Schools Dictionary

tantrism: The enlightenment path outlined in the Tantra scriptures.

1)    Tantrism is sometimes considered a parallel stream of history and tradition in Hinduism, running alongside and gradually interweaving with the Vedic brahminical tradition.

2)    Tantrism refers to traditions, mainly within Saivism and Shaktism, that focus on the arousal of the kundalini force, and which view the human body as a vehicle of the Divine and an instrument for liberation. Tantrism's ultimate aim is a channeling of the kundalini life force through the sushumna, the gracious channel, upwards into the sahasrara chakra and beyond, through the door of brahman (brahmarandhra) into Parasiva, either before or at the time of death. The stress is on the transformation of all spheres of consciousness, spiritual, psychic, emotional and material. It is a path of sadhana.

Shakta Tantrism: Brings a strong emphasis on the worship of the feminine force. Depending on the school, this may be symbolic or literal in rites involving sexual intercourse, etc. Shakta Tantrism's main principle is the use of the material to gain the spiritual. In certain schools, historically, this implies embracing that which is normally forbidden and manipulating the forces to attain transcendent consciousness rather than lower consciousness. There are three main streams:

-       the righthand path (dakshina marga or dakshinachara) of conservative Hindu practice,

-       the left-hand path (vama marga or vamachara) involving the use of things normally forbidden such as taking intoxicants, meat, ritual sex, etc., and

-       the yogic path of the Kaula sect. Gorakshanatha followers are sometimes grouped with the latter.

See: Shaktism, kundalini, kundalini yoga, raja yoga, tantra.

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

Iamblichus (255?-333) Neoplatonic theurgist, mystic, and reviver of the practical mysteries outside of Mystery schools or temples. Student of Porphyry and founder of the Syrian Neoplatonic school.

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

Rudolf Steiner

(1861 - 1925 ) Austrian philosopher, scientist, artist and educator who was the originator of the social philosophy called Anthroposophy. Steiner founded the Anthroposophical Society in 1924, and it now has branches throughout the world, and is especially popular in Britain.

He traveled extensively in Europe lecturing on spiritual science, the arts, social sciences, religion, education, agriculture and health. His published works amount to over 350 titles, including collections of lectures, books, articles, reviews and dramas. His occult philosophy is outlined in key titles such as Knowledge of the Higher Worlds and Its Attainment (1904-05), and An Outline of Occult Science (1909).

His teachings inspired the development of the Waldorf School movement and of schools for handicapped or maladjusted children; his agricultural methods for preparing soil inspired chemical-free organic farming and gardening; he created eurythmy, a form of expressive movement to music and speech; and his guidelines on holistic medicine and pharmacology are still widely respected.

(See also: Rudolf Steiner , New Age Spirituality, Body Mind and Soul)

sampradaya

A school of philosophy or religion. According to the Padma Purana, there are four authorized Vaishnava sampradayas, founded by Lord Brahma, the goddess Lakshmi, Lord Siva, and the four Kumara sages. In Kali-yuga these schools have been reestablished by the acharyas Madhva, Ramanuja, Vishnu Svami, and Nimbarka. The sampradaya of Lord Chaitanya Mahaprabhu is officially connected with the Madhva line, but incorporates teachings of all four sampradayas.

(See also: sampradaya , Bhakti, Bhakti Yoga, Bhakti Dictionary, Body Mind and Soul)

Middle Vehicle

Also called Middle Doctrine School or Madhyarnika; one of the two main schools of Mahayana thought; it upholds the Void as the only really real or independent, unconditioned Reality.

 (See also: Middle Vehicle , Buddhism, Body Mind and Soul)

Sankhya (Sanskrit). The system of philosophy founded by Kapila Rishi, a system of analytical metaphysics, and one of the six Darshanas or schools of philosophy. It discourses on numerical categories and the meaning of the twenty-five tatwas (the forces of nature in various degrees). This "atomistic school", as some call it, explains nature by the interaction of twenty-four elements with purusha (spirit) modified by the three gunas (qualities), teaching the eternity of pradhana (primordial, homogeneous matter), or the self-transformation of nature and the eternity of the human Egos.

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

Atomists Certain ancient Greek philosophers, especially of the school of Leucippus and Deomcritus, who taught that all things arose from atoms (atomoi) and a vacuum (kenon). By atoms Democritus meant "indivisible particles of substance containing in themselves the potentialities of all possible future development, self-moved, self-driven . . . spiritual indivisible entities, the ultimates of being, self-conscious, spiritual monads.

"Nor by his word kenon, or void, did he mean an utter emptiness, as we misconstrue that word. He meant the vast expanses of the spatial deeps, Space, in fact, which this infinite host of monads filled" (MIE 34-5). The atomists became more materialistic as time passed. The equivalent Hindu atomist schools are the Nyaya and Vaiseshika.

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

Karma: Depending on the culture, the concept of karma has several different interpretations. While some schools of thought use the term to mean a sort of payback for our good and bad deeds, others (notably Buddhist scholars) maintain that karma never means the effect of a good or bad deed, but the deed itself. This initial deed, they argue, sets into motion a chain of events that leads to eiher good or bad situations, depending on the nature of the original deed. Edgar Cayce, on the other hand, taught that the consequences of our actions in this life were not karma, but simply cause and effect. He said that karma was always what we bring into this life as consequences from a past life.

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

Soma (Sanskrit) In Hinduism, the moon astronomically; mystically, a sacred beverage of initiates, "made from a rare mountain plant by initiated Brahmans" (TG 304).

As the moon, Soma is an occult mystery, for the moon as a symbol stands for both good and evil, yet more often a symbol of evil than of good. Astrologically, Soma is the regent of the invisible or occult moon, while Indu represents the physical moon. "Soma is the mystery god and presides over the mystic and occult nature in man and the Universe" (SD 2:45). Soma or lunar worship was once purely occult and its rites were based upon a minute and profound knowledge of nature.

According to Hindu tradition, Soma as a sacred juice gave mystic visions and trance-revelations, the result of which union was Budha (esoteric wisdom). This sacred beverage was drunk by Brahmins and initiates during their mysteries and sacrificial rites.

"The 'Soma' plant is the asclepias acida, which yields a juice from which that mystic beverage, the Soma drink, is made. Alone the descendants of the Rishis, the Agnihotri (the fire priests) of the great mysteries knew all its powers. But the real property of the true Soma was (and is) to make a new man of the Initiate, after he is reborn, namely once that he begins to live in his astral body . . .; for, his spiritual nature overcoming the physical, he would soon snap it off and part even from that etherealized form. . . .

"The partaker of Soma finds himself both linked to his external body, and yet away from it in his spiritual form. The latter, freed from the former, soars for the time being in the ethereal higher regions, becoming virtually 'as one of the gods,' and yet preserving in his physical brain the memory of what he sees and learns. Plainly speaking, Soma is the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge forbidden by the jealous Elohim to Adam and Eve or Yah-ve, 'lest Man should become as one of us' " (SD 2:498-9&n).

"A 'soma-drinker' attains the power of placing himself in direct rapport with the bright side of the moon, thus deriving inspiration from the concentrated intellectual energy of the blessed ancestors. . . .

"This which seems one stream (to the ignorant) is of a dual nature -- one giving life and wisdom, the other being lethal. He who can separate the former from the latter, as Kalahamsa separated the milk from the water, which was mixed with it, thus showing great wisdom -- will have his reward" (BCW 12:203-4).

"This Hindu sacred beverage answers to the Greek Ambrosia or nectar, drunk by the gods of Olympus. A cup of kykeon was also quaffed by the mysta at the Eleusinian initiation. He who drinks it easily reaches Brahma, or the place of splendor (Heaven). The soma-drink known to Europeans is not the genuine beverage, but its substitute; for the initiated priests alone can taste of the real soma; and even kings and rajas, when sacrificing, receive the substitute. . . . We were positively informed that the majority of the sacrificial priests of the Dekkan have lost the secret of the true soma. It can be found neither in the ritual books nor through oral information. The true followers of the primitive Vedic religion are very few; these are the alleged descendants from the Rishis, the real Agnihotris, the initiates of the great Mysteries. The soma-drink is also commemorated in the Hindu Pantheon, for it is called King-Soma. He who drinks of it is made to participate in the heavenly king, because he becomes filled with it, as the Christian apostles and their converts became filled with the Holy Ghost, and purified of their sins. The soma makes a new man of the initiate; he is reborn and transformed, and his spiritual nature overcomes the physical; it gives the divine power of inspiration, and develops the clairvoyant faculty to the utmost. According to the exoteric explanation the soma is a plant, but, at the same time it is an angel. It forcibly connects the inner, highest 'spirit' of man, which spirit is an angel like the mystical soma, with his 'irrational soul,' or astral body, and thus united by the power of the magic drink, they soar together above physical nature and participate during life in the beatitude and ineffable glories of Heaven.

"Thus the Hindu soma is mystically, and in all respects the same that the Eucharist supper is to the Christian. The idea is similar. By means of the sacrificial prayers -- the mantras -- this liquor is supposed to be transformed on the spot into real soma -- or the angel, and even into Brahma himself" (IU 1:xl-xli).

The mystical drink has been known in all ages and among all peoples. The ancient Teutonic tribes, whether of the Germanic or Anglo-Saxons, spoke of their divine mead, the drink of the gods. The Hindus spoke of Soma, the direct distillation from the moon and from the overseeing and guiding eye of the sun; the Greeks of the Homeric age spoke of ambrosia or nectar, a drink of the gods which renewed their understanding and gave them inspiration as well. Another branch of the Greeks belonging to the Dionysian and Orphic branches of mystical thought, spoke equally mystically of the mystic wine, and also of the mystic cereal, partaken of during the Mysteries, and it is from this last that the mystical wine and cereal or bread of the Christians was taken over almost completely from the Dionysian Eucharist, only among Christians even from quite early times it became degraded into actual blood and flesh of Jesus.

The evident meaning must be connected with the old occult thought that wine, or the mead of the northern peoples where the grape and soma were unknown or uncultivated, all had the meaning of the inspiration of initiation, a kind of ecstasy of vision and knowledge brought about through initiation, of which the physical intoxication of wine, mead, or the soma juice has all the lower and materialized aspect, every spiritual thing having its material counterpart, every right-hand thought or rule in occultism having its left-hand or sorcerer perversion or counterpart. Thus in the highest initiation, even today and from immemorial time, the holy drink or potation was entirely mystical, and had a dozen of these significances, all bound up together; yet despite this fact, for some of the lower initiations where a student found difficulty in throwing off the physical and astral influences, a harmless -- when administered rightly -- drug or drink was given which temporarily stupefied the lower quaternary; but it is to be noted that this substitute of the physical drink came about when neophytes began to find it very difficult to do what their more spiritual forerunners had done: raising themselves solely by inner aspiration up to inspiration, by inner insight up to the epopteia or vision.

Thus the question whether the mystical drink was an actual drink, or merely a mystical one, cannot be answered by a simple yes or no. Originally it was entirely mystical, later it remained as mystical as ever, but the body with its grossness, and the astral influences with their terrible power over the men and women of the time, were temporarily reduced to quiescence by a preparation known to initiates to have the power of bringing about the condition required, without any permanent or even long after-effect, very much as a sedative will be given by a physician today. It is of course true that if this drink, however relatively innocent in a single instance, were to be constantly repeated, it would have developed into a drug habit.

Some of the later peoples in their initiations actually did use a kind of physical soma which had the effect of bringing about a dulling of the restless brain-mind for the time being, so that the inner powers were temporarily freed from the clogging influences of the astral light and the body.

The use of drugs in initiatory ceremonies of any kind, however, is a relatively late and degenerate practice, and has never at any time been, nor will it ever be, introduced by the Mother-Lodge coming down to us even from the middle of the third root-race. With it the old tradition burns more brightly than ever that the true soma, the true mead of the gods or wine of the spirit, is the raising of the human into the spiritual by aspiration, training, and strict following of the traditional laws of discipleship, so that finally the neophyte feels the sunlight from above stealing through the moon of his mind.

So strongly is this the case, that even today in theosophical occult studies, drug taking of any kind is strictly forbidden, including alcohol, for alcohol is a drug, a product of natural decay and decomposition, and while less spectacular and violent as a rule than drugs such as opium and its derivatives, it is far more easily procurable and is therefore more specifically pointed to as objectionable. The idea of the occult student is to have the body absolutely normal, healthy, clean, and functioning in the smoothness of health, so that even overeating is seen to be a harmful thing, because it clogs the body, dulls the mind, and could even actually lead to physical disability.

There is and has been a great deal of confusion, not only at present but throughout the ages, about these matters, and several mystical schools have even chosen the language of the tavern and drinking house as the cloak for conveying occult or semi-occult teaching. A noted example is the Sufi school with its poems lauding the flowing bowl and the joys of the tavern and the bosom friends therein, and the beloved's breast. Here the tavern was the universe, the flowing cup or wine was the wine of the spirit bringing inner ecstasy, the bosom of the beloved was the raising oneself into inner communion with the god within, of which the Jewish bosom of Abraham is a feeble correspondence. The friends of the tavern are those perfect human relations brought about by a community of spiritual and intellectual interests, and the associations of the tavern are the mysteries of the world around us with their marvels and arcana. Nevertheless in various countries as the fourth root-race ran toward its evil culmination, the mystic became translated into the material, the spiritual degenerated into the teaching of matter, so that indeed in later Atlantean times the drugging of initiates was common, and the results always disastrous, this being one of the sorceries for which the Atlanteans in occult history have remained infamous. Yet even in the fifth root-race, due to the heavy Atlantean karma still weighing on us, many nations as late as historic times employed more or less harmless potations to bring about a temporary dulling or stupefying of the brain and nervous system -- a procedure always vigorously opposed by the theosophic occult school which has never at any time allowed it.

(See also: Soma , Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary)

Appaya Dikshita: (Sanskrit) Philosophical genius of South India (1554-1626) who worked to reconcile Vaishnavism and Saivism, advancing the Siva Advaita school of Saivism by his writings, and bolstering other schools by his brilliant summations of their philosophies. He is best known for his commentaries on the teachings of Srikantha. Appaya Dikshita also created a manual of Saiva temple ritual still in use today. See: Siva Advaita.

(See also: Appaya Dikshita , Hinduism, Body Mind and Soul)

Magi (plural of Old Persian magus a wise man from the verbal root meh great; cf Sanskrit maha; cf Avestan mogaha, Latin plural magus, Greek magos, Persian mogh, Pahlavi maga)

An hereditary priesthood or sacerdotal caste in Media and Persia. Zoroaster, himself a member of the Society of the Magi, divides the initiates into three degrees according to their level of enlightenment: the highest were referred to as Khvateush (those enlightened with their own inner light or self-enlightened); the second were called Varezenem (those who practice); and the third, Airyamna (friends or Aryans). The ancient Parsis may be divided into three degrees of Magi: the Herbods or novitiates; the Mobeds or masters; and the Destur Mobeds or perfect masters -- the "Dester Mobeds being identical with the Hierophants of the mysteries, as practised in Greece and Egypt" (TG 197).

Pliny mentions three schools of Magi: one founded at an unknown antiquity; a second established by Osthanes and Zoroaster; and a third by Moses and Jambres.

"And all the knowledge possessed by these different schools, whether Magian, Egyptian, or Jewish, was derived from India, or rather from both sides of the Himalayas" (IU 2:361). According to Shahrestani (12th-century Islamic scholar) the Magi are divided into three sects: Gaeomarethians (Kayumarthians), Zarvanian (Zurvanian), and Zoroastrians. They all share the common belief that in this manifested universe the dualism of light and darkness is at work and that the final victory of the light is the day of resurrection.

Porphyry refers to the Magi as the learned men among the Persians who are in the service of the deity (Abst 4:16), while Philo Judaeus describes them as the most wonderful inquirers into the hidden mysteries of nature: holy men who set themselves apart from everything else on this earth, "contemplated the divine virtues and understood the divine nature of the gods and spirits, the more clearly; and so, initiated others into the same mysteries, which consist in one holding an uninterrupted intercourse with these invisible beings during life" (IU 1:94-5). It is likely that the use of the name and the order survived in times when their true dignity was no longer apparent.

In the Bible Magi is translated "wise men." The term has also become familiar through the story of the three wise men who came to the infant Jesus bearing gold, frankincense, and myrrh.

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

Materialism In the rigid philosophical sense, any theory which considers the facts of the universe to be sufficiently explained by the existence and nature of matter. A familiar form of this is what has been called the atomo-mechanical theory, which derives all phenomena from the movements of material atoms in space. The philosophical definition of materialism differs according to the meaning of the word matter; as for instance, when we limit matter by no physical attributes or implications alone, but

See in it the sevenfold prakritis or pradhanas of Hindu philosophers and mystics, matter is then seen to be but a name for the veil or shadow of spirit -- the other side of spirit as it were. This distinction makes materialism but a synonym for spiritualism -- i.e., the profound philosophic theory that the universe is built throughout, from and of the substances and attributes of spirit, which become matter in its innumerable and manifold forms and phases on the lower cosmic planes. What physicists have been calling matter is a percept derived from the interaction of the physical senses with the physical plane of prakriti or nature.

Matter is one of the twin aspects of universal life, coeternal with spirit and indeed spirit's veil or vehicle, and hence is present on every plane of manifestation, from the highest to the lowest. When the manifested One of a universe is considered as a unit or unity, it is called the First or Unmanifest Logos; when it is considered as a duality it is called the Manifest-Unmanifested or Second Logos, and is spirit-matter or life, spirit being its positive pole and matter its negative. Matter is everywhere the vehicle of spirit, and in matter inhere the attributes which spirit expresses in it. Hence materialism, in this sense, would define the whole theosophic philosophy.

The history of philosophy presents a rivalry of schools where materialism is contrasted with idealism, but all these rival schools originated outside of the Mysteries of the sanctuary, although many if not all contain substantial elements of occult verities. The attempt entirely to separate the notions of spirit and matter, of mind and body, of noumenon and phenomenon, results in futility and confusion; a purely ideal world is as unreal as a purely material one.

Materialism, however, stands commonly for an attitude of mind which exalts sense-life, together with its appropriate species of intellectualism, into a summum bonum; and which strives to devise a philosophy that will justify such an attitude. It is an attitude towards life consisting of mental and emotional attachment to externals, to the senses, and to reasoning based on sensory perceptions; and a corresponding neglect and denial of real values. This kind of materialism undermines morals by substituting self-interest or expediency for an innate moral sense, as the basis for conduct. It places illusory power in the hands of man, while at the same time depriving him of his real power of penetrating discrimination, and hence of his ability while under this illusion to use the powers of nature aright.

(See also: Materialism , Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary)

Zen: Literally translated, zen means meditation. Zen is one of four major schools of Buddhism. The other schools are: Mahayana, Theravada, Zen (or Ch'an or Son), and Vajrayana.

 (See also: Zen , Buddhism, Body Mind and Soul)

nastika: (Sanskrit) "One who denies; unbeliever." Opposite of astika, "one who asserts."

The terms astika (orthodox) and nastika (unorthodox) are a traditional classification of Indian schools of thought. Nastika refers to all traditions that reject and deny the scriptural authority of the Vedas. This includes Sikhism, Jainism, Buddhism, the Charvaka materialists and others. Astika refers to those schools that accept the revealed authority of the Vedas as supreme scripture. This includes the four major sects: Saivism, Shaktism, Vaishnavism and Smartism.

See: atheism, Charvaka, materialism.

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

Shakta Tantrism: Brings a strong emphasis on the worship of the feminine force.

Depending on the school, this may be symbolic or literal in rites involving sexual intercourse, etc. Shakta Tantrism's main principle is the use of the material to gain the spiritual. In certain schools, historically, this implies embracing that which is normally forbidden and manipulating the forces to attain transcendent consciousness rather than lower consciousness. There are three main streams:

-       the righthand path (dakshina marga or dakshinachara) of conservative Hindu practice,

-       the left-hand path (vama marga or vamachara) involving the use of things normally forbidden such as taking intoxicants, meat, ritual sex, etc., and

-       the yogic path of the Kaula sect. Gorakshanatha followers are sometimes grouped with the latter.

See: Tantrism, Shaktism, kundalini, raja yoga, tantra.

(See also: Shakta Tantrism , Hinduism, Body Mind and Soul)

Tum, or To?m The "Brothers of the Tum", a very ancient school of Initiation in Northern India in the days of Buddhist persecution. The "Turn B’hai" have now become the "Aum B’hai", spelt, however, differently at present, both schools having merged into one. The first was composed of Kshatriyas, the second of Brahmans. The word "Tum" has a double meaning, that of darkness (absolute darkness), which as absolute is higher than the highest and purest of lights, and a sense resting on the mystical greeting among Initiates, " Thou art thou, thyself ", equivalent to saying "Thou art one with the Infinite and the All".

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

 Vedanta:

one of the schools of Indian philosophy

(See also:  Vedanta , Body Mind and Soul)

 Vaisesika:

one of the schools of Indian philosophy

(See also:  Vaisesika , Body Mind and Soul)

Hazim hozim (Hebrew) (from plural hazah to see, behold, contemplation as of spiritual or divine things; singular hozeh prophet or seer)

In ancient times there were schools of hozim which were well known, in which occult sciences were taught. Samuel is said to have been the head of such a school at Ramah, while Elisha is said to have had his at Jericho.

(See also: Hazim, hozim , Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary, Occultism, Occultism Dictionary)

Gnostics Various schools -- agreeing in fundamentals, differing in details according to their teachers -- which inculcated gnosis (divine wisdom); they preceded or coincided with the early centuries of Christianity, and were grouped about Alexandria, Antioch, and other large centers of the Jewish-Hellenic-Syrian culture.

The teachers include Philo Judaeus, Clement of Alexandria, Simon Magus and his pupil Menander, Saturninus, Basilides, Valentinus, Marcion, Celsus, and others. Their teachings in many respects were those of the ancient wisdom, derived from contact with the still extant sources in Egypt, India, Persia, and elsewhere.

Characteristic doctrines held by them are the system of emanations, powers, or aeons, with which they bridged the gap, otherwise remaining unfilled, between divinity and the world; the whole thus constituting the pleroma. All the potentialities of the supreme descend by emanational evolution through the various orders of aeons to man, who is thereby endowed with unlimited potentials. The distinction between Agathodaimon and Kakodaimon; the recognition of the mystical serpent of knowledge as the endower of mankind with wisdom and opponent of the merely creative or working Demiourgos (represented as the Old Testament Jehovah) were, among other matters, fairly well made in these systems.

According to Clement, the enlightened or perfect Christian is a Gnostic. In Gnostic teaching, Christ is an aeon of high degree; he is Lucifer the Light-bringer, who redeems humanity from the lower power of the merely creative or working Demiourgos -- that is, from becoming enmeshed in the lower cosmic powers.

Until the mid-twentieth century, the principal extant Gnostic writings were quotes in surviving attacks against the Gnostics made by early Christian writers, the Pistis Sophia and "two Books of Jeu," and the Neoplatonic Corpus Hermeticum (Hermes Trimegistos, Divine Pymander, etc.). With the discovery of the Nag-Hammadi scrolls, many more Gnostic writings have come to light and scholars are gaining a wider understanding of both Christian and non-Christian Gnosticism.

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

Alternative medicine: This term was originally coined to describe health care approaches not taught in medical schools. It has been replaced with “complementary medicine” since Americans rarely use these approaches to the exclusion of Western, conventional medicine. Integrative medicine refers to the proactive, deliberate combination of conventional and complementary therapies.

(See also: Alternative medicine , Alternative Health, Body Mind and Soul)

Masoretic Points or Vowels A system adopted by the College of the Massoretes where certain signs were added to the vowelless consonants of the Hebrew manuscripts, in order to supply vowels as well as to mark the division of the consonants into words -- hence the term Massorah -- thus enabling a reader to give the supposedly correct meaning, pronunciation, and intonation of the texts when read in the synagogue or to oneself.

Hebrew, written originally without any spaces between the words, naturally called for some system of division, or vocalizing the series of consonants, and hence arose the usage of the Massoretic points or vowels. The vowel indications consist for the most part of dots and dashes, commonly termed points, and the placing of these dots and points is called puctating.

This method of puctating was developed in the schools of Palestine, some say mainly by the rabbis of the School of Tiberias; another system, however, was used in Babylon, which differed in notation rather than in pronunciation. For an illustration of the method of employing differing vowels to the same Hebrew consonants,

See also BERE'SHITH

(See also: Masoretic Points, Vowels , Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary)