with the Jewish Jehovah, but was identified in initiation through his own inner god or Father in Heaven, and the Jewish Jehovah mystically was the regent of the planet Saturn.

The first three letters in Greek make I.H.S. placed at the head of representations of the crucified Jesus, often said to stand for Iesus Hominum Salvator (Jesus the savior of men) or In hoc signo (in this sign), with reference to the alleged vision of a cross of the Emperor Constantine. Jesus is a form of a worldwide mystery-name, whose importance was its meaning, usually given as a three-letter monogram, analogous to the Sanskrit Aum. We find it in the Greek Gnostic Iao and variants are common in ancient Greece, such as Iasios, Iasion, Iason, Iasos; and initiates were known as Iasides or sons of Iaso.

See also AVATARA

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

AUTOPOETIC LAPIS

Terence McKenna's psilocybic revelation from "Magical Blend," April, 1989: "The 'autopoetic lapis' is the ingression of novelty to concrescence, a 'tightening gyre'. Everything flows together and coalesces in the alchemical stone at the end of time ... when the laws of physics are obviated, the universe disappears and what is left is the tightly bound plenum, the monad, able to express itself, rather than only able to cast a shadow into physis as its reflection. In 2012 our species enters hyperspace, but it will appear to be the collapse of the state vector, the end of physical laws and the release of the mind itself.

"All these other images - the starship, the space colony, the lapis - these are precursory images. They follow naturally from the idea that history is the shock wave of eschatology. As one closes distance with the eschatological object, the reflections it is throwing off resemble more and more the thing itself. In the final moment the Unspeakable stands revealed. There are no more reflections of the Mystery. The Mystery in all its nakedness is seen, and nothing else exists. But what it is, decency can safely scarcely hint at; nevertheless, it is the crowning joy of futurism to seek anticipation of it."

(See also: AUTOPOETIC LAPIS , Magick, Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary, Body Mind and Soul,)

Wicca: Wicca is a religion of veneration of Nature and the worship of Divinity as containing both feminine and masculine aspects. It is founded upon the spiritual roots of pre-Christian European beliefs and practices. When Wicca first came to public attention in the early 1950s through the efforts of Gerald Gardner, it was portrayed as the remnant of an ancient European fertility cult. Practitioners referred to Wicca as the Old Religion. It was also known as the Craft of the Wise. On the surface modern Wicca appears to be a folklore and folk magick system. On the inner initiate level Wicca contains pre-Christian European Mystery Teachings.

(See also: Wicca , Magic, Shamanism, Paganism, Wicca)

Incarnation Imbodiments of an entity or monad in a body of flesh, usually human. It is also used of avataras, buddhas, etc., in treating of the manifold mystery of the union of godhood and humanhood. This mystery, both among Hindus and Christians, is a distorted and anthropomorphic understanding of the teaching as to the presence of the unseen cosmic principles throughout all nature and man, as symbolized by the circle and cross.

Divine incarnations do not mean that a divine being seizes upon and occupies the body of human being as by a kind of obsession; but that every person has within him the powers by which he can manifest his own innate divinity, and that a few people have these powers developed in a special degree. When properly understood, a truly divine incarnation, as in avataras, was one of the greatest of the mysteries of every archaic religious system.

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

A Theosophical definition of Guru-parampara :

Guru-parampara

(Sanskrit) This is a compound formed of guru, meaning "teacher," and a subordinate compound param-para, the latter compound meaning "a row or uninterrupted series or succession." Hence guru-parampara signifies an uninterrupted series or succession of teachers. Every Mystery school or esoteric college of ancient times had its regular and uninterrupted series or succession of teacher succeeding teacher, each one passing on to his successor the mystical authority and headship he himself had received from his predecessor.

Like everything else of an esoteric character in the ancient world, the guru-parampara or succession of teachers faithfully copied what actually exists or takes place in nature herself, where a hierarchy with its summit or head is immediately linked on to a superior hierarchy as well as to an inferior one; and it is in this manner that the mystical circulations of the kosmos, and the transmission of life or vital currents throughout the fabric or web of being is assured.

From this ancient fact and teaching of the Mystery schools came the greatly distorted Apostolic Succession of the Christian Church, a pale and feeble reflection in merely ecclesiastical government of a fundamental spiritual and mystical reality. The great Brotherhood of the sages and seers of the world, which in fact is the association of the Masters of Wisdom and Compassion headed by the Maha-chohan, is the purest and most absolute form or example of the guru-parampara existing on our earth today. (See also Hermetic Chain)

See also: Guru-parampara , Mysticism, Body Mind and Soul

Azazel (Hebrew, Jewish) "God of Victory"; the scape-goat for the sins of Israel. He who comprehends the mystery of Azazel, says Aben-Ezra, "will learn the mystery of God’s name", and truly. See "Typhon" and the scape-goat made sacred to him in ancient Egypt.

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