Spiritual Guides Dictionary

Guides Spiritualistic term for supposed invisible helpers and instructors belonging to the Spirit-land communicating with people either through mediumship or by a receptive capacity of the person communicated with.

While theosophy rejects the explanation offered by spiritualists, it nevertheless teaches that the universe in its webs of being contains many orders of entities existing in all-various grades. Some of these entities can be to any worthy person a source of inspiration. However, the fact that their influence comes from a nonphysical source is no guarantee of the desirability of that influence, but by the very fact of its unknown origin should be scrutinized at once or suspected as to character and source. Nor must we forget in this connection that the possibilities of self-deception are almost infinite.

In general the consensus of all antiquity was that communication or intercourse of any kind with astral entities, whether spooks, shells, elementaries, or what not, was extremely dangerous and often evil in their influence upon human character. In India such astral entities are called bhutas, pisachas, etc.

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

Gullinbursti (Icelandic) (from gullin golden + bursti bristles, mane)

In Norse mythology, a golden boar which draws the chariot of Frey, god of the terrestrial world. He received it as a gift from the two dwarfs Brock (mineral kingdom) and Sindri (vegetable kingdom), sons of Ivalde, the moon.

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

Angels

Jacob wrestled the angel, and the angel was overcome.

- Bono, U2, Rattle and Hum

The word 'angel' literally means 'messenger.' Often, delivery of a particular message in the dream is the role filled by these beings. As the needs arise, they may provide additional help to the dreamer beyond simply delivering information. Since so many religions and contemporary worldviews have made room for angels in their understanding of the universe, this topic needs to be broken down a little more.

The philosopher Carl Jung had room in his worldview for 'spirit guides'. These were apparitions that shared both knowledge and insight. This insight came as dialogue. Consequently, the Jungian angel was something of a spiritual mentor.

Religious angels have usually served more as ambassadors. They come with specific information, but not much dialogue. They are dispatched for specific purposes. Revelation, not dialogue, is the mission of the angel in this context.

Beginning with popular literature of the 1970s, angels have become more involved with tangible needs of this world. Tyres are repaired, oncoming traffic is diverted, and rickety homes are preserved from the weather by angels. This seems to be a reflection on the growing interest in finding a reliable help in a malevolent world.

Angels have also become, in a sense, the sort of instant wish-granter. Some people dream of angels helping them in this way. In this sort of case, you may be turning toward an actual friend in real life to give you something.

Many angels in dreams represent help from an unknown and unseeable origin to survive a difficult situation. You are turning out into the unknown, expecting help from beyond your actual means. This could be called 'wish-projection.'

Finally, the angel may be what the name implies: a message.

To discern which type of angel you have in your dreams requires some energy. Does your worldview include the possibility of such beings? If not, your angel may be wish-projection.

Did your angel speak or act mysteriously? If the angel spoke, what was the content? If the angel merely acted, what was the nature of the action?

What area of your life seems to need a special solution that exceeds your resources? Do you feel emotionally unsupported in one of your personal quests or spiritual struggles?

See also Death and Magical powers

Source: iVillage, http://www.ivillage.co.uk

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

Inner Guide Work: conducer to contacting one's true inner wisdom. control of the process ultimately passes from the hypnotherapist to Inner Guides.

(See also: Inner Guide Work , Body Mind and Soul, Alternative Health, Alternative Health Dictionary)

A Theosophical definition of Planetary Spirit (Planetary Spirits) :

Planetary Spirit (Planetary Spirits)

Every celestial body in space, of whatever kind or type, is under the overseeing and directing influence of a hierarchy of spiritual and quasi-spiritual and astral beings, who in their aggregate are generalized under the name of celestial spirits. These celestial spirits exist therefore in various stages or degrees of evolution; but the term planetary spirits is usually restricted to the highest class of these beings when referring to a planet.

In every case, and whatever the celestial body may be, such a hierarchy of ethereal beings, when the most advanced in evolution of them are considered, in long past cycles of kosmic evolution had evolved through a stage of development corresponding to the humanity of earth. Every planetary spirit therefore, wherever existent, in those far past aeons of kosmic time was a man or a being equivalent to what we humans on earth call man.

The planetary spirits of earth, for instance, are intimately linked with the origin and destiny of our present humanity, for not only are they our predecessors along the evolutionary path, but certain classes of them are actually the spiritual guides and instructors of mankind. We humans, in far distant aeons of the future, on a planetary chain which will be the child or grandchild of the present earth-chain, will be the planetary spirits of that future planetary chain. It is obvious that as H. P. Blavatsky says: "Our Earth, being as yet only in its Fourth Round, is far too young to have produced high Planetary Spirits"; but when the seventh round of this earth planetary chain shall have reached its end, our present humanity will then have become dhyanchohans of various grades, planetary spirits of one group or class, with necessary evolutionary differences as among themselves.

The planetary spirits watch over, guide, and lead the hosts of evolving entities inferior to themselves during the various rounds of a planetary chain. Finally, every celestial globe, whether sun or planet or other celestial body, has as the summit or acme of its spiritual hierarchy a supreme celestial spirit who is the hierarch of its own hierarchy. It should not be forgotten that the humanity of today forms a component element or stage or degree in the hierarchy of this (our) planetary chain.

See also: Planetary Spirit (Planetary Spirits) , Mysticism, Body Mind and Soul

Medicine As the healing art, medicine is as old as thinking man. Before the latent fires of mind were lighted in the third root-race, disease and death were unknown. However, with the physicalization of protoplastic humanity, and the separation of the sexes, the unnatural linking with the animals in the third and fourth root-races disordered the harmonious relations between man and nature. In addition, self-conscious man's continued evolution into matter, with the involution of his spiritual nature, brought about forms of disorder, disease, and physical death. Then, beings from higher spheres descended, and dynasties of divine kings and spiritual guides taught men, leading them to the invention of all the arts and sciences, including the medical use of plants (cf SD 2:364).

Medicine was originally a divine science, providing for the well-being of the spiritual, mental, psychic, astral, and physical man. Archaic medicine included a profound knowledge of genuine astrology, of true alchemy, of occult physiology, of the finer forces vibrating as sound, color, form, thought, and feeling, and whatever related man to his home universe of natural law and order. This was the basis of the natural "magic" which tradition has linked with the medical art. This knowledge was dual in its power to work for life or death, for good or evil ends. Its full comprehension required not only a trained intellect, but the intuitive understanding of a pure spiritual nature. Nevertheless, the Atlanteans acquired enough knowledge of the use of dangerous powers that they became -- albeit with numerous and noteworthy exceptions -- a nation of sorcerers. Then, the white magicians established the Mystery schools in which to safeguard the sacred teachings from evildoers and to protect humanity from their influence. Thus, the deeper truths of the healing art have ever since been entrusted only to pledged disciples and initiates. Such fragments of it as have been rediscovered by intuitive physicians from time to time have usually been in keeping with the general cultural level of their civilization. The exceptions have been men who have frequently been too far ahead of their times to be understood. Such a man was Paracelsus in medieval Europe, persecuted for heretical teachings such as the psychoelectric and magnetic play of sidereal forces which linked man with the stars -- the spiritus vitae in man came from the spiritus mundi.

Of the archaic history of medicine -- as of the race -- little is to be found. However, echoes of the primitive wisdom have survived, and every country having a literature of its ancient periods has some account of the healing art. The Hindu sacred scriptures -- the oldest literature extant -- have treatises upon medicine and surgery, showing a profound and intimate knowledge of the subject. This high standard was not maintained when the Vedic writings became misunderstood and mutilated by later commentators. The exclusive Brahmins' assumption of the right to all knowledge also prevented original thought and research. What writings are available today are of little practical value without the lost key. Even our typically matter-of-fact interpretation of legendary and classical beliefs and customs, and of archaeological findings, overlooks that what is known of ancient medical practice is largely exoteric, symbolic of a deeper teaching than we possess.

Records of ancient medicine in Babylonia, Egypt, Greece, etc., tell of the temples being used as hospitals, with priest-physicians supported by the state giving every care to the sick who came, both rich and poor. In addition to material means of treatment -- many of which we have rediscovered -- these devotees of the gods of healing used special incense, prayers, the "temple sleep," invocations, music, astrology, etc., which we regard as harmless superstition of an earlier day. However, such conditions, intelligently adapted to each case, in making a pure, serene, uplifting atmosphere around the sick person, would invoke the influences of wholeness within and without him. By putting the inner man in tune with his body, his disordered nature-forces manifesting as disease would tend to flow freely in the currents of health. Natural magic is as practical as the unknown alchemy which transmutes our digested daily bread into molecules of our living body.

There is a mystic science attached to the caduceus, the classical emblem of medicine. To the priest-physicians in the temples, this symbol was sacred not only to the god of wisdom and healing, but stood for profound cosmic truths, knowledge of which was held in common by all initiates. It symbolized the tree of life and being. Cosmically this symbol stood for the concealed root or origin of universal duality which manifests as positive and negative, good and evil, subjective and objective, light and darkness, male and female, health and sickness, life and death.

(See also: Medicine , Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary)

creative visualization: Subject of the bestseller of the same name, written by Shakti Gawain in 1978.

In creative visualization, one clearly imagines whatever one wants to manifest (see manifesting); then one gives the idea, image, or feeling positive energy, by focusing on it regularly, until it becomes reality. Creative visualization's theory posits a spiritual source: a supply of infinite energy, love, and wisdom discoverable in the inner beings of humans.

Expressions for methods identical or similar to creative visualization include: active imagination, creative imaging, directed day-dream, directed waking dream, dynamic imaging, guided fantasy, guided imagery, guided visualization, imagery, imaginal medicine, imaging, initiated symbol projection, inner guide meditation, led meditation, magickal visualization, mental imagery, pathworking, Positive Imaging, positive thinking, positive visualization, visualization, visualization therapy, waking dream therapy, and willed imagination.

For example, willed imagination, also called creative visualization, is the magickal art of imagining the result one desires of one's magick (the word for Wiccan magic) in order to achieve that result.

(See also: Creative visualization , Body Mind and Soul, Alternative Health, Alternative Health Dictionary)

A Dictionary of Spiritual Terms. From Acupuncture to Zoroaster.

Please note that all words in grey, like "yoga", "enlightenment" or "kundalini" are hyperlinked to archives further explaining the term. At the corresponding archive you will also find articles related to the term.

A dictionary Of Siddha Yoga Terminology. From Abhanga to Yogini.

Please note that all words in grey, like "enlightenment" or "kundalini" are hyperlinked to archives further explaining the term. At the corresponding archive you will also find articles related to the term.

Guruparampara (Sanskrit) (from guru teacher + parampara a row or uninterrupted series or succession)

An uninterrupted series or succession of teachers. Every Mystery school or esoteric college of ancient times had its regular and uninterrupted series of teacher succeeding teacher, each one passing on to his successor the mystical authority and headship he himself had received from his predecessor.

There are two kinds of guruparampara: first, those who rise one above the other in spiritual dignity and in progressively greater esoteric degree; and, second, those who succeed each other in time and in one line in the outer world. Yet these two kinds are but the same rule of series manifesting in two slightly differing manners. This process copies the hierarchical structure of nature itself.

Guruparampara applies in ordinary human life, for "a long chain of influence extends from the highest spiritual guide who may belong to any man, down through vast numbers of spiritual chiefs, ending at last even in the mere teacher of our youth. Or, to restate it in modern reversion of thought, a chain extends up from our teacher or preceptors to the highest spiritual chief in whose ray or descending line one may happen to be. And it makes no difference whatever, in this occult relation, that neither pupil nor final guide may be aware, or admit, that this is the case" (Letters That Have Helped Me).

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

Chandra-vansa (Sanskrit) The "Lunar Race", in contradistinction to Suryavansa, the "Solar Race". Some Orientalists think it an inconsistency that Krishna, a Chandravansa (of the Yadu branch) should have been declared an Avatar of Vishnu, who is a manifestation of the solar energy in Rig -Veda, a work of unsurpassed authority with the Brahmans.

This shows, however, the deep occult meaning of the Avatar ; a meaning which only esoteric philosophy can explain. A glossary is no fit place for such explanations; but it may be useful to remind those who know, and teach those who do not, that in Occultism, man is called a solar-lunar being, solar in his higher triad, and lunar in his quaternary. Moreover, it is the Sun who imparts his light to the Moon, in the same way as the human triad sheds its divine light on the mortal shell of sinful man.

Life celestial quickens life terrestrial. Krishna stands metaphysically for the Ego made one with Atma-Buddhi, and performs mystically the same function as the Christos of the Gnostics, both being "the inner god in the temple" - man. Lucifer is "the bright morning star", a well known symbol in Revelations, and, as a planet, corresponds to the EGO. Now Lucifer (or the planet Venus) is the Sukra-Usanas of the Hindus ; and Usanas is the Daitya-guru, i.e., the spiritual guide and instructor of the Danavas and the Daityas. The latter are the giant-demons in the Puranas, and in the esoteric interpretations, the antetypal symbol of the man of flesh, physical mankind. The Daityas can raise themselves, it is said, through knowledge "austerities and devotion" to "the rank of the gods and of the ABSOLUTE".

All this is very suggestive in the legend of Krishna ; and what is more suggestive still is that just as Krishna, the Avatar of a great God in India, is of time race of Yadu, so is another incarnation, "God incarnate himself" - or the "God-man Christ", also of the race Iadoo - the name for the Jews all over Asia. Moreover, as his mother, who is represented as Queen of Heaven standing on the crescent, is identified in Gnostic philosophy, and also in the esoteric system, with the Moon herself, like all the other lunar goddesses such as Isis, Diana, Astarte and others - mothers of the Logoi, so Christ is called repeatedly in the Roman Catholic Church, the Sun-Christ, the Christ-Soleil and so on. If the later is a metaphor so also is the earlier.

(See also: Chandra-vansa , Theosophy, Spirituality, Body mind and Soul, Spiritual Dictionary,)

guru

1. Teacher, preceptor. 2. Spiritual guide who leads the student from darkness into the light, personification of truth for the disciple

(See also: Guru , Body Mind and Soul)

Avalokiteswara (Sanskrit) "The on-looking Lord" In the exoteric interpretation, he is Padmapani (the lotus bearer and the lotus-born) in Tibet, the first divine ancestor of the Tibetans, the complete incarnation or Avatar of Avalokiteswara; but in esoteric philosophy Avaloki, the "on-looker", is the Higher Self, while Padmapani is the Higher Ego or Manas.

The mystic formula "Om mani padme hum" is specially used to invoke their joint help. While popular fancy claims for Avalokiteswara many incarnations on earth, and sees in him, not very wrongly, the spiritual guide of every believer, the esoteric interpretation sees in him the Logos, both celestial and human.

Therefore, when the Yogacharya School has declared Avalokiteswara as Padmapani "to be the Dhyani Bodhisattva of Amitabha Buddha", it is indeed, because the former is the spiritual reflex in the world of forms of the latter, both being one - one in heaven, the other on earth.

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

Angel

A spiritual being, especially in Persian, Jewish, Christian and Islamic theologies, that is commonly portrayed as being winged and as serving as God's messengers. The spiritual guide of an individual. Modern Christian angels come to us from the Gnostics and Persians.

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

Colors

Most people dream in colors, but at times some stand out more than others. Colors are symbolic and their symbolism is part of culture. We communicate with color and relate ideas with them. For example, a bride wears white and black is worn at funerals. Colors also represent energy. The meaning that you give to the colors in your dreams depends on the meaning that you give to those colors in daily life. If you "see red" when you are angry, then red symbolizes anger and not passion for you. Some generalizations have been made as to the meaning of colors in dreams. They are as follows

Black: depression, sadness, despair. Some believe it symbolizes hidden sexual desires.

Blue: spirituality, optimism, positive thoughts, communication. Some believe that when you see it in your dreams, you may be in the presence of your spiritual guide.

Green: money, jealousy, health concerns, love.

Red: passion, sexuality, anger, warning.

White: purity, transformation, cleanliness, dignity.

See also: Meaning of Dreams about Pink, Yellow, Brown, Purple, Orange

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

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

Quietists A type of religious mysticism which arose within the Roman Catholic Church in Italy and Spain during the latter half of the 17th century, especially in connection with a priest named Miguel de Molinos, who published his Spiritual Guide in Rome in 1675.

The book of this apparently simple and pious man shows how to attain a state of inward peace by withdrawal of the thoughts and desires from all earthly matters and fixing them in contemplation of what the aspirant conceives to be the divine and in prayer. This he regarded as the only essential, doctrine and ritual being of no consequence. His views won great popularity and he received high favors from the Pope; but they did not at all suit the purposes of those then in power. Molinos was condemned and imprisoned and a persecution instituted against Quietists in general.

Also used to denote other schools or sects of the same type, or to designate a particular attitude of mind or policy in which passive resignation is adopted. These Occidental Quietists of whatever affiliation represent what the hatha yogis are in India.

While there are certain aspects of distinctly commendable character in true Quietism, it is nevertheless still more true that Quietism of any sort is in a sense spiritual and intellectual somnolence, and therefore runs directly counter to the far higher spiritual precepts wherein man is enjoined to be as fully awake and as alive as possible in the world in which he lives in order that he may do his full duty to his fellows and to the world, the while cultivating the higher spiritual, intellectual, and psychological parts of his constitution.

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

Guru (Sanskrit) (from the verbal root gur to be weighty, venerable, excellent)

Teacher, preceptor; applied not only to a chela's spiritual teacher, but to spiritual and metaphysical teachers of many kinds. The spiritual fire within each person, the higher self or atma-buddhi, is also called a guru, a divine instructor; and this higher self within each individual is, when all is said, the supreme guru for that person.

The Master outside of the disciple's own spiritual guide is a very necessary element in genuine occult instruction; but the outer guru, the Master who teaches and leads the disciple, has always in view the evocation and development of the guru within the disciple -- the bringing to birth of the chela's own inner divine and intellectual energies and powers.

(See also: Gupta-vidya , Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary, Occultism, Occultism Dictionary)

Angel: A spiritual being, especially in Persian, Jewish, Christian and Islamic theologies, that is commonly portrayed as being winged and as serving as God's messengers. The spiritual guide of an individual.

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

Celestial Soul Clearing: Theistic means of removing Earth-Bound Spirits. These are transitioned souls that can draw energy from one's life force. The method's theory posits ArchAngels and Spirit Guides and Guardians.

(See also: Celestial Soul Clearing , Body Mind and Soul, Alternative Health, Alternative Health Dictionary)

Spirit Control

A disembodied spirit who relays messages from dead people to the living through a trance medium. Spirit Guide

(See also: Spirit Control , New Age Spirituality, Body Mind and Soul)