Psychology of religion - Sigmund Freud: Oedipus complex illusion. Sigmund Freud (1856–1939) gave explanations of the genesis of religion in his various writings. In Totem and Taboo, he applied the idea of the Oedipus complex (involving unresolved sexual feelings of, for example, a son toward his mother and hostility toward his father) and postulated its emergence in the primordial stage of human development. In Moses and Monotheism, Freud reconstructed biblical history in accord with his ge ...

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Psychology of religion, Psychology of religion - Psychoanalytical studies, Psychology of religion - Sigmund Freud: Oedipus complex illusion, Psychology of religion - Carl Jung: Universal archetypes, Psychology of religion - Erich Fromm: Desire need for stable frame, Psychology of religion - Other studies, Psychology of religion - William James: Personal religious experience pragmatism, Psychology of religion - Alfred Adler: Feeling of inferiority perfection, Psychology of religion - Ludwig Feuerbach: Imagination wishes fear of death, Psychology of religion - Gordon Allport: Mature and immature religion, Psychology of religion - Erik H. Erikson: Influence on personality development, Psychology of religion - Rudolf Otto: Non-rational experience, Psychology of religion - Psychometric approaches to religion, Psychology of religion - Developmental approaches to religion, Psychology of religion - Religion and coping with stress, Psychology of religion - Evolutionary psychology of religion, Psychology of religion - Religion and drugs, Psychology of religion - Karl Marx: Religion as opium of the people, Psychology of religion - James H. Leuba: Mystical experience and drugs, Psychology of religion - Drug-induced religious experiences, Psychology of religion - The effects of meditation, Psychology of religion - Links

Read more here: » Psychology of religion: Encyclopedia II - Psychology of religion - Psychoanalytical studies

Psychology of religion - Karl Marx: Religion as opium of the people. Karl Marx famously asserted religion to be "the opium of people" (sometimes quoted in English as "the opiate of the masses"). He stated that "Morals, religion, metaphysics and other forms of ideology and the forms of consciousness corresponding to them no longer retain their apparent independence. It is not consciousness t ...

See also:

Psychology of religion, Psychology of religion - Psychoanalytical studies, Psychology of religion - Sigmund Freud: Oedipus complex illusion, Psychology of religion - Carl Jung: Universal archetypes, Psychology of religion - Erich Fromm: Desire need for stable frame, Psychology of religion - Other studies, Psychology of religion - William James: Personal religious experience pragmatism, Psychology of religion - Alfred Adler: Feeling of inferiority perfection, Psychology of religion - Ludwig Feuerbach: Imagination wishes fear of death, Psychology of religion - Gordon Allport: Mature and immature religion, Psychology of religion - Erik H. Erikson: Influence on personality development, Psychology of religion - Rudolf Otto: Non-rational experience, Psychology of religion - Psychometric approaches to religion, Psychology of religion - Developmental approaches to religion, Psychology of religion - Religion and coping with stress, Psychology of religion - Evolutionary psychology of religion, Psychology of religion - Religion and drugs, Psychology of religion - Karl Marx: Religion as opium of the people, Psychology of religion - James H. Leuba: Mystical experience and drugs, Psychology of religion - Drug-induced religious experiences, Psychology of religion - The effects of meditation, Psychology of religion - Links

Read more here: » Psychology of religion: Encyclopedia II - Psychology of religion - Religion and drugs

Anselm may, with some justice, be considered the first scholarly philosopher of Christian theology. His only great predecessor, Scotus Erigena, had more of the speculative and mystical element than is consistent with a schoolman. In Anselm, by contrast, one finds the special characteristics of scholastic theological thought: a recognition of the relationship of reason to revealed truth, and an attempt to elaborate a rational system of faith. See also:

Anselm of Canterbury, Anselm of Canterbury - Biography, Anselm of Canterbury - Early life, Anselm of Canterbury - His years at Bec, Anselm of Canterbury - Archbishop of Canterbury, Anselm of Canterbury - Conflicts with King Henry I, Anselm of Canterbury - Dilecto dilectori, Anselm of Canterbury - Writings, Anselm of Canterbury - Foundation, Anselm of Canterbury - Proofs, Anselm of Canterbury - Further works, Anselm of Canterbury - Recognition, Anselm of Canterbury - Notes

Read more here: » Anselm of Canterbury: Encyclopedia II - Anselm of Canterbury - Writings

Maruts (Sanskrit). With the Orientalists Storm-Gods, but in the Veda something very mystical. In the esoteric teachings as they incarnate in every round, they are simply identical with some of the Agnishwatta Pitris, the Human intelligent Egos. Hence the allegory of Siva transforming the lumps of flesh into boys, and calling them Maruts, to show senseless men transformed by becoming the Vehicles of the Pitris or Fire Maruts, and thus rational beings.

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

Izanagi and Izanami (Japanese) In Shintoism, the primordial male and female ancestors of humanity, who begot the first god of earth, Tenshoko doijin.

"These 'gods' are simply our five races, Isanagi and Isanami being the two kinds of the 'ancestors,' the two preceding races which give birth to animal and to rational man" (SD 1:241). This heavenly pair was said to have created Japan from drops of brine.

(See also: Izanagi and Izanami, Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary, Occultism, Occultism Dictionary)

Anselm may, with some justice, be considered the first scholarly philosopher and theologian. His only great predecessor, Scotus Erigena, had more of the speculative and mystical element than is consistent with a schoolman; but in Anselm are found that recognition of the relation of reason to revealed truth, and that attempt to elaborate a rational system of faith, which form the special characteristics of scholastic thought. His constant endeavour is to render the contents of the Christian consciousness clear to reason, and to develop the in ...

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Anselm of Canterbury, Anselm of Canterbury - Biography, Anselm of Canterbury - Writings, Anselm of Canterbury - Notes

Read more here: » Anselm of Canterbury: Encyclopedia II - Anselm of Canterbury - Writings

Epithumia (Greek) In Greek metaphysics, equivalent in the human constitution to kama or the desire principle. Psyche or soul was a union of bios (physical vitality, prana), epithumia, and phren or mens (mind, manas). (BCW 1:292, 365) "Pythagoras and Plato both divided soul into two representative parts, independent of each other -- the one, the rational soul, or ((logos)), the other irrational, ((alogos))-- the latter being again subdivided into two parts or aspects the ((thymichon)) and the ((epithymichon)), which, with the divine soul and its spirit and the body, make the seven principles of Theosophy" (BCW 7:229).

See also PRINCIPLES

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

Geoffrey K. Mondello (see References below) believes that a mystical experience of God is real and provable, and is possible due to the claimed fact that God exists. He holds that given the reality and logic of writers such as St. John of the Cross, religious mystical experience is not irrational exuberance but is rather "a profoundly rational experience" with consequences for the structure of knowledge. A dimension of this influence on knowledge is the extent to which the purgative process rectifies our relationship to God which "has ...

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Prayer in Christianity, Prayer in Christianity - Liturgical, Prayer in Christianity - Seasonal prayers, Prayer in Christianity - Prayer to saints, Prayer in Christianity - Prayer for the dead, Prayer in Christianity - Prayerbooks, Prayer in Christianity - Vocal, Prayer in Christianity - Meditative, Prayer in Christianity - Prayer of recollection, Prayer in Christianity - Contemplative prayer, Prayer in Christianity - Charismatic prayer Speaking in Tougues, Prayer in Christianity - A Christian philosophy of prayer, Prayer in Christianity - Epistemological issues

Read more here: » Prayer in Christianity: Encyclopedia II - Prayer in Christianity - Epistemological issues

Ruah (Hebrew) Also ruahh. Vital breath, wind, air, very much in the sense that the Greek pneuma means spirit, wind, air, and breath; a breath, exhalation; the rational soul or mind, possessing counsel, purpose, and will -- often confused with the vital principle placed in the breath and with the principle of life.

In connection with 'elohim, ruah denotes the rational and purposive mental quality of the gods -- the mental breath or power appearing mainly in humans, feebly in animals. It was regarded in Genesis as moving over the chaos at the creation, and operating in and through the universe, producing that which is noble and good in man and leading him to virtue. Cosmic ruah is in many respects equivalent to the Third Logos of Greek philosophy. A similar meaning implied exceptional soul powers, as in the inspired ruler and the prophet; hence the prophetic spirit -- which was often represented as passing from one person and resting in another.

In the Hebrew Qabbalah, ruah had the same general meaning, equivalent to buddhi-manas in the theosophical classification of human principles. But modern Western Qabbalists have confused ruah with the kama-rupa, or even sometimes with kama-manas, precisely as they have confused it with nephesh, the animal vitality connected with appetitive desire or kama.

(See also: Ruah, Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary)

ASTROSOPHY

Astrology has frequently been criticized for offering proofs of its validity on single examples, as though it were some sort of faulty science. Astrology, however, does not rest upon cause and effect, but is based on the hermetic principle of Correspondence, exemplified by synchronicities and other simultaneous parallelisms. Mind is the link between the body and the Cosmos. Astrology is the recognition of this connection. When the psyche descends to the sensory world, its celestial planets are drawn inward, i.e. earthed, and they become cramped, distorted, negative reflections - faint echoes of what they were. So the planets become their own inversions. Saturn, for instance, is originally divine intelligence, but in man it now settles for putting ordinary "reason" on the throne of Transcendence. Since Saturn is the heaviest of the planets, its gravity pulls down all the others which in turn become inversions of themselves also. Hence confusion grows on what it feeds and since astrology fights a failing battle in its effort to keep the psyche's Cosmic connection, it is subject to endless criticism.

With the dawn of the "Age of Reason", we imagined that we had found the solution to our problems by rejecting the celestial link altogether and by exalting "Rationalism". This was the opposite direction from the one we should have taken. Now, feeling the lack of the "Spiritual" we seek it where we can - and, to our regret, now find outside ourselves only "irrationalism". With that we can no proceed to exclude the natural world as well as the transcendental, pathetically turning to the computer, robot and artificial intelligence as our highest goals.

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

Saadia Gaon (892-942) is considered one of the greatest of the early Jewish philosophers. His Emunoth ve-Deoth was originally called Kitab al-Amanat wal-l'tikadat, the "Book of the Articles of Faith and Doctrines of Dogma". It was the first systematic presentation and philosophic foundation of the dogmas of Judaism, completed in 933. In it he posits the rationality of the Jewish faith, with the restriction that reason must capitulate wherever it contradicts tradition. Dogma must take precedence of reason. Thus in the question concerni ...

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Jewish philosophy, Jewish philosophy - Approaches, Jewish philosophy - Early Jewish philosophy, Jewish philosophy - Philo of Alexandria, Jewish philosophy - Avicebron Solomon ibn Gabirol, Jewish philosophy - Jewish Mysticism Kabbalah, Jewish philosophy - Saadia Gaon, Jewish philosophy - Karaite philosophy, Jewish philosophy - Bahya ibn Paquda's Duties of the Heart, Jewish philosophy - Yehuda Halevi and the Kuzari, Jewish philosophy - The rise of Aristotelian thought, Jewish philosophy - Maimonides, Jewish philosophy - Position in the history of thought, Jewish philosophy - Renaissance philosophers, Jewish philosophy - Post-Enlightenment Jewish philosophers, Jewish philosophy - Modern Jewish philosophy, Jewish philosophy - Holocaust theology, Jewish philosophy - Modern Jewish philosophers, Jewish philosophy - Orthodox Judaism philosophers, Jewish philosophy - Conservative Judaism philosophers, Jewish philosophy - Reform Judaism philosophers, Jewish philosophy - Reconstructionist Judaism philosophers, Jewish philosophy - Others, Jewish philosophy - Philosophers informed by their Jewish background

Read more here: » Jewish philosophy: Encyclopedia II - Jewish philosophy - Saadia Gaon

Marut, Maruts (Sanskrit) A class of spiritual or highly ethereal beings, properly classed as belonging to the middle sphere between heaven and earth. They are one of the classes of agnishvattas, and hence in strait union with the asuras -- indeed leaving mythologic legends about the maruts aside, there are times when the distinctions between the maruts and asuras vanish.

In the Vedas the maruts are described as children of heaven (spiritual spheres) and ocean (cosmic space), armed with golden weapons, such as lightning and thunderbolts, as having iron teeth and roaring like lions, and residing in the north, as riding in golden cars drawn by ruddy horses -- all of which is merely mythologic elaborations of symbolic fancy. The maruts are mythologically represented as storm gods and the friends and allies of Indra. Esoterically they belong to the hierarchies of those dhyani-chohans who enlightened the early races of mankind. In one sense they are our human egos as emanations from the manasaputras, and from another viewpoint, they are the manasaputras themselves, a class of the agnishvattas. Hence the allegory of Siva transforming the lumps of flesh into boys and calling them maruts, to show senseless men transformed by becoming the vehicles of the solar pitris or fire-maruts, and thus rational beings. Again, they are the adepts who incarnate on earth to help mankind.

The Vayu-Purana shows that the Maruts, "the oldest as the most incomprehensible of all the secondary or lower gods in the Rig Veda -- 'are born in every manvantara (Round) seven times seven (or 49); that in each Manvantara, four times seven (or twenty-eight) they obtain emancipation, but their places are filled up by persons reborn in that character.' " In the Ramayana Diti, the lower or manifested aspect of Aditi, "anxious to obtain a son who would destroy Indra, is told by Kasyapa the Sage, that 'if, with thoughts wholly pious and person entirely pure, she carries the babe in her womb for a hundred years' she will get such a son. But Indra foils her in the design. With his thunderbolt he divides the embryo in her womb into seven portions, and then divides every such portion into seven pieces again, which become the swift-moving deities, the Maruts. These deities are only another aspect, or a development of the Kumaras [or agnishvattas], who are Rudras in their patronymic, like many others" (SD 2:613).

The maruts have their representatives on lower planes, which causes much of the confusion and apparently contradictory statements about them. "The Maruts represent

(a)  the passions that storm and rage within every candidate's breast, when preparing for an ascetic life -- this mystically;

(b)  the occult potencies concealed in the manifold aspects of Akasa's lower principles -- her body, or sthula sarira, representing the terrestrial, lower, atmosphere of every inhabited globe -- this mystically and sidereally;

(c)   actual conscious Existences, Beings of a cosmic and psychic nature" (SD 2:615).

(See also: Marut, Maruts, Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary)

ELEMENTS

The four principles of reality. They derive their nature from the phases of the Moon (Waxing, Full, Waning, Disappearing) and can be associated with the four points of the compass (see TETRAMORPH), but we should be wary of trying to assign a logical progression to them. For instance, science tends to see them merely as matter, energy, space and time. But contemporary scientific rationalism does not apply to ancient intuitional philosophy.

The ancients were correct to advise us not to try to separate the elements from one another (the "unified field" theory, however, doesn't apply to this aspect either). They take their being from the context of one another acting in unison. Thus Earth is the materialized, magnetic form which seeks contraction (coagula) and Air is the medium of space, freedom and dispersion (solve). Water is the dual flow of involution and evolution, the End and the Beginning, quicksilver-like Creation and Dissolution, Surface and Depth. The waters are divided into the upper waters of the potential and the lower waters of the actual. Water is the element of transition between the other elements. Fire, the plasmic state of transmutation, is the energy behind all things.

Each element is unique in its relationship to the others and in fully exercising that uniqueness, disappears. Water confluences the elements into a duality, Earth contains them all and is their united totality. Air is the separation in which they individuate themselves and vanish, while Fire is the uniqueness itself that extracts anything from its context, particularly the separation of "something" from Nothing, or vice-versa.

The quartering of the elements takes innumerable forms. Eliphas Levi, for instance, even gives a tetramorphic quaternity to Alchemy (Salt, Sulphur, Mercury and Azoth) and to the Qabalah (Macroposopus, Microposopus and the 2 "Mothers").

In Facing the Sphinx, Marie Farrington gives the number of elements as seven: earth, water, fire, air, ether or vapor, blossom (the seminal principle) and the Wind of Purpose (or Ghost). Amongst the Hindus the sixth was Bala-Rama, "the representation of masculine virility, the semen virile. The 7th was the summit and soul of the rest." In Ancient China, we observe earth, water, fire, wind and space (wood is only a physical element). The seven Latin verbs are Velle, Audere, Scire, Tacere, Revelare, Resurgere, Renunciare.

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

AURA THERAPY

Every substance in the universe, both living and dead tissue, emits energy and has therefore a radiation pattern. This radiation, termed 'aura', thus forms distinctly different force fields in the case of each item, in the same manner as a fingerprint. The individual auras are in contact with a universal field of spiritual energy from which they draw their power.

Artists and mystics have from ancient times seen and portrayed this effect all over the world. Aura therapists say that although we are usually not aware of it consciously, auras, rather the effect of interacting auras, determine our first responses to people and situations. Developed and understood properly, it is a quicker and more sensitive gauge than more rational faculties. The unease or elation that one feels immediately on meeting another person is thus caused by the auras being in harmony or without it.

The auras of plants, animals and minerals are said to communicate and interact with one another as part of a single living system. Each person's aura is thought to be made up of the radiation from all the cells and chemicals within the body and their interaction. The visible aura, which is much in evidence in all religious texts, is said to be an oval extending from a few centimeters to a meter around the body, sometimes more at the head. The light being composed of seven coloured rays, each associated with particular organs of the body and conveying a distinct message. The variations in shape, colour & strength a reflection of each individual's uniqueness.

Therapists believe that personality and emotions too can be interpreted from auras. One with soft, fringed edges for instance is likely to indicate a person too susceptible to the influence of others. Firm but fluid boundaries would indicate openness but not vulnerability. And a hard, distinct outline belonging to one who is defensive and insecure. Similarly, lots of red within the aura would indicate anger while a predominance of blue would stand for idealism.

Treatment comes in the form of adding extra colours to improve a dull or depleted aura or using complimentary colours to offset to help balance one that is too strong. The therapists only acting as conduits for transferring the universal spiritual energy into the auras of patients, by touching the latter's auras or by using visualisation to transmit energy. However, active patient in the entire process is extremely crucial which involves their becoming more self-aware of their spiritual nature.

(See also: AURA THERAPY, Ayurveda, Ayurvedic Dictionary, Alternative Health, Body Mind and Soul)

THE EMPEROR AND THE STAR

These are Crowley's two greatest mysteries. We need to study them in tandem, because Crowley insists that the Emperor's proper letter is not Heh, but Tzaddi, so it must change places with The Star. Since these new attributions fly in the face of every tradition, let's try to guess why he does this.

By Crowley's reckoning, the star, Kokhav = 48 (a multiple of 12), the astrological number) or the "sphere of Venus". It represents Mercy (Gedulah or Chesed ). It also means, "strength" and "army". Forty eight divided by four is 14, the card of Temperance (or Alchemy), where we also have the angel pouring the waters. Qisar and Melech both translate as "Emperor". To continue with Crowley's reckoning, qisar would equal 371 ("Evil") and melech would equal 78 (that is, 15, or The Devil). However, if we use the ordinal value of the letters alone we get for Qisar and Melech, respectively, 60 and 33. Thirty Three is "sorrow, weeping" and a spring or fountain." Sixty is "watch-tower", excellence, sublimity, glory, pride, a Vision..." For kochav we get 28 or "Union, unity, power, and the mystic Netzach. . ." If we skip Aleph we get for Qisar and Melech, 60 and 30 ("Judah, Libra, Justice"). All of these seem appropriate enough for "The Emperor" but still do not explain why Crowley wants him to be the 17th card!

One reason that Crowley might have wanted to exchange The Emperor with Atu number 17 is so that (17 = 1 + 7 = 8) The Emperor (4) would serve as the higher exponent of Justice, which he had renamed "Adjustment" and already exchanged with Strength at 11. In his system, that places mundane authority (the Emperor) in the most subservient position and exalts Sirius (the Star) to the seat of greatest power at Atu 4. Meanwhile, Strength, now Atu 11, becomes the higher exponent of The Priestess (Atu 2), since 11 is the number of sorcery. This kind of highly rational manipulation of universal symbols is typical of Crowley's creative and very original approach to M/magic(k). The whole thing is extremely round-about and vexatious and looks like nothing so much as one of those infinitely-regressing whorls of cocaine-induced ratiocination, which were sometimes characteristic of Crowley. His paltry excuse that tzaddi is the letter that begins the word for Emperor "in many languages", is not meant to fool any serious student. It occurs only in Russian, Tsar, which is but a corruption of "Caesar."

Moreover, even if we assign the ordinal value to tzaddi (18), that translates as the notariqon of Yehi Aur ("Let there be light!"); Chai (the "living"); the antique serpent (Lucifer?); Hatred and "My Beloved". All of those seem strangely fitting for The Star, whereas "four" seems more natural to the Emperor if we think of him as the Tetragrammaton (IHVH). Apparently, that was precisely what AC wanted to avoid -- the ascription of IHVH to the Emperor. All the same, after all this numerology, we are no closer to the meaning of these cards. Indeed, we are farther at sea than ever!

(See also: THE EMPEROR AND THE STAR, Magick, Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary, Body Mind and Soul, )

BELIEF

What KG calls a "primal obsession" and in Aleister Crowley and the Hidden God, he says, "Every magician must discover the word that conceals his dominant obsession, must vibrate it until its energizing elemental is awakened." Myths are never intended to be believed. They are opportunities to restructure our values and lead us to new insights. Goblins need not be real in order to be real. No magician ever believes anything. That includes the current consensus. Gurdjieff went so far as to say, "Believe nothing, not even yourself." Feelings, unless one has trained intuitional talents, can never be trusted to reflect reality. The alternative to believing is simply experiencing or knowing.

It is not belief that acts as a placebo, it is the absence of doubt. This is the real meaning of Gnosticism which had no truck with belief, but was concerned solely with knowing (from Gk. gnostikos, good at knowing). You know something by direct experience of the body and mind, not through second-hand evidence or teaching or belief. Healing has nothing to do with struggling against disbelief, it is a relaxing into the experience itself and accepting, without giving way to despair, that whatever happens is all right. When patients say they believe, they really mean they have learned how to relax on the tightrope without falling off. If they had to keep forcing themselves to believe, theyd quickly wither and fall.

Meanwhile, 19th Century rationalism is paling to insignificance. Our Xtian children, reared in frustration and boredom, soon desert their native religions and run away to sex and drugs. Then, after burning themselves out, they return in the mantle of shame that we force them to wear, offering themselves to be brainwashed anew in our guilt-ridden, mind-murdering belief factories.

There is a deplorable tendency for our society to mention religion and magic in the same breath, as though they were synonyms. Of course, nothing could be further from the truth. Admittedly, it is an idiosyncrasy of some magi to bristle at religion, chiefly because it is authoritarian, rigid, ignorant and oppressive, and also because it belittles and persecutes creativity. However, a sharp line between magic and religion must be strongly drawn. We are told that magic goes beyond belief. It does nothing of the kind - it shuns belief like the pox! If religion is 100% belief, magic is based in equal parts upon knowledge, originality, perseverance and boldness. Where confusion arises in the popular mind is over sorcery, which uses the trappings of magic and religion indiscriminately, is based on belief and subordination, but at the same time brazenly seeks selfish material gain and ego enhancement. Sorcery is really a kind of credulous business transaction, whose motto might well be the ends glorify the means.

Although Judaism and Buddhism are special cases, in Xtianity and Islam, the purpose of religion is individual salvation in the Hereafter. These belief-based religions assure salvation through fixing one's faith on a God or a Paraclete which is other than the self and which, in fact, erases the self altogether. The purpose of magic, on the other hand, is frankly the transmogrification in whole or in part, with or without the invocation of Gods of the hell that our world really is. Since the magician always dwells at the chaotic, creative edge of the present, this transmogrification concerns itself with means as much as ends. He rings in the changes as he goes along, extemporaneously. Nor does the magician cringe and subordinate himself, but acts on equal footing with the pantheistic and holonomic principle that each part is equal to, if not greater than, the whole. Since, moreover, any part, in a sense, is equal to any other part, the magician himself is neither more nor less valuable than anyone or anything else. The individual self is merely unique in the meaning and interpretation of its contribution. Therefore, the magician is always willing to sacrifice himself in any manner that may prove necessary to his work.

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

Third Round During the third cycling of the monadic hosts or life-waves around the globes of a planetary chain, the same general trend is pursued as in the second round, but with the added development of a third factor in the evolutionary pilgrimage. Globe D of the earth-chain had not yet attained its present coarse consistency, for the third element-principle (water) was in process of evolutionary development; thus the globe was characteristically of a watery nature.

At that period even the more evolved monads of the lunar chain, representing and leading the human kingdom, had but reached the state of "presentments of men," having huge ape-like forms; yet they were not apes in any sense of the word, for what we know now as monkeys and apes were of far later development as partial offsprings from the human stock, which took place during the present fourth round. These third round men were "no fit rupa for the Brothers of the Fifth" (SD 2:57) -- referring to the fifth class of monads or manasaputras.

At the end of the third round, there were forerunning monads who were already human in nature and characteristic, and who were leading the way towards the true humanity of the fourth round, and therefore were the guides of the less progressed human monads when it became the latter's turn to incarnate during the fourth round. These advance-guard monads are sometimes termed the Sons of Yoga. As intellectual and moral responsibility appears in the evolving human monads only when mind enters the picture -- which occurred for the majority of the human monads only during the third root-race of the fourth round -- during the third round few monads had reached the stage of true intellectual and moral responsibility; and during the second round even these forerunners were themselves unfolding the powers and responsibilities of mind and of choice.

During the third round: "He had now a perfectly concrete or compacted body; at first the form of a giant ape, and more intelligent (or rather cunning) than spiritual. For in the downward arc he has now reached the point where his primordial spirituality is eclipsed or over-shadowed by nascent mentality. In the last half of this third round his gigantic stature decreases, his body improves in texture . . . and he becomes a more rational being -- through still more an ape than a Deva man" (ML 87-8) -- that is, manas (mind) was not yet functioning. Thus while the third-round forerunners may be considered truly human, the great bulk of the human kingdom was still but in the elemental stages of intellectual and moral responsibility. Mind was only just beginning to show itself, and hence the humans were rather cunning than intellectual, instinctual rather than spiritual.

Another phase of evolution of the life-waves during the third round was the great outflow of differing animal forms which took place, due to the immense pressure of the inner urge of the various life-centers to express themselves in their respective phases of evolutionary unfolding. However, what we now call the mammalian stocks were a much later development, for these appeared during the fourth round; though there were forerunners even of the mammalia during the last part of the third round. Furthermore, all of these various stocks or groups of evolving beings originated in astral types thrown off by third round man. The present "amphibia, birds, reptiles, fishes, etc., are the resultants of the Third Round, astral fossil forms stored up in the auric envelope of the Earth and projected into physical objectivity subsequent to the deposition of the first Laurentian rocks" (SD 2:684) when this took place during the fourth round.

(See also: Third Round, Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary)

Monad, Monas [from Greek monas a unit, individual, atom]

A unit, a one; something nondivisible and which is therefore conceived of as real, in contradistinction to compound things which (as compounds) are not real.

In the Pythagorean system the Duad emanates from the higher and solitary Monas, which is thus the First Cause or First Logos, the Duad being the Second Cause or Logos; and from the second emanates the third stage of individuality, the Triad, Third Cause or Logos. In the human constitution the Monas signifies atman, the Duad buddhi, and the Triad signifies manas.

The term monad was adopted from Greek philosophy by Bruno, Leibniz, and others. According to Leibniz there can be but one ultimate cosmic reality or monad, the universe; but he recognizes an innumerable multiplicity of monads which pervade the universe, copies or reflections of the universal monad regarded as real except in their relation to the universal monad. He divides his derivative monads into three classes: rational souls; sentient but irrational monads; and material monads, or organic and inorganic bodies.

As regards the material monads, while recognizing that corporeal matter is compound, and the attributes by which we perceive it unreal, unlike Berkeley, he does not deny its existence but regards it essentially as monadic. Thus his universe is an aggregate of individuals. The relations of these individuals to each other and to the universal is a supreme harmony, implying both individuality and coordination, thus reconciling the antinomy of bonds of law and freedom. The interrelations of various groups of monads is as a series of hierarchies.

Theosophical usage is largely the same as that of Leibniz, as the focus or heart in any individual being, of all its divine, spiritual, and intellectual powers and attributes -- the immortal part of its being. In The Secret Doctrine we find a triadic union of gods-monads-atoms, related to each other as spirit-soul-body (or more accurately spirit, spirit-soul, and spirit-soul-body). Monads and atoms are related to each other as the energic and the material side of manifestation, the atoms being the reflections, veils, or projections of and from the monads themselves.

Monads are the ultimate elements of the universe, spiritual-substantial entities, self-motivated, self-impelled, self-conscious, in infinitely varying degrees. They engender other monads, which in turn engender others, and thus springs up the host of living entities forming the immense variety and unity of the manifested world. As any monad descends into matter, it secretes from itself various veils or vehicles adapted for its self-expression on the various cosmic planes. Thus in man there is the divine monad, the spiritual monad, the higher human or chain monad, the lower human or globe monad, the animal monad, and the astral-physical monad. The following diagram shows the relations between the cosmic principles; the monads, egos and souls in the human being; and the human principles

The monad, as its name implies, is ever-enduring as an individual, although at the end of each manvantara it rises into a still higher or divine stage of perfect union with the boundless divine, only to re-issue forth again in due course as the monad it was before, thus beginning a new, immensely long time period of active individualized life as a spiritual consciousness-center. Thus it is that even the monads evolve, each on its own plane, for the hierarchies of the monads are innumerable and exist in all-various degrees at stages of evolutionary progression on the endless ladder of cosmic life.

(See also: Monad, Monas, Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary)

Logos (Greek) plural logoi. Word; expressive cosmic intelligence manifested in every rational being. With Plato, that power of the mind which is manifested in speech; its relation to nous or intelligence is not always clearly distinguished.

With reference to the logos in man, an important distinction was made by the ancients between the logos endiathetos (ideal or unspoken word) and the logos prophorikos (expressed or spoken word), the former being an unexpressed idea in the mind. The word was adopted by Christian theologians mingled with ideas taken from the Hebrews, used in the second sense, as found in the first chapter of John, where the Logos seems almost anthropomorphized.

In theosophy, logos stands for the manifested unity at the head of any hierarchy, which is the First Logos. There are innumerable such logoi in cosmic space. The Second Logos emanates from it and is dual, combining both the active and passive sides of the emanation from the First Logos, just as a word combines idea or thought with the vibratory energy of sound. The Third Logos, again, is the offspring or emanation from the Second or Dual Logos.

It is just in these three logoi, considered as a cosmic unit, that arose the original teaching of the Christian Trinity. In the original Christian idea, the Son was identified with the Third Logos and proceeded from the Father and the Holy Spirit, the Second Logos, originally in Christianity a feminine cosmic power; whereas the Roman Catholic Church made the procession of the Son come directly from the First Logos or Father, the Holy Ghost being misplaced and made the Third Logos. In later developments of Christian theology, the Logos is spoken of as the Word made flesh, the manifestation of God on earth, the Son of God, Christ, the miscalled Second Person of the Trinity. This idea was still further narrowed and debased into the doctrine of a single and special earthy manifestation of the Godhead.

After parabrahman, the one ineffable and unthinkable reality, comes the First or Unmanifested Logos, corresponding to paramatman in cosmos and atman in man, the supreme monadic self in any hierarchy; then as an emanation from the former comes the quasi-manifested or Second Logos, corresponding to cosmic and human buddhi, always envisaged as a feminine potency; and then from the former two proceeds the manifested, creative, or Third Logos, corresponding to mahat on the cosmic plane and manas in the human constitution. Thus Logos is a center of unity in a being, which may exist in an unmanifest or a manifest condition, but always derivative from the supreme mystery above it -- to which must be added an intermediate state of partial or incipient manifestation. Man is sometimes spoken of as the Third Logos, as it corresponds to manas.

"This (first)

Logos may be called in the language of old writers either Eswara or Pratyagatma or Sabda Brahmam. It is called the Verbum or the Word by the Christians, and it is the divine Christos who is eternally in the bosom of his father. It is called Avalokiteswara by the Buddhists; at any rate, Avalokiteswara in one sense is the Logos in general, . . . In almost every doctrine they have formulated the existence of a centre of spiritual energy which is unborn and eternal, and which exists in a latent condition in the bosom of Parabrahmam at the time of pralaya, and starts as a centre of conscious energy at the time of cosmic activity. It is the first gnatha or the ego in the cosmos, and every other ego and every other self . . . is but its reflection or manifestation. In its inmost nature it is not unknowable as Parabrahmam, but it is an object of the highest knowledge that man is capable of acquiring. . . .

". . . Parabrahmam by itself cannot be seen as it is. It is seen by the Logos with a veil thrown over it, and that veil is the mighty expanse of cosmic matter. It is the basis of all material manifestations in the cosmos.

". . . the first manifestation of Parabrahmam is a Trinity, the highest Trinity that we are capable of understanding. It consists of Mulaprakriti, Eswara or the Logos, and the conscious energy of the Logos, which is its power and light; and here we have the three principles upon which the whole cosmos seems to be based. First, we have matter; secondly, we have force -- at any rate, the foundation of all the forces in the cosmos; and thirdly, we have the ego or the one root of self, of which every other kind of self is but a manifestation or reflection" (Notes on BG 18-22).

On account of the universal analogies running throughout Nature, every cosmic unit, such as a solar system or a sun, is an expression in itself of a minor series of First, Second, and Third Logoi; and this primordial Triad through the Third Logos breaks into seven offspring-logoi, which become the seven solar logoi.

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

Saadia Gaon was a pioneer in the fields in which he toiled. The foremost object of his work was the Bible; his importance is due primarily to his establishment of a new school of Biblical exegesis characterized by a rational investigation of the contents of the Bible and a scientific knowledge of the language of the holy text. Saadia's Arabic translation of the Bible is of importance for the history of civilization; itself a product of the Arabization of a large portion of Judaism, it served for centuries as a potent factor in the imp ...

See also:

Saadia Gaon, Saadia Gaon - The Sefer ha-Galui, Saadia Gaon - Works, Saadia Gaon - Significance, Saadia Gaon - His Philosophy of Religion, Saadia Gaon - Relations to Mysticism

Read more here: » Saadia Gaon: Encyclopedia II - Saadia Gaon - Significance

Some mystics believe, that a soul is growing in steps from minerals, plants and animals to men. When the human body dies, a soul could become an angel. The Sufi mystic Jalal al-Din Muhammad Rumi wrote in his poem Masnavi: I died as inanimate matter and arose a plant, I died as a plant and rose again an animal. I died as an animal and arose a man. Why then should I fear to become less by dying? I shall die once again as a man ...

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Angel, Angel - Etymology, Angel - Angels in the Tanakh, Angel - Appearance of angels, Angel - Purpose, Angel - Jewish views, Angel - Maimonides and rationalism, Angel - Christian views, Angel - Islamic views, Angel - Latter-Day Saint views, Angel - Other religions, Angel - Hinduism, Angel - Thelema, Angel - Angels as a development step of the soul, Angel - Named angels and archangels, Angel - Bibliography

Read more here: » Angel: Encyclopedia II - Angel - Angels as a development step of the soul