Rosicrucians (Mys.). The name was first given to the disciples of a learned Adept named Christian Rosenkreuz, who flourished in Germany, circa 1460.

He founded an Order of mystical students whose early history is to be found in the German work, Fama Fraternitatis (1614), which has been published in several languages.

The members of the Order maintained their secrecy, but traces of them have been found in various places every half century since these dates. The Societas Rosicruciana in Anglia is a Masonic Order, which has adopted membership in the "outer"; the Chabrath Zereh Aur Bokher, or Order of the G. D., which has a very complete scheme of initiation into the Kabbalah and the Higher Magic of the Western or Hermetic type, and admits both sexes, is a direct descendant from medieval sodalities of Rosicrucians, themselves descended from the Egyptian Mysteries.

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

Bacchus (Ancient Greek). Exoterically and superficially the god of wine and the vintage, and of licentiousness and joy; but the esoteric meaning of this personification is more abstruse and philosophical.

He is the Osiris of Egypt, and his life and significance belong to the same group as the other solar deities, all "sin-bearing," killed and resurrected; e.g., as Dionysos or Atys of Phrygia (Adonis, or the Syrian Tammuz), as Ausonius, Baldur (q.v.), &c., &c. All these were put to death, mourned for, and restored to life. The rejoicings for Atys took place at the Hilaria on the "pagan" Easter, March 15. Ausonius, a form of Bacchus, was slain "at the vernal equinox, March 21st, and rose in three days". Tammuz, the double of Adonis and Atys, was mourned by the women at the "grove" of his name "over Bethlehem, where the infant Jesus cried", says St. Jerome.

Bacchus is murdered and his mother collects the fragments of his lacerated body as Isis does those of Osiris, and so on. Dionysos Iacchus, torn to shreds by the Titans, Osiris, Krishna, all descended into Hades and returned again.

Astronomically, they all represent the Sun ; psychically they are all emblems of the ever-resurrecting " Soul" (the Ego in its re-incarnation) ; spiritually, all the innocent scape-goats, atoning for the sins of mortals, their own earthly envelopes, and in truth, the poeticized image of DIVINE MAN, the form of clay informed by its God.

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

Nirvani (Sanskrit). One who has attained Nirvana - an emancipated soul.

That Nirvana means nothing of the kind asserted by Orientalists every scholar who has visited China, India and Japan is well aware. It is "escape from misery" but only from that of matter, freedom from Klesha, or Kama, and the complete extinction of animal desires.

If we are told that Abidharma defines Nirvana "as a state of absolute annihilation", we concur, adding to the last word the qualification "of everything connected with matter or the physical world", and this simply because the latter (as also all in it) is illusion, maya. Sakya-muni Buddha said in the last moments of his life that "the spiritual body is immortal" (See Sans. Chin. Dict.). As Mr. Eitel, the scholarly Sinologist, explains it: "The popular exoteric systems agree in defining Nirvana negatively as a state of absolute exemption from the circle of transmigration; as a state of entire freedom from all forms of existence; to begin with, freedom from all passion and exertion; a state of indifference to all sensibility" and he might have added "death of all compassion for the world of suffering". And this is why the Bodhisattvas who prefer the Nirmanakaya to the Dharmakaya vesture, stand higher in the popular estimation than the Nirvanis.

But the same scholar adds that: "Positively (and esoterically) they define Nirvana as the highest state of spiritual bliss, as absolute immortality through absorption of the soul (spirit rather) into itself, but preserving individuality so that, e.g., Buddhas, after entering Nirvana, may reappear on earth" - i.e., in the future Manvantara.

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

Sisthrus (Chald.). According to Berosus, the last of the ten kings of the dynasty of the divine kings, and the "Noah" of Chaldea.

Thus, as Vishnu foretells the coming deluge to Vaivasvata-Manu, and, fore warning, commands him to build an ark, wherein he and seven Rishis are saved ; so the god Hea foretells the same to Sisithrus (or Xisuthrus) commanding him to prepare a vessel and save himself with a few elect.

Following suit, almost 800,000 years later, the Lord God of Israel repeats the warning to Noah. Which is prior, therefore? The story of Xisuthrus, now deciphered from the Assyrian tablets, corroborates that which was said of the Chaldean deluge by Berosus, Apollodorus, Abydenus, etc., etc. (See eleventh tablet in G. Smith’s Chaldean Account of Genesis, page 263, et seq.).

This tablet xi. covers every point treated of in chapters six and seven of Genesis - the gods, the sins of men, the command to build an ark, the Flood, the destruction of men, the dove and the raven sent out of the ark, and finally the Mount of Salvation in Armenia (Nizi r-Ararat); all is there.

The words "the god Hea heard, and his liver was angry, because his men had corrupted his purity", and the story of his destroying all his seed, were engraved on stone tablets many thousand years before the Assyrians reproduced them on their baked tiles, and even these most assuredly antedate the Pentateuch, "written from memory" by Ezra, hardly four centuries B.c.

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

Summerland. The name given by the American Spiritualists and Phenomenalists to the land or region inhabited after death by their "Spirits". It is situated, says Andrew Jackson Davis, either within or beyond the Milky Way. It is described as having cities and beautiful buildings, a Congress Hall, museums and libraries for the instruction of the growing generations of young " Spirits ".

We are not told whether the latter are subject to disease, decay and death; but unless they are, the claim that the disembodied "Spirit" of a child and even still-born babe grows and develops as an adult is hardly consistent with logic. But that which we are distinctly told is, that in the Summerland Spirits are given in marriage, beget spiritual (?) children, and are even concerned with politics.

All this is no satire or exaggeration of ours, since the numerous works by Mr. A. Jackson Davis are there to prove it, e.g., the International Congress of Spirits by that author, as well as we remember the title. It is this grossly materialistic way of viewing a disembodied spirit that has turned many of the present Theosophists away from Spiritualism and its "philosophy". The majesty of death is thus desecrated, and its awful and solemn mystery becomes no better than a farce.

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

Vidya-dhara (Sanskrit). And Vidya-dhari, male and female deities. Lit., "possessors of knowledge".

They are also called Nabhas-chara, "moving in the air", flying, and Priyam-vada, "sweet-spoken ". They are the Sylphs of the Rosicrucians; inferior deities inhabiting the astral sphere between the earth and ether; believed in popular folk-lore to be beneficent, but in reality they are cunning and mischievous, and intelligent Elementals, or "Powers of the air ". They are represented in the East, and in the West, as having intercourse with men (" intermarrying ", as it is called in Rosicrucian parlance; see Count de Gabalis).

In India they are also called Kama-rupins, as they take shapes at will. It is among these creatures that the "spirit-wives" and " spirit-husbands" of certain modern spiritualistic mediums and hysteriacs are recruited. These boast with pride of having such pernicious connexions (e.g., the American "Lily ", the spirit-wife of a well-known head of a now scattered community of Spiritualists, of a great poet and well-known writer), and call them angel-guides, maintaining that they are the spirits of famous disembodied mortals.

These " spirit-husbands" and "wives" have not originated with the modern Spiritists and Spiritualists, but have been known in the East for thousands of years, in the Occult philosophy, under the names above given, and among the profane as - Pishathas.

(See also: Vidya-dhara, Theosophy, Spirituality, Body mind and Soul, Spiritual Dictionary, )

Eden (Hebrew, Jewish). "Delight", pleasure. In Genesis the "Garden of Delight" built by God ; in the Kabbala the

"Garden of Delight", a place of Initiation into the mysteries. Orientalists identify it with a place which was situated in Babylonia in the district of Karduniyas, called also Gan-dunu, which is almost like the Gan-eden of the Jews. (See the works of Sir H. Rawlinson, and G. Smith.)

That district has four rivers, Euphrates, Tigris, Surappi, Ukni. The two first have been adopted without any change by the Jews; the other two they have probably transformed into " Gihon and Pison", so as to have something original. The following are some of the reasons for the identification of Eden, given by Assyriologists. The cities of Babylon, Larancha and Sippara, were founded before the flood, according to the chronology of the Jews.

"Surippak was the city of the ark, the mountain east of the Tigris was the resting place of the ark, Babylon was the site of the tower, and Ur of the Chaldees the birthplace of Abraham." And, as Abraham,

"the first leader of the Hebrew race, migrated from Ur to Harran in Syria and from thence to Palestine", the best Assyriologists think that it is "so much evidence in favour of the hypothesis that Chaldea was the original home of these stories (in the Bible) and that the Jews received them originally from the Babylonians".

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

Surplus of Life Used in theosophy to express the original processes building the globes of a planetary chain, as well as the living beings forming the hierarchies of the chain. Applying the Christian analogy of the unrolling of a scroll to the manifestation of the globes of a chain, when the first globe (globe A) has come into manifestation, only 1/7th of the scroll has been unrolled or opened out, leaving 6/7ths of the scroll intact or unopened. The surplus of life applies to the 6/7ths still not manifested -- which would be globes B, C, D, E, F, and G. After the appearance of globe A, the surplus of life moves down a plane in order to develop globe B, and thus the scroll is opened another seventh, leaving 5/7ths intact; and so the process continues until all the seven globes of the planetary chain have appeared.

The analogy may also be applied to the seven principles composing the human being. Atman is the first principle to be unrolled, the other six principles (buddhi, manas, kama, prana, linga-sarira, and sthula-sarira) remaining infolded or involved. The surplus of life of the human constitution then unrolls another principle to manifest buddhi, the other five still being infolded, and so the process continues until all seven principles are unrolled or emanated.

(See also: Surplus of Life, Mysticism, Mysticism Dictionary, Body mind and Soul)

Theosophy [from Greek theosophia from theos god, divinity + sophia wisdom]

Divine wisdom, the knowledge of things divine; often described as attainable by direct experience, by becoming conscious of the essential, divine part of our nature, self-identification with the inner god, leading to communion with other similar divine beings. Theosophy actually is the "substratum and basis of all the world-religions and philosophies, taught and practised by a few elect ever since man became a thinking being" (TG 328). Also called by such names as the secret doctrine and the esoteric tradition, its teachings have been preserved, checked and rechecked with every new generation of its guardians and adepts.

The word became familiar to Greeks in the 3rd century with Ammonius Saccas and the Alexandrian Neoplatonists or Theurgists, who taught of divine emanations, whereby the entire universe as well as humans and all other beings are shown to be descendants of the highest gods. Theosophist is also applied to mystics in later times such as Eckhart, Boehme, and Paracelsus. It was adopted in 1875 by H. P. Blavatsky and others associated with her at the founding of the Theosophical Society as the name for the modern form of the archaic wisdom-religion which she promulgated. This wisdom-religion "was ever one and being the last word of possible human knowledge, was, therefore, carefully preserved. It preceded by long ages the Alexandrian Theosophists, reached the modern, and will survive every other religion and philosophy" (Key 7-8).

"The Secret Doctrine is the accumulated Wisdom of the Ages, and its cosmogony alone is the most stupendous and elaborate system: e.g., even in the exotericism of the Puranas. But such is the mysterious power of Occult symbolism, that the facts which have actually occupied countless generations of initiated seers and prophets to marshal, to set down and explain; in the bewildering series of evolutionary progress, are all recorded on a few pages of geometrical sign and glyphs. The flashing gaze of those seers has penetrated into the very kernel of matter, and recorded the soul of things there, where an ordinary profane, however learned, would have perceived but the external work of form. But modern science believes not in the 'soul of things,' and hence will reject the whole system of ancient cosmogony. It is useless to say that the system in question is no fancy of one or several isolated individuals. That it is the uninterrupted record covering thousands of generations of Seers whose respective experiences were made to test and to verify the traditions passed orally by one early race to another, of the teachings of higher and exalted beings, who watched over the childhood of Humanity. That for long ages, the 'Wise Men' of the Fifth Race, of the stock saved and rescued from the last cataclysm and shifting of continents, had passed their lives in learning, not teaching. How did they do so? It is answered: by checking, testing, and verifying in every department of nature the traditions of old by the independent visions of great adepts; i.e., men who have developed and perfected their physical, mental, psychic, and spiritual organisations to the utmost possible degree. No vision of one adept was accepted till it was checked and confirmed by the visions -- so obtained as to stand as independent evidence -- of other adepts, and by centuries of experiences" (SD 1:272-3).

G. de Purucker wrote: "There has existed in the world for almost innumerable ages, a completely coherent and fully comprehensive system of religious philosophy, or of philosophical, scientific religion, which from time to time has been given out to man when the world needed a fuller revealing of spiritual truth than it then at such time had. Further, this wonderful system has been for all those past ages in the safe guardianship of the relatively perfected men . . . [the mahatmas]; and, still further, the present Theosophical Movement is, in our age, one of such fuller revelations or renewals of that wonderful System" (ET 33-4).

One of the mahatmas referring to the guardianship of the divine wisdom, wrote: "For countless generations hath the adept builded a fane of imperishable rocks, a giant's Tower of Infinite Thought, wherein the Titan dwelt, and will yet, if need be, dwell alone, emerging from it but at the end of every cycle, to invite the elect of mankind to co-operate with him and help in his turn enlighten superstitious man. And we will go on in that periodical work of ours; we will not allow ourselves to be baffled in our philanthropic attempts until that day when the foundations of a new continent of thought are so firmly built that no amount of opposition and ignorant malice guided by the Brethren of the Shadow will be found to prevail" (ML 51).

See also THEOSOPHICAL SOCIETY

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

Bel (Chald.). The oldest and mightiest god of Babylonia, one of the earliest trinities, - Anu (q.v.) ; Bel, "Lord of the World", father of the gods, Creator, and "Lord of the City of Nipur’; and Hea, maker of fate, Lord of the Deep, God of Wisdom and esoteric Knowledge, and "Lord of the city of Eridu".

The wife of Bel, or his female aspect (Sakti), was Belat, or Beltis, "the mother of the great gods", and the "Lady of the city of Nipur".

The original Bel was also called Enu, Elu and Kaptu (see Chaldean account of Genesis, by G. Smith). His eldest son was the Moon God Sin (whose names were also Ur, Agu and Itu), who was the presiding deity of the city of Ur, called in his honour by one of his names. Now Ur was the place of nativity of Abram (see "Astrology").

In the early Babylonian religion the Moon was, like Soma in India, a male, and the Sun a female deity. And this led almost every nation to great fratricidal wars between the lunar and the solar worshippers - e.g., the contests between the Lunar and the Solar Dynasties, the Chandra and Suryavansa in ancient Aryavarta. Thus we find the same on a smaller scale between the Semitic tribes. Abram and his father Terah are shown migrating from Ur and carrying their lunar god (or its scion) with them ; for Jehovah Elohim or El - another form of Elu - has ever been connected with the moon.

It is the Jewish lunar chronology which has led the European "civilized" nations into the greatest blunders and mistakes. Merodach, the son of Hea, became the later Bel and was worshipped at Babylon. His other title, Belas, has a number of symbolical meanings.

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

Chain Used in modern theosophy to designate the visible and invisible globes which form the interior and exterior structure of any celestial body. The kosmos as a whole is a living organism, subdivided into almost innumerable subordinate series of hierarchical units; hence the kosmos is an assemblage of beings of many kinds, each of which is a compound unit, and in order to signify that the elements composing each such unit are linked together as an individual, the word chain is applied to celestial bodies.

The teaching is that every celestial body whatever, visible or invisible, forms a unity with companion globes on invisible planes. When referring to the chains of globes forming a solar system, it is customary to call them planetary chains; thus we have the earth-chain, the lunar chain, the Mercury-chain, etc., each consisting of seven such globes on the manifested plane, to which the letters A, B, C, D, E, F, and G are applied.

The globes of a chain are said to be in coadunation but not in consubstantiality, which means that, though of different grades of materiality, they form a catenary unit. Although each chain consists of seven or twelve globes, the only one visible to the human eye on earth is that which is on the same plane of materiality. Of the twelve globes to each chain, seven belong to the manifested worlds and five to the unmanifested. The seven manifested globes are distributed on four planes, and the twelve globes on seven planes, as shown in the diagram.

The left-hand side of the diagram represents the descending or shadowy arc of evolution, the right side the ascending or luminous arc. Our universe is also described as one of a cosmic chain of universes.

In other particular uses of the word, the Hermetic Chain is the succession of teachers of the esoteric wisdom who preserve and pass on the sacred knowledge from generation to generation.

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

Electricity Theosophy regards electricity not as a mere effect but as an entity or cosmic force named fohat, also spoken of distributively as the sons of fohat. In correlating electricity with these cosmic forces, we find the term given either to the one great energy from which the others differentiate, or to a particular one of such differentiations: e.g., kundalini-sakti, which is characterized by spiral or serpentine motion and is thus related to electromagnetic phenomena, although kundalini might better be called vital electricity or magnetism, for electricity and magnetism are alter egos.

Electricity as we know it is the end product of a chain of appearances on various cosmic planes. It is said in old occult works that Father-Mother is the primordial aether or akasa, sometimes called svabhavat, which was homogeneous before the evolution of the Son -- fohat or cosmic electricity. Electricity is also mentioned as a form of cosmic vitality, emanating chiefly from the various suns in the universe, but also in a less degree from all other cosmic entities; and behind all such vital activities is the all-permanent cosmic intelligence unfolding itself into the vital web of the minor cosmic intelligences. Electricity on our earth-plane is one of the lowest forms of spirit-light or daiviprakriti.

The Secret Doctrine states that electricity is atomic, as signifying infinitesimal particles, which obtains confirmation from modern research and theory. Again, the statement that electricity is intimately involved in the manifestations of all forms of life is being elucidated by investigations relative to the currents which accompany vital actions in living organisms.

The standpoint of occultism is that no cosmic force, or manifestations of any cosmic force, is different from cosmic life itself -- except in its svabhava or characteristic attributes; and furthermore, that no smallest particle or point of infinite space is lifeless, so that the grossest matter is to be looked upon as a dense composite of vital action. From these two postulates it follows that electricity is not only vitality, but vitality controlled by intelligence, and our own inability to sense the intelligence in electric action lies solely in our ignorance of how cosmic intelligence acts, for it is all-permeant and virtually infinite in its manifestations, whereas our own ideas of vital action are limited to the very small compass of our acquaintance with particular units which we call living.

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

Globe In theosophy, a unit in the constitution of every planet or sun, each of which is composed of several globes, in their entirety referred to as a planetary or solar chain. Furthermore, moons, nebulae, and comets also have a seven or twelvefold constitution, even as has man, who is a copy in the small of the universe.

These globes are analogous to the monadic centers in the human constitution. The seven manifested globes on the four lower cosmic planes for purposes of convenience are enumerated as A, B, C, D, E, F, G; but reference is sometimes made more mystically to the globes from "A to Z," plainly hinting at all the globes of the chain. When considering seven cosmic planes, twelve globes are given. These globes are related to the seven (or twelve) sacred planets and to the twelve zodiacal constellations (diagram from FSO 323).

The life-waves, the various hosts or kingdoms such as elemental, mineral, animal, human, or devas, circle around these globes in seven great cycles called rounds. Each life-wave in turn first enters globe A, runs through its life cycle there, and then passes in time on to globe B, the succeeding life-wave meanwhile entering globe A, and so onwards and forwards through the whole series. In our own planetary chain, globe D is our earth. Three globes precede it on the downward arc, and three follow it on the ascending arc of evolution -- referring here to the manifested seven globes. The passing through seven root-races of any kingdom or life-wave on any globe is called a globe-round.

The seven globes can be related to the Qabbalistic worlds and sephiroth, as Blavatsky did (SD 1:200):

See also PLANETARY CHAIN

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

Upadhi (Sanskrit) Limitation, peculiarity, disguise, vehicle; in theosophy, " 'that which stands forth following a model or pattern,' as a canvas, so to say, upon which the light from a projecting lantern plays. An 'upadhi' therefore, mystically speaking, is like a play of shadow and form, when compared with the ultimate Reality, which is the cause of this play of shadow and form. Man may be considered as being composed of three (or even four) essential upadhis or bases" (OG 178).

According to the classification of the Taraka-Raja-Yoga philosophy, man is divided into three upadhis which are synthesized by, and are the vehicle of, the highest principle or atman. These three upadhis are: karanopadhi, the upadhi of the causal or spiritual mind; sukshmopadhi, the upadhi of the higher and lower manas plus the astral vehicle and the life-essence combined with kama; and the sthulopadhi, the physical body, which thus is the general vehicle or upadhi of the six principles composing the human constitution.

Mulaprakriti (primordial physical matter) in Hindu philosophy is the upadhi or vehicle of every phenomenon, whether physical, mental, or psychic. "Matter is Eternal. It is the Upadhi (the physical basis) for the One infinite Universal Mind to build thereon its ideations" (SD 1:280). An upadhi, then, is the vehicle, carrier, or means by which a higher or superior energy of whatever plane is enabled to manifest its characteristics and qualities on the lower plane, out of the substance of which lower plane the upadhi is built.

Sometimes upadhi is interchangeable with vahana (vehicle); thus manas is spoken of as the upadhi or vahana of buddhi. But the more frequent use of upadhi is as a foundation or base. For instance, Blavatsky speaks of hydrogen as the upadhi of both air and water; and of akasa as the upadhi of divine thought. "Cosmic Ideation focussed in a principle or upadhi (basis) results as the consciousness of the individual Ego. Its manifestation varies with the degree of upadhi, e.g., through that known as Manas it wells up as Mind-Consciousness; through the more finely differentiated fabric (sixth state of matter) of the Buddhi resting on the experience of Manas as its basis -- as a stream of spiritual intuition" (SD 1:329n).

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

Chnoumis (Ancient Greek) The same as Chnouphis and Kneph. A symbol of creative force ; Chnoumis or Kneph is "the unmade and eternal deity" according to Plutarch. He is represented as blue (ether), and with his ram’s head with an asp between the horns, he might be taken for Ammon or Chnouphis (.q.v’. ).

The fact is that all these gods are solar, and represent under various aspects the phases of generation and impregna tion. Their ram’s heads denote this meaning, a ram ever symbolizing generative energy in the abstract, while the bull was the symbol of strength and the creative function. All were one god, whose attributes were individualised and personified. According to Sir G. Wilkinsen, Kneph or Chnoumis was "the idea of the Spirit of God" ; and Bonwick explains that, as Av, "matter" or "flesh", he was criocephalic (ram- headed), wearing a solar disk on the head, standing on the Serpent Mehen, with a viper in his left and a cross in his right hand, and bent upon the function of creation in the underworld (the earth, esoterically).

The Kabbalists identify him with "Binah, the third Sephira of the Sephirothal Tree, or Binah, represented by the Divine name of Jehovah". If as Chnoumis-Kneph, he represents the Indian Narayana, the Spirit of ( moving on the waters of space, as Eichton or Ether he holds in his mouth an Egg, the symbol of evolution ; and as Av he is Siva, the Destroyer and the Regenerator ; for, as Deveria explains:"His Journey to the lower hemispheres appears to symbolize the evolutions of substances, which are born to die and to be reborn." Esoterically, however, and as taught by the Initiates of the inner temple, Chnoumis-Kneph was pre-eminently the god of reincarnation. Says an inscription: "I am Chnoumis, Son of the Universe, 700", a mystery having a direct reference to the reincarnating EGO.

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

Cherubim (Hebrew, Jewish) According to the Kabbalists, a group of angels, which they specially associated with the Sephira Jesod. in Christian teaching, an order of angels who are "watchers".

Genesis places Cherubim to guard the lost Eden, and the O.T. frequently refers to them as guardians of the divine glory. Two winged representations in gold were placed over the Ark of the Covenant; colossal figures of the same were also placed in the Sanctum Sanctorum of the Temple of Solomon. Ezekiel describes them in poetic language.

 Each Cherub appears to have been a compound figure with four faces - of a man, eagle, lion, and ox, and was certainly winged. Parkhurst, in voc. Cherub, suggests that the derivation of the word is from K, a particle of similitude, and RB or RUB, greatness, master, majesty, and so an image of godhead. Many other nations have displayed similar figures as symbols of deity ; e.g., the Egyptians in their figures of Serapis. as Macrohius describes in his Saturnalia; the Greeks had their triple-headed Hecate, and the Latins had three-faced images of Diana, as Ovid tells us, ecce procul ternis Hecate variata figuris. Virgil also describes her in the fourth Book of the Eneid.

Porphyry and Eusebius write the same of Proserpine. The Vandals had a many-headed deity they called Triglaf. The ancient German races had an idol Rodigast with human body and heads of the ox, eagle, and man. The Persians have some figures of Mithras with a man’s body, lion’s head, and four wings. Add to these the Chimera Sphinx of Egypt, Moloch, Astarte of the Syrians, and some figures of Isis with Bull’s horns and feathers of a bird on the head.

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

Thoth (Egypt, Egyptian). The most mysterious and the least understood of gods, whose personal character is entirely distinct from all other ancient deities.

While the permutations of Osiris, Isis, Horus, and the rest, are so numberless that their individuality is all but lost, Thoth remains changeless from the first to the last Dynasty. He is the god of wisdom and of authority over all other gods. He is the recorder and the judge. His ibis-head, the pen and tablet of the celestial scribe, who records the thoughts, words and deeds of men and weighs them in the balance, liken him to the type of the esoteric Lipikas.

His name is one of the first that appears on the oldest monuments. He is the lunar god of the first dynasties, the master of Cynocephalus - the dog-headed ape who stood in Egypt as a living symbol and remembrance of the Third Root-Race. (Secret Doctrine, II. pp. 184 and 185). He is the "Lord of Hermopolis" - Janus, Hermes and Mercury combined. He is crowned with an atef and the lunar disk, and bears the "Eye of Horus ", the third eye, in his hand. He is the Greek Hermes, the god of learning, and Hermes Trismegistus, the " Thrice-great Hermes ", the patron of physical sciences and the patron and very soul of the occult esoteric knowledge. As Mr. J. Bonwick, F.R.G.S., beautifully expresses it: " Thoth has a powerful effect on the imagination . . . in this intricate yet beautiful phantasmagoria of thought and moral sentiment of that shadowy past. It is in vain we ask ourselves however man, in the infancy of this world of humanity, in the rudeness of supposed incipient civilization, could have dreamed of such a heavenly being as Thoth. The lines are so delicately drawn, so intimately and tastefully interwoven, that we seem to regard a picture designed by the genius of a Milton, and executed with the skill of a Raphael." Verily, there was some truth in that old saying, " The wisdom of the Egyptians ".When it is shown that the wife of Cephren, builder of the second Pyramid, was a priestess of Thoth, one sees that the ideas comprehended in him were fixed 6,000 years ago ". According to Plato, "Thoth-Hermes was the discoverer and inventor of numbers, geometry, astronomy and letters". Proclus, the disciple of Plotinus, speaking of this mysterious deity, says: "He presides over every species of condition, leading us to an intelligible essence from this mortal abode, governing the different herds of souls".

In other words Thoth, as the Registrar and Recorder of Osiris in Amenti, the Judgment Hall of the Dead was a psychopompic deity; while Iamblichus hints that " the cross with a handle (the thau or tau) which Tot holds in his hand, was none other than the monogram of his name". Besides the Tau, as the prototype of Mercury, Thoth carries the serpent-rod, emblem of Wisdom, the rod that became the Caduceus. Says Mr. Bonwick, " Hermes was the serpent itself in a mystical sense. He glides like that creature, noiselessly, without apparent exertion, along the course of ages. He is . . . a representative of the spangled heavens. But he is the foe of the bad serpent, for the ibis devoured the snakes of Egypt."

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

Kabalist. From Q B L H, KABALA, an unwritten or oral tradition.

The kabalist is a student of "secret science", one who interprets the hidden meaning of the Scriptures with the help of the symbolical Kabala, and explains the real one by these means. The Tanaim were the first kabalists among the Jews; they appeared at Jerusalem about the beginning of the third century before the Christian era. The books of Ezekiel, Daniel, Henoch, and the Revelation of St. John, are purely kabalistical.

This secret doctrine is identical with that of Chaldeans, and includes at the same time much of the Persian wisdom, or "magic". History catches glimpses of famous kabalists ever since the eleventh century.

The Medieval ages, and even our own times, have had an enormous number of the most learned and intellectual men who were students of the Kabala (or Qabbalah, as some spell it).

The most famous among the former were Paracelsus, Henry Khunrath, Jacob Bohmen, Robert Fludd, the two Van Helmonts, the Abbot John Trithemius, Cornelius Agrippa, Cardinal Nicolao Cusani, Jerome Carden, Pope Sixtus IV., and such Christian scholars as Raymond Lully, Giovanni Pico de la Mirandola, Guillaume Postel, the great John Reuchlin, Dr. Henry More, Eugenius Philalethes (Thomas Vaughan), the erudite Jesuit Athanasius Kircher, Christian Knorr (Baron) von Rosenroth; then Sir Isaac Newton., Leibniz, Lord Bacon, Spinosa, etc., etc., the list being almost inexhaustible.

As remarked by Mr. Isaac Myer, in his Qabbalah, the ideas of the Kabalists have largely influenced European literature. "Upon the practical Qabbalah, the Abbé ,de Villars (nephew of de Montfaucon) in 1670, published his celebrated satirical novel, ‘The Count de Gabalis’, upon which Pope based his ‘Rape of the Lock’. Qabbalism ran through the Medieval poems, the ‘Romance of the Rose’, and permeates the writings of Dante." No two of them, however, agreed upon the origin of the Kabala, the Zohar, Sepher Yetzirah, etc. Some show it as coming from the Biblical Patriarchs, Abraham, and even Seth; others from Egypt, others again from Chaldea.

The system is certainly very old; but like all the rest of systems, whether religious or philosophical, the Kabala is derived directly from the primeval Secret Doctrine of the East; through the Vedas, the Upanishads, Orpheus and Thales, Pythagoras and the Egyptians. Whatever its source, its substratum is at any rate identical with that of all the other systems from the Book of the Dead down to the later Gnostics. The best exponents of the Kabala in the Theosophical Society were among the earliest, Dr. S. Pancoast, of Philadelphia, and Mr. G. Felt; and among the latest, Dr. W. Wynn Westcott, Mr. S. L. Mac Gregor Mathers (both of the Rosicrucian College) and a few others. (See " Qabbalah ".)

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

This is a sitemap for Theosophy - G . Click on a link and you will find multiple definitions and articles related to the word.

G - Letter G, Gabhastiman, Gabiri, Gabri, Gabriel, Gabriel de Collanges, Gaea, Gaekarena, Gaffarillus, Gaganesvara, Gaganeswara, Gah, Gahambars, Gaia, Gai-hinnom, Gal-hinnom, Galli, Gallu, Galukpas, Gambanteinn, Gambatrin, Gamma, Gammanten, Gana, Ganadevas, Gan-Aeden, Ganapati, Gandapada, Gandhara, Gandharva, Gandharvas, Gandiva, Gandunia, Gan-Eden, Ganesa, Ganga, Gangadvara, Gangadwara, Ganga-Putra, Ganges River, Gangi, Ganinnanse, Ganja, Ganymede, Gaokerena, Garden of Eden, Garga, Garima, gariman, Garm, Garuda, Garuda-Purana, Gate of Horn, Gates of Horn and Ivory, Gatha, Gati, Gatra, Gaudapada, Gaudapadacarya, Gaudapadacharya, Gauramukha, Gauri, Gavel, Gaya, Gayatri, Gayomard, Gayo-martan, Geber, Gebirol, Ge'boorah, Geborim, Geburah, Gedong, Gedulah, Geh, Gehenna, Gehs, Gei' Hinnom, Gelukpa, Gelukpas, Gelung, Gemara, Gematria, Gemini, Gemmation, Gen-dun, Genesis, Genii, Genius, Geocentric Theory, Geological Eras, Geonic Period, Germ Cell, Germ Plasm, Germ-Buds, Geryon, Gethsemane, Ghadia, Ghaf, Gharma, Gharma-ja, Ghat, Ghatikas, Ghatkas, Ghebers, Ghocha, Gholaites, Ghools, Ghosha, Ghost, Ghoul, Gian-ben-Gian, Gibborim, Gilgamesh, Gilgoolem, Gilgulim, Gimil, Gimle, Gimli, Gin-Hoang, Ginnungagap, Giol, Giordano, Giri, Giusseppe, Gjol, Glacial Periods, Glamour, Gland, Globe-round, Gna, Gnan Devas, Gnana, Gnana-Devas, Gnanam, Gnanasakti, Gnan-Devas, Gnata, Gnatha, Gnayam, Gnipa, Gnome, Gnomes, Gnosis, Gnostics, Gnothi Seauton, Gnyana, Gnypa, Goat of Mendes, Gobi Desert, Goblin, Goddess, Godhead, God-man, God-parents, God-sparks, God-wisdom, Goetia, Gogard, Gokard, Gold, Golden Age, Golden Apples, Golden Ass, Golden Calf, Golden Chain, Golden Cord, Golden Cow, Golden Egg, Golden Fleece, Golden Rule, Golden Thread, Golgotha, Goliath, Goloka, Gompa, Gonpa, Gonpa dgon-pa, Gonpis, Good, Good Friday, Goose, Gopa, Gopi, Gopichandana, Gopura, Gorgon, Gorilla, Gorsedd, Gosain, Gospels, Gossain, Gossaini, Gotama, Gotra, Gotra-Bhu-Jnana, Gott, Governors, Grace, Graha-raja, Grain, Gramani, Grand Architect of the Universe, Grantha, Gravitation, Great Age, Great Bear, Great Breath, Great Chain of Being, Great Day, Great Day Be With Us, Great Deep, Great Extreme, Great Four, Great Heresy, Great Initiator, Great Mother, Great Sacrifice, Great War, Great White Lodge, Great Year, Green, Griffin, Grihasta, Grihastha, Group-souls, Grypes, Guanches, Guardian Angel, Guardian Wall, Guff, Guhya, Guhya Vidya, Guhya-adesa, Guhya-vidya, Guides, Guido Bonati, Guillaume, Gullinbursti, Gullveig, Gullweig, Gultweig, Guna, Gunas, Gunavat, Gungnir, Gunis, Guph, Gupta Vidya, Gupta-maya, Gupta-vidya, Guru Deva, Guru-deva, Guruparampara, Gwydion, Gwynfydolion, Gyalugpas, Gyan, Gyan-Ben-Gian, Gyelong, Gyges, Gyloon, Gylung, Gymnosophists, Gyn, Gyut, gzhis ka rtse,

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