Sakshin saksin (Sanskrit) [from sa together with + aksha eye]

That which is before the eyes; an observer, witness. In philosophy, the ego or subject, as opposed to the object or that which is external to the observing ego. Subba Row used the term as the highest of the our aspects of a parabrahman within the human constitution (Five Years of Theosophy 108).

(See also: Sakshin, saksin, Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary)

Spirit, Spirits Although of a wide and general use, in theosophy it means incorporeal intelligences of a high degree, such as dyanis or planetary spirits, those hosts of arupa (bodiless) monads or egos which spring more or less directly from the universal consciousness or cosmic spirit. Thus the spiritual monad in man is, strictly speaking, a spirit as derivative directly from the cosmic intelligence, mahat or mahabuddhi manifesting through mahat. Spirits exist in almost limitless ranges of hierarchical classes, highest, intermediate, and lower.

A great distinction is drawn between spirit and soul, the vehicle of an ego. Theosophy objects to its use for astral kama-rupas of the seance room.

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

Akasic Magnetism In theosophy both electricity and magnetism are considered as the vital fluids or effluxes of living beings, which flow forth from them and, interblending and interworking, produce the multimyriad forms of electric and magnetic phenomenal activity common everywhere. This means that both magnetism and electricity are to be traced to their source in cosmic akasa, which is in the great what the magnetism of an individual is in the small.

 The changes occurring in the earth's magnetism "are due to akasic magnetism incessantly generating electric currents which tend to restore disturbed equilibrium" (ML 160). Hence all magnetic or electrical activity on earth is produced by astral magnetism and electricity incessantly generating electric and magnetic currents which reproduce themselves in the physical sphere.

(See also: Akasic Magnetism, Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary, Occultism, Occultism Dictionary)

Pot Amun (Coptic) A priest and hierophant of the early Ptolemaic dynasty. A term said by Diogenes Laertius to signify one consecrated to Amun (Amen), the god of esoteric wisdom, as amen means "the occult." "Pot-Amun is credited with having been the first to teach Theosophy, or the outlines of the Secret Wisdom-Religion, to the uninitiated" (TG 259).

(See also: Pot Amun, Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary, Occultism, Occultism Dictionary)

Psychology In philosophy, the systematic study of mind, as opposed to physics or the study of matter. Applied in theosophy to the attributes, qualities, and powers of the human intermediate nature, contrasted with physiology.

In ancient times psychology was the science of soul; and this science being the causative, and physiology the effective or consequential, no one was considered an informed or expert physiologist who was not previously trained in psychology.

In modern days, due to an almost utter ignorance of the inner nature of man, psychology has largely been based on physiology, if indeed not a vague type of physiology itself.

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

Pretas (Sanskrit) [from pra away + the verbal root i to go]

Gone ahead, departed; the remains in the astral light of the human dead, popularly called spooks or ghosts, and commonly in India signifying evil astral entities. In theosophy, the astral shells of human beings, especially of avaricious and selfish people, and more generally of those who have lived evil lives on earth. Pretas also can be the elementaries reborn as such in the kama-loka.

See also BHUTAS

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

Panspermic, Panspermy [from Greek pan all + sperma seed]

The theory that the so-called spontaneous generation of life is due to the omnipresence of vital germs. In theosophy, panspermy is the doctrine that every atom of the material world is essentially a life-atom, an entity possessing virtually unlimited powers of development or evolutionary unfolding, each individual entity according to its own inner characteristics or svabhava.

See also ABIOGENESIS

(See also: Panspermic, Panspermy, Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary, Occultism, Occultism Dictionary)

Fourteen A septenate in which each member is dual. In the Hindu Laws of Manu, fourteen manus are enumerated; and in theosophy a root-manu and a seed-manu are given for each round. In a Hindu allegory, there arise from the churning of the ocean fourteen "precious things," which in a corresponding Japanese system are enumerated as seven.

See also KURMA-AVATARA

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

Family Race In theosophy, each of the main seven racial cycles is first divided into seven primary subraces, each of which is again divided into seven secondary or sub-subraces, each of which latter is divided into seven so-called family races. The period of such a family race is generally given as that of the precessional cycle (25,920 years).

(See also: Family Race, Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary, Occultism, Occultism Dictionary)

Atom atomos (Greek) Indivisible, individual, a unit; among the Greek Atomists what in theosophy is called a monad. Atomic theories of the constitution of the universe or of matter are many and ancient. In modern physics the atom is a small particle once thought indivisible, but now resolved into component units. In some philosophies, as that of Leibniz, the atoms (which he calls monads) are psychological rather than physical units -- unitary beings of diverse kinds and grades, composing the universe.

In theosophy, atoms have to be considered in relation to monads; in The Secret Doctrine gods, monads, and atoms are a triad like spirit, soul, and body. A monad is a divine-spiritual life-atom, a living being, evolving on its own plane, and a life-atom is the vehicle of the monad which ensouls it, and in turn ensouls a physical atom. The ultimates of nature are atoms on the material side, monads on the energic side; monads are indivisible, atoms divisible (a departure from the etymological meaning). Thus there is a quaternary of gods, monads, life-atoms, and physical atoms. "An atom may be compared to (and is for the Occultist) the seventh principle of a body or rather of a molecule.

The physical or chemical molecule is composed of an infinity of finer molecules and these in their turn of innumerable and still finer molecules. Take for instance a molecule of iron and so resolve it that it becomes non-molecular; it is then, at once transformed into one of its seven principles, viz., its astral body; the seventh of these is the atom. The analogy between a molecule of iron, before it is broken up, and this same molecule after resolution, is the same as that between a physical body before and after death. The principle remains minus the body. Of course this is occult alchemy, not modern chemistry" (TBL 84).

(See also: Atom, atomos, Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary, Occultism, Occultism Dictionary)

Amsa, Amsu (Sanskrit) Fragment, particle, part; name of one of the adityas in the Mahabharata; also of Surya (the sun) whose solar energy was so tremendous that the divine architect Visvakarman cut off an eighth part of his glory.

From the luminous fragments (amsa) which fell to earth, Visvakarman made a number of implements for the gods, including Vishnu's discus and Siva's trident. In the Bhagavad-Gita (15:7), Krishna emanates an amsa of himself which, becoming a jiva (monad) in the world of living beings, draws to itself manas (mind) and the five senses which originate in prakriti (nature).

Also, the tonic or predominant note in a raga, a Hindu mode of musical notes or melodic sounds so formulated as to arouse intensity of emotion, often of a high order, appropriate to the different portions of the day and night.

In theosophy amsa may be applied to particles of any kind: to a life-atom as well as to a monad as points or "fragments" of the cosmic consciousness-life-substance.

(See also: Amsa, Amsu, Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary, Occultism, Occultism Dictionary)

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

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

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

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

Yod-heva, Yodh-heva, Yod-hewa, Yod-havvah (Hebrew) [from yod a Hebrew letter, the number 10, and the masculine generative power + heva from the verbal root hawah to have life, breathe, desire or long for, signifying the feminine generative power]

A Qabbalistic phallic term used by Blavatsky to allow theosophy to represent the androgynous aspect of the Hebrew creative deity Jehovah (Yehovah). It also in a sense represents the Tetragrammaton.

See also YOD

(See also: Yod-heva, Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary, Body mind and Soul)

Zachar (Hebrew) A male; used in "male-and-female [zachar u neqebah]

created he them" (Genesis 1:27). This refers not to the formation of a man and a woman, but of an androgyne or bisexual being who was at once male and female conjoined, and thus has reference to the third root-race in theosophy.

See also SACR

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

Sura, Suras (Sanskrit) Used in the Vedas for gods in general, equivalent to devas; originally solar deities, as is shown by the name surya (sun), and correspond in many instances to the manasaputras and agnishvattas of theosophy. Later by the Indian exotericists the suras arbitrarily became asuras (not suras), yet "the 'Ancestors' breathed out the first man, as Brahma is explained to have breathed out the Suras (Gods), when they became 'Asuras' (from Asu, breath)" (SD 2:86).

See also ASURA; MAHASURA

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

Teth teith (Hebrew) The ninth letter of the Hebrew alphabet, standing for the number nine. In the Qabbalah, used as a symbolic device for the cosmic intelligent electric force, in theosophy called fohat, "whose symbol is the serpent which played such a prominent part in the Mysteries. Its universal value is nine, . . . and the ninth door of the fifty portals or gateways that lead to the concealed mysteries of being" (SD 1:76).

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

Mysticism The doctrine that the nature of reality can be known by direct apprehension, by faculties above the senses, by intuition.

"Mysticism demands a faculty above reason, by which the subject shall be placed in immediate and complete union with the object of his desire -- a union in which the consciousness of self has disappeared, and in which therefore subject and object are one" (Encyclopedia Britannica, 9th ed. "Mysticism"). It overlaps in meaning such terms as the Neoplatonic ecstasis, and the theosophy of Iamblichus.

(See also: Mysticism, Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary)

Divine Rulers The nations of antiquity, such as the Egyptians, Chaldeans, and Greeks, had traditions of early racial divine rulers and spiritual dynasties which preceded their human kings. In the later races, these rulers stood for the dynasties of the gods, rishis, pitris, manus, etc., who are said in theosophy to have incarnated themselves in the third root-race on this globe during our present round, and to be born again and again as spiritual teachers in succeeding cycles for the instruction of nations, among whom they appear from time to time.

(See also: Divine Rulers, Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary)

Religion [from Latin religare to bind back, implying obligation; or from relegere to select, distinguish among various elements for the choosing of the best; ponder]

In theosophy individual religion of conduct means faith in his own essential divinity as a source of wisdom and an unerring and infallible guide in conduct; an ever-growing realization of that truth, an ever-growing consciousness of one's spiritual identity with the divine in nature; and constant devotion to the ideals thus inspired. Religion means a self-sacrificing devotion to truth, a resolve to live in harmony with all other lives, a sacrificing of the personal self to the greater self.

In theosophy there is no divorce between the devotional and speculative functions of the mind; science and philosophy do not conflict with the innate sense of rectitude. Ethics are not based on expediency, a social compact, or a special revelation, but are inherent in the laws of the universe.

The ancient wisdom is the quintessence of all religions, the universal parent-source of all faiths; and in proportion as each great world religion rises to the height of its own possibilities, so will the external divergences among the different faiths of mankind blend into the original fundamental unity.

(See also: Religion, Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary)

Wisdom-Religion, Wisdom-Science.

See THEOSOPHY

(See also: Wisdom-Religion, Wisdom-Science, Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary, Body mind and Soul)

Primates In modern zoology, the highest order of mammalia, which includes man, apes, monkeys, and lemurs. Divided by some scientists into bimana (man) and quadrumana (the others); or again into the suborders of simiae (man, apes, and monkeys) and prosimiae (lemurs).

Theosophy does not admit the foregoing classification, for the reason that man comprises a kingdom by himself. The confusion arises because of the similarity of the apes and certain others of the higher mammalia with man's physical structure, explained theosophically by the fact that in former ages the originants of the apes as well as of the monkeys and lemurs sprang from man.

While the human kingdom, among its other physical bodily characteristics, belongs to the mammalia, this is not enough to classify man as belonging to the same kingdom as that of the beasts.

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