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V

Vaughan, Thomas +

Writing under the name Eugenius Philalethes, he published ''Magia Adamica'' (1650). (BCW [[SMW::off]][[Zirkoff B. - Appendix (BCW vol.4)#668|4:668]][[SMW::on]]). English alchemist and mystic writing as Eugenius Philalethes. His works include ''Anthroposophia Theomagica'', ''Anima Magica Abscondita'', ''Magia Adamica'' and ''The True Coelum Terrae'', collected by A. E. Waite in ''The Magical Writings of Thomas Vaughan'' (1888). (BCW [[SMW::off]][[Zirkoff B. - Appendix (BCW vol.5)#383|5:383]][[SMW::on]]). +

Vay, Adelma von +

Mystical writer also known as Adelheid von Vay; author of ''Geist, Kraft, Stoff'' (1870) and ''Studien über die Geisterwelt'' (1874). The appendix describes her friendship with Blavatsky and accounts of automatic writing and healing associated with her. (BCW [[SMW::off]][[Zirkoff B. - Appendix (BCW vol.4)#668|4:668-669]][[SMW::on]]). Her interpretation of elementals in ''Isis Unveiled'' drew an objection from [[Blavatsky, Helena Petrovna|H. P. Blavatsky]], preserved in an annotation to a newspaper cutting in her scrapbook ([[Zirkoff, Boris|B. de Zirkoff]], [[Zirkoff B. - H.P.B. Corrects an Error about Elementals#281|BCW 1:281-282]]). +

Vayu +

Air: the god and sovereign of the air; one of the five states of matter, namely the ''gaseous''; one of the five elements, called, as wind,'' Vâta''. The ''Vishnu Purâna'' makes Vâyu King of the Gandharvas. He is the father of Hanumân, in the ''Râmâyana.'' The trinity of the mystic gods in Kosmos closely related to each other, are “ Agni (fire) whose place is on earth; Vâyu (air, or one of the forms of Indra), whose place is in the air ; and Sûrya (the sun) whose place is in the air (''Nirukta''.) In esoteric interpretation, these three cosmic principles, correspond with the three human principles, Kâma, Kâma‐Manas and Manas, the sun of the intellect. [[Category: CTD info from Theosophical Glossary]] (TG). +

Vayu-Purana +

Zirkoff cites R. Mitra’s two-volume edition, published by the Asiatic Society of Bengal in 1880 and 1888 as number 85 of ''Bibliotheca Indica''. (BCW [[SMW::off]][[Zirkoff B. - Appendix (BCW vol.5)#368|5:368]][[SMW::on]]). De Zirkoff lists R. Mitra’s two-volume edition, published by the Asiatic Society of Bengal in Calcutta in 1880 and 1888 as number 85 of ''Bibliotheca Indica''. (BCW [[SMW::off]][[Zirkoff B. - Appendix (BCW vol.6)#426|6:426]][[SMW::on]]). +

Vedana +

The second of the five ''Shandhas '' (perceptions, senses). The sixth Nidâna. [[Category: CTD info from Theosophical Glossary]] (TG). +

Vedanta +

A mystic system of philosophy which has developed from the efforts of generations of sages to interpret the secret meaning of the'' Upanishads (q.v.)''. It is called in the ''Shad‐Darshanas'' (six schools or systems of demonstration), ''Uttara Mîmânsâ'', attributed to ''Vyâsa'', the compiler of the ''Vedas'', who is thus referred to as the founder of the Vedânta. The orthodox Hindus call Vedânta_a term meaning literally the “end of all (Vedic) knowledge ” — ''Brahmâ‐jnâna'', or pure and spiritual knowledge of Brahmâ. Even if we accept the late dates assigned to various Sanskrit schools and treatises by our Orientalists, the Vedânta must be 3,300 years old, as Vyâsa is said to have lived I,400 years B.C. If, as Elphinstone has it in his ''History of India'', the ''Brahmanas ''are the ''Talmud'' of the Hindus, and the ''Vedas ''the Mosaic books, then the ''Vedânta'' may be correctly called the ''Kabalah'' of India. But how vastly more grand! Sankarâchârya, who was the popularizer of the Vedântic system, and the founder of the ''Adwaita'' philosophy, is sometimes called the founder of the modern schools of the Vedânta. [[Category: CTD info from Theosophical Glossary]] (TG). +

Vedas +

The “revelation”. the scriptures of the Hindus, from the root'' vid'', “to know ”, or “divine knowledge”. They are the most ancient as well as the most sacred of the Sanskrit works. The ''Vedas'' on the date and antiquity of which no two Orientalists can agree, are claimed by the Hindus themselves, whose Brahmans and Pundits ought to know best about their own religious works, to have been first taught orally for thousands of years and then compiled on the shores of Lake Mânasa‐ Sarovara (phonetically, ''Mansarovara'') beyond the Himalayas, in Tibet. When was this done? While their religious teachers, such as Swami Dayanand Saraswati, claim for them an antiquity of many decades of ages, our modern Orientalists will grant them no greater antiquity in their present form than about between 1,000 and 2,000 B.C. As compiled in their final form by Veda‐Vyâsa, however, the Brahmans themselves unanimously assign 3,100 years before the Christian era, the date when Vyâsa flourished. Therefore the ''Vedas'' must be as old as this date. But their antiquity is sufficiently proven by the fact that they are written in such an ancient form, of Sanskrit, so different from the Sanskrit now used, that there is no other, work like them in the literature of this eldest sister of all the known languages, as Prof. Max Muller calls it. Only the most learned of the Brahman Pundits can read the Vedas in their original. It is urged that Colebrooke found the date 1400 B.c. corroborated absolutely by a passage which he discovered, and which is based on astronomical data. But if, as shown unanimously by all the Orientalists and the Hindu Pundits also, that (a) the ''Vedas ''are not a single work, nor yet any one of the separate ''Vedas;'' but that each ''Veda'', and almost every hymn and division of the latter, is the production of various authors; and that (b) these have been written (whether as ''sruti'', “revelation ”, or not) at various periods of the ethnological evolution of the Indo‐Aryan race, then — what does Mr. Colebrooke’s discovery prove? Simply that the ''Vedas'' were ''finally'' arranged and compiled fourteen centuries before our era; but this interferes in no way with their antiquity. Quite the reverse; for, as an offset to Mr. Colebrooke’s passage, there is a learned article, written on purely astronomical data by Krishna Shâstri Godbole (of Bombay), which proves as absolutely and on the same evidence that the ''Vedas'' must have been taught at least 25,000 years ago. (See ''Theosophist'', Vol. II., p. 238 ''et seq''., Aug., 1881.) This statement is, if not supported, at any rate not contradicted by what Prof. Cowell says in Appendix VII., of Elphinstone’ ''History of '' ''India:'' “ There is a difference in age between the various hymns, which are now united in their present form as the Sanhitâ of the ''Rig Veda''; but'' we have no data to determine '' ''their relative antiquity,'' and purely subjective criticism, apart from solid data, has so often failed in other instances, that we can trust but little to any of its inferences in such a recently opened field of research as Sanskrit literature. [a fourth part of the Vaidik literature is as yet in print, and very little of it has been translated into English (1866).] The still unsettled controversies about the Homeric poems may well warn us of being too confident in our judgments regarding ''the yet earlier hymns of the Rig ‐'' ''Veda''. . . . When we examine these hymns . . . they are deeply interesting for the history of the human mind, belonging as they do to a much older phase than the poems of Homer or Hesiod.” The Vedic writings are all classified in two great divisions, exoteric and esoteric, the former being called ''Karma‐Kânda,'' “division of actions or works ”, and the ''Jnâna Kânda'', “division of (divine) knowledge”, the Upanishads (q.v.) coming under this last classification. Both departments are regarded as ''Sruti'' or revelation. To each hymn of the ''Rig ‐Veda'', the name of the Seer or Rishi to whom it was revealed is prefixed. It, thus, becomes evident on the authority of these very names (such as Vasishta, Viswâmitra, Nârada, etc.), all of which belong to men born in various manvantaras and even ages, that centuries, and perhaps millenniums, must have elapsed between the dates of their composition. [[Category: CTD info from Theosophical Glossary]] (TG).

Veda‐Vyasa +

The compiler of the ''Vedas (q.v.).'' [[Category: CTD info from Theosophical Glossary]] (TG). +

Vedder, Elihu +

American painter, long resident in Rome, known for illustrations to Omar Khayyam's Rubaiyat (1884) and decorative work including the Minerva mosaic in the Library of Congress (BCW [[SMW::off]][[Zirkoff B. - Appendix (BCW vol.10)#428|10:428]][[SMW::on]]). +

Veddhas +

The name of a wild race of men living in the forests of Ceylon. They are very difficult to find. [[Category: CTD info from Theosophical Glossary]] (TG). +

Vedāntasāra +

Sadananda's work, listed in an edition with introduction, English translation and commentary by Swami Nikhilananda, and in G. A. Jacob's translation (BCW [[SMW::off]][[Zirkoff B. - Appendix (BCW vol.8)#416|8:416]][[SMW::on]]). +

Vega, Garcilaso de la +

Peruvian historian known as “Inca,” of Spanish and Inca descent, who moved to Spain in 1560. His major works are La Florida del Inca (1605) and Comentarios reales, a history of Peru published in two parts. (BCW [[SMW::off]][[Zirkoff B. - Appendix (BCW vol.2)#547|2:547]][[SMW::on]]). +

Vehicle of Life +

The “Septeriary” Man among the Pythagoreans, “number seven” among the profane. The former “explained it by saying, that the human body consisted of four principal elements (principles), and that the soul is triple (the higher triad)” . (See ''Isis Unveiled'', Vol. II., p. 418, New York, 1877.) It has been often remarked that in the earlier works of the Theosophists no septenary division of man was mentioned. The above quotation is sufficient warrant that, although with every caution, the subject was more than once approached, and is not a new‐fangled theory or invention. [[Category: CTD info from Theosophical Glossary]] (TG). +

Vendidad +

The first book (''Nosk'') in the collection of Zend fragments usually known as the ''Zend‐Avesta''. The ''Vendidâd'' is a corruption of the compound‐word “Vidaêvo‐dâtern”, meaning “the anti‐ demoniac law ”, and is full of teachings how to avoid sin and defilement by purification, moral and physical — each of which teachings is based on Occult laws. It is a pre‐eminently occult treatise, full of symbolism and often of meaning quite the reverse of that which is expressed in its dead‐ letter text. The ''Vendîdâd,'' as claimed by tradition, is the only one of the twenty‐one Nosks (works) that has escaped the ''auto‐da‐fé ''at the hands of the drunken Iskander the Rûmi, he whom posterity calls Alexander the Great — though the epithet is justifiable only when applied to the brutality, vices and cruelty of this conqueror. It is through the vandalism of this Greek that literature and knowledge have lost much priceless lore in the Nosks burnt by him. Even the Vendidâd has reached us in only a fragmentary state. The first chapters are very mystical, and therefore called “mythical” in the renderings of European Orientalists. The two “creators” of “spirit‐matter” or the world of differentiation — Ahura‐ Mazda and Angra‐Mainyu (Ahriman) — are introduced in them, and also Yima (the first man, or mankind personified). The work is divided into ''Fargards'' or chapters, and a portion of these is devoted to the formation of our globe, or terrestrial evolution. (See'' Zend‐'' ''Avesta''.) [[Category: CTD info from Theosophical Glossary]] (TG). The bibliography refers to James Darmesteter’s translation in The Zend-Avesta, part I, Sacred Books of the East IV. (BCW [[SMW::off]][[Zirkoff B. - Appendix (BCW vol.2)#547|2:547]][[SMW::on]]). For its bibliography, de Zirkoff refers readers to the entry on the ''Avesta''. (BCW [[SMW::off]][[Zirkoff B. - Appendix (BCW vol.3)#535|3:535]][[SMW::on]]). The appendix refers the reader to ''Avesta''. (BCW [[SMW::off]][[Zirkoff B. - Appendix (BCW vol.4)#669|4:669]][[SMW::on]]).

Venkata Kistnarow, K. R. +

This name credited to the publications in ''The Theosophist'', [[Theosophist/Vol9|vol. 9]] (1887–1888). +

Venkatakristnayya, L. +

This name credited to the publications in ''The Theosophist'', [[Theosophist/Vol9|vol. 9]] (1887–1888). +

Ventura di Raulica +

Zirkoff's bibliography refers the reader to BCW Vol. VII, p. 400 for information about this figure. (BCW [[SMW::off]][[Zirkoff B. - Appendix (BCW vol.1)#530|1:530]][[SMW::on]]). +

Ventura di Raulica, Gioacchino +

Italian preacher, patriot and philosopher (1792-1861), formerly a Jesuit and later superior-general of the Theatines. His writings address Christian philosophy and the relationship between religious and political authority. (BCW [[SMW::off]][[Zirkoff B. - Appendix (BCW vol.7)#400|7:400]][[SMW::on]]). Vide Vol. VII, p. 400, for biographical and other data (BCW [[SMW::off]][[Zirkoff B. - Appendix (BCW vol.9)#458|9:458]][[SMW::on]]). +

Verne, Jules +

His ''De la Terre à la Lune'' (“From the Earth to the Moon”) was published in 1865. (BCW [[SMW::off]][[Zirkoff B. - Appendix (BCW vol.3)#535|3:535]][[SMW::on]]). +

Verrall, Arthur Woollgar +

The bibliography refers to the entry on Euripides (BCW [[SMW::off]][[Zirkoff B. - Appendix (BCW vol.8)#478|8:478]][[SMW::on]]). +